Do you watch CNN?

I was flipping between channels the other night watching the various network's coverage of the tsunami aftermath when I noticed CNN had preempted it's regular broadcast in favor of CNNI.
Wow.

CNN International should rename it's network to Al Jazeera West. I know that my friends on the left think that FOX News is a right-wing church organ, and from time to time , I see the news anchors slant their reporting to the right. But the main difference is I see it and recognize it. When I ask liberals about CNN or the legacy media network's coverage, they don't see the slant. They will not acknowledge it, they don't see any slant because it fits their view of the world.

If I were ever appointed to run the FCC, I would make the networks run a scroll below the talking heads and anchors stating who they voted for in the past 5 elections and a 'score" from the ACLU and the NRA. At the very least you could reasonably assume if the person talking about news story had a bias. They do a similar thing with financial advisors that talk about stocks and mutual funds. There is a disclaimer on the screen that must say if the advisor on the show owns that particular stock or fund.

Can you imagine Judy Woodruff''s score?

Tens of thousands are dead, let the eco-spin begin.

The old media is awash in stories from agenda driven journalist bent on using this tragedy to further their cause. Can we please stop blaming American capitalism for the deaths of people half a world away.
The real story of this event will start making itself known in a few days. As thousands of coastal inhabitants start dying from drinking contaminated water, cholera and typhoid. This situation will get much worse before it gets any better.

I would like to find the UN bureaucrat that had the gaul to call our initial 25 million dollars contribution to the UN relief fund 'stingy". I would like to yank his diplomatic credentials and send him back to Norway to find a real job without a US taxpayer funded expense account. Please show me a successful UN led program. Please?
Haiti? No.
Rwanda? No.
The Congo? No.
Oil for Food? Oh hell no.

A question for President Bush. When will we stop sending the UN money?
We fund about 22% of the UN budget, the most of any nation. Let them keep bad-mouthing the United States, but without using our money to do it.

Let us put that money to good use. Send it to Worldvision.

Tragedy strikes, the people of the United States respond.

Unless you have been in the County lock-up drying out, you have seen the story about the tsunami that has left 22,000 plus dead. My prayers to the families of the lost and missing. As Hugh Hewitt has suggested, please give to Worldvision, they will be need more than we can imagine.
I wonder how hard currency financial aid will come from the EU or Arab nations? I know that the people of the US will do most of the heavy lifting in this crisis, like most others that have come before. The 'Great Satan' helps more of the starving and stricken people on this planet that anyone else. Why? It must be because of the guilt we feel for driving SUV and hogging all the resources in the world. Or just maybe it is because we are a kind nation founded on Christian principals. My vote is for the latter.

Please give. Tonight, far away a father combs the beaches looking for his lost children. He does not care about politics or the Kyoto treaty, he just wants to hold his children again.

Christmas, from a saddle.

I have tried over the years to keep a personal tradition. A Christmas day horseback ride. In my home growing up we opened our presents Christmas eve night. I loved waiting in my room to hear Santa land on the roof with his sleigh. I would hear footsteps on the roof and what seemed like three hours later, my mother would tell us to come in and see what Santa brought. I would later figure out that Santa's reindeer don't wear cowbells and the thought of my father running around the house clanging the cowbells while my Mom put the wrapped presents under the tree stills makes me chuckle. The best part was on Christmas morning, the parents can sleep in and the kids can wake at any hour and go outside and spend the entire day riding their new bike or skating or what have you.
When I met my wife and started going to her house for Christmas I was shown the other, more traditional way to open the presents. Christmas morning everyone gets up, the kids who will not stir any other day of the year until 8:00 am will wake at 6:05 and start pestering the parents to get up and start opening presents. Everyone stumbles to the tree and the paper storm starts. Then there is clean up, breakfast, a shower and then by 10:30 you can start playing with your toys in ernest.
Now that I have grown, I still love Christmas. My wife has won the battle and we open our presents on Christmas morning, but I do get to have some time for myself on that day. When we lived on the ranch, I would saddle a horse just after the presents were opened and ride for a few hours by myself. I don't think there is any better decompression for me than a quiet ride alone. Time to think, time to reflect, the rhythm of the hooves on the ground, the feeling of the horse moving under you is unique. This year we are going to the snow on Christmas day. We will go tubing with the family and have a picnic lunch in the snow. I am looking forward to it, but I will have to put off my ride until Sunday morning after church.

College Terrorism?

Frontpage magazine reports a disturbing piece about the College Republican Club at UCSF.

Tolerance? Peace? Free Speech? Oh, don't be silly, Republicans don't deserve any.
The left in this country wants to call themselves the party of free speech?

What a joke.

Agnostic? Secular Liberal? Merry Christmas anyway!

I spent the past few hours Christmas caroling with my local 4-H club through the town of Esparto, the kids had a great time and the residents of our small town enjoyed the entertainment. I am sure this would infuriate the ACLU members in our town, if we had any, a government supported youth group singing about Christmas!

How dare these rural hillbillies take our tax dollars and use them to celebrate a religious event. Start plucking the chickens and boiling the tar, we need to run these Jesus freaks out of town.

The people who want to eliminate all symbols of religion from public view are the same ones who rail at conservatives for not celebrating diversity. Let me give you a little something to chew on. Secularism is a religion too. Just look at the way the secular left in this country views the role of government. To them it is the way, the truth, and the light. The courts and the law have replaced God and the Gospels. The model that they want to emulate is socialism, if not out-right communism. Just ask any member of the ACLU, after they have had a few too many glasses of chardonnay.

The reason behind this pursuit of the all powerful government? The more powerful the government, the less powerful the citizens that inhabit that nation will be. If on the other hand, the rights of the people come from God and it is the job of government to protect and not to infringe upon them, the citizens remain free. Free to practice their religion, free to check the staggering growth and power of the government. Free to pursue life, liberty and happiness.

When George Bush outlaws all religions except his brand of Christianity, then I will be out in front of the Whitehouse with my picket sign, or rifle, marching on Washington. Short of that, this is still a Christian nation, under God, with liberty and justice for all.

Have a Merry Christmas, while you still can.

Hogue vs. Williams - a Sacramento street fight

While I love a good debate, I am getting rather tired of the media mud-clod throwing match between KTKZ's morning host Eric Hogue and KFBK's evening host Mark Williams. While I do support Eric's side in this ongoing feud, I do wish both would get on to more important items, the upcoming media battle over Ted Costa's Fair Districts plan as one example. The Sacramento Bee's staff will be looking for ammunition to debunk any effect from talk radio, they will use the feud to undermine the influence both shows may have in the battle for the hearts and minds of the listening public. Lets agree to disagree. If there is another mud-clod thrown, duck. The capitol region listeners and blog readers deserve better.

Too smart for our own good?

I am sure that for as long as people have pondered things, people have pondered weather humans have grown too smart for our own good. I am sitting down at my laptop listening to Sheryl Crows' greatest hits on my headphones so as not to disturb my wife, blogging on the internet, sharing my random thoughts with people around the globe.

What would my grandfather think of that? Would he think it was even possible?

I often thought my father's generation saw the most change. My father was born in 1915, he rode a horse to school, lived through the depression, built PT boats during WWII, saw the advent of passenger air travel and a man walking on the moon through a device called television.

I was born in 1965, I remember Neil Armstrong's walk, remember listening to Walter Cronkite tell is how many US soldiers were killed in Vietnam that day, watched the "duck and cover" films about what to do in the event of a Solviet nuclear attack, saw the same Solviet Union die under it's own weight without a shot fired, bought a commodore 64 and thought it was pretty cool.

I now ponder what my children's generation will see? It is my hope that his generation will do wonderful things. Every son is sure that they are smarter than their father, every father is sure their son is a hopeless slacker. Every generation thinks the next will learn from their mistakes. I pray my son learns from our generation. The biggest mistake that I can think of right now is forgetting that there are people in the world that want nothing more than to see and your family dead. Democrat or Republican, a member in good standing of Greenpeace or the NRA, a pacifist vegetarian or a beer drinking redneck, they want to see you convert to their radical form of Islam or die a horrible death. That is a cold hard fact.

It would be nice if we could convince these people that we are not evil, but it's not going to happen. They want to send everyone back to the 14th century. That would be a bad thing. Although I would stop getting SPAM and popups, I would like my daughter to go to school and have the right to vote and run for the presidency. We have the means to make the world a better place, the technology, the most productive and creative workforce the world has ever known. What are we doing with these gifts? What does the world see when they think of American products?
Porn and fast food more than likely.

Why don't they think of the medicine and food we send around the world? When there is a natural disaster, who gives the most? The people of this nation are the most generous when it comes to the suffering of the needy. I should say that some of people in this country are generous. The American Christian, regularly maligned by the mainstream media and the liberal left are the most generous and the best friend of the poor anywhere in the world.

In our quest for new technology and a quicker buck, we have lost sight of what is most important. Leaving our children a better world than the one we inherited. A world without terrorists nations operating openly. A world where basic freedom is embraced. A world where America is looked upon as the greatest force for good. Let's start with a better America, one with a little less Hollywood and porn and a little more Christian faith.

Peggy Noonan

Reading this week's column, I find myself wishing that Peggy Noonan were my neighbor. I am reading her book "A heart, a cross and a flag" right now. It is a series of her weekly columns from the year after 9/11. What a great book, I am giving it to my son to read after I finish. We will have a great time talking about each chapter.

The average guy.

Who is this mythical person? There is a lot of buzz surrounding the average guy. I hear about his television viewing habits, how many pounds of red meat he eats in a given year, and for whom he voted in the last election. There seems to be no end to the amount of data gathered from this person. But lost in all the data gathered and examined is his character. What kind of man is he? Is he honest? Is he kind? Does he cheat on wife? I wonder who I am sharing this country, and the highway with. One can only answer the question by looking at who you see in your everyday life.

Living in Yolo County California, I will concede that my viewpoint may be a bit skewed, but this is my view of my common man: He is not very concerned with the world outside of his workplace, his house or his children's school. This is not a criticism of him, he thinks that he controls very little of his life.

He works hard everyday. On Monday morning, when most sales reps and office dwellers are nibbling whole-grain muffins and sipping their venti mocas listening to the sales manager or department head groan on about what needs to get done this week, the average guy has been at work for three hours and is looking forward to lunchtime. He is concerned that just one more screw-up and he will be fired. He is powerless to change the day to day events at his company, so he goes along with the tide trying not to be noticed. He has learned that a nail sticking up gets pounded down.

When he is at home he tries to relax. This sometimes means not playing with his children, just blanking out in front of the television for an hour or two. He is paying more interest than he should on his credit cards, his home mortgage and his car loan. It's not that he wants to pay more, he just gets lost in all the lingo of personal finance and thinks that the person on the other side of the desk is going to screw him anyway. He does not save enough. When he gets to the end of the month, there is not much ‘extra money” laying around.

He loves his wife, although they don't have many conversations about how they are doing in their lives. They are doing alright, just as good as their neighbors anyway. They don’t go out on dates anymore, they both have to work. When they do get time away from the kids, they feel exhausted. He has not cheated on his wife, sure he has thought about it, but he know his wife would take everything and leave him. He is satisfied with a little flirting at the bar or at the store. He just wants to know he still has it. His kids are pretty good kids, they don't get picked up by the police and they are still in school. He would like to know more about what they think and how they make their decisions, but they don't talk much anymore. They ask for money to go out on the weekend, but they haven't sat down at the dinner table and spoke about life for a long time.

He doesn't care about politics. Once every four years he may go to his local polling place if he really likes a certain candidate or really hates one. He does not watch cable news on a regular basis. When he does, he sees two people on the show and they each tell a story that is opposite from the other. He thinks that these two guys went to the best colleges and they can't agree on what to do, so how should I know? He wonders why the host of the program doesn't tell one of them they are full of beans and tell the viewer why they are wrong.

He doesn't care about the Supreme Court as long as they don't take the pledge of allegiance out of the schools. He couldn't tell you what congressional district he lives in, although he may know the name of his representative, maybe. He has never met his local congressman or woman because they have never come to the small town he lives in. He wonders if his elected officials know anything about his daily life? He would like to ask them where does all his tax money go? He sees the City, County, and State employees driving new cars and trucks while he drives his 6 year old truck with 160,000 miles . When he goes to the city he sees the new three story City office building and he wonders what that must have cost?

He drinks beer during the week and something a little stronger on the weekends. He knows he should quit or at least slow down to just the weekends. But wherever he goes, someone is offering him a beer, or a Jack and Coke. Everyone he knows drinks, his friends and his family. This must be normal, everybody does it.

He is on the whole an honest man. He tells the cashier at the store when she gives him to much change back. He pays his taxes, but if he could find a way to pay less with a slim chance of getting caught, he probably would. It is his money after all.

So what can I say about the average guy in my world?

He is a good guy. He could be so much more, but then again, couldn't we all?

How thankful are you?

(I wrote this almost 20 years ago. Funny how so much has changed, and how much hasn't)

As Thanksgiving approaches, newspapers and blogs are filled with stories written by people telling about what they are thankful for. Many columns are written with wonderful style and prose, with good reason, this is the time of year to reflect on the blessings we hold dearest. My blog for Thanksgiving will touch on this theme also, maybe from a slightly different point of view. Are we thankful enough?

I can only speak on this subject from my own perspective. I could write about what you should be thankful for, however to do this I would have to burden you with my values. You may not, and probably do not, share my values.

Am I thankful enough for the blessings in my life? Not by a long shot. My life, as cluttered as it is with all the trappings of this modern life, is one that 95% of the people that inhabit this globe would trade for in a minute. I am reasonably healthy, the only health problems I currently have or am likely to have are of my own doing. I am never in want for food or clean water. I have a home that keeps me warm in the winter and cool in the summer. I live in an area of the planet that is free from war. I can walk down my street, and with the possible exception of getting hit by a bingo player on the way to the casino, I am perfectly safe.

 
I am married to a wonderful woman. She, like me, has her faults and areas to improve upon. Taken as a package, she is a better wife than I deserve or should expect. I have two great children. My son is 11 years old. He has a very kind soul. He will someday be much larger than I am. Six foot three or four, as the doctor has told us. My daughter is now four, she is a bundle of energy, and cute as can be. She will give me my heart attack, of this I am sure. Our two children are great kids, all though there are challenges and disappointments along the way, they have made me grow as a person and a father. I love them dearly.
So how do I show thanks for all the blessing in my life? I Complain.

 
Do I tell my wife that I love her everyday? No. Do I tell her how much she means to me, and that I would be miserable without her? Not as often as I should. I spend my life thinking about the things she does that I don't like. What about my children? No matter how wonderful my son is, I want him to be perfect. I know that if he tried as hard as I would like him to, he could be a better person. I want the Bs to be As, I want him to keep his room spotless. 

When I stand back from myself, I ask why I don't demand more from myself? Why am I so hard on my son when I should be doing much better running my own life? As for my daughter, she falls under my wife's care more than mine. My wife takes her to school and picks her up. My daughter would much rather spend the day with my wife than me. I love her, but she is Mommy's girl.

I don't think of myself as a bad parent, and if you asked the people that know me, they would say that I do a pretty good job. What I need is change of perspective. I need to stop concentrating on the negative, and start looking at the positive. I am trying to change these habits, however hard they are to break.

November, pheasants, coffee and good friends.

November is special, no other month brings back more memories for me. I love the crisp fall air, the first morning I step out my frontdoor and see my breath brings a little smile. My wife loves the warm weather of summer. If she could find a place that never gets below 75 degrees, she would move there. While I enjoy the warm summer nights on the deck with the barbecue going, there is nothing better in my mind than putting on a wool shirt and loading up my Labrador for the opening day of pheasant season.

The smell of gun oil on my Browning gives me a satisfaction that is hard to put into words. I search around the shop for my hunting vest, looking through the pockets to see what type of shells are there.

If they are low-base 8s, I remember last year's quail hunt down by Cache Creek. The excitement of a bursting covey as they scatter to new cover. The nod of the head given when you make a nice double. Those 8s may be from a late season dove hunt on a ranch that belongs to my friend's grandfather. I'm taken back to the kitchen table at the ranch, talking to my friends grandfather about life, cattle or his service in the Navy before and during and after WWII. My friend and I talk to both his grandparents for an hour or two over coffee, not because they let us hunt there, because they are good people and good company.

If I pull out a handful of high-base 6s, those must be from last year's pheasant season. My lab Jake has completed his metamorphosis from a bird dog to a gopher dog. The blame is mine. In my youth I hunted with my first lab, a yellow lab that I named Buddy. During my college years I spent many more days in the field than I do now. Buddy and I would hunt the ditches and barley fields around the County. Most days were unsuccessful if you base success on how many birds were taken on that particular day. When they are judged, as they should be, on the pleasure that comes from being in the field with a good dog, those days are priceless. I take no credit for the hunting ability of Buddy, he was great dog and we spent a lot of time together, time hunting. I do take all the blame for Jake, my current black lab, for being the out of shape, gopher killer that he is. When I came home today I found the garbage can knocked down, and the trash scattered all around. Jake the gopher killer strikes again.

November also brings the first of the holidays to us. Some people will say that Halloween starts the holiday season, I do not. I have never had family come from out of town to go trick-or-treating. Thanksgiving is possibly my favorite holiday. The Dallas Cowboys play in the afternoon, and the game is over just about the time the turkey is ready. The adults (myself included) sit in the kitchen and drink a fresh cup of coffee while the children play in the front room. We talk about politics and the plans for the ranch. We talk about the people we miss, those that could not make the trip from out of state this year.

For me, November is like the smooth surface of a lake. When you look at the surface you see your reflection, and your surroundings. But if you get a bit closer and look from a different angle, you look through the water's surface to what lies beneath.

Torch the barn and kill the rats.

Notice has been given to the high ranking bureaucrats in the State department. The Clinton administration's good old boy network is getting the message, your time is up. Your failure in North Korea and around the world has been noted. You may now take positions as professors at Harvard and Berkeley, you don't have to go home, but you can't stay here.

Pink slips will be hot off the laser printer for the Clinton Era clones at the CIA. Have a nice life at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, your paper's slamming the Bush foreign policy will be more than welcomed. Say Hello to Richard Clarke.

Fox reports that Condoleezza Rice will take the reins at State. Her second in command, Stephen Hadley will take over as the National Security Advisor. While I do like Colin Powell, he and Donald Rumsfeld did not see the world through the same lens.

More to come.

Arafat is dead, drinks are on me.

Can we stop with the 'news coverage' of Yasser Arafat's death now, please. Do we have to see the coffin of this terrorist paraded around on a French military jet on his farewell tour? Where is the news story? There is life and death battle going on in the streets of Fallujah, where our Marines and Army forces are cleaning out the terrorists. Let's focus on that, I would rather see the MSM slanted story on the slaughter of innocents than watch a millionaire terrorist's corpse fawned over. The Sacramento Bee front page today has two stories on Arafat's dirt nap. Maybe they forgot today's date. November 11th, Veteran's Day. A story honoring veterans is on page A9.
Even the Daily Democrat, the local woodland paper, pays homage to our veterans on it's front page.

I don't want to sound cold hearted about Arafat's death, but we may finally have a chance at peace in the Middle East. A slim one at best, but a chance none the less.

My thanks to America's veterans, no matter what your service. From a Ranger on D-Day to a supply clerk in Oklahoma in Dessert Storm. Thank you for your service.

No Global Test for the next congress.

The Main Stream Media has had a chance to digest the President's victory for the past week. What have they concluded? If the President does not cave into the Democratic minority's list of demands, he has lost his mandate and has failed to bring the nation together. As we like to say here in Yolo County, can they smell what they are shoveling?
The President has a wonderful opportunity to bring the nation together, not by implementing the policies of the loosing party's platform, but by reaching out to conservative and moderate democrats. With a 'coalition of willing' in the Senate and the House, the President can accomplish the job the majority of Americans want to have done. The MSM and the Democratic leadership want to make the President pass a version of John Kerry's 'Global Test' before they will come together to pass legislation and judicial nominees.

Margaret Thatcher once said; "To me, consensus seems to be the process of abandoning all beliefs, principles, values and policies."This is exactly what the Democrats are asking the Republican majority and the President to do in the name of unity. I for one am not buying this bill of goods. In fact, I won't even lease it. There are approximately 100 outcomes that follow this line or reasoning, 99 are very bad. The remaining outcome is based on the assumption that Democrat's policies are the best for America. As I think on this further, let me restate my opinion, all 100 are very bad. The President has extended his hand across the isle in the first months of 2001 and after 9/11, only to get thrown under the bus by a very bitter Democratic leadership.

Carl Rove retold just one example of the hypocritical behavior of the Democrats in congress on the November 7th broadcast of Meet the Press with Tim Russert.

"I remember well after 9/11 sitting with the president and a leader of the Democratic Party talking about the economic stimulus package. The president said, "Look, our economy's been hit hard on 9/11. We need to do something to jump start our economy. You know, my advisors at the Council of Economic Advisors tell me the number one thing we can do to jump start the economy is A." And this Democrat leader said, "Well, Mr. President, I can't get the votes for A, but I can get the votes for B." And the president said--listened to him and several days later laid out his package and included as one of the principle elements of it B. And that Democrat leader immediately went out and criticized it. And, you know, I was angry at the time. I remember the president saying, "Look, that's the way the town works. Let it go."

I hope that President Bush tells this Congress that he is leading this nation in a new direction, you can get on board or get out of the way.

Putting tusks on a jackass just won't do it.

As I listen to the democratic pundits and MSM gather up the broken pieces of their 2004 campaign, they still don't understand why they lost. How could they. The problem, as they see it, is voters did not feel comfortable with the way democrats talked about religion and values. I listened to one after another of the democratic brain-trust say that if they just learn how to talk about God and morality in a way that doesn't offend these religious wakos, we will win in 2008.

I don't know what kind of work you as the reader do for a living, but lets say you are an auto mechanic. You know about cars, you like cars, they are part of your life. Now let's say there is someone that wants to sell you something, and this person, who does not know much about cars, believes that if he learns to talk about cars, you will buy what he is selling. Would that be very effective?
"Mr jackson, I see your driving a Ford Mustang, I own one too, I just love it, its a four wheel drive Mustang, with a Cummings diesel engine. Can I interest you in voting for me?"

The Democrats cannot or will not realize that people that hold values and religious beliefs at the heart of their being are not fooled by charlatans. As I write this, I must point out that hundreds of thousands of good folks did get suckered by Jim and Tammy Baker. However the Bakers were good Christians, they were just corrupted by power and greed. A similar situation has infected the Democratic party leadership.

As I posted previously, the Democrats must find in their party, religious, security minded, real people and put them in positions of real power. It will not do to have Deepak Chopra come to democratic leadership retreat and teach them how to talk like a real religious person. I think that is exactly what the dark blue elitist will do. It will lead to another crushing defeat.

I know democrats, I used to be one. I live in dark blue county of a dark blue state. There are moderate democrats that believe in God, would not abolish abortion, but cannot be in a party that fights for partial birth abortions. They are for a strong national defense and helping the most in need, without punishing the success that drives our economy and provides the jobs that everyone wants. The democrats will be shocked to learn that these leaders will be found in the Baptist churches of the south, and the fundamental churches of the Midwest, just the places they need help.

Will they do it. No

Why, they will have to something very fearful for the democratic leadership, willingly give up power in the short term to gain back the trust of Americans for the long term. This means telling the American public that we think Michael Moore is terribly misguided, and we do not think he speaks for our party. That means telling NARAL and NOW to shut up and lobby behind the scenes. Tell them that they will have to deal with a ban on partial birth abortion if they want any chance of saving Roe v Wade as the law of the land. This means telling Senoirs that social security as you know it will be changed because it has grown from a safety net designed to help fill the gaps in your own retirement plan, to a system that most of you think is your retirement plan. We know this will not be popular, but it is either a leaner more efficient form of social security or one day the checks will just stop coming.

Now that I think about it, there is no way the Democrats will do it, or if they did, no way the MSM would go along with it. OK here is plan B, listen to Schumer and Polosi and run farther to the left, all the way off the map to land of Howard Dean and Michael Moore.

I will pull up a chair and watch the train wreck.

Democrats loose big, will they comeback in 2006?

As word comes in that Senator John Kerry has called the President to concede the 2004 election, one must look at the two parties to see where we go from here. Republicans will no doubt feel that they have won a decisive victory, not only in the Presidential election but picking up 4 seats in the Senate and at least four in the House of Representatives. John Thune defeats former Senate minority leader Tom Daschle in South Dakota for the topping on the sunday.

Now that the picture comes into focus, a few questions need to be answered. Will the GOP drive a hard right leaning agenda through the Congress by picking off moderate democrats? Will the democrats make the same mistake they made in 02' when they lost and picked ultra-left Nancy Pelosi as the face of their party in the house? Those question will be answered soon.

If the democrats want to get back into the game, here is the way they can do it.
Find a base that is not divided before the race starts. Early in 2004 it was very clear that the democrats had placed their bets on groups of voters that contribute the vast majority of their time and treasure. These groups are the labor unions, both public and private, the pro-choice lobby, the anti-war movement, and the life long democrats that vote democratic because their parents had.

Most democrats that I know are not as liberal as the leadership of the democratic party by a factor of three to one. While they will say that they are pro-choice, they are not for partial birth abortion. They will say that they are for higher taxes on the rich, but they want their taxes lower. They don't like the war in Iraq, but they don't want to surrender and bring the troops and the terrorists home to America. Finally, they will say that they don't care what goes on the privacy of people's bedrooms, but they are not for gay marriage.

If the democrats want to win back the White house or even make gains in the congress, here is how they can do it.

Get used to loosing for a while.

The only way the democrats can pull them selves out of the huge hole they are in is to find out where the public is and find a way to out popularize the GOP. Here is another way to look at this, if you fight a war every four years with the same allies, and you keep loosing, find different allies. Tell the leadership of NOW, and NARAL that partial birth abortion is loosing them elections and supreme court justices. We want your money and your support, but if you don't change your position on this one issue, we won't be seen with you. Tell the public and private union bosses, hey, we fought for you on the baggage screeners after 9/11 when the nation wanted politicians to unite, and we were seen as partisans hacks not patriots. Tell the Howard Dean environmentalists and pacifists that we want your money and support, but we can't lock up the Anwar oil reserves when we are telling voters that the war in Iraq is a war for oil.

The republicans have discovered the big secret in our new political world. Clear, simple stands based on values. American values, not european values, not socialist values, not the new-age secular values that people find interesting but don't want to use to change the nations direction.

Why do I want the Democrats to come back to the center from the ultra-left edge of disaster?
Unity, the unity we need to win the war on terrorism that will be with us for generations. When America looks at two parties that reflect American values separated only by two different ways to get there, people will unite behind either party, no matter the victor.

Half way home and still up in the air.

Dateline Esparto; 7:45PM
Bush up in the electoral college, Florida, Ohio, and Pennsylvania still undecided. I am waiting as fast as I can.

Volunteer to be a poll worker. Spongebob needs help.

Will Spongebob Square Pants decide the election this year? The Democrats hope so. Voter fraud is being taken to a new level by the left in this election. Maybe they will make it an Olympic sport on 2008. With groups like Acorn and the George Soros backed ACT and MoveOn registering voters both animate and inanimate this could get very messy.

Yea, but what about those evil Republicans and their intimidation tactics?
May I see your ID?
I don't see your name on the official voter role?
Are you registered to vote in this precinct?
I show you as being an absentee voter, would like a provisional ballot?

Yes, all very intimidating questions. Here's a thought. Register before the deadline, use your real name, and then show up at the right polling place, show your government issued ID and vote, once. That's all there is to it. Millions of Americans have done it. It works.

Dan Rather's strike pre-empted. October surprise fizzle.

Dan Rather must be popping blood pressure meds like Pez. After the Texas Air National Guard story was proven to be false, he throws Mary Mapes under the bus to keep his job. Now CBS has George W Bush right where they want him, they are going to put out the 'October Surprise' story Sunday on 60 Minutes to finally kill the Bush re-election campaign. Woops.
One, no two problems with that strategy, first the NY Times won't sit on the story until Sunday and pre-emp CBS by running the story Monday. Second, the story is proving to be just as misleading. They must have forgotten about the embedded NBC journalist who was with troops when they first went into the Al Qa Qaa. The Kerryspot has posted emails from soldiers in the 101st Airborne. They confirm that the 380 tons of 'UN sealed' explosives were not there when the soldiers entered the depot.
" The Commander on the site had complete real time intelligence on what to expect and possibly find at the Al-QaQaa depot. The ordinance in question was not found when teams were sent in to inspect and secure the area. When this information was relayed, Operational plans were adjusted and the unit moved forward. Had the ordinance in question been discovered, a security team would have been left in place. " The Times and CBS may have blown it. Or an even worse thought, The Times put the story out now because they knew it was a looser, they are saving up the real October Surprise until November 1st.

Was I this bad when Clinton was in office?

Cruising through some random blogs last night I found a few that fascinate me. One guy can not write the word Republican, he uses Republuicscum. The war was thought up by Haliburton, Bush is Hitler. Nice.
There are a few others that made me laugh, and also made me wonder if I sounded this bad during the Clinton years. I don't think I was as hateful and vindictive as these folks seem to be. Sure I find a few right-wing bloggers who could use a sedative and some anger management classes, but nothing like the number of lefties out there.

During the Clinton administration, I was more upset by the main stream media than Bill Clinton. The bias that they showed toward the democrats was astonishing. If nothing else, the media bias drove people to talk radio and the internet in droves. I listened to Rush when he was right here at Sacramento's KFBK. I loved listening to Rush debate the Mayor of Davis once a week on the local television news, it was quite enjoyable. As Rush is fond of saying, liberals are the funniest when they are out of power. It is true, one look at the tenor of the left in this election will tell you how desperate they are. Their desperation drives them like an addict chasing down his dealer.

I still say that President Clinton was the best pure politician I have ever seen. However the nation does not need the best politician, it needs the best leader, and Bill Clinton for all his charm and warmth was not a good leader. He was a populist weathervane, what ever direction public opinion was blowing, that's where he was. A great strategy for being re-elected, a terrible strategy for leading a nation in a time of growing danger.

I confess that when Clinton won a second term, defeating Senator Bob Dole in the most inept campaign run in my lifetime, I did think this country would go down the tubes. It did not. The Clinton 90s were a great time for the market and for the tech sector, which in turn drove the market even higher. The problem was when the tech bubble burst, it left the market and the economy with a huge hangover. A hangover that was handed over to President Bush in 2001. I rode out the tech bubble with my company in Sacramento, we were 18 months or so behind the bay area in feeling the effects of the tech bust. As the tech companies were fighting to gain capital and marketshare, more that a few were cooking the books to show ever increasing profits. As long as the market kept rising and the stock prices rose, who wanted to investigate these cash cows? Who wanted to make waves? Certainly not the Clinton administration, not the Reno Justice department, not Rubins' or Summers' Treasury department. Nope, lets just slide on out of here and toss the keys to this mess to W and his crew.

It is my opinion that our system is broken, most Democrats and Republicans are addicted to the power and influence that is our political system. I fear without some type of change our electorate will become less involved, more apathetic and we will soon be at the mercy of just the ultra partisans. We may already be there. What will fix it? I don't know. Term limits? I am not sure. The problem is, as bad as our system is, it is still the best system in practice anywhere on the globe.

Encumbered by idoits, we pressed on........

Thanks to Hugh Hewitt

I have read most of the great vox blogoli submittions on Hugh's site. There are many funny, brilliant, and a few disturbed individuals out there. I would like to thank Hugh, or more likely Duane, for posting my blog on the subject. As the bloggeshere takes off and forms the third branch of the media, bloggers will act as the conscience of the media. Print and broadcast media will continue to blur the line between opinion and real news. Bloggers will check the facts and find the stories that they hide in the back pages, with the facts and maybe that one sentence that should be the headline.

I recently posted a letter I wrote to my local paper on an opinion they published about the assault weapons ban. The local paper stole half the article and the headline from the Denver Post.
I told a friend about the 'facts' that the paper used and how I pointed out their inaccuracy. He told me something that I still think about. He said that you can see how wrong they are on this story because you know something about the subject, just think about all the other stories they write that you don't know as much about. They are probably just as inaccurate.

This is where the bloggers are such a great resource, out there in cyberspace there are experts in so many fields that when a MSM reporter exaggerate or just flat out lie about something, they will point it out.

Why vote for Bush?

This is a very easy answer for me. It may be harder to see viewed through the prism of the mainstream media. Here are a few examples of the differences between these two men.

George W Bush is a real person. He is less concerned with what people think about him than what they think about the country. He really is comfortable with real Americans. He owns a Carhartt jacket and it is worn in and well used.

John Kerry is a caricature of himself. Depending on what battleground states he is in, he is many things to many people. He was raised on a farm, he is an avid hunter and would not think of taking your guns, and he is strong on national defense and always has been. I just wish people would smell what he is shoveling.
I wonder what his Massachusets constituents feel about the new and improved John Kerry. They must wonder, who this guy? Where is our Fifth Avenue, Kennedy Center, French-speaking elitist?

George W Bush is a proven leader. You may not like all his decisions, but he does not shrink away from making them. He will listen to all sides of an issue, them make the decision that he thinks is best for the country.

John Kerry has never held an executive position. He has never been CEO of a large company with a payroll to meet. He has never been Governor of a state where you have the final say in passing laws and making budgets. He has been a Senator. In his 20 years as Senator from Massachusetts where is his record of accomplishments? He is just one of 100 votes in the Senate, he can afford to be wrong, and he is wrong far to often. Being wrong post 9/11 can get us killed.

George W Bush does not give a rip about what the U.N. thinks we should do. This is a very good thing. The U.N. is one of the most corrupt organizations in the world. The U.N. is not about bringing peace to the world, it is not about spreading freedom across the globe, it is about money. Your money as a matter of fact. The United States is the largest financial contributor to the U.N., and has been every year since its creation in 1945. U.S. contributions to the U.N. system in 2003 were well over $3 billion. Think of the U.N. as a huge bureaucracy with great pay, great benefits, and no accountability. You get to make 10 or 100 times the salary you would earn in the real world. If you know who to talk to, you can get millions in kickbacks from Saddam through the oil for food program. I think sometime after the election the mainstream media will finally acknowledge the Oil for Food story. The whole story about the French, Russians and Germans along with U.N. officials receiving millions in bribes to undermine the sanctions that John Kerry holds in such high esteem will come out. Kerry’s position that the sanctions would hold Saddam in check will be discredited.
John Kerry wants the U.N. to grade our ‘Global Test’ before we take military action.

George W Bush thinks that you can send your money better than the government. This year’s Nobel Prize winner in Economics thinks that the Bush tax cuts did not go far enough, he thinks they should have been larger. I agree, the way to grow the economy is to let people have more of the money they earn. We know the best way to spend it, we will buy houses, cars, computers, go on vacations. Actions that create demand for jobs.
John Kerry thinks he is much smarter than you, if he can take the majority of the money you earn, he will give to the people that really need it, government employees. He will grow the Government, not the private sector. That’s great if you want to be a drone in the big hive of a bureaucracy. Not so great if you own a small business, or work for one.

I could go on and on, but I hope you get the big picture, John Kerry will say or do anything to be elected. George W Bush is a proven leader.

Please be patient, my Son would like to speak.

Hi, Steven here. I think its not fair that any student from kindergarten to College should have to go to School 5 or more days a week. I think any Student should only have to go to School 1 or 2 days of School maximum. Personally I think that only 5 Classes in School are useful, Bible Class to boost your knowledge about God, Writing because if I didn't know how to write I couldn't give you this important message today, Math because almost whatever you do you have to think about it, History because everyone needs to know about the word's and Americas past, issues and celebrations. And also P.E. because it is very important to stay in shape.


If you aren't completely bored yet, I'd like to comment on one more issue. Prices of anything and everything. I recently went to a music store with my dad. I'm a big fan of music but CD's are just too expensive, I now realize why people Download songs from the Internet, it's pretty obvious that nobody wants to shell out $20 or $30 bucks for a C.D. No one has figured out yet that if you make stuff cheaper people will buy it. Well that's it for me thanks for reading.

I am posting this under protest, while I do acknowledge my son's right to free speech, it is after all my blog.

Help save Happy!

As a small rancher here in Yolo County, I can see both sides of this issue. The issue in question is whether a donkey braying in the night is worth $100 per bray? Happy is a 7 year old donkey that lives in Placer County with his owner Lisa Carpenter.

When you live in a rural community there are things that must be willing to accept. Livestock noise is one of them. When my neighbor weans his calves, they ball all night long. When my other neighbor sells his hay, the trucker comes at 3:45 am every week and loads the hay so he can get to Petaluma by 6:00 and beat the traffic. Does this wake me up? Yes. Do I like it? No.
This is the trade off I am willing to make not to hear bass thumping music coming from across the street every Friday and Saturday night.
I hope Lisa and Happy prevail in court, and I hope her neighbor gets some sleep.

Bush eats Kerry's lunch in third debate.

Bob Schieffer, a graduate of the Dan Rather school of un-biased journalism, did his best tonight to get John kerry over the hump, but to no avail. Any clear thinking pundit must score tonight's debate as a win for bush, with style points going to Kerry for not looking like this. The President laid out his vision of the future, rejecting the carnival barker hype of John Kerry.

"Step inside the tent! Give me your credit card before you go and I will amaze you with free healthcare for every human in the country, a free college education, more social security than you can ever spend! John Edwards and I will even cure all you people in wheelchairs, we guarantee it. Don't worry, we will only charge the top 1% . Oh and by the way Dick Cheney has a gay daughter."

Just wait until the Visa bill comes. You think your bank has hidden fees? When you put the most liberal Senator and a trial lawyer in charge of the tax code, hold on to your wallets.

The Presidents comments on faith were fantastic, he laid out his faith without sounding like a religious fanatic, as the MSM often portrays him.

Bottom line, big win for George W. Bush.

Democrats and voter fraud, just like peas and carrots.

Drudge reports a Denver TV station finds democratic voter fraud running rampant. ACORN, a left-wing group if there ever was one, states they were victims of the fraud as well.

A quote from the article; Some of the registration drive workers earn $2 per application or about $10 an hour. One woman admitted to forging three people's names on about 40 voter registration applications. Kym Cason says she was helping her boyfriend earn more money from a get-out-the-vote organization called ACORN or Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now. ACORN works with low or moderate-income families on housing issues. Cason said her extra registrations earned her boyfriend $50

Gerald Obi says workers pressured him to keep registering to vote so they too could earn extra cash. When asked how many times he had registered this year, Obi said, "about 35 times."

In Cleveland Acorn strikes again.

I once heard that if Hillary Clinton ever runs for President, some of the democratically held areas will have a 112% voter turnout. I believe it. Is this what John Kerry talks about when he says that he will make sure that minority voters will not be turned away from the polls by Republicans this year.

I could take up three pages of news articles on democratic voter fraud, here is a link of Kerry's troops getting out the vote.

Time for change, loose change that is.

If you are new my post you may not know that I have just started my new business. My current cash flow seems to be trending to an outward flow, and money is tight. The Presidential race seems to be tightening also. I am sending a check to George W Bush today, in addition I have another idea. I have large coin jar that I empty my pockets into every night, there has to be $100 or more in there. I usually take it to the coinstar location at my local supermarket and turn it into cash, for 5% of the gross.

I recommend everyone that hasn't maxed out their Presidential limit to get out those coin jars, or cans, or cigar boxes or whatever you have that loose change in. I don't want to hear about 'that's my beer money' or some other lame excuse, take those coins in and get that money to George W Bush. Together we can make the difference. These next three weeks is where we can put Kerry away!

French Oil Company bribes, Russia, and Iraq.

It seems like some of the "Oil For Food" boys had better start checking their six. The police are right behind you. In an article from the Australian Financial Review, the French oil giant Total is under investigation from French police. Moscow News also reports that Total made millions of dollars worth of bribes to Russian and Iraqi officials. Could this be the beginning of a major effort to prosecute the UN's O.F.F. program? One can only hope.

Great post as usual from the Kerry spot. Maybe we did kill OBL in Torra Borra, has anyone seen him on video tape in two years?

Kerry call for the United Federation of Planets to pass his test.

John, it's not how you say it, it's what you say. Defending his "Global Test" remark, Kerry has upped the ante on the President by now asserting a inter galactic test.
"But I can do a better job of protecting America's security because the test that I was talking about was a test of legitimacy, not just in the globe, but elsewhere."

Call Jean-Luc Picard, and Jacques Chirac, and get Kofi to order up some espresso, we have to cram for our test!


I can't wait for tomorrow.........

Kerry's "Plan" is a house of cards. Watch as they fall.

Let me get this straight, Kerry's wants to get the UN fully involved in Iraq. How can Kerry get them to jump into the Suni triangle, because of the respect and good will he has for this outstanding organization.
Based on their past performance, if the UN were to get its hands on any power over Iraq what would they do? They could bribe the terrorists under a new "Oil for democracy" program. I wonder how much it would take to get Abu Musab al-Zarqawi and his boys to go back to their houses and make nice? 1 million dollars apiece? 5, 10 million?

Maybe Kerry can get France and Russia to send troops to Iraq if he convinces the UN to fire up the Oil for food program again. With the millions in kickbacks and bribes paid to Saddam and his buddies in the UN, they know the program would mean hundreds of millions more.

Kerry's other point he "won" the debate with, we should sell Iran nuclear fuel rods. Is this man insane? Does anyone else smell Madeline Albright here, or is it just me? The Clinton administration did such a wonderful job with North Korea and it's nuclear program, everything was just fine until we found out that the communists were cheating! Now they have several working nukes, way to go Madeline.
Wait just a minute, it's Iran on line one, they say to shove it.

As the wheels come flying off Kerry's plan one by one, it makes me think that people must see through this guy right? Lord I hope so.

Time for a change in District 5?

I was checking in on the current race for 5th District Supervisor for Yolo County when I started looking into the incumbent, Lynnel Pollock. I have known her son Brad for years and think he is a great guy. I have issues with Lynnel's position on a few things.

Ms. Pollock serves as Yolo chair for the Bill of Rights defense Committee. A liberal group that is bent on gutting the Patriot Act, the very means to defend this nation against terrorism. Check out their links page, if these groups represent the values of the 5th district, then I am moving. I have not seen Attorney General Ashcroft digging through my garbage or tapping my phonecalls. Maybe I am just not looking hard enough. She signed the Yolo County Resolution for this group and that disturbs me.

In an interview in 1998 she said of the new casino expansion "It's exciting that they will add a nice restaurant in the area. I'm sure a lot of local people will go there," said Lynnel Pollock, the Yolo County supervisor whose district includes Rumsey. She also sits on a council that negotiates issues with the tribe.
"The biggest issue out there is traffic. It's a narrow, winding road, and there is a lot of traffic on it, but the tribe has been very good at continuously making access to the casino smoother and safer," Pollock said.

Traffic a problem, no kidding. I am glad that the Casino is making nice turn lanes in front of the casino, the problem is the 13 miles of narrow winding roads that lead to the casino. The compromise deal to expand the casino and to allow serving alcohol was not in my families best interest. When asked about the deal, Ms Pollock had this to say. `We have done the best we could, said Supervisor Lynnel Pollock, who teamed with Supervisor Mike McGowan in the negotiations. `Now, it's up to our constituents to examine the agreement and see if we've addressed the issues that are of concern to them. I know that it is not an easy negotiation to make, the casino can do just about anything they want on their land. Getting funding to expand roads is a good start, but they have built the new casino now, the traffic is worse, they are serving alcohol, and where are our widened roads? If it takes the tribe one year to build a giant new hotel and casino, why can't we have a major road construction project going at the same time?

Certainly Rd 23 has not been touched. This road is becoming a popular shortcut around Esparto for casino patrons and locals alike. I have had three people run their cars into my irrigation ditch in the past year, this is the ditch that sits about 90 feet from the road. One guy sheepishly told me that he was going about 80 or 90 when he lost control and flipped his car into the ditch. Two were from the bay area going home after a long night of gambling.

If Lynnel wins it will not be the end of the world, things will go on as usual, the problem is they are usually getting worse.

If it's all about the oil, then here is my plan.

I love liberals, I really do, and without them my life would be much less entertaining. They constantly tell the public that Bush went to war in Iraq for the oil. If that is the case, I pose a question to you, why doesn't he just take the oil for the U.S. or Halliburton or whatever sinister group the black helicopter crowd on the left thinks is behind the invasion? The answer is, it's not about taking the oil.

If George W. Bush wanted to take control of the Middle East oil supply, he could do it tomorrow. Park the USS Abraham Lincoln in the Straits of Hormuz, tell OPEC that every third oil tanker that comes through the straight belongs to the U.S.
What could they do? What could the world do? There is not a Navy on this planet that could force that carrier task force out of the straight. None.
It would be the largest protection racquet in the history of the world.

If they want to ship through the pipelines to the Mediterranean, fine, we park another carrier in the straight of Gibraltar. Same toll.

The War in Iraq is not about taking over the Iraqi oil fields, just like the first gulf war was not about taking the Kuwaiti oil fields, which we could have done since we were there in 1991.

When liberals tell you about how bad America is, and about how we are the most destructive force in the world today, just laugh at them, I do.

The United States in the most benevolent super power the world has ever known. If we wanted to, the U.S. could take down and destroy any government in the world, with the exception of China. China will be the next country to take on the title of Super Power; they will be there within the two decades. Lets see how the Chinese use their power and influence. If you honestly believe that China would be a better global citizen than the United States, then you are an idiot of extraordinary stature.

This is not meant as a cheap shot, it is the truth. That kind of thinking is going to get us killed, on a wholesale scale.

By the way, check out HughHewitt for an excellent question by question breakdown of the debate.

Buggy whip makers and the Main Stream Media

In 5 years my son will ask me, how did you get your news before the Internet?
I will tell him that when I was young, you had to wait until 5:00 and tune into the network news. We lived in a very rural area where we were fortunate to receive three channels of television with no daily newspaper service. I grew up believing whatever Walter Cronkite and his fellow anchors said was the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. I know better now.

Cronkite wants a crackdown on this Internet thing. 'I am dumbfounded that there hasn’t been a crackdown with the libel and slander laws on some of these would-be writers and reporters on the Internet. I expect that to develop in the fairly near future.' How about CBS News Walter!

The mainstream media is the frog in the pot slowly heading towards the rolling boil that will kill them. The water gets warmer, the bias gets stronger, the people turn the channel and cancel their subscriptions, get out the tarter sauce or whatever you eat with frog legs, because it's dinner time.

The bloggeshere and cable news will soon be the first option for news. The mainstream journalists are so close to the people that make the news, especially liberal politicians, that they cannot separate cold hard facts from their common view of the world.


Take the case of the Times reporter allegedly tipping off a terrorist front group that the Feds were going to raid them. I can't help but wonder where this man's allegiance lies? Does he have an allegiance to the United States, the country that makes his profession possible? He must think that as an "objective journalist" he does cannot have such a thing. After all, we are all humans, no one better than the other, no country better than another. That my friend is the problem, tied up in neat little package.

Is America always right, no.
Is America the best hope for freedom and democracy in the world today? Absolutely.

For every American backed dictator you want to point to as proof that America is evil, I will point to the worldwide threat from Nazi Germany, Soviet Communism that we defeated. I will point to the fact that today, right now, poor and repressed people around the world are packing all they own in a sack and trying to get to this great country.

The mainstream media is far too "intelligent" to fall for this simplistic approach of national pride.

Tomorrow at the Presidential debate, I hope the moderator asks President Bush if he thinks that America is loosing its credibility in the world. I know what I would like him to say.

"No, this Nation is responsible for the freedom of most of the countries on this planet. We are the last best hope of mankind. Next question."

If Kerry wins, can we lease Dick Cheney to him?

Think of the John Kerry administration.
OK, now take a deep breath and realize, it will not happen, we will be fine.
However if John Kerry were elected President, can you imagine the decision making process?
Sitting in the command center with his staff;

" Mr. President we have to make a decision now."

"Well, we cannot make a hasty decision here"

"With all due respect Mr. President, NORAD just confirmed a North Korean missile launch at Tokyo and Seoul"

"Secretary Albright, what do you think?"

"President Kim Jung Il has given me assurances that he will not attack his neighbors"

"Secretary Berger, could this be an accident?"

"It must be, Mr. President"

"Joe, call the Times and issue a strong statement about our concern over this tragic accident, and get Kofi on the line, we need to convene the Security Council."

"Mr. President, we have just confirmed a medium yield nuclear strike in the heart of Tokyo, Soul was hit with the same type of device minutes before"

"Mr. President, North Korea has just started a nuclear war in Asia, we need to respond, quickly. Two of our allies, and thousands of our soldiers have just been vaporized, what are we going to do?"

"This is terrible"

"Yes, this is terrible, but we still must respond."

"I can't believe this is happening."

"Mr. President, it is happening, it has already happened."

"Sandy, can you get Schroeder and Chirac on the phone, I don't want to act alone, we must have everyone on board here"

"Mr. President, they are on line one and two, they told me that we can't attack North Korea, they have thousands of advisors and contractors working on their nuclear reactor programs, Chirac assures me the reactors are only for civilian power generation."

"OK, Joe call the Times and the Post and issue a statement condemning this act of aggression, Joe make it a very strong statement"


If John Kerry wins in November, the team he will have advising him will have a long record of failure that is a certainty. If we could, I would advise leasing the democrats Dick Cheney to make the hard decisions in a crisis, we could encase him in a glass box with the caption "Break only in the event of emergency."
The catch is, if Kerry wins, it will be an emergency.

Deer hunting, a time to reflect.

This past weekend marked the end of A zone deer season. I sat on a hilltop looking down on the narrow deer paths worn into the opposing slopes with my son Steven beside me. Together we watched the sun slide behind the coastal mountains, and talked in low voices about hunting.

I am fortunate that my son is interested in hunting and the love of the outdoors that it inspires. He has all the distraction of these modern days, a Playstation2, CD player, and sports. When he asked to go hunting with my friend Dan and I on the last weekend of the season, I set the alarm for 5:00 and went to bed happy.

I spend many hours a week with my son, on the way home from school, at diner and working on his homework. I cannot think of a more enjoyable three hours I have spent with him this year.

It is something that is hard to describe to non-hunters, especially anti-hunters. When most of urban America thinks about deer hunters, they think about beer-drinking rednecks with machine guns spraying the forest indiscriminately. Or at least that is what I have heard from more that a few. This is unfortunate. The fact is we may have more in common with the environmentalist than they realize. The first maybe hard to come to grips with, we love animals. We do. I love to watch a doe and her fawns eat the grass on the hills. I can watch them for hours, they are beautiful creatures.

I also know that the best way to manage the deer population is through a regulated hunting season. My background is in ranching, here in California and Oregon, I can remember the look of starving deer caused by two years of drought and a very hard winter. If we stopped hunting this year, the deer herds would soar then die off in a vicious cycle. Although many hunters try, I do not hunt for trophy deer. I usually take an immature buck for the freezer and the horns are used for buttons or other projects.

I did not kill a buck this year. I paid for my license and deer tags, like I do every year, even when I am sure I won’t have time to hunt. Why, because this money goes to the department of fish and game. These funds help the department conduct research into deer related diseases and to patrol the state for poachers.

As my son and I walked back down to the road in the gathering darkness, we spoke of next year when he will be old enough to hunt with me not as a spectator, but as a hunter. I am sure we will have many more great times in the field, both as father and son, and as hunters.

A letter to the Daily Disappointment

As I read your opinion piece about the assault weapons ban sun setting, I was struck by the rather one sided information sited in your article.

By the way, if you are going to Plagiarize, at least list the source that wrote half your story, and the headline.

"Tell that to the families and friends of the 12 students and teacher killed at Columbine High School on April 20, 1999. One of the weapons used by Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold was a variant of the banned TEC-DC9 semiautomatic pistol. Last year, a banned AK-47 rifle was used in the killing of a 15-year-old boy and wounding of three teenage girls in a packed New Orleans school gym"
What about the three other guns that Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold used? Are the deaths of the children killed with those guns any less tragic? I hope you do not believe they are. Many of the children were brutally killed using a pump action shotgun, the same type of shotgun that I use to hunt pheasants and ducks. The same type used by thousands of your readers and dozens of your advertisers. Does this mean that you want these guns banned as well?

The assault weapons ban did not reduce murder in California, the State that banned assault weapons in 1998. The first 5 years of the ban, murders increased in California by 26%. The fact is knives, clubs and bare hands are used in more than 20 times more murders. (FBI, Crime in the United States 2002)

Another quote "Police universally agree that assault weapons are not used for sport or by people wanting to protect themselves."
Really, please drive out to Davis, to Yolo Sportsman's Club for a high-power rifle match. You will find, much to your astonishment, law abiding citizens shooting AR-15s and other assault weapons at matches. Maybe the police you site don't go to Camp Perry Ohio for the Department of Civilian Marksmanship National Match. There are many police departments represented at the National Match, competing with "Assault Weapons" for sport.

I could counter your article point by point, although I don't think you would get past the first few lines. I believe that your mind is made up. "Assault Weapons" are bad, people should not have them. When do I get to write my column?

Back in Yolo County.......

Well back here in the real world, or my world at least, events move at a speed of forged documents through a fax machine at Kinkos.

Our first inclement weather of the year hit on Sunday the 19th. A severe thunderstorm dumped two inches of rain on our Capital City. Too bad the legislature was in recess. The local alfalfa growers were taken by surprise, as many stacks of hay sat out in the rain. The local cattle ranchers smile at the possibility of cheaper rain damaged hay for the winter, and the promise of a good feed year. However, this being Yolo county, the mercury will soon be back in the high 80's and this rain will be long forgotten by this weekend.

Capay Valley 4-H has started, I am still debating if I will have the time to be leathercraft leader.
It's a great group of kids and parents. My son will be showing his horse this year. Thursday night is "spaghetti Dinner" at Woodland Christian School. The yearly fund raiser is a great place to meet the staff and support the wonderful work that the school does.
Why do I send my children to private school, well I'll tell you it is not because I have money falling ouy of my pockets. As I stated in my first post, I am starting a new Business, I have no income at this point. My wife and I put our children first, just as 15% of public school teachers do.
I would love to be driving a new 4-door, four wheel drive Dodge diesel pickup. The money we pay for our children's school would more than pay for it. The thing that bothers me the most is I still have to pay taxes for a school that my children do not attend! In addition to the local school district fees on my new house.

That will have to be whole new blog some other day.

I will attend the next meeting of the Esparto Chamber of Commerce.
Yes, we have one, I think?

Rathergate just the set-up for a knockout blow to bush?

After a bit of googling, I came up with this story from Democrats.com. A dollar to a doughnut that Rather, or someone else in the MSM is sitting on the story of a guy that sold Bush cocaine back in1972. Now I'm sure this person will be completely credible, just like the memos, and will have come forward just in time to try to do the utmost damage to the President.

Rather, could start with - "Tonight we may have found the reason why then Lt. Bush did not show up for his required physical in 1972. Tonight's story is about a reluctant witness that has come forward with remarkable information about the President's use of cocaine while he was in the Texas Air National guard."

I am of the opinion, if Rather had actual notarized memos saying exactly what the fake documents allege, George Bush would not lose two points in the polls. His base doesn't care, the swing voters care very little, looking at the latest poll results. Love him or hate him, you know just what you are getting with George W Bush. If Bush used cocaine when he was a young man, I don't think that changes who he is today, or who he has been as commander in chief for the past four years. He is a know quantity. I know people who used cocaine in their twenties, it was not hard to find even in a small town. Does that disqualify them from changing, growing into people that do a tremendous service to our City or County or State or Country? I hope not.

I just can't understand why Rather and the gang at CBS are hanging on to this story so tight. I have to believe that this is the set-up jab for a knockout left hook coming down the road. Were the Rathergate memos were just to pave the way for the cu de gras?

I could be wrong, Rather could be just a egocentric leftwing blow-hard that cannot face up to the fact he wanted to believe so bad, he could not see the truth. Either way, he should go in for a CT scan this week so he can find a medical condition to give him a way to retire gracefully.

CBS rushed into journalistic war.

CBS rushed into journalistic war despite warnings from their own experts, as reported in the Washington Post story. Two document experts retained by CBS News for the disputed "60 Minutes" story on President Bush's National Guard record said yesterday they had warned the program that the memos involved had significant problems but that their concerns were not heeded.

The "smoking-gun" that Dan Rather was going to finally put into the hands of George W. Bush blew up in his face this week. Do I think that Dan rather is personally out to get W? Absolutely. As Eric Hogue pointed out on his morning program, Rather would like nothing more in this world than to get back at the son of Bush 41, the man who put Rather in his place back during an interview in 1988. Rather Biased

In a letter sent to Andrew Heyward, President of CBS news Media Research center's Brent Bozell asks Mr. Heyward to launch a full independent investigation and secondly to immediately suspend Rather.

Is this the next Rathergate? Power line

I'm sure more updates are coming, actually I am getting tired of the Rathergate story. I can hear the low creaking sounds coming from trunk of the CBS news tree, I am just waiting for the deafening crash of CBS news hitting jouralism's forest floor.

TIMBER!

Pajama Clad Truth Ninjas.

A fictional day in the life of Dan Rather;

Wake up, browse the Times and the Post;
Just look at what these Bloggers are saying about me! What gives you the right to question CBS’s and my reporting? What a bunch of right wing, pajama-wearing, ignorant peasants.

Ride into work;
Just look at all these little people, I wonder if any of them are Bloggers? Look at that guy in the sweat suit, I bet he has a blog. “What’s the matter Jethro, where are your pajamas?” What a looser, I bet he never even went to college.

Lunch at my private table;
Where do these people come from? We should do a story on establishing a 10-day waiting period before you can post a blog. I mean we just can’t have anyone putting out stories for public consumption. Who checks their facts? They could say anything.

Prepping for tonight’s broadcast;
“Hey did we get the fax from the Kerry campaign yet? I want to lead with their talking points if possible. If not can you call some one over at Handgun Control Inc. and get a quote for the assault weapon ban story? Great, and can you get some file footage of someone shot with an AK-47? Yea, the younger and more ethnic looking the better. Thanks, well I’ll be in make-up if you need me."

OK, I am exaggerating, Dan wouldn't think this way, right?

Great post Little Green Footballs

When this war is over......

I have been blog surfing the past week and have come upon a few main themes about the war on terror.

1. That the President is not fighting the war on terror the right way.
2. The war is not worth fighting, we should withdraw our troops now.
3. The war is a scheme thought up by Cheney and Haliburton.
4. The President is doing the right thing, and should stay the coarse.

Now I'm sure we could get to #3422 because there are a bunch of folks with crazy ideas out there. So I will add one more, mine.
We are not yet fighting this war with both hands. No offence to our brave troops on duty in Iraq and Afghanistan, I support you with all my heart and soul, and pray for you all the time. However, I would like to point to the frame of mind that I don't think we have yet and will need to win this war. It was best summed up by Admiral William "Bull" Halsey. He was looking over the the carnage and wreckage of the fleet late on December 7th, 1941.

He said " When this war is over the Japanese language will be spoken only in Hell."

I am not saying that we should round up all the Muslims in the world and summarily execute them, far from it. But we do need to look at the World Trade Center, the Pentagon and a scar in the earth in Pennsylvania and get this fresh in our minds.

When this war is over the extremist Wahaibi form of Islam will be practiced only in Hell.

I am heartened to see some in predominantly Muslim countries are publicly rejecting this form of Islam for the abomination it is. Al Arabia, an all Arab language TV network, has made these statements recently. Good for them. Take back your religion from these terrorists. Shut down these hate filled mosques, teach your children that the people running your country are the problem, not a country 3,000 miles away.

If we get attacked again, and I think we will despite all the money and man-power we are spending to prevent it, the gloves will come off. By that I mean a broadcast to the people in Tehran going something like this " Hello, sorry to disturb you dinner but anyone that does not wish to be turned to ash should exit the Tehran by noon tomorrow, thank you, that is all". Follow that by a note Syria and Lebanon and the Palestinians asking who would like to be next.
We won the second World War by pounding the Nazis and the German countryside into submission. The civilian casualties were terrible, but three generations of German people have been born since then and they are not too inclined to fight to this day. The same with the Japanese, before the war, most of the Japanese public looked upon the Emperor as the embodiment of God. If he said go to war, you obeyed with no questions asked. They received a very costly education from the U.S. about the mortality of the Emperor and the Empire.

I believe this is a World War, and we should be fighting it as one. You are either with us or with the terrorists, well, its time to pick sides because the cruise missiles will be flying through a window near you soon.

Thank goodness I am not President of the United States, or worse yet, Emperor of Earth.

We will kill you last.

I was looking at a site http://www.yolobeatbush2004.com/ and saw the text of Zell Miller's introduction of John Kerry at the Democratic Party of Georgia's Jefferson-Jackson Dinner. It’s Zell speaking glowingly about John Kerry. They use it to make it look like Zell has gone crazy. It makes me chuckle, it is so painfully obvious why Senator Kerry is behind in the polls. Look at the date - March 2001.
This is a position they cannot win from. The Democrats cannot be the September 10, 2001 party and lead this country. In the post-9/11 world we live in, things have changed. Most of the liberals that I speak to are so anti-Bush that they are blind to the way the rest of us in the country thinks.

I am an ex-democrat, believe what you will about George W Bush, he is not sitting in his office with Dick Cheney scheming about ways to put poor people out on the street or how he can make more money for Halliburton. I honestly believe he gets a briefing every morning that would make you or I want to crawl under our beds. There are people, Islamic terrorist mainly, that want to kill you and I. Not because George Bush is the President, because they have been taught to believe that America is the main force of evil on the planet. They believed it when Bill Clinton was in the White House, they believe it now, and they will teach their children the same thing.

They must be stopped. By stopped, I mean killed, period. As the people in Russia just discovered, when the terrorists busted through the doors of that school last week. Reports from the victims that survived quoted the terrorists as shouting "Allahu Akhbar! as they murdered the defenseless children. God is great? What kind of culture teaches it's people that they way to glorify God is the deliberate murder of children.

Senator Kerry is the right man for his state. He can afford to be wrong on national defense all the time as a Senator. There are 99 other votes to cancel out his mistakes. As President he will join the Germans and the French who will negotiate with the terrorists and come away with this bargain; "We will kill you last".

No thanks.

"Typewritergate"

I have been enjoyed watching the "Typewritergate" story unfold as more actual experts come forward to say that the documents Dan Rather and 60 Minutes used in their hit piece on the President are forgeries. http://www.hughhewitt.com/ Just think if this were thrown out Sunday night before the election. It reminds me of the DUI story the Gore camp tossed out the weekend before the 2000 election. This might have been worth 1-2 points in some swing states and done real damage with no time to refute the memos. This must be "use it or lose it" time in the Kerry Camp. They know that if they don't do something to counter the Bush bounce, Kerry will be back down to his core numbers, 40- 42% of the electorate that would vote for a anyone with a "D" next to their name. The Kerry campaign is leaking, and waves are getting bigger everyday.

I hope the Vice President did not strike a match to a fuse last week when he said that a wrong choice in this election could lead to another larger attack. Dick Cheney is smarter than me by a factor that I cannot guess, but if Al Qaeda does attack America before the election the Kerry camp will run a spot with VP's quote round the clock to throw it back in his face.

Even though I am starting a new business and do not have money to spare, I am donating to the National Republican Senatorial Committee. http://www.nrsc.org/ If we can return sanity to the US senate and have a 6 or 8 seat majority, next election cycle we can start to back more conservative challengers to the milk-toast moderate republicans.

Starting my new Business

Today I woke before dawn to get to the State exam site on time. I got there on time, well sort of, I was an hour and a half early. So after two large coffees and a bagel, I was ready to take my Contractors test. I took the law and the trade tests and passed them both in two hours. I was relieved to say the least. That was until I had to start writing check to the bonding company, the school, the State again. That is what you should expect starting a new business.

Other than that, I was able to listen to talk-radio again. I have burning the candle and have not been able to catch up on the mud-slinging and back biting of the Presidential campaign. Sounds like the Kerry camp is pulling out all the mud they were saving for the last weekend, allegation and half truths could not have been diffused in time for the election. I wonder if anyone with an open mind can look at the "military Documents" with the new type of fonts and irregular format and say, ya know I believe Dan Rather, these show proof that if you put George W Bush in office he is going to leave town when the going gets rough. Then you have to think that, Oh that's right, He has been Commander in Chief for the past three years and has been rock solid and steadfast in the war on terror. Oh and by the way, I must have missed the adds and the speeches he has been giving touting his record in the Texas Nation guard as proof of his fitness for command.

Unlike his opponent, who has based his entire campaign on the fact that 30 years ago he served four months in Vietnam. I hope you are not fooled by the mainstream media. They are as Pro-Kerry as you could get without being on the campaign payroll. John Kerry has been a United States Senator for 19 years, by my limited math skills that's about 57 times longer than his tour in Vietnam. What has he done in this time? Where are his adds saying " I proposed and worked hard to pass this legislation or that bill that would have made life better for you and family" they are just not there. He has been a Tax and Spend Liberal from Massachusetts, and that about all I can gather. I have no problems with Liberals, I don't. I think their ideas are wrong, but this is America and people have different ideas, I get that. Where I have no patience with Liberals is, they won't tell you what they really want to do! If John Kerry told the American people what he would really like to do if he was President, he would lose in a landslide. That is a cold fact. Sorry.

Welcome toYolo County, now go home.

My inaugural posting finds me two days away from taking my contractors license test here in CalIfornia (as Arnold would say). I am not at all sure the redtape and regulation is worth the opportunity to be low-bidder. However as I sit in my mind-numbing class 8 hour class the thought occurs to me that if I want to be paid what I think I'm worth, I had better be the one writing the checks.
I am brand new to the bloggesphere, and have often wondered if I had anything worthy of posting and having you folks (or folk as the case may be) read. In any case, here I go.

I live in the once exceedingly rural Yolo County California. In Esparto, gateway to the Capay Valley. I say once because the County is rapidly changing. Counties do that, and I am not the type to harken back to a quieter time when you could have a picnic on the centerline of Highway 16 after10 pm without fear of becoming street-pizza. Although I do remember getting latenight call from the Highway Patrol informing me that my cows were on the road,,, again. If my cows wondered on that same road today, they would meet a rapid demise in the grill of a speeding Bingo player's Honda Accord on the way to the Indian casino.

I love this place, this wormhole in time and space. A place where you meet wonderful down to earth people, farmers and ranchers that would be just as happy if it were 1947 again, or 1847 for that matter. Then turn the corner and find a PHD that works at U.C. Davis that is rather annoyed that he can't get DSL out here in the "sticks". The Bush/Cheney stickers outnumber the Kerry/Edwards stickers 3 to 1, and most of the population still drive pickups. Friday-night football is still the most exciting (only) thing to do.

My blog will be a about,,,,, lots of thing, stuff and assorted miscellaneous rambling. I do hope to have a point to make along the way. I have opinions that I will express and if I ruffle your feathers, be glad I don't corner you down at the Junction ( the local watering hole) where your feathers might get plucked.

I am rapidly approaching 40, and my wife will attest to the fact that I love talking politics, guns, horses, beef cattle, and history. I mention my age only to say that I have been forming my opinions for some time. They are my beliefs, and by God, I believe them!

I must get some sleep, I have another 8 hours of painfully dull class tomorrow.
Get back to soon.