Putting our money where we say our mouths are

Posted: December 16, 2023 by navygrade36bureaucrat in amazon reviews
Tags: , ,

The recent budget deal to fund the Department of Defense, once again, showed how much elected Republicans are absolute wimps about negotiating. While continued billions to Ukraine was halted, we got nothing banning paid travel for abortion and a very limited spending cap on DEI.

We’re in the middle of funding one war in Ukraine, watching Israel fight another and trying to prepare to fight China…and we’re still wasting money on DEI and abortion?

But honestly, I’m not surprised, because most Republicans fail to put their money behind their values.

An easy example is Starbucks. Starbucks has long championed abortion, yet I still watch hundreds of Catholics order their Unicorn Latte (or whatever other sugary nonsense they prefer) from a company that happily donates to Planned Parenthood and a host of other reprehensible organizations. There are now hundreds of small coffee shops and plenty of other chains, and there is zero reason you can’t drink coffee from somewhere else. Yet here we are, throwing money towards the people that hate us.

Worse still, Republican voters are typically the stingiest in supporting alternative media. I’m becoming more and more impressed with Daily Wire’s “Bentkey” programming that my wife and I are likely going to cancel our Disney+ membership. Given the increasing amount of dumb programming coming out of Disney, its harder and harder for me to justify sending money to them when there is plenty of good kids content on Bentkey. I might have to use the DVD to watch Star Wars once in a while, but that’s already paid for, and at least they can’t change Luke’s preferred pronouns in my copy of Empire Strikes Back.

This Christmas, you should look at where you are spending your money, and try to find an alternative if that source is a raging liberal dumpster fire. Budweiser was a great example of people waking up and going “Hmm, not going to support this anymore,” and it sent a strong message to other businesses. But more has to be done. Continuing to pour money into organizations that hate your values is going to continue to breed feckless politicians, who follow the money.

While you’re at it, since Christmas is coming soon, why not send a friend or relative a copy of my book? It’s available in printed and audiobook format, and you can’t go wrong sending money to me.

This post represents the views of the author and not those of the Department of Defense, Department of the Navy, or any other government agency.

K’Mtar: [Alexander has just dropped an opponent in the Holodeck] Po’tajg! Po’tajg! Finish him. [Alexander drops his bat’leth and walks away. The Hologram Klingon gets up knife ready to kill him from behind] Freeze program. [To Alexander] You should have killed him when you had the chance.
Lt. Worf: Why did you not?
Alexander: I don’t know.
K’Mtar: Look at him! He did not care that you showed him mercy. He was going to kill you.
Lt. Worf: K’mtar, that is enough.
K’Mtar: If this was real, he’d be dead by now. 

Star Trek TNG Firstborn 1994 via chakoteya.net

Experience keeps a dear school, but fools will learn in no other.

Ben Franklin Poor Richard Almanack 1758

Yesterday I talked about the problem of Gaza post Hamas, over at the daily links at Elder of Ziyon I saw this story and video that emphasizes that problem, a story that is both heartbreaking and maddening

“We thought that Palestinians are good people. All they want is peace and prosperity,” Lahav told the Washington Free Beacon in an interview from a hotel in this Red Sea resort city where she and most of her community were temporarily relocated. “It’s just that Hamas is forcing them to be in this aggressive situation.”

When terrorists first shook the door of her safe room on Oct. 7, Lahav was sure that she and her 22-year-old daughter were about to be killed. But a makeshift lock she had fashioned out of an oar and a vacuum cleaner thwarted three separate break-in attempts. The women lay in the darkened room for about 10 hours listening to sounds of automatic gunfire and grenade explosions. At one point, they heard a group of teenagers robbing their house.

Later, Lahav learned from other Nir Oz survivors that Gazan women and children as young as 10 years old had followed Hamas terrorists into the kibbutz, looting, helping the armed terrorists, and apparently enjoying themselves.

Here is the video

It’s heartbreaking because better than one in four of the people in her Kibbutz were killed or kidnapped. But it’s also maddening because this woman is in her 60’s and the evidence during her entire life has been that the Palestinians have wanted them dead, have cheered when terror attacks had taken place and only saw the Israeli peace camp as useful idiots to be exploited.

Yet it took the slaughter of her neighbors for her to learn this lesson and the only reason she and her daughter lived long enough to learn that lesson was that her makeshift lock held out.

How many of her neighbors would still be alive today if they had learned that lesson before Oct 7th?

And let’s ask two more important question to folks here in the states, questions whose answers I believe are just as clear:

  1. How many of those protesting in the streets today in NYC, DC and elsewhere would kill the Jews they encounter here if they thought they could get away with it?
  2. Is there any reason to believe they would or will stop with the Jews when they are done

I submit and suggest that the answer to question 1 is “Yes” and the answer to question 2 is “No” and the only reason you will not likely see this happen in the US is that the citizens of this country are the most heavily armed civilian population in the world today, possibly in history.

Which explains why the left wants us disarmed.

May Israel grow wiser from these event and may the west profit from this horrible example. Finally to those who don’t think this could happen here, I wish you the best of luck, may the dear school of experience never take residence in your town.

Update: She wasn’t alone in her naïveté and her reeducation

The Real Conundrum In Gaza

Posted: December 14, 2023 by datechguy in Israel, Israel vs Hamas, Uncategorized
Tags: ,

It’s very much looking like Israel has decided that the left in the west rants are going to be ignored and that the Jewish state is going all in on destroying Hamas, damn the torpedoes full speed ahead. Hamas leaders have fled Qatar and the rats seem to be abandoning the sinking ship even to the point of floating albeit briefly recognizing Israel’s right to exist.

Granted it’s still going to take several months of mopping up but the real question is: what happens next?

The citizens of Gaza might not like the destruction that’s been wrought against them thanks to Hamas’ actions. They might even be pissed about their taking the aid sent to them to build a terror infrastructure, but this doesn’t translate into liking Israel or even not wanting Jews dead, they just doesn’t like the consequences of the various attempts to kill the Jews..

The problem is that no only do polls show that the Palestinians overwhelmingly support the attacks and atrocities of October 7th but better than two out of three want a return to the good old days of suicide bombings and buses full of Jews blowing up.

Remember these aren’t polls of Hamas members these are pols of Palestinians.

I submit and suggest that’s it’s impossible for Israel to allow Gaza to govern itself if the population is simply go back to killing Jews under their own banner rather than under the Hamas banner. Furthermore you can’t make peace with people determined to kill you, you can impose peace, you can as General Sherman put it make war so horrible that it will be decades before they consider turning to it.

So what is the solution? What should be done with Gaza when the last member of Hamas is sent to get his virgins? Feel free to put your suggestion in comments and next week I’ll give you mine.

I have to state for the record at the begging of this article that I have never been a never Trumper.  Neither am I a Trump worshipper, although the Trump worshipers’ take on him is the more accurate of the two.  I see him for who he really is, a deeply flawed individual who did an admiral job as president. That is until the Wuhan Flu pandemic began, and he botched things rather badly.

At the beginning of the 2016 primary season, I ranked Donald Trump near the bottom of the crowded Republican field.  The instant he secured the Republican nomination I became a very outspoken Trump supporter because I knew he would do an infinitely better job than any of the Marxist Democrats.

I am a Libertarian and not all of Donald Trump’s policies are particularly Libertarian. During the 2016 primary season I ranked Rand Paul and Ben Carson well above Trump.

Donald Trump’s greatest flaw is an almost complete lack of self-control when speaking and using social media.  Too often he comes across as a non-intellectual.  He also has a very loud and abrasive personality.  At times he strayed from conservative/libertarian principles.  The media very unfairly tagged Trump as a racist and a bigot.  During his four years in office, he did a poor job picking advisors and cabinet officials, especially when it came to Chief of Staff.

Last week I tried to imagine who the perfect running mate Donald Trump could possibly chose.  I figured that that person would have to offset all of Trump’s negatives.  He would have to be an exact opposite.  The person who immediately jumped to mind was Dr. Ben Carson. Two days later I saw articles online written by authors who independently reached the same conclusions.

Here are some quotes I dug up that are proof that Dr. Ben Carson would make a fantastic president, unfortunately he lacks the charisma necessary for any individual to win elections in our media driven society.

This first quote is from Ben Carson: Obamacare worst thing ‘since slavery’ – The Washington Post

You know Obamacare is really I think the worst thing that has happened in this nation since slavery, and it is in a way, it is slavery in a way, because it is making all of us subservient to the government, and it was never about health care. It was about control.

This next quote is one of my favorites: http://www.cnsnews.com/video/newsbusters/dr-ben-carson-we-american-people-are-not-each-other-s-enemies

I want people to understand that we, the American people, are not each other’s enemies. The real enemies are those people who are trying to divide us into every little possible group.

Ben Carson explains Holocaust comments | CNN Politics

“Basically, what I said is that when tyranny occurs traditionally around the world, they try and disarm the people first. And that is exactly what happened in Germany,” Carson said at the National Press Club. “You know, mid- to late 30s they started a program to disarm the people and by mid- to late 40’s, look what had happened.”

Carson was referencing remarks Thursday on CNN that the Holocaust would have been less deadly had more people in Europe been armed.

“I think the likelihood of Hitler being able to accomplish his goals would have been greatly diminished if the people had been armed,” he told Wolf Blitzer when asked if there were no gun-control laws in Germany would that have prevented the murder of 6 million Jews. “I’m telling you there is a reason these dictatorial people take the guns first.”

Video | Facebook

We’ve been conditioned to think that only politicians can solve our problems. But at some point, maybe we will wake up and recognize that it was the politicians who created our problems.

Who said what and what it meant: The 4th GOP debate, annotated – The Washington Post

We need to be thinking about: How do we allow people to ascend the ladder of opportunity, rather than how do we give them everything and keep them dependent.

One Nation book Introduction.

The PC police are out in force at all times. … We’ve reached the point where people are afraid to actually talk about what they want to say.

Ben Carson, America the Beautiful: Rediscovering What Made This Nation Great

“Since Americans are by nature individualistic and entrepreneurial, by definition, then, the socialist program is anti-American, to say nothing of totalitarian. Socialism is an old dream. Some dreams are nightmares when put into practice.”
― 

Ben Carson, One Nation: What We Can All Do to Save America’s Future

“Many well-meaning Americans have bought into the PC speech code, thinking that by being extra careful not to offend anyone we will achieve unity. What they fail to realize is that this is a false unity that prevents us from talking about important issues and is a Far Left strategy to paralyze us while they change our nation. People have been led to become so sensitive that fault can be found in almost anything anyone says because somewhere, somehow, someone will be offended by it.”
― 

Ben Carson, One Nation: What We Can All Do to Save America’s Future

“I believe the only thing that will correct our downward trajectory is the rekindling of the enthusiasm for individual freedom and the reestablishment of the U.S. Constitution as the dominant document of governance. Unless the majority of Americans awaken from their complacency and recognize the threat to their fundamental individual liberties imposed by continued expansion of the federal government, nothing will save us from the fate of all pinnacle nations that have preceded us, those that tolerated political and moral corruption while ignoring fiscal irresponsibility.”