A SMALL TOWN

For the last couple of days I’ve had John Mellencamp’s song “SMALL TOWN” going through my head. It starts,

“I was born in a small town

And I live in a small town.” 

I can’t say I was born in a small town, Chicago being my place of origin, but I have spent more than half my life in small towns and I probably will remain. 

Our local high school football team played in the state championships last week.  This may not sound too spectacular to some but, in order to understand this you need to know that this is a school that requires you to do well academically and finals were given to all students regardless of their athletic ability.  Besides the cramming for tests, another negative factor in their case was that their last chance at a championship game occurred thirty five years ago.

Saturday morning they received a huge send off from the local citizens, scored breakfast at a local eatery and were sent on their way to the Georgia Dome.  They were to play against last year’s winners – a big, tough group of young men who had had a perfect season. But, our local team were winners whatever the outcome of the game and they knew it.  They were wrapped in the arms of Jefferson, Georgia; their home town.

Not being a huge football fan unless my grandsons are on the field --I had places to go and things I wanted to do that afternoon -- I turned on the television to maybe just catch the opening.  It was the most exciting game I’ve every watched.  Jefferson won 31-14; their first state championship ever.

Another small town had an enormous tragedy last week.  Twenty tiny children murdered, six adults murdered and many unanswered questions as to why.  The residents of Newtown, Connecticut will endure suffering and pain for a long time to come.  Media coverage has been a mixed blessing.  There will always be some journalists who cross over the line with inappropriate questions and seemingly insensitive remarks. Most members of the press, on the other hand, have shown compassion and sympathy and have conducted themselves in a dignified manner. Seeing the faces of the members of this community and hearing their stories brings them close to our families and make us want to reach out to them in their need.

Through social media, whether television, Facebook, Twitter, etc., we all live in a small town.  Please, wrap your arms around this community; these families, these teachers, these people just like you and I, who need your love and support.

“No I cannot forget where it is that I come from

I cannot forget the people who love me”

All the best,

Sharon

ARE WE JUST TOO STUPID TO VOTE?

            As to the outcome of our recent national election, what can I say that most of you haven’t said already?  We had out chance and blew it but, take heed in the words of Thomas Jefferson, who said, “The good sense of the people will always be found to be the best army.  They may be led astray for a moment, but will soon correct themselves.”  Let us all hope that our political leadership can correct their path to be more in tune with today’s issues but still hold fast to the principles and guidelines of our forefathers. 

We just got too wrapped up in the Big Election to keep an eye on what was on the rest of the ballot.  You know what I’m talking about, the stuff that will eventually affect you and your family every day -- big city issues and little town issues within your state that had made it to the ballot for your approval or disapproval and needed to be decided upon.  But, it’s not easy to make a decision if you don’t bother to examine the pros and cons of that which you are privileged to vote on.

            Georgia, for example had a lot of interest in a vote concerning a constitutional amendment, a very confusingly stated amendment, allowing a state board to issue charters for private operators to run independent public schools.  We were bombarded with commercials showing young children extolling the virtues of their local charter school and how they no longer had to deal with gangs and lack of supplies and inadequate supervision.  We were made to feel like ogres if we did not agree to make schools like this available in our own community.  The Amendment passed 58 per cent yes to 41 per cent no.   Big win for the kids, right?  Wrong.  Big loss for local school boards and their communities.

            If voters had gone to Georgia’s Secretary of State’s website before election day, they would have found that more than 300 charter schools already exist right here. These schools came into being after local citizens approached their school board with concerns that this type of school may be necessary in their area.  After a period of discussion and laying out the pros and cons, a vote was taken as to the additional steps necessary.  You do understand that this is all being done at the local level with essentially neighbors talking to neighbors; all having a tie to each other within the same community.  If  the proposed school is given a go ahead, state and local funding will be used to support it.  If the school board rejects the idea and the community still wants to go ahead with the idea they can appeal to the state.  The school board members eventually will be at the mercy of the local voters come election time if they do not comply with the wishes of the majority.

            Under the new system that has been voted into place, the state will assemble a charter commission that will consider applications by operators to run these new charter schools.  Local school boards will not have any say over these applications.  Charter schools are financed with public money but, they are run by private organizations.  Many of these organizations and the people involved with them do not even reside in the state.

            We’re looking forward to seeing how or how much this constitutional amendment affects the state’s education system or,  is this just another attempt to take control over our local affairs by those who “know what’s right for us.”

            We’d like to hear your comments on any local election results in your areas that you feel were not as well researched as they should have been.  Also, what’s your take on same sex marriage, marijuana use and other such state’s rights issues in the news. 

All the best,

Sharon

"The winter of our discontent."

Not my line, but a great one.  And, it aptly describes a future we should be preparing for.  Of course, like anything, it will be worse if Obama is still in office; but, either way, it's likely going to be very bad.  I'm talking about what the "Arab Spring" is turning into.  Let's look at Egypt.  The majority in the legislature is Islamist, talking about putting the Israeli-Egyptian peace agreement up to a popular vote.  As I write this, Americans who were supposedly pitching democray "illegally" have just been released on "bail."  If any of these Americans go back to stand trial, should a trial be scheduled, they should see if the Guinness Book has any category for incomprehensible stupidity.  

As Americans, we make the mistake of assuming that, when there is a popular uprising in a Muslim country, it will lead to some sort of democracy.  These days, that's not going to happen.  Organized groups within the countries in question already have the ability to make their message heard and have the appeal that Radical Fundamentalist Islam somehow seems to engender.  The Islamists don't have to "hit the ground running," because they're already on the ground showing themselves to be the rallying point for the revolution.  

One of these days, unless some new war pops up, a war with game-changing ramifications, the people of the United States and Great Britain are going to wake up to a Middle East that, with few exceptions, is Radical Muslim and out for our blood.  In talking about the future of our relationship with Jihadists, I've very sadly pointed out that my grandchildren's grandchildren will be fighting this same war -- unless, God forbid -- we are too ignorant to realize the nature of the situation and we are dead or reduced to fighting guerilla actions against those who would enslave or kill us.  Am I saying all Moslims are our enemies?  Of course not!  It would be nice, however, if the good Moslims would more aggressively stand against the blood-thirsty killers who hide behind Islam as an excuse for war, brutality, enslavement of women and the barbarism of stonings, hangings and lopping off limbs.  But, whether or not that occurs, I see the escalation of the conflict as all but inevitable.  I wish that weren't the case.  Have a nice day!  JERRY    

THE MOST IMPORTANT THING IS TO DEFEAT OBAMA

I continue to watch the Republicans jockeying for advantage one over the other.  That's great.  But, time is fast approaching for those candidates who know they will not get the nomination -- no matter what -- to bow out gracefully.  Every penny spent with one Republican fighting another is money that cannot be used to fight Obama.  Every jab at one candidate or another is something the Obama re-election machine might be able to use against the Republican nominee.  The saving of America from Obama and his ilk is more important than one man's political aspirations.  We need to get behind the man with the greatest potential to win, then channel all available resources to fight the cancer that is the Obama administration, so that America can be brought back from the brink, knowing full-well as we do that four more years of Obama and his ultra-leftwing socialists will only mean more assaults on our freedoms and could ring the death knell for the United States.  This battle is too important to lose. Obama must be defeated and virtually everything put in place by his administration undone, as if Obama had never been.  If we lose this fight, America may well be finished.  When one considers that, individual egos should be set aside so that all resources and energies can be thrown into the battle to save America and rid America of Obama's dream for America -- a nightmare for the rest of us.  Have a nice day!  JERRY 

WE ARE ALL SAXONS

Last week, when the Obama administration tried to force Roman Catholic institutions to violate their conscience by funding birth control, a lot of us who were not Catholic realized that we were in spirit.  We were Catholic in the sense that Obama and his minions were attempting to force something contrary to one's religious beliefs down the throats of the American people and abrogate the First Amendment in the process.  We didn't like it and we wouldn't accept it.  Sharon and I were looking for a movie to watch last night and we settled on on of our all-time favorites.  In beautiful color, when we used to watch it as kids on regular TV, we thought it was black & white.  It was the first pre-recorded movie we acquired back in the early days -- we learned it was color! -- and, when we got into DVDs, it was a must acquisition.  I'm talking about one of the best action films ever made, beautifully photographed, with one of the truly finest film scores ever written (Erich Wolfgang Korngold).  Directed by Michael Curtiz, it stars Errol Flynn, Olivia DeHavilland, Basil Rathbone and Claude Raines, with a superb supporting cast .  The film is "The Adventures of Robin Hood." from 1938. It takes a great deal of liberty with history, as most tales of Robin Hood do.  One constant, however, is that while King Richard was off at the Crusades, dark machinations were taking place back home in England, the Normans who had conquered England in 1066 very seriously interested in taxing those not on some protected list or another into the ground.  Robin Hood did not rob from the rich to give to the poor.  He was not some proto-Communist trying to re-distribute wealth, like many of the Democrats want to do. He robbed the people who collected illegal taxes, the people who found every excuse to gouge money from the real producers in the English economy.  Most of the exploited and downtrodden were the Saxons, the losing side of the Norman Conquest.  But, England was a country of more than just Normans and Saxons.  There were other ethnic groups as well.  In the Robin  Hood legends, Robin stands up for the oppressed and, in a way, if you were oppressed, whether you were Angle, Saxon, Jute or even a Norman who'd fallen out of favor, in the cause that Robin championed they were all Saxons.

Our government needs to stop finding ways of creating new taxes and playing class warfare games in the process.  People who have earned really big bucks shouldn't be punished for their efforts and their success.  The government needs to lower taxes, not raise taxes.  The government needs to stop spending money it doesn't have.  The Norman conquerors knew that to control the capital confered the real power.  The Democrats know that, too, which is why they want to take money from those who have earned it and generously gift it to those who have not.  Now, there are probably some good Democrats and there are lots of worthwhile Independents and there are Libertarians who don't have to follow their tenets into territory where to do so is positively silly.  We are all Saxons!  When Election Day comes, remember and spread the word:  "Robin in Sherwood at the Gallows Oak!"  Which means, get out the vote and expel the Norman interlopers from office!  We are all Saxons!