QOTD: Twenty Things President Trump Did Not Do

Mr Leo Decaj posted a comment on President Donald J Trump's Facebook page and asked that it be shared.  I shared it in a comment on Bill Quick's fine Deplorable Blog "Daily Pundit", and Bill liked it so well he pulled it up to a stand-alone post:

Twenty Things President Trump Did Not Do

Leo Decaj wrote: “Keep this in mind :

1. Donald Trump did not steal your money.

2. Donald Trump did not raise your taxes.

3. Donald Trump did not quadruple the price of food.

4. Trump is not stirring a race war.

5. Trump did not leave any US soldiers in Benghazi to be slaughtered and desecrated by Muslims.

6. Trump did not send the US Navy to fight for Syrian Al-Qaeda.

7. Trump did not arm ISIS and systematically exterminate Christians throughout the Middle East.

8. Trump did not betray Israel.

9. Trump did not provide financing and technology to Iran’s nuclear weapons program.

10. Trump did not give our military secrets to China.

11. Trump did not remove our nuclear missile shield in Poland at the behest of Russia.

12. Trump did not shrivel our military, and betray our veterans.

13. Trump did not cripple our economy.

14. Trump did not increase our debt to 20 trillion dollars.

15. Trump did not ruin our credit, twice.

16. Trump did not double African American unemployment.

17. Trump did not increase welfare to a record level for eight years.

18. Trump did not sign a law making it legal to execute, and imprison Americans.

19. Trump did not set free all of terrorists in Guantanamo bay.

20. Trump did not steal your rights, violate US Constitutional law, or commit treason, hundreds of times.

Yet Trump is being ripped apart in the news, non stop. Barrack Hussein Obama, Hillary Clinton and the criminals occupying our government, are not. The media is the Democratic Party. Save our culture. Stop listening to them..!! 

He's right! 

Thank you, Mr Leo Decaj, for standing up for America, and for our truly elected "by the people" President, Donald John Trump!

No Truce With Quislings: NeverTrump Still Trying To Poison The Truth

The guy who writes at "Posse Incitatus" blog is, for all the rebellious name of his blog, normally level headed - as in "a normal person" along with "usually".

But he has HAD IT with those who've set themselves in opposition to President Trump.

In a post titled "This Stupid Business About Bannon Is Why Never Trump Must Be Destroyed", he writes:

"There is nothing new here, just the usual "people are saying" crap mixed in with the "have you stopped beating your wife?" style questions being thrown at the Trump camp.

"What's new is that Conservatism Inc. has decided to join the witch hunt.

"I'm old enough to remember Jonah Goldberg angrily denouncing this game, but now he's down with it.  The reason is of course that National Review hates Breitbart.

"Breitbart has been an oasis during this election season, a source of constant inspiration and amusement.  Naturally the left wants it dead.

"So does Official Conservatism.  You see, unlike National Review, Breitbart is actually gaining readers rather than losing them.

"This is why Never Trump needs to be disposed of immediately.  They have shown that in addition to being traitors during the election, they are happy to serve as Quislings after it. "

Bingo.  President Trump knows this better than anyone. To accomplish his goals, he will have to use every bit of cunning that God has given him for this job.  Expect him to keep his every plan close to the vest until after the ink has dried on his bold John Henry and the action has already been accomplished. 

And in the mean time, we can't believe a single word written by any person who was not a solid, early champion of President Trump.  Especially the National Review and avowed NeverTrump ilk. If they say the sky is blue, go verify it yourself - and still assume they  have an ulterior motive for telling it. 

The links on my "dynamically updated" sidebar are all to people who supported Trump actively or at least offered truly balanced coverage and can write about him fairly without throwing in lists of perjorative adjectives at the end of every paragraph.   Daily Pundit, The Last Refuge, Don Surber, The Diplomad 2.0,  White House Dossier,  King Jester's Blog,  William M Briggs, Vox Popoli,  Stephan Molyneux, Drudge Report, Sharyl Attkisson,  and Chronicles Magazine are all solid sources of genuine facts and pull-em-up-short rebuttals. The others are reliable as well. 

The First Amendment and Hand Cranked Printing Presses

On this Independence Day, a little history lesson. "The Press" did not mean "journalists" when our nation was founded. It did not mean television, radio, or the internet. It did not mean respectable owners of newspapers or members of the White House Press Corps or people with Journalism Degrees or writers who make their living as full time reporters or only respectable bloggers or official licensed anything.

It meant "The Printing Press" of the type seen above, which is what Benjamin Franklin, Printer, used to print newspapers, broadsides, editorials, and -  to make a living - various advertising and other works for hire.  It meant anyone who owned a press or who could pay for something to be printed.

Franklin had a LOT to say about "freedom of the Press" and the right to freely publish things that offended some people.  

Most of the concepts we still apply to "Freedom of the Press" came from Franklin's own experience. His older brother James was a Printer, and was jailed for a month for printing some political outrage and then refusing to divulge the name of his source. Franklin, his apprentice, was 16 at the time and the court tried to force him to share the name as well. He stubbornly refused. He later wrote:

"During my brother's confinement, which I resented a good deal, notwithstanding our private differences, I had the management of the paper; and I made bold to give our rulers some rubs in it, which my brother took very kindly, while others began to consider me in an unfavorable light, as a young genius that had a turn for libelling and satire. My brother's discharge was accompany'd with an order of the House (a very odd one), that 'James Franklin should no longer print the paper called the New England Courant.'" 

James got around that ban by releasing Ben from his apprenticeship (basically "graduating" him), and putting Ben's name on the masthead.

Then, as now, stubborn and recalcitrant "printers" are essential to prevent the never-ending attempts to censor Everyman. "Hate Speech" laws and "Blasphemy" laws are two sides of the same anti-Constitutional coin.  Freedom of the Press means both the right to print things the Printer himself disagrees with, and the right to print things that offend some people or even "all" people.

Just like in Franklin's day, sometimes the *authors* will need to be anonymous. But the Printers need liberty to make their platforms - whether Google or Facebook or Amazon or Wordpress or the New York Times  - available to all viewpoints without any government interference whatsoever.

In 1731, Franklin printed an advertisement from a ship captain who said he would not accept priests from the Church of England as his passengers.  Since America was still a colony of Great Britain, the Church of England was the OFFICIAL government-supported religion, and King George was the head of it. Other denominations were persecuted and "upstanding community leaders" were indignant over the advertisement.

Below is the full text of Franklin's response to the mob of pre-Twitter outrage:


An Apology for Printers by Benjamin Franklin

"Being frequently censured and condemned by different persons for printing things which they say ought not to be printed, I have sometimes thought it might be necessary to make a standing apology for myself, and publish it once a year, to be read upon all occasions of that nature. Much business has hitherto hindered the execution of this design; but having very lately given extraordinary offence by printing an advertisement with a certain N.B. at the end of it, I find an apology more particularly requisite at this juncture, though it happens when I have not yet leisure to write such a thing in the proper form, and can only in a loose manner throw those considerations together which should have been the substance of it. 

I request all who are angry with me on the account of printing things they don't like, calmly to consider these following particulars: 

1 . That the opinions of men are almost as various as their faces; an observation general enough to become a common proverb, "So many men so many minds"; 

2. That the business of printing has chiefly to do with men's opinions; most things that are printed tending to promote some, or oppose others; 

3. That hence arises the peculiar unhappiness of that business, which other callings are no way liable to; they who follow printing being scarce able to do anything in their way of getting a living, which shall not probably give offence to some, and perhaps to many; whereas the smith, the shoemaker, the carpenter, or the man of any other trade,  may work indifferently for people of all persuasions, without offending any of them; and the merchant may buy and sell with Jews, Turks, heretics and infidels of all sorts, and get money by every one of them, without giving offence to the most orthodox, of any sort; or suffering the least censure or ill-will on the account from any man whatever; 

4. That it is as unreasonable in any one man or set of men to expect to be pleased with everything that is printed, as to think that nobody ought to be pleased but themselves; 

5. Printers are educated in the belief, that when men differ in opinion, both sides ought equally to have the advantage of being heard by the public; and that when truth and error have fair play, the former is always an overmatch for the latter. Hence they cheerfully serve all contending writers that pay them well, without regarding on which side they are of the question in dispute; 

6. Being thus continually employed in serving both parties, printers naturally acquire a vast unconcernedness as to the right or wrong opinions contained in what they print; regarding it only as the matter of their daily labor. They print things full of spleen and animosity, with the utmost calmness and indifference, and without the least ill-will to the persons reflected on, who nevertheless unjustly think the printer as much their enemy as the author, and join both together in their resentment; 

7. That it is unreasonable to imagine printers approve of everything they print, and to censure them on any particular thing accordingly; since in the way of their business they print such great variety of things opposite and contradictory. It is likewise as unreasonable what some assert, "That printers ought not to print anything but what they approve;" since if all of that business should make such a resolution, and abide by it, an end would thereby be put to free writing, and the world would afterwards have nothing to read but what happened to be the opinions of printers; 

8. That if all printers were determined not to print anything till they were sure it would offend nobody, there would be very little printed; 

9. That if they sometimes print vicious or silly things not worth reading, it may not be because they approve such things themselves, but because the people are so viciously and corruptly educated that good things are not encouraged. I have known a very numerous impression of Robin Hood's songs go off in this province at 2 s. per book, in less than a twelvemonth; when a small quantity of David's Psalms (an excellent version) has lain upon my hands above twice the time; 

10. That notwithstanding what might be urged in behalf of a man's being allowed to do in the way of his business whatever he is paid for, yet printers do continually discourage the printing of great numbers of bad things, and stifle them in the birth. I myself have constantly refused to print anything that might countenance vice, or promote immorality; though by complying in such cases with the corrupt taste of the majority I might have got much money. 

I have also always refused to print such things as might do real injury to any person, how much soever I have been solicited, and tempted with offers of great pay; and how much soever I have by refusing got the ill-will of those who would have employed me. I have hitherto fallen under the resentment of large bodies of men, for refusing absolutely to print any of their party or personal reflections. In this manner I have made myself many enemies, and the constant fatigue of denying is almost insupportable. 

But the public being unacquainted with all this, whenever the poor printer happens either through ignorance or much persuasion, to do anything that is generally thought worthy of blame, he meets with no more friendship or favor on the above account, than if there were no merit in it at all. Thus, as Waller says. "Poets lose half the praise they would have got Were it but known what they discreetly blot;" yet are censured for every bad line found in their works with the utmost severity. 

I come now to the particular case of the N. B. above-mentioned, about which there has been more clamor against me, than ever before on any other account. 

In the hurry of other business an advertisement was brought to me to be printed. It signified that such a ship lying at such a wharf would sail for Barbados in such a time, and that freighters and passengers might agree with the captain at such a place. So far is what's common; but at the bottom this odd thing was added, "N. B. No Sea-hens nor Black Gowns will be admitted on any terms." I printed it, and received my money; and the advertisement was stuck up round the town as usual. I had not so much curiosity at that time as to enquire the meaning of it, nor did I in the least imagine it would give so much offence. 

Several good men are very angry with me on this occasion. They are pleased to say I have too much sense to do such things ignorantly, that if they were printers they would not have done such a thing on any consideration, that it could proceed from nothing but my abundant malice against religion and the clergy. They therefore declare they will not take any more of my papers, nor have any further dealings with me, but will hinder me of all the custom they can. All this is very hard! 

I believe it had been better if I had refused to print the said advertisement. However, it's done, and cannot be revoked. I have only the following few particulars to offer, some of them in my behalf, by way of mitigation, and some not much to the purpose; but I desire none of them may be read when the reader is not in a very good humor: 

1. That I really did it without the least malice, and imagined the N. B was placed there only to make the advertisement stared at, and more generally read; 

2. That I never saw the word Sea-hens before in my life; nor have I yet asked the meaning of it. And though I had certainly known that Black Gowns in that place signified the clergy of the Church of England, yet I have that confidence in the generous good temper of such of them as I know, as to be well satisfied such a trifling mention of their habit gives them no disturbance; 

3. That most of the clergy in this and the neighboring provinces, are my customers, and some of them my very good friends; and I must be very malicious, indeed, or very stupid, to print this thing for a small profit, if I had thought it would have given them just cause of offence ; 

4. That if I had much malice against the clergy, and withal much sense, it's strange I never write or talk against the clergy myself. Some have observed that it's a fruitful topic, and the easiest to be witty upon of all others; yet I appeal to the public that I am never guilty this way, and to all my acquaintances as to my conversation; 

5. That if a man of sense had malice enough to desire to injure the 
clergy, this is the most foolish thing he could possibly contrive for that purpose; 

6. That I got five shillings by it; 

7. That none who are angry with me would have given me so much to 
let it alone; 

8. That if all the people of different opinions in this province would engage to give me as much for not printing things they don't like, as I can get by printing them, I should probably live a very easy life; and if all printers were everywhere so dealt by, there would be very little printed; 

9. That I am obliged to all who take my paper, and am willing to think they do it out of mere friendship. I only desire they would think the same when I deal with them. I thank those who leave off, that they have taken it so long. But I beg they would not endeavor to dissuade others, for that will look like malice; 

10. That it's impossible any man should know what he would do if he were a printer; 

11. That notwithstanding the rashness and inexperience of youth, which is most likely to be prevailed upon to do things that ought not to be done, yet I have avoided printing such things as usually give offence either to church or state, more than any printer that has followed the business in this province before; 

12. And lastly, that I have printed above a thousand advertisements which made not the least mention of Sea-hens or Black Gowns; and this being the first offence, I have the more reason to expect forgiveness. 

I take leave to conclude with an old fable, which some of my readers have heard before, and some have not: 

"A certain well-meaning man and his son were traveling towards a market town with an ass which they had to sell. The road was bad, and the old man therefore rode, but the son went afoot. The first passerby they met asked the father if he was not ashamed to ride by himself, and suffer the poor lad to wade along through the mire; this induced him to take up his son behind him. 

"He had not traveled far, when he met others, who said, they are two unmerciful lubbers to get both on the back of that poor ass in such a deep road. Upon this the old man got off, and let his son ride alone. The next they met called the lad a graceless, rascally young jackanapes, to ride in that manner through the dirt, while his aged father trudged along on foot; and they said the old man was a fool for suffering it. 

"He then bid his son come down, and walk with him, and they traveled on leading the ass by the halter, till they met another company, who called them a couple of senseless blockheads, for going both on foot in such a dirty way, when they had an empty ass with them, which they might ride upon. The old man could bear it no longer. 'My son,' said he, 'it grieves me much that we cannot please all these people. Let me throw the ass over the next bridge, and be no further troubled with him.'" 

Had the old man been seen acting this last resolution, he would probably have been called a fool for troubling himself about the different opinions of all that were pleased to find fault with him. Therefore, though I have a temper almost as complying as his, I intend not to imitate him in this last particular. I consider the variety of humors among men, and despair of pleasing everybody; yet I shall not therefore leave off printing. 

I shall continue my business. I shall not burn my press and melt my letters. "

                                                             ~B. Franklin, 1731, Pennsylvania Gazette

At Daily Pundit: Presumptive vs Presumed, and Why It Matters (UPDATED)

Wordsmith Bill Quick (who coined the term "Blogosphere") at Daily Pundit offers a vocabulary lesson:

"A fast and dirty indicator that a commentator doesn’t have much use for Donald Trump is the frequent use of the term “presumptive nominee” to describe him.

"This usage was given an official benedication when Reince Priebus made the statement that Trump must be regarded as the presumptive nominee.

"Clue:  Reince Priebus is no Trump fan, either."

Do go over and read the whole thing. There's serious history behind it, and the distinctions are worth remembering for future elections, too.

Awareness of both etymology and connotation are essential if we are ever going to start reclaiming the language from the distortions of the Marketing Class.

5/27/16 Update: Bill has added another post that further analyzes the subtle differences in connotation of these words (what I call "deep grammar") in the post titled "Presumed Versus Presumptive".

Top Prepper Websites Voting! :-)

What do you think?  Do you like my blog and my You Tube channel as good sources of preparedness info?   Please vote for me! Your vote will also take you to a list of other great sites. Thanks and please don't forget to subscribe to my You Tube channel! :-)

"No Comment" From Me If a Site Uses Discus or Facebook For Blog Comments

Do you like having comments from genuine human people who actually read your blog often?

I'm no longer even going to try to comment on any blog that uses Discus or Facebook to manage their commenting function. My comments on  one site do not need to be viewed by the other participants at some other, unrelated website I might visit a year from now. And my Facebook friends are already overwhelmed with alerts from my posts, they don't need all this too.

And frankly, me and the NSA are the only people who need to have a Collected Works of my comments around the interwebs. 

So I'll still read, and maybe even share, posts on such blogs. But that is why you don't hear a peep from me.

And thank you to those folks that use a commenting software that lets me be myself without pooling my information with every other site I visit.

Progressive Blacklists Get Uglier: Dinesh D'Sousa's "America" (#5 Best Seller on Amazon) Removed From Costco Shelves

At least McCarthy was loyal to the United States of America. The Progressive Blacklisting of anything decent and normal and American is getting too ugly to tolerate.
On Monday, Dinesh's book "American: Imagine The World Without Her", the companion text to his latest hit movie, was #51 on Amazon overall. Today it is #5, thanks to patriotic Americans' reacting to Costco's disgusting attempt to control what the public reads.

When you finish reading, please go to your favorite blog and use their affiliate links to buy your copy through Amazon. I am not an affliliate, but that is no reason not to share the wealth with the other conservative bloggers who keep us informed and thinking for ourselves.

Here is Dinesh's statement on the matter (click here to go to the Facebook post):

Dinesh D'Souza   July 08, 2014 at 5:28 PM
"Yesterday I was stunned to learn that Costco had pulled my latest book, America: Imagine The World Without Her, from all of its stores. This was despite the fact that the book had sold very well at the chain and that my movie of the same name was releasing on over 1,000 screens the very next day. Today, I am disappointed to learn that this news has been confirmed by Costco . This action confirms the suspicions of all freedom-loving Americans and is a direct attack on my livelihood which I take very seriously. In a free society, Costco is free to ban my book, but their customers are also free to shop at other stores which don't censor books. In the book and the movie, I talk about the shaming of Americans and a culture of intimidation and censorship that has been spearheaded by the President himself. It's one thing for Costco executives to pal around with President Obama and donate almost exclusively to Democrats. But to turn their company into a tool for suppressing dissent against the government is another matter. I urge all Americans to watch our film in their nearest theater and buy the book from an establishment that honors freedom of speech. Once they do that, they will understand why the President and his allies are so afraid of this message and determined to keep it from reaching the American people."

I do not EVER want to hear any liberal try to talk about some 50 year old events of any kind again.  Not ever. Not ANY. What matters is what is happening today. They are aggressively blacklisting Christians, people who support ACTUAL EXISTING LAW, people who support sexual constancy as a virtue, people who support honesty in all things,  people who don't give a damn what YOU do but are willing to say when asked that they support the only kind of marriage any society in the history of the world has ever recognized, people who support legitimate elections, people who oppose concentration camps and support defended borders, people who expect citizenship to mean something that it has ALWAYS meant.

In general any person who loves, lives and speaks out in favor of legitimate American Culture is embattled by hateful people who are not thinking at all, but taking marching orders like zombies.

The zombie apocalypse is here, and the brain eaters call themselves "Progressives".


UPDATE 7/9/14:  Newsmax reports that Costco has retreated following the loud outcry and promises to restock the books. The company's official reasoning shows how recursive Progressives are - everything runs in a closed circle with these people:  Chief Financial Officer Richard Galanti  "said that the company's national goal is to market books that are on The New York Times' bestseller list, but that "America" has not been on the list. A company statement on the Costco Facebook page stated."

BUT of course (and Costco's people know this), The NYT has refused to place Dinesh's book on their list at all, despite strong debut sales:  the Washington Examiner reported previously that America has been "banished" from the famous list, despite far outselling one by Hillary Clinton:

"The New York Times bestseller list hasn't waited a millisecond to put Hillary Clinton's book atop its influential chart after just a week of sales, but has totally ignored another top-10 hardcover from noted conservative and critic of President Obama, Dinesh D'Souza.

"His new book, on sale for three weeks, isn’t just absent from the top 10 lists already set for the next two Sundays, but totally missing from the list of the nation’s top 25 nonfiction hardcovers despite having sales higher than 13 on the latest Times chart.

"According to sales reports provided to Secrets, D'Souza's new book America: Imagine a World Without Her, sold 4,915 in the first week and 5,592 in the second week. Had it been included on the upcoming June 22 Times hardcover nonfiction list, it would have ranked No. 8, and then No. 11 on the June 29 list that puts Clinton's sales at 85,721. The lists are widely circulated in the publishing industry before they go public.

"The Times is somewhat mysterious in how it calculates its list, but it includes several books selling well under 3,000 copies in a week. A spokeswoman said, “We let the rankings speak for themselves and are confident they are accurate.”

"America is expected to explode when the accompanying movie debuts next month. In America, D’Sousa slams Obama’s agenda and targets Clinton too — maybe one reason the Times hasn’t recognized it."

Click through to read the rest of the article by Examiner's "Washington Secrets" Columnist Paul Bedard.

Remember this every time some Progressive tries to convince you of anything. All of their arguments are self-referential and meaningless. As one would expect from zombies.

UPDATE 7/17/14:  The New York Times had to relent finally, too, or risk losing what shreds of authority the gray old thing has left, and allowed "America - Imagine A World Without Her" on the NYT Best Seller List. Result?  America will debut at #2. From Dinesh's site:

" Dinesh D’Souza’s publisher at Regnery recently sent this note about his latest book:
“I am happy to report that for the week of July 27, America will appear on the New York Times best seller list at second place for hardcover books as well as eBooks!”
This comes following the New York Times past omissions of the book from the best seller list, despite its rise to #1 on Amazon’s best seller list." 

Congratulations, Dinesh - and all red blooded Americans of all heritage. The zombies are still outside the gates, but chalk one up for reality this week!

"In God We Trust" USA's National Motto is 150 Years Old Today!

Via Mostly Cajun's most excellent regular feature "Today in History":

150 years ago today, April 22. 1864 – "The U.S. Congress passes the Coinage Act which mandates that the inscription “In God We Trust” be placed on all coins minted as United States currency."

This is the only national motto the United States of America has ever had. Its roots go back to the founding of our nation by many disparate - but still Christian - religious groups seeking freedom to practice their religion and teach and preach the Bible as their consciences dictated without interference or persecution from the government.  By virtue of finding this liberty, and firmly upholding it, these Christians graciously also offered the same freedom of religion to Jews and to non-Christian faiths.

Pecan Corner: Thursday of Holy Week: The Power of Humility

Using the "Blog This" feature to bump up this seasonal post. Click the link to read it all:   Pecan Corner: Thursday of Holy Week: The Power of Humility: In the British newspaper The Daily Mail , Peter Hitchens, brother of noted athiest Christopher Hitchens, speaks about his own wanderings fro...

I Prefer Posting to My Blog, But Facebook is So Easy.Would it Be Good or Bad to Bring the Sharing Experience to Blogger?

Just thinking out loud here.  

I joined Facebook in order to see the photos my children post, and I have to say I love many things about the medium - especially how helpful it is in connecting to distant people we love: cousins, nieces & nephews, former co-workers, kids who grew up with my kids, in-laws from a former marriage, etc.

But I end up using Facebook for things that would otherwise be blog posts - because it is so FAST to "share" on FB as opposed to writing a post for the blog. So I share anywhere from 10 to 20 things a day, and when something breaks like the Harry Reid connection to the Bundy Ranch BLM Fiasco, I put everything on there instead of popping the links in here.

But unlike Blogger, where we can consider a topic in depth and people can continue to refer to a post and the details, links and resources within it for years to come, on Facebook these stories are impossible to find again two days later, all covered up or hidden, and completely unsearchable.

 Twitter is not really an option for me. It takes me a hundred and forty characters to say hello.  And that, too, is a fleeting format.

So what I am really trying to figure out is how I can bring that speedy sharing over here to the blog without getting bogged down in trying to write a full post for each.

First Amendment Quote of the Day - February 17, 2014

"This war is waged in our courts and in the halls of political power. It is pursued with grim and relentless determination by a group of like-minded elites, determined to transform the country from a land sustained by faith — into a land where faith is silenced, privatized, and circumscribed."
                       
                        Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal, at the Reagan Library, via And So it Goes in Shreveport: "Iowa State University to Remove Gideon Bibles from Campus Hotel"

Marriage in Sickness and in Health: By the Grace of God, My Husband is Alive, and Will Be Well

In mid-October, my husband's back went out on him. This is not unusual, he has bad disks and thus has occassional trouble with it. But this time was different: nothing improved it, and he could not lie down. After trying all his usual methods of healing it, he finally asked me to take him to the ER in the middle of the night. A routine blood test showed he was anemic. Anemic? A great ER doctor in our small hospital knew how odd this was, and ran a CT scan.

Paul had three iliac aneurysms, two of which were 10 cm and one of which had already ruptured*. Our hospital sent him by ambulance to Hendrick Medical Center in Abilene, where he had emergency surgery. God blessed us in every way, with top notch care all the way through, and a talented, experienced surgeon who was able to overcome some extreme challenges in the surgery - not least of which was that all were within the pelvic area, so simply accessing them was an ordeal. When his surgeon came out to speak with me after the surgery, the phrase he kept repeating was "it was so difficult".

After 13 days in the hospital and 19 days in nursing care, his Dr prescribed at-home physical therapy and home health nursing visits, so I was able to bring him home.

The trauma of the surgery injured the nerves in Paul's legs, and he has not been able to use them since. They WILL heal, and we see tiny improvements each day, but for now he is generally confined to bed. He cannot transfer, so I have a Hoyer Lift that I use to move him from bed to wheelchair. He can sit for about 45 minutes before he is hurting and needs to go back to bed. For doctor visits, we use the state-funded rural bus that has a lift so that he can be transported in his wheelchair. We have a great therapist who comes 3 times a week and there are several exercises we do throughout the day on our own.

Both of us are Christians, and we know that God has saved his life. Understanding that the only alternative would have been death (most people with this condition simply die - there are usually no symptoms - and even with surgery after rupture, 50% do not survive the operation), our spirits have been buoyed all along with gratefullness for Paul's now-extended life.  We are also blessed with a loving family that have been unflagging in staying in touch and helping in what ways they can. Finally, our church members and friends have shown their care for us in so many ways. During the 32 days before Paul came home, not a single day went by without visits from our brothers and sisters in Christ. Two weeks of that was in a hospital 75 miles from here, but people drove it to visit for 10 minutes, just to encourage  us.

It is at times like this that one learns what one is really made of, and how strong a marriage can be. Because we are good friends, we are able to enjoy the 24/7 togetherness that we have right now. Paul can accept very personal care from me, and I can give it, because our relationship goes beyond our individual selves. Our time revolves around a vast number of new daily tasks and schedules. I've had to learn to do a lot of new things. Paul is having to cope with a kind of helplessness that we never imagined.  We both approach the day one hour at a time, and we don't think too far beyond that. And God has blessed both of us to be able to travel this road in good humor and hope.

I can say that when I try to count my blessings, I run out of numbers. Paul's life far outweighs any possible inconvenience or detour in our plans. The knowledge of that alone makes me wake up happy each day.

There will be much to write about our journey through this part of our lives, but that will come later. For now, I am happy to have a bit more creative energy available to resume blogging, and to start peeping over our own four walls again once in a while.



*There is a simple Ultrasound screening that your doctor can order for you to check for Iliac or Aortic aneurysms. There is a greater risk as people age, and if you have had heart trouble. Paul did not have any heart problems, and he is only 61.  I am guessing the ultrasound is painless, and it can relieve your mind if the results are negative!



[The art is Winslow Homer's "Moonlight", painted in 1874. Winslow Homer was the Norman Rockwell of the 19th Century. He chronicled American life and the Civil War with great realism and beauty. His images of the sea are magnificent. He also produced a fine body of work around the Caribbean islands.]

The Author Reviews My Review

There are some good books out there in the self publishing world today. One way to find some of the better ones is to read the authors' own blogs. That is how I came across a particularly memorable story about a thief and a castle and a wizard.....   Author Christopher Taylor (Word Around The Net, linked from my sidebar), approves of my review of his fun chivalrous fantasy novel "Old Habits":

 "I expect to get indifferent, happy, and even insulting reviews, but something I never expected was a review that so completely understood what I was trying to accomplish with my story and seems to have crawled inside my head when I was writing it, which is deeply humbling and gratifying all at once. I wanted to share it with everyone so they can learn more about the book."       

See? Can this guy write or what? Click over to his blog to read the review - and buy the book!

Maybe if he sells enough of this one he will feel inspired to write a sequel! 

The Empty Seats in the Courtroom

I had wanted my first blog post from my new computer to be a Thank You to my sweet son Nicolas and my sweet daughter-in-love Lani for presenting me with a new Dell Laptop and having my photos recovered from the old crashed hard drive. I don't think they agree with my politics but they like my recipes and the good normal life things I write about. Nick and Lani, I love you both. I promise to write some fun stuff soon.

But my first blog post on this new computer is not just gratefulness for these grown children whose lives are now bearing the fruit that was only a promise when they were born as tiny, tiny infants. So small their little hands could curl around their mothers' little fingers. So beautiful. And so much beauty and wonder and joy we have known from having them in our lives all these years as they have grown and matured and loved and become people who've exceeded their parents' happiest dreams. 

It is also a post of grief for the abortion-murdered children whose mothers will never know the joy of an adult son or daughter.  Who have been seduced into submitting to the murder of their futures by the murder of their babies.

The empty seats in the photo above are real. They are places reserved for news reporters who no longer care what is happening outside their own doors.
 
As I write, people who call themselves journalists and reporters and editors have decided they prefer to allow the Holocaust of the Unborn to continue than to mention the name of Kermit Gosnell.  They are sitting at their desks with their fingers in their ears singing "la la la la la la la" to drown out the sound of the evidence being presented in this trial.
 
People who make decisions about what stories to cover and how to report them for nearly every major news outlet in the United States have almost uniformly rejected the Trial of Two Centuries as "local news". They have chosen to continue to take the role of sycophants in a modern sacrifice of the first born.  USA Today's Kirsten Powers is one of the lone voices raised against the travesty of failure by newspaper, television and internet general media to cover this story. Mollie Hemingway, of "(The Press Doesn't ) Get Religion", has been a bulldog in confronting people at news desks with this.

The photo above is a picture of the courtroom in which the Kermit Gosnell Trial is being held. The Press are damned by their own absence. May God have mercy on their souls, because their sin of omission will not disappear just because they pretend it isn't there.

Just like little babies do not disappear just because some people pretend they don't exist.

My Chex Mix Recipe

She shows up after weeks of silence, only to post a Chex Party Mix recipe... during Lent?!?!?! 

Blogging is light right now for reasons previously given (I am still sharing a computer and focusing on creative ventures). This post goes back to why I started this blog originally. It was a good way to share my recipes when the kids called to ask "how do you make your.....?". When I posted them on Facebook, they rapidly disappeared.... but here on the blog, it is easy to find the recipe again in a jiffy.

When Ethan called tonight to ask how I make my party mix, which is only a little different from the "official" version (and still different from the real Original Version), I remembered I have never posted this recipe on here..... soooo here you go, Ethan! :-)

CHEX MIX

3    cups Corn Chex® cereal
3    cups Rice Chex® cereal
3    cups Wheat Chex® cereal
1    cup peanuts or mixed nuts (sometimes I add pecans when I have them - toast them first)
1    cup bite-size pretzels or pretzel sticks
1 1/4 stick (1/2 cup plus 2 tablespoons) butter or margarine
5    tablespoons Worcestershire sauce
2     teaspoons salt
1    teaspoon garlic powder
1    teaspoon onion powder

You need a big pan to bake this in. If you don't have one, one of those disposable foil turkey roasters from the grocery store is good. Just rinse it out and save it to use over and over again.  If I am making a double batch, I make two separate batches instead of trying to mix it all together. It just works better that way.

Heat oven to 250°F. In large bowl, mix cereals, nuts, and pretzels. Set aside.

Put butter in ungreased large roasting pan, and melt butter in oven. Stir in seasonings.

Pour cereal and pretzels into the pan and stir it, bringing the bottom pieces to the top over and over, for about 3 minutes until all the pieces are evenly coated.

Place in the oven and Bake, uncovered, for 1 hour, stirring a couple of times every 15 minutes.

Remove from oven and taste a (cooled) piece. If it needs a little more salt, sprinkle the salt shaker over it while it is still warm & stir it once or twice to distribute.

Let it sit out until completely cool before covering it or putting it away.  Store in airtight container.

----------

A blessed Lent, and a Joyous Easter to all and sundry! God bless you and yours this year!

Computer Failure and Summer Pleasantries

My trusty Dell Inspiron lies comatose, due to hard drive failure. It is 6 years old, so unlikely that we'll have it repaired. I'm going to ask Devin to look at it, and if it is costly to fix, he can have it for parts. There go all my bookmarks, photos, blog notes. C'est la vie. We won't replace it soon, there are more important priorities. For the time being, Paul is letting me share his computer - which is also our tv source.

So blogging will be lighter, but will not disappear. This blog has done well as an outlet for me and I enjoy my readers and the friends I've made through it.  I'll simply be posting once a week instead of 2 to 3 times. Maybe the quality will improve! Ha! :-)  Anyway, thanks for reading and for continuing to follow along. In the meantime, feel free to visit our sponsors.   :-)

It's actually been pleasant to be without a laptop.  At Paul's urging, I've resumed an old hobby, making costume jewelry and stringing beads - and making beads. When we met, I sold my jewelry in a couple of shops and did shows, but had let the hobby fall to the wayside long ago. Expect to see some pieces here at some point.

I've also been working on a big project that has been sitting and waiting for a couple of years: a tiny Cardinal travel trailer, vintage late 1960s. It had been gutted and I guess used as a food cart or something so it was a real mess! We aren't "restoring" it as such, but making it liveable as a secure place to sleep. Whereever we camp will certainly have "facilities" with showers and clean toilets, thank you very much! I am a big fan of hot water and indoor plumbing even when roughing it.  Paul shored up the inside and got the tags on and will take care of the electrics. My brother in law is going to paint the outside of it for us when we get to that point. Yesterday I finished the second coat of paint on the interior and now I'm searching for curtain material. It needs to have a touch of the avocado green of the naugahyde cushions, have a little blue, either  beachy, tropical or mid-century modern pattern. I lost the "before" pics on my computer, but I'll put up some "in progress" ones soon.

Yesterday morning after I got off work, we went to Cross Plains Texas to Robert E. Howard Days (aka Barbarian Days). I've been wanting to go to that since I first heard about it but something always interfered. We toured the author's house, bought various bits of Conan the Barbarian comic art, took pictures (I'll add them in a later post), and went to the Barbarian Festival. Cross Plains has a great, oak-shaded park for this kind of event. It was cool and comfortable. Live music, great Fair food, free watermelon and neat tshotshkes. One book I bought was "Lone Scout of Letters", the collected correspondence of Herbert C. Klatt, who died at 21 on 1928. Not only for those interested in Boy Scouts history, the Lone Scout organization, or the history of amateur journalism, the book also gives a glimpse into the life of a teenaged boy in rural Texas in the early part of the last century. 


We'll pick up the grandkids today to come spend a week or two. They are older, and they come each summer to help with the community Vacation Bible School. They always have a lot of fun, and we are so happy to have them. 

Now, off to church. Dinner on the ground and baptisms this afternoon, as more people answer Jesus' call to "Come, follow me."   


God bless you this Sunday, and through your week!

Today, It's: Mail Art.

 Well, my candidate has taken his name off the ballot for President. I guess the good news is that at least Texans won't have to worry about who is going to govern our state. Governor Perry, Governor Palin , and Todd Palin have endorsed Newt Gingrich. I will pray they are right, and turn my attention to daily, ordinary life for a while. 

I wander the web like I used to wander bookstores. Each week, some new thing will catch my attention, and I learn about it. Last time, it was Home Bee Keeping. More on that another time, because:

Today, it's Mail Art.

In this month's AAPA bundle (what people did before blogs), the Six Mile Press offering was about Carnegie Libraries. It inspired me, so for February's bundle, I'm making postcards out of a photo I took of the Carnegie Library in my hometown. I had prints made at Walmart.com, will use acetone to erase the corporate printing on the backs, rubber stamps to print "Post Card" on the backs, and stickers to label the front. (I'll add a photo to the blog when the project is done.)

Back to Mail Art. I wanted ideas for "arting up" my project, so went looking. Here are some places I found clever inspiration:

Everyday should be a Red Letter Day…

2012 Graceful Envelope Contest (and archives of past winners)

The Missive Maven

Austin Kleon's Blog, and esp. "How To Steal Like An Artist"

Postcrossing: The Postcard Crossing Project

S-FIMail

Good Mail Day

How fun is this? I may be looking at a new hobby-ette! Or, at least, until something else attracts my attention...

What Did People Do Before Blogs? The American Amateur Press Association (AAPA) is 75 Years Old This Month!

This is
A Printing Office

Crossroads of Civilization
Refuge of All the Arts
Against the Ravages of Time
Armoury of Fearless Truth
Against Whispering Rumour
Incessant Trumpet of Trade
From this Place words May Fly Abroad
Not to Perish on Waves of Sound
Not to Vary with the Writer's Hand
But Fixed in Time, Having been Verified in Proof

Friend You Stand on Sacred Ground

This is a Printing Office

Beatrice Wade -1932
Printed in the Heritage Center Print Shop
Lancaster Pennsylvania

"Printed by AAPA members Mike Donnelly, Ken Kulakowsky, and
Rich Rtladge on an O.S. 8x12 C&P treadle driven platen press."

                                                     
                                                                     ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Interested? Check out the American Amateur Press Association,* now celebrating its 75th year of hobby journalism & printing arts. Don't let the word "Amateur" fool you - some of the finest professionals in their industries have published in these bundles  (and in eJournals)for simple pleasure since the AAPA was started by a bunch of teenagers in 1936. The AAPA welcomes writers, printers, publishers, editors, artists, illustrators, cartoonists & poets of all ages, from home schooled students to newspapermen to professional printers to true amateurs.

The great forerunners of blogs, amateur press associations have played a part in the lives and career choices and hobby pasttimes of thousands of ordinary Americans during the 20th century. In the AAPA, monthly bundles mailed to each member, annual Laureate Awards, and an annual convention bring everybody together.  Clean, friendly, and just for simple fun.

(*Please note, effective this month, dues have risen to $25 per year, to accomodate a move from bulk rate to 1st Class mailing. To receive a trial bundle, contact the secretary.)

UPDATE:  Linked by And So It Goes In Shreveport. Thanks! :-)

And So it Goes in Shreveport: "Priorities"

Pat Austin proves once again just what an awesome blogger she is with her post about Governor Perry's response to the Texas wild fires that are raging across the beautiful, native, Texas Hill Country; raging through the gracious Pineywoods into Louisiana and into Arkansas, raging through the Post Oak belt that runs all the way up into Oklahoma (which is suffering too), raging through the prairies where the Red Wing Blackbirds fly.

Go over to And So It Goes in Shreveport, and see the terrifying pictures Pat has put up to give you just an inkling of what is happening to our state.  God bless our governor for having his priorities in order: lives come before politics, before money, before anything else.

God bless Texas.

So Now I've Written a Letter to the Associated Press

Have you ever written to the AP news agency? I hadn't, until just now.

The Associated Press Statement of News Values and Principles is a fine document. It states, in part "But always and in all media, we insist on the highest standards of integrity and ethical behavior when we gather and deliver the news. That means we abhor inaccuracies, carelessness, bias or distortions."

So when I saw a distortion in an article tonight, I wrote a letter to the AP to ask them to correct it.

Here's my letter. Tell me what you think?



*****************************

Hello,

Thank you in advance for helping me with a troublesome matter.  I appreciate your time and effort.  Is this the best address to use to request a change in use of a descriptive word? 

Two stories are running tonight that may be found here: http://apnews.myway.com/article/20110809/D9P07TEG0.html   and here:  http://apnews.myway.com//article/20110808/D9P077F00.html  
The main story is: "London burns: Riots spread through UK capital city, Aug 8, 7:39 PM (ET),
By DAVID STRINGER and RAPHAEL G. SATTER , Jill Lawless, Meera Selva, Stephen Wilson and Dancia Kirka contributed to this report. "

Both versions contain the following sentences:

""This is the uprising of the working class, we're redistributing the wealth," said Bryn Phillips, a 28-year-old self-described anarchist, as young people emerged from the store with chocolate bars and ice cream cones.

"Phillips claimed rioters were motivated by distrust of the police, and drew a link between the rage on London's street and insurgent right-wing politics in the United States. "In America you have the tea party, in England you've got this," he said. "

The use of the word "insurgent' by the authors to describe the Tea Party or "right-wing politics" in the United States is not only inaccurate, but it is inappropriate, inflammatory and unwise.  The word "insurgent" is used currently by the US military to describe our opponents in Iraq & Afghanistan. It is wholly inappropriate to use such a word to label a simple political fiscal disagreement handled lawfully through ordinary established political channels. 

The source (Phillips)  being quoted may have drawn a comparison with his blunt statement, but he did not use the word "insurgent". Further, his statement required no elucidation for readers to understand it.   Thus the use of this word originated with the authors and reflects a highly unprofessional bias in making this false connection between rampaging young thugs burning buildings in Britain, and legitimate statements of orthodox opinions by voters and elected officials in the United States.

The AP is a trusted source of pure news, and has served people of all political, social, and fiscal viewpoints with great distinction. It deeply concerns me to see an article betraying such a lack of respect for simple communication ethics under the banner of the AP.

If you would please forward this to the editor who can address this matter, I would greatly appreciate it.  Also, if there is a better address for me to use in future, please apprise.

Thank you very much for your time and attention. 

/ signed/

*************


The AP email address is here.