You Don't Scare Me, Bully

Bullies are nasty things. Insecure individuals releasing their frustrations on the innocent has no basis in logic. When a child is bullied, our hearts go out to them. We see our own experiences reflected in their tear-filled eyes. But bullying is not quarantined to only the young. One has to ask oneself, what happens to child bullies when they grow up? For that answer, we don't have to look too far, especially right now.

The mainstream media, most liberals, and many other politicians exhibit the classic signs of being bullies in big-people clothes. Jack Conway, the Democratic candidate for Senate in Kentucky, is someone you might expect to find holding another person's head in a toilet. That swirly victim at present is Rand Paul. Being the son of someone so polarizing like Ron Paul can't be easy, small physical stature aside. Rand isn't a stranger to bullying. He seems to be a seasoned pro when dealing with senseless slander, but why should we sit back and let this kind of thing continue? We profess to be a society that's sickened by undeserved violence. We condemn the actions of child bullies, yet when that undeserved violence is wielded by a liberal or a liberal-sympathizing member of the media, we accept it. We shake our heads, say 'tisk tisk' and let it remain. The memory of the event is quickly buried under memories of countless events like it every day.

The 2010 mid-term elections have seen some really sad bullying tactics. An angry male Democrat calls his female Republican opponent a 'whore'. The liberal machine, media in tow, exploits the distant and irrelevant history of an otherwise normal woman, Christine O'Donnell, in order to make sure her liberal opponent is sent to Washington. An angry elitist Democrat resorts to physical contact with his Republican opponent during a debate. Congressional fat cats send their significant others on heckling missions to rattle their opponents. If Washington and the road to Washington were the halls of an elementary school, these politicians would be spending a lot of time in the Principal's office. But if Barack Obama is considered the Principal, I guess that disciplinary trip won't do much good.

And so, it is up to us, the 'parents' of this nation. Our priorities need to be set right. After Rand Paul's first-and potentially only-debate with Jack Conway, he refused to shake Conway's hand. Conway's attack ad was just too grotesque, his methods far too mad. Though some may view this action as rude on Paul's part, I say it's about time. The reason bullies continue to wreak havoc is because the victims don't stand up for themselves. This isn't a case for marshal law, no. Rather, this is a case for common human decency. We're told we have to lead by example, but when the bully is blind, they can't see that example. The media, liberals, and many in the government are blind. They have lost any sense of right and wrong. It's time those of us who are willing to fight to suck it up and do so. The next time someone attacks your faith, your patriotism, your intelligence, or your freedom, give them a lesson in the truth. Bullies are bad, no matter their age, and we can't let their behavior continue.

Silent Soldier: Our American Flag

Silent Soldier
original poem by x_1013_x

Through musket blast and canon roar,
the crash of bombs on foreign shore,
the flag has flown as it’s flown before;
glorious and tall.

Through hunger, cold, and haunting fear,
soldier’s loss, a mother’s tear,
it stands for all that we hold dear;
heeding freedom’s call.

Though history and years ahead,
what is silent and what is said,
purest blue, white, and red,
the flag will never fall.

Our current President seems to think very little of our flag. The flag was born of our battles for freedom. Without those battles, Obama wouldn't be president. Not just the struggles for racial equality, mind you, but the wars before America was founded and every battle since. After all, you can't be president of something that doesn't exist. He balks at wearing a pin, forgets to salute, and now seems ashamed enough of the stars and stripes that the U.S. military relief workers in Haiti have no colors under which to gather. Why he has this aversion to the flag is anyone's guess, but to me, the flag is everything it should be: a reminder that freedom must be cherished and the sacrifices made to gain that freedom should never be taken for granted.

Placing undue emphasis on the material things in life is rarely a good thing. Men have fought and died for less than cloth, that's for certain. But if someone can't have a little respect for something as storied and gallant as our flag, how can we expect them to respect our founding documents? No matter what happens in the coming months or years, the flag will stand true. It has seen us at our best and now, I fear, it's seeing us at our worst. But as long as there are those of us who remember what the flag symbolizes, there is genuine hope.

Healthcare Puppies

Americans are children. There, I said it. We want everything, we want it yesterday, and we never pay any mind to what may happen if we get it. Free health care isn’t mentioned in the constitution. We know this thanks to a lengthy historical expedition to Google where ‘top men’ typed in U.S. Constitution and read the full text on what’s known as a web page. It’s all there in black and white, or, I’m sure, green and red, if you prefer. History doesn’t lie, at least real history doesn’t. And until they find a way to alter the official, historical wording of the Constitution, which they may, it’s not going to state that health care is a right. Boy, I’d like to be in the room when they had the argument over whether ‘White-Out’ was racist, but I digress. Taxpayer-subsidized health care is not a right, whether you're tickled with that truth or not. Just like choices to degrade one’s health by smoking, excessive drinking, and obesity; health care is up to the person. If you’re able to get yourself in a mess, you should be able to get yourself out. That is in the Constitution, something about rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Your life is your right. By expecting the government to take care of your health and most likely regulate what you can and can’t do with your body, well, that would mean the government holds the rights to your body. You want someone else controlling your life? Move.

The whole situation puts me in mind of a whiny child wanting a puppy. Everyone else has one! In that case, sure, you can have a puppy. But that puppy comes with consequences. You have to feed it, bathe it, walk it, and pick up its crap. But what little kid really wants to do those things? That’s no fun. No matter how much the kid is told about these ‘consequences’ beforehand they just don’t seem to truly understand them until the little fuzz monster shows up and shreds their favorite teddy bear. Reality bites, literally. You want government health care? You think it’s going to be free! So here you go, your very own federal health plan… with consequences. In a few months, you get sick, really sick. You’re miserable and stuck in a line for hours to see a poorly funded and poorly qualified physician. On top of that, the treatment you need just isn’t available to you. It was needed for someone sicker a few towns over and surprise, Big Brother government doesn't have enough of other people's money to supply everything for every medical facility. Too bad. How’s that puppy looking now?

As for health care being free; that’s a load of daschund doo. You may be able to ride your free health care for a while, but when all the companies and ‘rich people’ taxpayers are tapped out, they’re coming for you. Depending on your circumstances, the good old government is going to start docking your welfare check or maybe even stop giving you one all together. Maybe they’ll place a heavier tax on that minimum wage check you get from Burger King. You may still be able to stand in a socialized medicine line for free, but you won’t have any money for bus fare to get there.

And still they wail, the malcontent children who are unwilling to learn you can't always get what you want. What about all the sick people who can’t get insurance from the mean old capitalists? I’ll tell you, but you may not like it. The reason so many people can’t afford health care or are turned down: no industry competition and soaring costs of medical lawsuits. Competition is healthy. Competition is the reason our country was good in the first place. Businesses were able to compete with one another for the consumer’s dollar. Innovations were made thanks to competition. As it stands, insurance companies don’t have that competition to help drive prices down. They aren’t allowed to sell across state lines; something that, if changed, would boost competition. The resulting price wars would be nothing but good for the consumer. Personally, I prefer lots of choices to only a few, but hey, that’s just me.

What happens when you spend tons of your capital paying off frivolous lawsuits? Think about it like this: You don’t deal with stress very well. You come home from work in a sour mood. Your husband/wife, children, pet does something that irritates your already sore disposition. What do you do? You pass your frustration off on them. This ‘blowing off of steam’ is your way of surviving. It’s not good for you and it’s not good for the final recipient of your anger, but it may keep you from having a heart attack or stroke. When insurers are forced to pay out large sums in medical lawsuits, they have no other way of surviving than to pass that cost onto the customers. It’s not evil or a symptom of the capitalist plague, it’s just the way businesses stay alive. If there was a way to deal with your workday stress directly, you could save yourself and your loved ones a lot of heartache. See how that works? TORT reform could take a lot of financial stress off the insurance companies and consequently, off the customers. Did I mention that health care costs themselves could go down too? If doctors weren’t forced by their paranoid insurers to do unnecessary tests, the costs would be much lower. TORT reform is a win-win for everyone… except, of course, the ambulance-chasing lawyers. But they’re really evil, so they don’t get a say.

There you have it, the explanation of why health care is not something you can get just by crying. Children aren’t allowed to get puppies just because they’re children, and though America may be a prosperous nation (at least it was) that fact alone does not guarantee its citizens everything they could ever want… for free. Everything has a cost, even freedom. And that ‘pursuit of happiness’ thing, well that doesn’t mean you sit on the sidelines while someone else runs the pursuit for you. So stop whining and curb your dog already.