Persons: The New Eunuchs

By

William D. Dannenmaier

During the sexual “revolution” of the 1970’s, George F. Gilder wrote an attack on the entire sexual freedom movement (Sexual Suicide, 1973). At the time I was a licensed psychologist teaching, among other things, mental health. I loved the book. In one passage Mr. Gilder addressed the then popular “Sex and Temperament in a Primitive Society” by Margaret Meade which discussed the sexual mores of three tribes. “Why,” Mr. Gilder asked, “would we want to copy the behaviors of three dying civilizations?”

In 1854 Henry David Thoreau wrote “The mass of men live lives of quiet desperation” in “Walden”. (1854)  In some respects, there has been little change since Thoreau wrote, but in other respects great change. The drive for equality before the law between men and women which culminated in the 1960’s became, and remains, a movement which proclaims the equality of identity of men and women and equality in sexual freedom as well as equality in the work place.  

I was fortunate to grow in a society in which the idea of married women working was frowned upon. Men and women were supposed to marry and have families. The men were to provide for the family through their employment – their working hours often stretching into ten and twelve hour days – and the women were to manage the family. As the men worked, even cooking and cleaning in the workplaces, the women cooked and cleaned in the homes, cared for the children in the absence of their husbands and frequently managed the household finances. In my youth, men, tired from days of labor and taking orders from others, which all did regardless of wealth, were pleased to come to a home managed by a wife which provided warmth: relaxation, comradeship and, often, entertainment even if it meant only laughing at children’s antics. 

The feminist revolt of the 1960s changed this. Feminists taught, and young women believed, that women should enter the workforce, that the workforce was a place of opportunity and freedom. Employment and independence became the goal for young women. But there is no independence in employment, nor is there lasting pleasure in dedicating one’s life to most jobs. Were Thoreau writing today, he would have to write “men and women live lives of quiet desperation.” Just as men must obey orders and do as they are told by employers, fearing unemployment through “force reductions” or the closing of firms, so do employed women.  Paid employment is not freedom.

Feminism has changed men’s lives as well as women’s lives. Men now come home to tired wives, if married, or “partners” if not married, who have also spent the day working. There is little pleasure or relaxation in returning home, better a visit at a bar or meeting at a restaurant. This is not only expensive, but it provides little opportunity for true relaxation and companionship.  If finances or interests do not permit these “entertainments” one can always drowse stupidly in front of a television watching equally irrelevant and stupid shows. All of these activities provide a poor groundwork for an enjoyable and stabile marriage – or life.

Thoreau also said, “That man is richest whose pleasures are the cheapest.” In a similar vein, a hundred years later, my pastor and friend Frank Chubb once gave a sermon on “The Ninety-Eight Necessities of Life.” He then proceeded to enumerate things for which we spend our lives working, but which we don’t need. We have become a society in love with possessions, prestige and money.  In order to obtain and support these luxuries, including four and five bedroom houses with multiple bathrooms for childless couples, both must work. In seeking these unnecessary social frills, too many women have abandoned their traditional role as the leader of the family.  

Consider the following. Who has the greatest freedom, the woman who arises at six or seven to get to a place of employment and spend eight hours doing as she is told before spending another hour returning home or the married woman who, with a responsible husband, stays home and cares for the children? Husband “responsibility” includes helping at home, even when that help simply consists of putting an arm around a wife’s shoulders when she has had more of children than she can stand, turning her away, and taking over the children for a few hours.

Remember that as soon as those children begin attending school the home-maker wife has seven or eight hours by herself, giving orders only to herself. Some such women play bridge or golf, some run small businesses from their home, some become active in community affairs. Not theirs, the behind a counter or a computer life, doing as some manager says. The sky is their limit. If you don’t believe that, read Sarah Palin’s history.

It is true that women with children who have lost their husbands must be able to make a living, but the truly independent woman is she with a responsible husband who supports the family. She controls the budget, allocating the spending. She not only dresses the children, she teaches them their moral values. She determines how she spends the hours of her day and of the days of her children. In effect, she controls the future of the United States to a greater extent than any working person or any politician. 

Women who make a living as “feminists” have discarded their femininity in return for money, prestige and power. In discarding their roles of wife and mother they have made themselves into modern eunuchs. They are persons, not women, and more and more young women are realizing the emptiness of such lives.

Change the World?

By

William D. Dannenmaier

In a speech given during the primaries in New Hampshire, Barack Obama said, “We won’t just win in New Hampshire. We will win this election and, you and I together, we’re going to change the country and change the world.” (Toby Hamden, Telegraph.co.uk) Do we really want that?

I have lived long enough to be aware of and read about other leaders who have decided to “change the world.” Some called themselves Communists and some called themselves Socialists, which has always struck me as different labels on the same can of beans. In both cases, a powerful federal government decides what is best for all people.   

Probably the first of these was Lenin, and he did change his country, he effectively destroyed a fledgling democracy. His word was Communism, an idea in which all the power belonged to the people, but in reality rested in him and a powerful, privileged, leadership. Then he was ousted by Stalin, who used military power to take over Russia and much of Eastern Europe. In the process, he killed hundreds of thousands who opposed him. As his power spread in Europe, the number killed increased to millions, mostly among the working middle-class. But the indolent and the criminal class did not profit either, he established re-education camps in Siberia, where they learned to work for a living – or starve.  

A second person who set out to change his country and the world was Hitler. His dogmatism was Socialism. (Nazi stood for “National Socialist Party.) Following his election to leadership in the then Democracy of Germany, he used his goon squads to silence dissidents: early victims, who were imprisoned and executed, included the handicapped, Masons, peace loving Christians such as the Jehovah’s Witnesses and more than 800 Protestant ministers. Finally he turned his attention to the Jews. It was all for the good of the nation. He and those about him knew what was good for all.

Mao also knew what was best for the people of China. He executed over two million Chinese and, over the years, led the nation into poverty. It was only after his death, with the slow introduction of capitalism, which permits people to decide for themselves what is best for them, that prosperity returned for many, but it has been slow. 

Castro promised change. He was young, handsome and an excellent speaker – like Hitler. The people of Cuba needed change, and supported him. It was only after he gained control of the nation that they realized they no longer enjoyed the freedom to determine their own lives. Castro knew what was best. Millions fled the nation and the others now live in poverty. Not, of course, the leadership. As in all Socialist (Communist) nations, the leaders live privileged lives in prosperity. 

Now Chavez has decided he knows what is best for Venezuela. Young, handsome and an excellent speaker, he won leadership. At first, the country prospered as Chavez reaped the profits of capitalism, but now it is sinking into economic despair as industry after industry is taken over and directed by the government, but Chavez and the elite with whom he has surrounded himself still know what is best – and prosper.

Now we have Obama. Like Lenin, Hitler, Castro and Chavez, Obama is young, handsome and a marvelous speaker. He has been quoted as saying he will change the nation and the world. Currently all of the major media, all of whom have supported him, predict he will win the Presidency. This has made me consider how he might be expected to change the nation – and the world.

For starters, I believe all lawsuits against ACORN for its corruption and millions in tax evasion will be dropped, Unlike Hitler’s Gestapo or Mussolini’s adherents, ACORN members will not start wearing black shirts or brown shirts to identify their allegiance – at least not immediately. A few hundred dollars cash will be thrown to the poor and the welfare careerists, much as the emperors of Rome and the nobility of Medieval Europe threw coins to the poor as they rode by, to ensure their allegiance. Higher taxes will be imposed on the workers, but not on the wealthy who already have their money, so the Pelosis, the Reids, the Kerrys, the Gores and other important, wealthy, friends will be spared. Health care will be nationalized, creating a new, privileged, bureaucracy in WashingtonDC. The “fairness” doctrine will be passed and imposed on radio, one of the two current means by which average citizens can express their wishes and communicate with each other. It will not be extended to newspapers and major media, as yet, as they are Obama supporters. If, however, they stop to think and analyze where Obama is leading the nation, it can be extended to them, as happened in Germany and Cuba and is currently happening in Russia. I also expect some sort of fairness doctrine to be imposed on the Internet, the other current media by which average citizens can express their thoughts and communicate with one another. In general, all power will be concentrated in WashingtonDC, where politicians, such as Biden and Kennedy, millionaires who have never worked for a living, know what is best for all of us. We may not like this, although many will. It is easier to obey than to accept responsibility for yourself. He will change our world, if not the world.  As indicated, others have succeed in one and attempted the other.

Racism is Dead

By

William D. Dannenmaier

One of the silliest things I have heard from news commentators recently, has been the assertion that Obama’s candidacy for President means that racism in the United States is dead.

If any of those white news anchors truly believe this fiction, they should try walking down the street in a black neighborhood or a Hispanic neighborhood in any major city in the nation, including WashingtonDC, without their camera crews, body guards and armored vehicles. Then let them say that, after they get out of the hospital, provided they live. 

When I was a member of an evaluation team for HowardUniversity we were quartered in a nice hotel bordering a black neighborhood. One morning I stepped out of the front door and the black doorman, a tall strong man, asked me where I was going. I said I thought I would take a walk down the street. Looking at me, he said, “I wouldn’t do that if I were you.” I took his advice and simply crossed the street for a much less expensive breakfast than the hotel provided. The media personalities seem concerned that some of the 40 something percent of the whites who intend to vote for McCain might do so because Obama is black. I have not heard one suggest that the reason 98% of the blacks intend to vote for Obama has anything to do with race. 

But racism is not limited to blacks, it extends across racial and ethnic lines. A friend, one of my wife’s co-workers of years past, who happens to be black, told me that he was walking though a Hispanic neighborhood when three young men started following him. He said when he speeded up, they speeded up. Knowing that he wasn’t a fighter, he didn’t know what to do, but he knew he had to protect himself, so he turned around and assumed the stance that he had seen karate experts on television use even though he knew nothing about karate. He said the Hispanics stopped also and one of them said to the others, “Hey, this guy is a karate expert, let’s leave him alone.” They left.  He gave a great sigh of relief.

The truth is that there are neighborhoods in which any person who does not “belong” is in danger. I taught in one of the worst white slum areas in St. Louis for several years. I could visit and walk in that neighborhood after dark because I “belonged.” The young men hanging out on the streets knew me. But I would not have felt safe walking in neighboring white neighborhoods. Even though I was white, I didn’t belong.

When I was a student teacher, I was assigned to a slum school in North St. Louis. To get there, after leaving the bus, I walked through a black neighborhood. My father, a salesman at Sears, was telling his best friend there, Walter Bibbs (the unofficial boss of the warehouse and a tall strong black man) about my walk. Walter told him that I shouldn’t be doing that. Dad reported that Walter said, “Danne, I wouldn’t walk through that neighborhood and I’m black.”

The truth is that people like to associate with others of their own type: type by race, by ethnic group, by religion, by socio-economic class. Not all such groupings are dangerous, although they are restrictive, even if that restriction is simply ignoring the outsider. During my two years in junior high school I was in a special class. I was the only non-Jew in the class for those two years. Now, looking back, I have only respect for those Jewish fellow students. This was in the early forties when the treatment of Jews in Germany was well publicized, and there I was: Germanic and the only member of the class who was blond and blue-eyed, yet never was I insulted or abused because of that. I was, however, ignored and never a member of any casual conversation group. I didn’t belong. 

Over the years, I’ve learned to accept the fact that people with commonalities like to associate with one another: so Italians like to group and complain about the treatment they received from the Nuns who taught them, so blacks hang out together, so do football fans and bridge-players. So what? 

When I was sixteen, an elderly friend gave me a cheap fishing outfit. I was delighted, I loved it. As soon as possible I took a street car to the end of the line, by Creve Coeur lake, outside of St. Louis. It was raining heavily and a black man was there sitting under a small tent. He invited me to join him. Sitting there, I talked fishing and, I suspect, he quickly realized I didn’t know anything about it. When the rain stopped, he gave me some tips, as any other experienced adult would do for an enthusiastic youngster. I even caught a fish (a gar). We weren’t a black man and a white teenager – we were fishermen, we belonged.  

The problem arises when some small sub-group decides their problems arise from someone else and decide to punish those other people.

My experience of teaching college students over the years, leads me to believe that those who blame others for their problems are typically the ones who don’t work: don’t attempt to direct and improve their own lives. Lazy, failing, students always blame the professor, workers never do, even when they fail. I suspect many (but not all) of the shouts of racist, sexist, ethicist discrimination, etc., arise from just such people, and that it is endorsed and promoted by those who profit from it. It is always easier to blame someone else than to correct your own problems.

Our Amazing Academics

By

William D. Dannenmaier

As a retired professor, of over twenty years at the university level, I find two things amazing about our current academics: both administrators and teachers. First, is their interpretation of academic freedom. Second is their blind trust in students.

As a professor, I had the silly notion that when I taught a class in educational psychology or statistics, I was supposed to teach educational psychology or statistics. It is true that before class or after class, often in the coffee shop, I would joke, or talk politics, or car repair or, with older students (graduates of Vietnam) reminisce about combat situations, but not in class. From the time class started until the bell rang ending the class, I taught the subject assigned. I did believe in academic freedom, but I thought this meant I could teach in the way I wished, provided I was on subject. Thus, in statistics, I frequently put students at the board to solve problems and then reviewed their solutions for the class, just as I had in mathematics classes before starting college instruction. In educational psychology, I would use real life examples to illustrate principles. This latter confused some students, but they learned to apply academic ideas to life situations. Now, stories I hear from students tell of professors who spend class time discussing subjects completely irrelevant to the subject they are paid to teach.

A student I know signed to take English Composition II during summer school at AustinPeayStateUniversity. The first day the person attended class, the professor spent the entire class time expounding on why students should not vote for John McCain and why he should not be president. 

Let us assume that the student was not alone, that others signed up to study English. Summer classes at Austin Peay last five weeks and meet for an hour and a half each day for a total of 25 meetings.

Each student paid approximately $600 dollars for the class, plus other fees. Assuming that there were 25 students enrolled, a reasonable assumption, the teacher, or school, was receiving $600 dollars a day, for instructing students in English. Preaching a political stance instead of English took that one class away from the students. In effect, that professor stole from them the $600 dollars of instruction that they had paid for. 

If the school administrators know the professor is doing this, they are taking money under false pretences which should be fraud, if it isn’t.

I assume that teacher would defend her actions on a basis of academic freedom, but does academic freedom mean that the teacher is entitled to talk about any subject, whether an expert in that subject or not, without regard to the subject that he or she is being paid to teach? 

This is not academic freedom, it is academic theft!

The second amazing element in today’s colleges is the blind faith in students. Many schools now use the Internet to assign problems and conduct tests. Each student has an identity number to permit them access to the computer program, be it an assignment or a test. Has it ever occurred to anyone in higher education that it would be very easy for a student, interested only in a degree not learning, to log on to the computer and then have a competent friend, or paid helper, do the assignment or take the test for them? 

Approximately forty years ago, Dr. Don Black at the University of Alberta decided to test the honesty of a class of some sixty graduate students, all working teachers. Following a test, he graded them without making marks on the papers and recorded those grades. He told me that when he returned the tests he apologized to them, saying he had not had time to grade them. He then had them grade the papers themselves and report the grades to him. Approximately 80% of the class cheated in their scoring and grading. It may amaze the reader to know that all of the students’ grading “mistakes” were in their favor. 

I must confess that this tendency of students to help themselves is not new. If I go back to my days in college, now some sixty years past, that tendency of students to help themselves existed then. In fact, I would not have passed Zoology, had it not been for some illicit assistance on the final examination from my friend Joe Gore, later Dean of Education at a major university. 

The Internet may make life easier for professors, but it is not as if they were overworked. Few lecture more than 12 hours a week and for many it is 9 hours a week, often in classes they have taught frequently and for which they need little or no preparation. Using the Internet for assignments and examinations only makes cheating easier and more attractive.

Cost-Plus Contracts

By

William D. Dannenmaier

A comment by Senator McCain during his first debate was little noticed or examined by media. He said that one way to reduce the government deficit would be to eliminate military cost-plus contracts. Few people realize the hundreds of millions, probably billions, of tax dollars that have been wasted by such contracts.

When I was at WashingtonUniversity, one of my jobs was developing personnel selection programs for business and industry. I would not only evaluate their situation; I would develop a test battery for personnel, conduct the testing and report the results. Occasionally, this included proposing management development programs tailored to the specific business employing us. As part of this latter approach, which always involved senior professors at the university, I would attend the lectures and evaluate their effectiveness. This often included transporting the professor to and from the business concerned. I came to know several nationally respected experts in different fields, not just from listening at the lectures, but from quiet discussions on returning them home. 

My favorite was Dr. Sterling Schoen, an expert on management. One night, returning him home he told me of a study he had recently completed in which the effect of cost-plus contracts with the military had almost ruined a firm.

The company had been awarded a cost-plus contract by the military in 1940. They continued working military contracts until the late 1950’s when they lost their military contract and had to compete on the open market. That is when they began losing money. Bankruptcy threatened. Sterling was hired to evaluate the problem. He told me that he did a very simple study. Beginning with foremen, he asked each person in management to name the people who reported to him, and the people to whom he reported. He said that this procedure revealed six or seven (I’ve forgotten which) management personnel who had no one who reported to them and who reported to no one. In other words, they simply came to work, attended meetings and had no specific duties. 

For years, this had been very profitable for the company. Not just their salaries, but their secretaries’ salaries, their business trips to meetings (including transportation and hotels), their business luncheons and dinners were all part of the “cost.” This not only contributed to the total cost paid by the taxpayers, it greatly increased their profits, because their contract with the military gave them a percentage, perhaps as high as 10%, of the total cost. Now the company, having lost cost-plus contracts, had to pay their salaries and expenses without reward in either productivity or profit.

To the best of my knowledge, after being employed as a researcher by the army for ten years, all military contracts are cost-plus contracts. They contain no incentive for efficiency or economy. On the contrary, they reward inefficiency. Senator McCain must be very aware of cost-plus contracts from his years in the air force following his release from prisoner of war camp. Thus when one reads an occasional article complaining of some multi-million cost over-run, understand, this only increases the company’s profit. Why should they be concerned with keeping a project within the approved budget? 

I mentioned this to one of my sons who maintained an office in WashingtonDC for several years.  

 He assured me that the practice of “cost-plus” contracts was common throughout government.

In effect, we have a system, ignored if not supported, by our administrative branch of government headed by President Bush – and other Presidents before him – and by Congress, Democrats and Republicans alike which leads to the waste of taxpayer dollars. But the system is still worse; leaks of corruption in the oversight of oil contracts in the western states by government officials who would rather party with the company officials they are supposed to be over-seeing and who pay for dinners, drinks and prostitutes than enforce the rules; make one suspicious that such corruption is rampant elsewhere as well.

This is a problem that requires the work of a good, thorough, investigative reporter, but revelations of the so-called investigator reporters of the New York Times, USA Today and a few other newspapers reveals that these people would rather sit in their Beltway offices and telephone informers or simply stay at home and create imaginative articles. I believe the idea of carefully digging into the facts and behavior of government officials is beyond their interest, or their competence.

My hope, which can’t possibly happen, would be to elect an all new Congress and hope that they, in combination with a President who would houseclean the federal bureaucracy, would clean up the mess. To date, however, no one has picked up on McCain’ comment during the first debate that cost-plus contracts are a major budget problem.  If a President McCain did do it, if he could do it, it would be a good reason for electing him.

Meanderings

By

William D. Dannenmaier

Media stars complained that Sarah Palin was sending the same message every time. That is a problem for a person who has values and beliefs. They don’t change daily. Perhaps that is why the media personalities favor Obama, he is for change. He changes on economics, he changes on Iraq, he changes on so much it is hard to keep track. But he can be depended on for something new every time he talks. 

My son Bill reported that the damage to the homes he and his brothers Chris and Eric own in Galveston has been much worse than expected and he wondered if Stephen and Andrew could use their spring vacations to come and help.  I asked Andrew and his immediate answer was “Yes.” While Stephen was preparing to leave for school I asked him if he would go, provided his half-brothers paid his transportation down and back. I liked his immediate answer. “Certainly, one has to help family.” 

Some may recall that early in Obama’s run for the Democratic nomination he visited Africa. Accompanied by photographers and news media, he recalled his family heritage which included a visit to his half-brother. In a follow-up visit by a reporter from a European newspaper, the half-brother was reported as living in a hut on a dollar a month and said that his one wish was to get enough money to go to school to be a mechanic, so he could earn a decent living. (Dinesh D’Souza, Townhall.com, September 8, 2008) If one considers it, the faith of some people is amazing. Obama, a millionaire, will not send his half-brother the few hundred dollars that would enable him to obtain the education that he needs to escape poverty, yet people believe that if he elected, he will do great things to help people he doesn’t know.

Following a small incident at the Cardiac Club, I am again under house arrest until I receive approval from my cardiologist – no exercising, no lifting of objects over 10 pounds, and a report from Sheila on my daily diet, heart checks three times a day, etc. I telephoned Dr. Smith’s office to protest (Dr. Gary Smith is my G.P.) in anticipation of visiting him immediately. His delayed reply was that he had broken his foot. I e-mailed in return that he should stop kicking the wall when he heard that I planned an office visit.

Sheila had a laugh on me today. It was time to take the trash to the dumpster, so I began carrying the bags out to the four-wheeler, when Sheila bustled in, pushed me out of the way and carried the heavier bags and put them in the trailer. As I drove down the driveway and headed to the dumpster, I was laughing to myself that it hadn’t occurred to my bride that I would lift them out and throw them in the dumpster. After I arrived at the dumpster and had thrown in a lighter bag, Andrew pulled up in Stephen’s car. Sheila had sent him racing down to unload the trailer. She enjoyed that petty victory over me out of all proportion (in my opinion) to her triumph.

I would never, ever, under any conditions suggest or even hint that my bride doesn’t anticipate needs, consider resources and plan in detail her delicious meals, that’s why I was a bit surprised when, as I asked her what was for dinner. She looked up from where she was bending over varied packages in the bottom of the refrigerator and said, “I don’t know. Probably what’s in this package as soon as I find out what it is.”

Still on the topic of brides, I noticed an empty Hershey’s wrapper the other morning, and accused Sheila of eating chocolate without sharing. Her reply, “I know you believe it is immoral to eat chocolate before noon, but I don’t. So I helped save a moral dilemma for you by not mentioning it.” When I replied that she was flip-flopping on morals, she said, “Absolutely not. I’m firm in my morals for me and I’m firm on my morals for you.” Husbands can’t win.

The other morning I awoke completely refreshed, noticed that Sheila was up and hopped up myself. Entering the kitchen, I noticed she hadn’t started my coffee so I began that, but decided a trip to the bathroom was more essential. On the way there, I encountered my bride returning. Going back to the kitchen, I started on coffee and then looked at the clock. It was 11:30! I had slept all of two hours. I quit on the coffee and returned to bed.

On a political note, I have enjoyed the picture of Pelosi and Reid standing together, not a Republican in sight, and proclaiming the success of their Wall Street Bailout. The picture occurred on the same day that headlines announced that the bill had failed in passage. Now, Pelosi puts the Republicans as responsible, forgetting to mention that 40% of the Democrats she leads voted against it. For once, members of the House of Representatives have represented their constituents’ wishes!

All in all, the month of September was not the best for either McCain or me. Our refrigerator quit cooling, the gas heater in the study was disintegrating, the microwave showed problems and I was unable to get the doctor’s approval to return to normal activity until he has put me through some tests and I have seen a surgeon. Now, we have a new refrigerator, a new gas heater, a replacement microwave and Sheila has been talking about how attractive some of the men in the Cardiac Club are.   

Stray Thoughts

By

William D. Dannenmaier

My son Stephen announced to me that he has finally figured out “global warming.” He says there is no such thing, but that politicians spend so much time in air conditioned offices, airplanes and automobiles that they are shocked by their momentary exposures to the out-of-doors. They are also concerned about all the energy consumed by their air conditioners. Their solution is “global warming.” By cooling off the planet as a whole, they won’t need to expend energy – or their suppliants’ energy – by turning on and off air conditioners. 

Obama has suggested that if we keep our tires filled, we will increase our gas mileage and reduce our dependence on oil. That is true, but he should expand that theme. For one, we should quit using plastics. Plastics are an oil derivative. Return to glass soda bottles, they don’t require the use of oil and they can be re-used. Quit using plastic pipes, which have a short lifetime. Return to copper pipes, which last for years. Quit paving roads with asphalt which is an oil derivative, use concrete which lasts forever. Women should quit using make-up, again an oil derivative. The government should quit paying for highways which encourage drivers and use that money to support electric streetcars and buses in cities. Return to coal fired locomotives. All of these changes would do much more to reduce our dependence on oil than filling up our tires. They would reduce our dependence on oil companies and our need to drill for more oil also. 

For the past fourteen years, Congress and Presidents, primarily under the lead of Democrats have prevented the drilling for oil in known locations. Now the Democrats are complaining about the economy. Hasn’t it occurred to any of them that sending hundreds of millions, perhaps billions, of dollars to foreign countries every year for oil, while not using our own resources, is going to hurt our economy? It is remarkable, and a testament to the strength of our nation, that we have done as well as we have done during this stupidity.

Son Stephen said that people like Justice Thomas, Secretary of State Rice, Drs. Sowell and Williams and Star Parker aren’t real Blacks because they’re too busy being successful. He said it is only fair to say that Sarah Palin isn’t a REAL woman. While she has a successful, full-time career, she also has five children and a husband. No real woman would do that.  ((I have since read that the spokeswoman for NOW (National Organization for Women) has said that Palin isn’t a real woman!))

The cold that has plagued me through July and August has resumed its attacks. I mentioned to my bride that one of us should go to Dr. Smith and get enough medicine for two – a gentle hint that I KNOW she enjoys driving to Nashville. Her reply was that Dr. Smith never gives her medicine, only me. It’s a plot. To increase his business and the pleasures of my visits, he gives only me medicine. Knowing that Sheila and I are what you might call affectionate, he relies on the fact that as soon as I am well I’ll catch her cold again, requiring another trip to his office. (Actually, I’m afraid to return. I ate so many of their office brownies on my last visit – they may have been under the impression I was sharing with Sheila – that I need for Sheila to cook some treat before I return, which seems unlikely to happen until Christmas.)

Dinesh D’Souza ( Townhall.com, September 08, 2008) reports that Obama’s half-brother is living in poverty in Africa on a dollar a month. Obama visited that brother when he was publicizing his African “roots.” Then he left him in poverty. Obama has said great things about ending poverty for all, but if he won’t help his half-brother, what makes anyone, who is not a member of his clique, believe that he would help them? In a way, it was like his tour to Germany. When he found out that his press corps would not be admitted to the hospital in Landstuhl if he visited wounded veterans, he played basketball instead.  If it doesn’t profit Obama, forget it.

My bride was not disturbed by Obama’s reaction to his half-brother, but son Stephen was. He said that if any of his half-brothers or sisters were in trouble he would certainly do his best to help them, and I believe that. I also believe that those half-siblings would never permit their step-mother or half-brothers or sister to need help. In fact, two of them have already offered free housing to Stephen if he wanted to attend school in their communities. 

I was reminded the other evening of rule number three for helpful husbands. “Never take a shower immediately after putting a load of wash in on hot.” That comes immediately after rule one, “Always obey your bride,” and rule two, “always obey your bride.” 

Christian Nation

By

William D. Dannenmaier

In one of his speeches, Senator Obama said that the United States is “no longer just a Christian nation; we are also a Jewish nation, a Muslim nation, a Buddhist nation, a Hindu nation, and a nation of non-believers” (Christian News Network: June 28, 2006). I thought of his claim while listening to a sermon on Moses leading the children of Israel out of Egypt.

What he said is simply not true. Just as Moses led the children of Israel, leaders of the Pilgrims and Quakers led their people out of the discrimination and poverty of England, Holland and Germany to America. Here, they and their descendants established a government based on the principles that all people are created equal before God and that all people should be equal before the law. Most importantly, the Quakers of Pennsylvania, under the leadership of William Penn, accepted all peoples as equals before the law, without regard to their race or religion. You could be a Jew or a Muslim or a Hindu or a Buddhist or an atheist, it didn’t matter. What did matter was that you obeyed the laws based on Christian principles. In that sense, an important sense, it was a Christian state. 

I know little about Israel, but I have slight experience. While teaching in Canada I bought a book written by a Christian Israeli. He documented that the Christian community in Palestine had supported the Jews in their struggle for independence. He also named Christian communities that had fought with the Jews that were forcibly removed from “strategic” areas to other areas in the new nation. His own family, he reported, had lived and farmed in the interior of what is now Israel for generations. One day the Israeli military decided it wanted his family’s home and farm. The family went to court and the judge ruled in their favor, but the military ignored that, demolished his home and took his land. I gave that book to a student, intending to purchase a new one after I returned to the United States. Later I was sorry. The book, published in England and available in Canada was not available in the United States.

I have two other, lesser, examples.  A friend of my youth, Alex Tecklin who owned a tailor business and whom I came to know well during my years as a stockboy in men’s clothing at Famous Barr, offered me a partnership when I went to see him after leaving the army. In a later visit he told me that he, an orthodox Jew, was closing his business and migrating to Israel, his religious home. A few years later I encountered him in downtown St. Louis. When I expressed surprise he said, “Israel was disappointing, it is not a democracy, it is a military dictatorship. 

In a second incident, years later, I had a student at AustinPeayUniversity who liked me and ran a business. He came to offer me a job, having received a contract as a minority business owner. Chatting – I wasn’t interested in the job – he told me his history. Originally from Cuba, with a Hispanic name, he had migrated to Israel and served in the Israeli army. After completing his service, he migrated to the United States. I told him Alex’s story and he agreed. He said it was a military dictatorship and hard on any citizen who did not belong to the correct, orthodox, minority. He said that was why he left. 

In terms of the United States being a “Muslim” nation, I don’t believe that and wouldn’t want it. I know a lot more about it from the refrain on newspaper articles on Muslim’s killing innocent people who happened to belong to the wrong sect even though they were Muslim, not to mention what they do to non-Muslims when they control a nation and administer its laws. I have also read some of the Muslim Qur’an. Once you get past the first two or three short surahs (chapters), which are almost condensed versions of the first few books of the Old Testament, you find a religious document, which places women in a second place, Christians and Jews in an even lesser place and advocates death for all other minorities. How is it possible for laws based on such a religion to co-exist peacefully with laws based on Christian principles? The answer is, “It can’t!” For proof examine the problems of Holland and Belgium. 

I know less about Buddhists and Hindus, although I occasionally read articles about Buddhist mobs attacking Christians and Hindu mobs burning Christian churches and killing adults and children alike in varied far eastern nations. I’m always sorry for those Christians and, if I consider it, glad I don’t live there.

Mr. Obama may want the United States to be a land of Christian, Jewish, Muslim and other religions and laws, but I don’t. I want it to continue to be a nation based on Christian principles, which permit people of other faiths their beliefs provided their practices do not violate our Christian based laws.  

Stray Thoughts

By

William D. Dannenmaier

Honest people have received, finally, the right to own guns for self-protection, but they aren’t allowed to purchase them in WashingtonDC, or purchase them elsewhere and bring them to WashingtonDC. Makes sense, does it not? But then Congress rules DC. So important people, Congressional members and their influential (read wealthy) friends can have heavily armed bodyguards, but not every day working people. Thus, in DC, only two groups can walk around with guns, criminals and Congressional members, if you can tell the difference.

Were I a Republican running for Congress this year, in every speech, I would include the line, “if you are one of the 9% who approve of Congress, vote Democratic; if you are one of the 74% who are disgusted with Congress, vote Republican. Of course two of those Democrats who have been running Congress are on the Democratic ticket for the Presidency.

Hunting for my bride in the grocery store the other day, I thought of a simple, fool-proof test the army could use to determine if a soldier would make a good scout. Team him with an experienced housewife, send them to a grocery store, give her a two minute head-start and record how long – or if – he can find her. Any soldier who can find her within a reasonable time will make a great scout.

While working at the Cardiac Club the other day, my bride reminded me that we needed gas on the way home. I replied that we needed gas to get home, explaining to friends that we were using my son’s car. Then I added, “Someday I’d like to meet a man whose son’s car doesn’t need gas.” The listening men all cheered.

When we have packages, our mail carrier, Lynda Sucher, drives up to the house instead of leaving them at the mailbox. The other day we had some particularly heavy ones (books!) and when I went out to meet her, she asked me if I could carry them, clearly indicating that she would carry them to the house for me if I needed help. I replied that if I used my two arms together, it caused no problems, so she carefully stacked them into my waiting hands and watched as I returned to the house. I don’t know who told her of my heart and chest problems, but she went well beyond being nice, she was also considerate and willing to help. People like Lynda go beyond making a person’s day, they make a person’s week.

Finally! In my last blog, I complained that all of the candidates in the election came from wealthy, privileged, families. Obama is a product of expensive private schools and the Chicago political machine, Joe Biden’s family had sufficient money for him to run for the Senate, and win at the age of 29. He has never known anything other than politics. While McCain’s experience as a prisoner proved an integrity which went well beyond what most people could achieve, he was still an officer, and military officers lead privileged lives. The same is true of Congress with its members who are inherited multi-millionaires and the tax-payer made millionaires. None actually know the working people: who comprise most Americans. Now McCain has selected Sarah Palin as his Vice-Presidential running mate. Mrs. Palin’s father was a school teacher and her mother was a school secretary.  She was employed as a reporter following college.  She married a fisherman and has five children. That is enough for me! Forget the fact that she has been a successful mayor, fought the Alaskan political machine and oil interests to win the nomination for Governor and has been a successful Governor of our largest state.  If McCain wins, we shall have at least one voice, an important voice, in WashingtonDC, who understands working Americans. For the first time in this election, in fact in the last three or four presidential elections, I am enthusiastic.

My America

By

William D. Dannenmaier

In the 1930s, I was taught all of the proper things to do. I stood when our flag, carried by marching soldiers, went by, placed my hand over my heart when singing “God Bless America” and similar rituals. We were preparing for war so these events were frequent occurrences, but they had little meaning to me, a child.

Eventually my turn came. Entering the army, through a remarkable talent for speaking my mind when I should have been quiet and being quiet when I should have spoken up, I ended up on the front line with the 15^th Infantry Regiment in Korea on Christmas Eve, 1952. I was sent back to radio school for a month and returned to the Regiment as a radio man. Continuing my ability to speak out when more intelligent men were silent, I volunteered for the scouts, ending up with six months up front and four of active combat. 

Most of the men I knew were like me, persons who had no interest in being career soldiers but who had volunteered for the excitement, or because they believed their country needed them or they were drafted. Van Riper had been a salesman at Sears, Charley was a farm boy who intended to return to the farm, Giaruso had been in construction. Jim Gay had left college to join as had as had Stan O’Connor. Patriotism was not a topic: food, water and survival were. Dirty and ragged, we were often hungry, sometimes thirsty and always watchful and tired. I, personally, never felt any great patriotism, just a great sense of relief when the ship bringing me home passed under San Francisco’s golden gate bridge. I was home and alive.

The annual fireworks in Cumberland Furnace is a greater display of “My America” than it is of fireworks. Cumberland Furnace, once the center of the iron industry in Middle Tennessee, now has, probably, fewer than a hundred families scattered along the valley and the adjoining hollows. Still the annual Fourth of July fireworks display attracts two to three thousand people. People come hours early to enjoy the free show. Cars are parked everywhere: they fill the Community Center’s park, they are bumper to bumper along the roads and church parking lots are filled. The area is packed, but everyone is pleasant. No one is in a hurry, there are friendly greetings between strangers, and children romp freely in the ball field running in and out of falling water as the volunteer fire department sprays the field prior to the display: it is a festival of good cheer. Yet it is a one day event only. It represents, but is a tiny part, of my America.

Recently, one of my grandsons, Nick, visited for a month. We puzzled him. He wondered why people didn’t steal cherries from the trees I have along one edge of my property. I explained that I had more than I needed and gave away cherries. I welcomed those who picked their own, but that people always asked first. Similarly, I had too many early eating apples and peaches this year for my own use. I had some to give away. Poor Nick didn’t understand why he had to pick these by the bucketful and carry them to people who wanted them.   He was also puzzled when some of those people gave him things to carry back, such as packages of frozen “fried” sweet corn or tomatoes or bundles of sweet corn. But that is the way we operate, people share their surpluses just as they help each other when there is a need. I think Nick began to understand that before he left, but it was a difficult step for him.

This is “My America!” It is an America of sharing and giving, all founded on the principles of Christianity.  It is not a matter of wealth or possession or race or even of life styles. Everyone has something to give, even if only a smile and everyone has something they like to receive. When a person is known to need help, they receive it.  It is also the America that raised the young men who served in combat with me in Korea. 

Unfortunately, it is the America that too many of our “leaders” and their sycophants in the media; those who have lived privileged, wealthy, lives and attended expensive schools; have never associated with, don’t understand and yet pretend to represent as they relax in and enjoy their own affluence and power.  

Heil Obama, Sieg Heil!

By

William D. Dannenmaier

In the nineteen twenties and thirties, tens of thousands of Germans stood and chanted “Heil Hitler, Sieg Heil” (Hail Hitler, Hail Victory) as Hitler spoke.  A young, gifted, orator, Hitler promised change, hope and prosperity to those cheering crowds. He had strong followings among the youth, teachers, college professors and the unemployed. He won election to the Reichstag (parliament) in the 1920s and became party chairman of the National Socialist party at the age of 36. 

Does any of this sound familiar? Have we not a young, gifted orator who speaks of change and hope to chanting crowds of youth, teachers, college professors, social workers and welfare recipients?

In many respects, Hitler had an easier task. Following World War I, the people of Europe, including the Germans, the French and the English, wanted peace, but the English and French Politicians used their power following the war to divide Germany into pieces and impoverish the German people. The people to whom Hitler spoke were truly hurting. There were starving and homeless people in the streets. A mathematics teacher whom I knew in Alberta told me that as a youth he and his family had to scrounge in garbage cans for food, he had joined Hitler’s army voluntarily as a means of survival. Another student, also in Alberta, who had been in Rommel’s Afrika Corps and captured, told me that he remembered going outside one morning as a six-year-old child and seeing all the telephone and electric lines on the ground. The French army had crossed the border during the night and taken all of the telephone poles. They called it “reparations.” It was easy for people to follow a leader who promised a better life. 

Obama does not have it as easy. The only people who are hungry in the United States are usually hungry by choice – preferring alcohol or drugs to food. People do not sleep on the streets except by choice as the politicians of New York City discovered when they provided shelters for the homeless – who refused to use them. Couples with no children or one child live in two and three bedroom homes with multiple bathrooms. Bill Clinton’s “trailer trash” may live in trailers, but they often have expensive boats and multiple automobiles in their yards while they spend their time on cell telephones, video-games and watching expensive television sets. Obama’s greatest help in arguing for his “change and hope” comes from the news media, which insists that American’s lives are miserable, that the sky is about to fall.

As Hitler’s power grew, he destroyed the democratic government, gaining dictatorship of the nation. He nationalized business, labor, education and agriculture. His socialist government knew what was best for all.

Are there not, again, similarities? Education is already nationalized and Obama has spoken of the need for the federal government to “equalize” pay – his federal government will decide how much business and industry should pay their employees. The government already exerts massive control over education and agriculture, but Democratic leaders want to have more control over the medical system. Hitler would agree. The national government knows what is best for all – and can enforce it. 

But there was a dark side to Hitler’s federalization of everything.  His first step was to abolish the Reichstag (parliament) and its democratically elected leaders.  Dissenters were imprisoned. Masons, Jehovah Witnesses and members of other groups who opposed his policies were imprisoned and executed. All leaders of the Evangelical Christian churches were imprisoned and most, if not all, were executed. A notable exception was the “Sea Wolf” a leading Evangelical Christian who had gained fame, and his nickname, during the war as a submarine commander for surfacing after sinking a ship, rescuing survivors and making certain that their life boats were provided with the necessary means, including food and water, to get to the nearest land. Following the war, he became a leading Evangelical pastor. His success and humanity gained him such fame and following in Germany that even Hitler was afraid to execute him, although he did imprison him.

I would not like to see the United States follow the path of the Germany of the 1920s, but the circle of leaders with whom Obama has surrounded himself over the years and the self-serving behaviors of political leaders such as Pelosi and Reid are frightening. I don’t really believe Obama and his entourage can destroy our democracy, but the Germans of 1929 didn’t expect Hitler to destroy theirs either.

Obama, Pelosi and Reid: the Plantation Masters

By

William D. Dannenmaier

Now that the Chinese have reached an agreement with Cuba to drill for oil between the United States and Cuba, John McCain has decided it might be all right for the U. S. companies to do the same. The Democrats of course, led by Pelosi and Reid, continue to oppose this idea. They know that China will be much more careful to avoid despoiling the pristine environment than our companies would. Actually, this change, on McCain’s part, provides a means to change his opinion on drilling in ANWAR. We need to get China to make an agreement with Russia to drill in the straits between Russia and Alaska. 

I read that Congress, led by Pelosi and Reid, is considering nationalizing the oil refinery business. Great, all of the knowledgeable people currently running the refineries will keep their jobs – they are essential – but we shall add another highly paid bureaucracy of important people in the District of Columbia, friends of Congress, to oversee and direct what they don’t understand and, probably, aren’t interested in learning.

Along the same line, Obama has added to his plans to nationalize health care. The Federal government already controls much of health care; his change would permit them to control the doctors we see. 

I have also read that Obama told a feminist audience that the inequities in salaries paid to women in the types of jobs so many take, often in education and social welfare, as compared to the salaries paid to people in business need to be equalized. I suppose school teachers, who supervise thirty people, should receive the same wages as union automobile workers who supervise thirty people. As an ex-teacher this doesn’t sound bad since I understand salaries of over a hundred thousand dollars a year are common for line supervisors in the automotive industry. Taxpayers, however, might be unhappy.  Of course this pay might be for women teachers only, not men teachers. 

Stop and think a minute. The government will run our health program, our oil industry, and determine our pay in addition to those things such as education that they already run so efficiently from WashingtonDC. House Speaker Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Reid are leading this charge into federal control, Obama is seeking to join them in power. After all, they know what factory workers in Michigan and South Carolina need, what a grocery store owner in Kansas needs, what farmers throughout the Midwest need much better than those people know themselves. Those few leaders of the Democratic Party can tell us how to live our lives better than we can figure out for ourselves. 

The multi-millionaires who lead the Democratic Party have taken a leaf from the plantation owners of old, only instead of owning slaves, they own welfare recipients. The few welfare slaves that I know are reasonably satisfied with their situation: they receive free medical care, food stamps, housing allowance and other benefits. This enables them to buy all of the liquor they wish and live a life of poverty ease on these goodies provided by taxpayers through the government. But most of the people I have known, and I’ve lived and worked in four states and three foreign countries, are workers. My friends and acquaintances have included teachers, railroad workers, plumbers, carpenters, salesmen, small store owners, policemen – all sorts of working people. It might surprise Pelosi, Reid, Obama and his affirmative action educated wife, but most of them have been satisfied with their work and happy with the lives their efforts have provided. Even more idiotically, they have believed they could care for themselves and their families through their own efforts. And they have. 

Now, however, the leadership of the Democratic Party is telling them they can’t, they don’t know what they are doing. The Federal Government in Washington D. C., will manage more of their lives than it already does: the government knows what is best for everyone.

Does this sound familiar? Didn’t Stalin do this in the Soviet Union, Mao in China and Castro in Cuba. What exemplary nations to follow.  Consider how prosperous the working people of those nations and the nations they controlled in Eastern Europe became. Of course, all of those leaders had to kill a lot of people who wanted to run their own lives (a few millions in the Soviet Union and China, but fewer in Cuba), but didn’t they produce wonderful nations, nations that immigrants flooded in order to join the prosperity? 

All Pelosi, Reid and possibly Obama need is a few more friends, one would do the job on the Supreme Court, and an army loyal to these Messiahs already controlling Congress and, potentially. the Presidency, rather than to the people. It could be done. It has been done elsewhere.

Growing Up

By

William D. Dannenmaier

We haven’t heard much about the results of the Texas storm trooper attack on children recently. The last I read was that of the more then 460 children seized and interviewed by psychologists, who were seeking evidence of child abuse, only one teen-aged girl complained of abuse. Phenomenal! All of the teen-aged girls (and boys) whom I have ever known have felt they were abused at one time or another. 

Considering the above, I confessed to my bride this morning that I remember lying in bed when I was about eight wishing that my REAL parents would show up and rescue me from the cruel people with whom I was living. The only specific incident I recall is that one night, instead of kissing my mother and father before going to bed, as was expected, I kissed my mother and then went and kissed the dog before trotting off to bed. Knowing my father, who had the advantage of not having university classes in psychology, I expect that he had a good laugh after I left. (In exchange, Sheila admitted that there were times when she thought these cruel people couldn’t be her real parents.)

I suspect that if these Texan Gestapo types were to seize 460 children from any school or neighborhood in Texas, they would get at least one and probably several making similar complaints. In fact, considering the self-righteous, totalitarian behavior of those kidnappers, it would be interesting to have psychologists seeking reports of abuse interview THEIR children. Perhaps society would be better served if they had seized children from slum areas and turned them over to that sect to raise.

A problem with our current social leadership is that it has a surplus of education, so to speak, and an almost complete lack of wisdom. Somewhere along the line people given responsibility for the education and protection of children, which includes too many educational administrators, teachers, social workers and psychologists, have forgotten that children are little animals and, like all other young animals, they need activity and affection. One of the stupidest recent changes in schools has been to eliminate recess. Children need that time to run and shout. There is nothing wrong with running games and skipping rope in playgrounds, in fact it is essential, not simply for physical health, but to wear off that physical energy that healthy children have. 

A friend, a teacher at a middle class school, once told me that half of the children in her school were taking medicine for “hyperactivity.” Half? What she believed, and I accept, was that most of these were healthy, normal children who needed more physical activity to work off normal energy. Show me, if you can, any group of normal adults who can or would sit quietly in chairs for two or three hours listening to lectures five days a week. But we expect normal children to do it. It is easier on the teachers and administrators if the children are sedated.

The second idiocy is the failure to understand that children need affection. Normal children not only need to receive affection, they need to give it. The idea of arresting five and six year old children for sexual harassment because they hug or kiss one another is an absurdity. There is a need for quiet education, education in the sense of a quiet discussion about appropriate playground behavior, but certainly no need for police. The only children I’ve ever met who APPEARED to have no need to give and receive affection were mentally disturbed: usually autistic, schizoid or depressed. 

Children are always trying to do things without concern or awareness of possible dangers. Infants work hard at learning to crawl and, having learned, use this crawling power to get to places which are dangerous – any young parent knows this. When infants first learn to pull themselves into a standing position, there is always that danger of pulling down a hot pot of water or some heavy object on themselves. When toddlers begin walking a parent’s job becomes exhausting. Streets with traffic mean nothing to a three year old. They can walk! Reaching beyond their maturity level doesn’t change as they age. At every age young people are trying to do, and doing, things which can harm their futures. The problem is that as they get older, the dangers increase with the growth of sexual awareness. 

Mr. Reed, my friend and a retired principal who had managed a large junior high school for thirty years, once laughingly told me, “In the seventh grade the girls discover boys and are always racing around pushing and patting them with the boys wondering what is wrong with the girls. Then, in the eighth grade the boys are always chasing the girls while the girls are looking down their noses and saying, ‘how juvenile.’  Were he alive today, Mr. Reed would be shocked at the idea of suspending students for such behavior or calling in police, he considered it normal behavior which needed to be controlled by teachers.

Growing up, from infancy to responsible adulthood, is a long and difficult process. It is amazing how few professors and educators understand that. I have learned to be suspicious of writers who put “PhD” or some other emblem of school attendance behind their names when they are writing articles. This usually means that what they have written lacks the power to convince, so they hope that their university attendance emblem gives credence to poor thought. 

Stray Thoughts

By

William D. Dannenmaier

When questioned in an interview as to how she could be sincere as to her concerns about “global warming” when she owns and maintains a large mansion and travels extensively by private jet, Arianna Huffington, a multi-millionaire, left-wing liberal who has a blog and other “news” outlets, replied that she didn’t expect to be perfect. I suppose neither does Al Gore who, similarly, owns a mansion in Nashville which uses more gas and electricity per month than does the average family in Tennessee per year, and travels by private jet and gas-guzzling automobiles as he urges restraint on others. In this they are like Kerry, who swore he would force corporations to bring home overseas factories although he never brought home one of the 60 plus factories he owns overseas – that 60+ does not include factories in Canada and Mexico. He must have meant other people’s factories, not his. 

This is my problem with the wealthy elite who run the Democratic Party. They want others, most notably working people and other peasants, to live austere life styles while they enjoy their wealth – pardon me – while they use their wealth for our good.  

I see where Obama’s pastor and spiritual advisor of twenty years has been a featured speaker at the NAACP, the National Press Club, the Public Broadcasting System and in an interview with Bill Moyers. Not bad for a minister spouting anti-White, anti-American rantings. I suppose these organizations, in all fairness, will now invite a leader of the Ku Klux Klan as a speaker. 

Sharon Stone is one beautiful woman. Recently, she opined that the tragedy in China is punishment to the Chinese for their treatment of the Tibetans. Perhaps she believes that all of the destruction of small towns in the United States is God answering Pastor Wright’s plea for God to “damn America.” I suspect that when God created her, he started working from the toes up and got distracted when he reached the brains department.

One of the miracles of the Democratic Party and its propaganda machine – the “news” media - is their ability to define truth as obscene and have people believe them. I suppose it is the old Nazi program: tell a lie often enough and vigorously enough and people will believe it. A good example is “Swift Boating.” When Senator Kerry bragged about his heroism and war record during his presidential campaign the men who had served with him, the experienced “Swift Boaters” contradicted his claims with specific examples of his behaviors. But “Swift Boating,” telling the truth about a person’s claims became an obscenity. Similarly, “McCarthyism” remains an insult, even though history has shown that he actually uncovered Communist infiltration of our government at the highest levels. Uncovering unpopular truths is just plain wrong, obscene, to our news media.

An ongoing example is that the shortage of oil is a result of a plot, jointly conceived by Enron and President Bush. There is no question but that Enron spent lots of money supporting President Bush and varied Republican officials. The press has been talking about this throughout the Bush presidency, but they neglect to mention, or didn’t notice, that Enron spent just as much money on President Clinton and the Democratic party and were rewarded in many ways by President Clinton, for one thing, numerous trips to Africa, Asia and Europe at tax payer expense. It was only during the Bush administration that the corruption was uncovered and people were fired and/or sent to prison, but all of this has little to do with the price of gasoline.

It was President Clinton who vetoed a Republican bill fourteen years ago which would have permitted drilling for oil in the ANWAR. Since that time, no Democratic Congress has permitted passage of a bill permitting drilling in to Alaska reserves. Neither have these Congresses permitted off-shore drilling. They have also closed atomic energy plants, eliminating that source of energy. All of this, one suspects, has profited Enron, which may or may not be true in the tangled world of accounting, but what is certainly true is that it has limited the availability of cheap gasoline for the American people.

For some reason, I’ve had a bad year for new plantings in Cumberland Furnace. A shagbark hickory I purchased from Starks Bros never leafed out and neither did a grapevine I purchased at the local, family, Farmers’ Coop. I telephoned Starks about it and the young lady replied there was no problem, I had a one year guarantee, if it did not leaf out, I should simply telephone in either the fall or spring and they would replace it. When I asked my friendly Coop about it, they said it was my problem, not their problem. Once before – fifteen years ago – I had a problem at Starks. I ordered a Paul Scarlet rose and received a “better” variety, not what I wanted. When I telephoned and offered to return it, they said to keep it, they would send the Paul Scarlet. And they did. Starks trusts me – and their products. Which is it, I wonder, that the Coop doesn’t trust: me or their products?

For the first time ever, our Lapin cherry tree is loaded with cherries. Dark red, sweet and juicy: I enjoy them thoroughly. I picked a large bowl for Sheila to cook down and freeze for the winter months. Watching her work one day, my favorite activity, I noticed she was slicing them off the pits instead of de-pitting them. She said many of them had tiny worms in them. I wish she hadn’t said that. Now, every time I pick a handful, as I crunch one in my mouth, I wonder if the juice comes from the cherry or the worm. As I tell my bride, she should think of them as protein enriched. Either way, natural or enriched, they are tasty.

The Most Feared Religion

By

William D. Dannenmaier

A few murderers commandeer airplanes and fly them into buildings killing thousands and disrupting, forever, the lives of tens of thousands. It was a highlight, but not the end, of spasmodic acts of murder around the world by fools acting, they believe, in the name of Islam and financed by wealthy men living in luxury and safety.

Mobs of Hindus storm and burn a Christian church and kill those inside; men, women and children who are praying for peace and listening to words of love and charity.

Buddhists storm and burn a Christian church and kill those inside; the men, women and children praying for peace and listening to words of love and charity. These are “followers” of Buddha, who, as I understand it, preached peace, love and charity.

Christian missionaries are not permitted to evangelize in Israel. I suppose their message might be dangerous.

Of all of these actions, particularly those by Buddhists, Hindus and Muslims, the most widespread and vicious have been done in the name of the Islamic faith. It appears to be reasonable and proper to kill children, women and men, regardless of their religious beliefs, as Richard the Lion Hearted of England did in the Holy Land a thousand years ago in the name of Christianity, if you murder in the name of Islam. 

There is no question that these acts of terror have been effective. People in many countries fear the acts of Muslims. Americans now look askance at women or children wearing the clothing of the Near East: those burkas could hide bombs and guns and, as has been demonstrated in more than one other nation, the leaders of these killers, supposedly Muslim, do not hesitate to send women and children to do the jobs they don’t want to do. 

All of this leads to the question, what is the most feared religion?

Since most of the murders in recent years, internationally, have been by Muslims acting in the name of religion, I have begun reading the Qur’an (first translated by Abdullah Yusuf Ali 1934, this, 18^th edition released 2006) to attempt to find the reasoning and justification for killing innocent adults and children. First, I scanned the text and found nothing. Now, reading carefully, I’m up to Surah (chapter) 4 and have still found no advice to murder. Instead, I find numerous quotations from the Old Testament of the Bible recommending charity and mercy. For example, verse 83, Surah 2, says, “… treat with kindness your parents and kindred, and orphans and those in need; speak fair to people, be steadfast in prayer and practice regular charity.” This hardly would seem to justify planting bombs on children and women and sending them into market places to kill innocent, devout Muslims as well as innocents of other religions.  

I have even found a text affirming the divinity of Jesus Christ (Surah 3, 42 - 49).

Somewhere I read that Mohammed revolted against the corruption of the Christian church. After the Roman Empire adopted Christianity, “Christian” leaders became politically powerful – and corrupt. Mohammed studied the Bible and, to the extent I have as yet read, quoted extensively from it in, I believe, a reaction to the corruption of the church leaders of the politicized Christian church.

C. S. Lewis spoke of “nominal Christians,” persons who claimed Christianity because it permitted them to continue gain prestige, wealth and power in nations composed primarily of Christians through practices which were, at best, non-Christian and, at worst, anti the teachings of Jesus. When evangelic Christians attempted to change this, the politically powerful of the Middle Ages, themselves nominally Christian, did not hesitate to kill them in the most barbaric fashion possible to continue themselves in power. Does this sound a bit like contemporary Islam?

Has this same corruption gained control of the church of Islam, the teachings of Mohammed?  I believe it has. Muslim leaders of Muslim nations are devout at home and require adherence to rules they establish in the name of Islam: rules which enshrine them as leaders. But those same leaders shed their gowns and enjoy the same “sins” as non-Muslims when visiting Switzerland, Florida and other resort areas.  

I believe Christians are the most feared of all religious peoples, not the nominal Christians, but the true Christians, as described by Jonathan Swift in his essay, “The Abolishing of Christianity in England” (written in 1708). 

The leaders of contemporary “mainstream” churches are not exempt from membership in the nominal group. Too many of them appear to worship and seek the wealth and beauty of their churches and their own power and wealth more than adherence to the teachings of Jesus. Preaching diversity, attending the World Council of Churches in the name of equality of religions, saying that all religions are comparable, is simply not true. They aren’t. 

On the other hand, Evangelical Christians are feared and rightly so. They live and practice the simple faith of proposed by Jesus of love and charity to all and of equality of people. In nations founded or which have evolved according to Christian beliefs and principles, all are considered equal before the law as well as before God. This is why Evangelical Christianity is the most feared of all religions. The wealthy, privileged, leaders of Muslim nations have a great deal to fear if the impoverished and oppressed over whom they rule learn the teachings of a religion of love and equality before God, leading to equality of opportunity for all.  That is why they fight or prohibit Christianity in their Muslim fiefdoms.

It is my belief Mohammed began his preaching in reaction to the corruption arising from the political dominance of pseudo-Christian leaders, whose primary goals were wealth and power. I suspect that if he lived today, he would be a crusader against the political power and corruption of so many contemporary Muslim leaders.