Showing posts with label politics. Show all posts
Showing posts with label politics. Show all posts

Friday, June 19, 2020

Political Kneeling in America - Hostages to Stupidity


These are American Congressmen, sitting like hostages of political correctness, of hypocrisy, of social trends dictated by the media, kneeling in a religious gesture, not really knowing why, unless CNN tells me.

The stupidity of the situation is underlined even more by the fact that only one is actually using a little rug, the rest are kneeling on the hard floor.

These days many have knelt, soldiers, American policemen, Swedish policemen in front of migrants, Canadian premier in the face of its own imbecility, and as a general rule, whites in front of blacks. It seems nowadays, that if you are white in the West, you have a great supreme duty to kneel because of other people’s guilt, because of history, and because of a sick and corrupt system.

For us, thousands of miles away, this image must come with a double recommendation, I believe: don’t trust America as example of civilization, of the so-called “democracy,” because America is not a real democracy, nobody has blind trust in political leaders anymore, in politicians in general. Just look at the clowns on the left, the “progressives,” who do not pray to God, but instead engage in this ritual of religious essence, praying to NOTHING, except to their own stupidity interwoven with personal and political interests.

Personally, I can only laugh. We have seen many things coming from America, but seeing Congressmen on their knees in the memory of a depraved and drugged black man is a first.



Friday, October 25, 2019

Social Justice Politics Have Made Their Way into Romania


President Klaus Johannis and his wife
Photo: Ileana Johnson 2018
Politics in general have always been dirty, hard to grasp, and corrupt, but lately it has been irrational, based on the current low information electorate who, although bombarded with more information than ever, is more easily swayed or bullied into submission to a predetermined result.

People still vote based on their own preconceived notions, interests, the candidate personal charisma, their philosophy, and misinformation from the MSM they accept as absolute truth, without bothering to check on their own either because they are either too busy or too lazy. Electioneering by volunteers or by paid individuals further muddies the waters. People know that politics make strange bedfellows.

Some individuals promise their votes for empty promises, a drink, a chicken in every pot, a cheap cell phone, walking around cash, higher salaries, government contracts, or a sought-after position – it depends how high the voting stakes are.

The political atmosphere in Romania is as frustrating as that in America, involving many parties in Parliament, with a vast cadre of uneducated people, characters in a reality show composed of “red herrings” – misleading puppets and distractions from the larger picture in which the real global movers and shakers perform their acts of social engineering in an effort to destroy statehood and distinct historical nations with boundaries.

One of the global movers, the European Union, has appointed Laura Codrut Kovesi to one of its higher posts of European Chief Prosecutor, in an effort to show Romanians that their voices matter in the EU’s overall globalist effort. Nobody can accuse them of not being inclusive, they now have another rubber stump for their plans. She is much beloved by young Romanians and by Transylvanians who are much more cosmopolitan and globalist inclined.

In the name of the law and anti-corruption, she was chosen to create an institution in which orders are followed in order to introduce the desired outcome.

Politics and loyalties are upside down in Romania. The global #resisters who work for NGOs (non-governmental organizations) claim to be liberals on the right. Those on the left, who tend to be nostalgic for communism, are quite dumb as politicians go and are very nationalistic which infuriates the #resisters.

Communists allegedly no longer exist as the party has been ruled out of existence, but all children of important former communists, of Securitate personnel, of the Communist Party enforcers, and of the old torturers under communism, have cleaned up their image and have become “hashtag-ers” and big pro-Europeans.

PSD (The Social Democrat Party) with 158 seats in the Chamber of Deputies is the governing party in Parliament. PSD was founded by Ion Iliescu, the first president of Romania after the “revolution” of 1989, himself a former communist and member of the nomenklatura.

Following the “fall” of communism, Ion Iliescu served as Romania’s president until his retirement in 2008, which proves that communist indoctrination is hard to eradicate. PSD’s current leader is Viorica Dancila, Prime Minister, replacing Liviu Dragnea who was accused of “abuse of service.”

PNL (the National Liberal Party) holds second position in Parliament with 69 seats. Founded in 1990, PNL is the “conservative” liberal party, the social liberals of the party by the same name that existed in 1875-1940s under the Kingdom of Romania.

D. Roby explained that politics is very complicated in Romania. “PNL is the party of the mainstream, PSD is the euro-skeptic party, and USR (Uniunea Salvati Romania) is the sort of the Soros-educated party filled with people who range in spectrum from globalists, to Hungarian nationalists, to young people in Cluj [western Transylvania] who hate Bucharest [the capital] and dream of getting autonomy for Transylvania and one day separating from the rest of Romania.”

President Johannis, a Transylvanian from Brasov and a Romanian of German heritage, was a potential successor to the European Commission President but he did not make the cut to replace Junker. President Johannis may or may not be a globalist but he sees Romania’s success in the future tied to its participation in international institutions such as the European Union. Romania became EU member in 2007.

D. Roby said that “Romania imports more consumer goods than it exports” and, as a result, the majority of people in Romania, who are still poor by European standards, are paying for overpriced imports from Western Europe, sometimes produced with inputs purchased cheaply from Romania, (i.e. native berries which grown abundantly in Romania are made into an expensive berry preserve in Germany) when Romanians could have produced such consumption goods cheaper on their own domestic market.

Additionally, many consumption goods are inferior in quality, produced specifically for the Romanian market. Roby cited a recent scandal in which Milka chocolate bars made in Germany for export into Romania allegedly tasted different than the chocolate bars made in the same factory for the German market due to the use of cheaper ingredients.

Certain aspects of the reality that existed under Ceausescu’s communist party dictatorship, are still found in 2019.  “A hard-working person who makes an honest living is branded as a thief while a smart-alecky individual who lies, cheats, steals, misrepresents, and forces others to pay him/her bribes is idolized as a hero who beat the system.”

Workers are still expected to venerate the low-paying jobs and never complain when they work long hours as if they were in a labor camp. Foreign national companies are still paying skilled Romanian workers low wages and expect them to deliver stellar performance.

An article by Valentin Busuioc in Lumea Justitiei (World Justice) magazine described President Trump speech at the U.N. on September 24, 2019 as “explosive” and meant to “shut up all the propagandists from the #resist crowd in Romania who “agitate to destroy the national values in the name of globalism, no matter what the price.” Busuioc wrote that politicians in Romania should not allow themselves to be influenced by “the [globalist] dream of national traitors.”

Busuioc also touched on the political issue of the “growing industry of radical activists and non-governmental organizations that promote human trafficking. These groups encourage illegal migration and demand the erasure of national borders.” The social justice rhetoric has transformed innocent humans into pawns of the phony social justice politics of the American left. Romanians have become victims themselves to the forced economic migration quota under the guise of refugees planned by the United Nations and enforced by the EU leaders in Brussels.
https://m.luju.ro/trump-le-a-dat-moarte-rezistentilor-presedintele-sua-donald-trump-a-avut-un-discurs-fulminant-la-onu-care-sa-le-fie-lectie-vanzatorilor-romaniei-daca-vrei-libertate-fii-mandru-de-tara-ta-daca-vrei-democratie-pastreaza-ti-suveranitatea-daca-vrei-pace-iubes

Swayed by corrupt politicians whose motives they barely understand, low information Romanian voters, not unlike some of our American voters, continue to turn at the polls to elect those who will eventually dissolve their borders and their own country for which their ancestors fought so hard to preserve.




Tuesday, November 27, 2018

Church and State

Orthodox Church built after the fall of communism
Photo: Ileana Johnson 2015
People in general do not seem to agree on much these days, split between their own confused ideas and the latest narrative promoted by the deceitful main stream media, beholden to the globalist ideology of Democrat Socialism and Cultural Marxism.

Often the thought processes of the voting masses are incoherent because their knowledge, the reality, and their basic instincts of survival and safety are perverted by the globalist agenda but they are too ignorant to realize that what they espouse is quite contradictory. So they vote into Congress frightening Millennials like Alexandria Occasio-Cortez, who will now have the power to fundamentally alter our collective future in the distorted image of her disordered and ill-informed mind.

It’s not just the political representatives who are working against the wishes of the people. The Christian clergy of all stripes are organizing on behalf of foreign invaders looking for welfare and against the best interests of the American people.  

Educators and academics are happy to shape the minds of young people in their own globalist Marxist vision. They’ve been indoctrinating us for decades that we cannot mix Church and State, we must tear down any symbol of Christianity that might offend others, while bending over backwards through threats and the courts to accommodate a few offended atheists, many offended Muslims, and other refugee “stock” as the U.N. defines them, mushrooming all over the world with help from the U.N. Refugee Agency (UNHCR). https://www.unhcr.org/

Citizens in European countries are ahead of the curve in this indoctrination into Cultural Marxism, a world-wide phenomenon driven by controlling globalists with large pockets, aiming to erase borders and to destroy every country’s sovereignty. Ordinary people with good intentions are voting for their own demise, for the Socialist Democrats, who are short on knowledge and long on propaganda, corruption, and deceit.

Romanians fight bitterly over investment in the construction of Orthodox churches. They want instead to improve the declining education of their children, to build hospitals and roads which they were denied under Ceausescu’s bleak communist regime. Decades of communist indoctrination and terrible medical care has confused their priorities. The soul of a person or a nation cannot be healed through Marxist ideology and globalist education. Faith and church are needed.

Eastern Europeans admire the wonderful education system in Western European countries as a model of “global citizenship.” But they fail to see how morality has decayed there and how they’re losing their national identities, histories, and their borders to the demands of Angela Merkel’s EU.

European Union “globalist policies” (diversity, multi-culturalism, manufactured global warming, aggressive anti-fossil fuels environmentalism, border destruction, the right to unimpeded migrant movement across national borders) have destroyed smaller countries with “progressivism” that has instead regressed western civilization and allowed invaders from third world nations to take over. “While Europe slept,” Europeans lost their national independence and control over their respective nations’ monetary policies.

Romanians bemoan the fact that too many Orthodox Churches are being built, that the cost of one church could help build five badly needed kilometers of interstate.

The church was instrumental in founding universities across Europe and in the printing of books and educational materials.  The oldest universities in Europe were run and staffed by priests. And where would we be today if beautiful cathedrals were not built over the centuries by very poor and rich parishioners alike who donated to the construction funds?

Perhaps Romanians should be outraged not by the expenditures to build churches but by the 3,000 euros spent each month for every corrupt politician in Parliament, a financial waste that dwarfs any spending for the building of a church that would preserve the soul and character of the nation for generations to come.

People need both cathedrals and hospitals to care for their souls and their bodies. Churches must not be just museums for tourists, or places for baptisms, weddings, and last rites.

Additionally, the building of a school or of a library does not guarantee a proper education or the storing of real knowledge and ideas - both can be just places of indoctrination.

Why are we visiting in awe the Sistine Chapel and the Vatican, all gold-leafed and marbled with sarcophagi, religious statues, paintings, colonnades, murals, mosaics, and objects d’art, reaching sky-high to Heaven? Poor people suffered for the glory of God, the Church, and the Pope. Good or bad, it is our collective history, our collective civilization which has evolved over the centuries of human existence.

Atheists complain about megalomaniacal priests and too many churches, but who is to say what is too much? Priests have always been vectors of faith, education, and of the political class in order to steer society’s mind and soul in the desired direction. A few higher ranked priests like the current Pope have used their faith podium to dabble in the “scientific consensus” of climate change and social engineering.

Others argue that people can pray anywhere, they don’t need a golden church to do so, and money is much better spent on education. What kind of education would that be? Common Core Standards? Building a fancy library does not guarantee that people will suddenly start reading.  And what would they read and study?  “Progressive” propaganda?  Will they read the classics? Will they learn about documented and archived history or revisionist history? Will they learn civics? Will they learn national pride and to appreciate God and country?

Many former Iron Countries citizens have left their homes and are building the library of the future in other countries, influencing the spread of Cultural Marxism they call Socialist Democracy, a sad perversion of reality which naïve humans believe blindly.

Church and State have been intrinsically connected throughout history and separating them is destroying the essence of who we are. We cannot separate the influence of the church from the foundation of the state no matter how many times atheists and their corrupt lawyers sue.

 

Sunday, November 4, 2018

Politics at the Beach

Beach road to the left
Photo: Ileana Johnson 2018
I was hoping that I could get away from politics during our vacation and just enjoy the beach, the white sand, the sea gulls, the dolphins, and the Floridian sunshine. But politics hit me in the face in one form or another in this area overflowing with snow-bird Democrats from New York, New Jersey, and Ohio.

Last year NGOs used young, beautiful, and half-clad women on the beach to advocate for legalizing marijuana.  This year we were assaulted by greens urging naïve pedestrians in affluent areas to fill out questionnaires to save marine life. Tugging at their heart strings, it was an easy sell for donations to various environmental and conservation groups. 

Waiters and restaurant owners had replaced plastic straws with paper straws – glossy and expensive signs “educated” us at each table that drinking without a straw each time saved a turtle.

One day a mature and well-preserved lady with her husband was high-fiving an elderly New Yorker wearing a blue t-shirt with her favorite candidate for Florida governor. They told her, they were very eager to vote early as well for the same candidate.

I muttered under my breath the word “commies;” the couple heard me and replied that they hoped I could not vote. Tangling with total strangers who have no idea what communism is or how awful it was to live under the communism they yearn to bring to this country was not my idea of fun on vacation. But I am not one to back down from an argument with useful idiots who argue and vote for their own demise. The rich ones think that the scourge of communism will somehow bypass them only because they are “enlightened-thinking” Democrats who deplore their opponents with divergent opinions as Neanderthals with pea brains.

As Project Veritas latest video release revealed, there is nothing American about this particular campaign, just a run of the mill progressive (read communist) assault on a “cracker” state as one of the campaign staffers said in the video. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=di3WRRHRWlE&feature=player_embedded&fbclid=IwAR20L4DZ4j11AVtvISueOJx6wTl6MONZ5zIum4AAYNjrsNUWNzZPcCvw4-w

Often the longest and most protracted political battles are the local ones. One determined resident managed to get on the ballot the three-year long battle over access to a beach road that had been opened to the public for decades but one hurricane had blocked one small section and that gave the city planners the idea to give that section to a rich developer who was planning on building high-rise condos that could sell for mega-bucks. He mentioned that one nearby condo had sold recently for $4.5 million.

The locals had been up in arms fighting to keep this beach road open to the public. Beach-goers contribute large amounts of revenue to the local economy in the form of tourist taxes, hotels, restaurant meals, and other vacation amenities.

 
Mike's rocky strip where he plans a wooden pier for walkers
Photo: Ileana Johnson 2018
 
A local man, who, by his admission, cannot even afford to live near this beach, had bought a small rocky strip of land jutting out into the ocean. Mike flies the American flag proudly and lowers it every afternoon at sunset in a moving ceremony.  A carpenter by trade, he told me that he had spent close to half a million dollars in legal fees to defend everybody’s right of access to the beach, but especially the handicapped. This particular access is very close to the beach, a few steps to be exact.

 
Mike lowering the flag at sunset with Dave
Photo: Ileana Johnson 2018
 
One single handicapped parking spot is now covered by a mound of sand. That is another minor battle as the mound had been sitting there for a while. The plan was to spread the sand on the eroded beach but turtle nesting season was in full swing and the county was waiting, irritating the nearby condo-owners who wanted an unobstructed view of the ocean.

On October 31, the top layers was spread but the bottom part of the mound would have to be taken away to be used in construction since the scraping of the bucket would contaminate the sand with asphalt thus rendering it unusable for the beach.

In a soft but determined voice, he told me that he used to bring his mother to the beach in a wheelchair every sunset until she passed away. Not having children and a family of his own, he wants to leave this strip of land to the public trust in perpetuity so that people could enjoy the ocean. He plans on building a wooden platform on the rocks to allow wheelchair access to the handicapped and to our veterans. He hopes that on Tuesday, the voters will resolve the fate of the beach road in their favor.

The voters will decide on the charter amendment to preserve county-owned parks, preserves, beach and water access and waterfront vistas (ordinance no. 2018-036). Currently the Board of Commissioners has the authority to sell any county-owned property and to vacate roads and rights of way.

“The amendment would prohibit the county from selling or giving away any county-owned parks and preserves, and prevent the county from vacating any road segments or rights of way along any beach, river, creek, canal, lake, bay, gulf access or waterfront vistas." https://www.scgov.net/government/communications/county-charter-amendment-summary

 
Scooter of the Beach
Photo: Ileana Johnson 2018
 
A local celebrity resident, Scooter of the Beach, has been giving video reports on social media daily for the last three months about the status of the red tide bacteria which killed so much marine life, turning water brown, red, or dark green, and causing respiratory irritation and cough on the beach, affecting tourism this summer on a 100-mile stretch.

“Red tide is a common name for a worldwide phenomenon known as an algae bloom (large concentrations of aquatic microorganisms—protozoans or unicellular algae) when it is caused by species of dinoflagellates and other algae. The upwelling of nutrients from the sea floor from massive storms is most likely the cause of these events.”

But locals blame red tide on individual fertilizer use and others on the discharges into the ocean of byproducts from a sugar plant.

 

Saturday, April 21, 2018

Marginalized or Successful Indoctrinator

Photo Credit: Marijane Green
If you’ve ever been marginalized by progressives for your conservative views, for your anti-communist teaching philosophy and other divergent opinions, you were not alone. 

If you’ve worked in highly progressive academic environments and were not re-hired as adjunct, granted tenure, or were not even considered for tenure unless you belonged to organizations such as the NEA, AFT, or other Democrat-supporting organizations, you were not alone.
If you’ve worked in secondary education and were told that your opinions did not matter because the entrenched Democrat bureaucracy did things entirely different from what you perceive as common sense and logical in supporting an American education, you were not alone.

If you taught full-time or part-time and the Dean, Director, or Principal told you that you must use a certain textbook that you found offensive, or that you must teach or grade a certain way, dumb down the curriculum in order to allow everyone to avoid failure and pass students who otherwise did not deserve to pass but their parents were threatening to sue the school, you were not alone.

This is how the politics in education work today and have worked for quite some time. Incisive parents who were involved in their children’s education understood the schemes and fads early on and took measures to protect their children by home schooling them or putting them in private schools.
Other parents who were seldom seen at school or PTA meetings were oblivious, did not care who influenced their children’s world views, or were too trusting of those empowered to shape their children’s minds eight hours a day. Television, Hollywood, violent video games, alcohol and drugs did the rest.

And a small percentage of parents were only concerned that Johnny received free tuition and free meals, thus they did not have to be responsible or participate in the education of their progeny. Why bother if the state provided free education, free meals, and paid teachers?

Everybody knows that children see teachers as the ultimate authority and respect them. Some teachers are truly exceptional, others speak with authority in their subject area, and yet others are highly respected for their scholarship or as influential role models.

But all teachers are not created equal or driven by the same desire to promote American exceptionalism and to shape tomorrow’s American leaders and thinkers. Most of the students shaped today will be America’s busy bees and compliant followers who believe everything they are told without asking pertinent questions.

Parents blame their children’s problems on teachers and administrators. Administrators blame everything on the lack of funding or the “low” teacher salaries when compared to the private sector. But the private sector does not get three-month vacations each year. Unionized teachers strike because their salaries are deemed inadequate even though they are the best paid teachers in the country.

Corrupt politicians and dishonest bureaucrats who retire from government or are fired receive cushy and well-remunerated teaching assignments in private colleges around the country, tasked with teaching ethics in general, political ropes, or social justice.

Democrats and some Republicans in higher positions of power receive millions in book advances, idolized by the press and book reviewers. Students flock to their classes so that they too can learn how to lie and cheat their way to the top in the name of social justice.

Teachers say that parents are the problem, their lack of involvement in their children’s education. Parents are not teaching their progeny manners, respect for authority, how to get along with other children without throwing a temper tantrum, lack of modesty in clothing and shoes, obscenely priced when compared to a teacher’s entire outfit, but expect teachers to provide pencils, pens, crayons, glue, scissors, writing paper, and other classroom supplies to their students.

Teachers find fault with parents who never show up at school regularly, who never help their children do homework, or check their homework every night. Some of their questions are:

-          Do parents help their children prepare for the next school day?

-          Do they punish their children for being disruptive elements in the classroom or do parents   complain to the principal that the teacher is unfairly singling out their child and thus she/he is the source of the problem?

-          Do they blame the teacher when their child cheats on a test instead of making their child responsible for their behavior?

-          Do they teach their children to listen in class and behave properly, respecting authority?

It is certainly difficult for a teacher to be both educator and parent to someone else’s child, especially when young teachers don’t have children of their own yet, are not allowed to discipline students in any way for fear of lawsuits, and must provide justification in writing for their lesson plans every day.
Using their students as pawns, public school teachers and administrators have nominated themselves the socialist political compass of our country and have allowed students to walk out of the classroom several times in order to protest the Democrat cause d’jour instead of doing the jobs they were hired to do, teach our children.

Teaching is an art and cannot be taught by the College of Education or by the latest education fad but it can be forced in a certain direction. Unfortunately, in order to keep their jobs, most teachers use all the prescribed lesson plans, worksheets, and textbooks provided by Common Core or whatever orders come down from the administration via the Department of Education which attaches their orders to school funding and grants.
Even though President Trump had expressed his intent to end Common Core in our public schools, the current Education Secretary, Betsy DeVos, a wealthy business woman and educational activist with no experience in public education, has made no effort to end Common Core which is very much alive and well in most of our public and private schools.

Whether the teacher is marginalized or a successful indoctrinator protected by the teacher’s union or by tenure, at the end of the day they must do as they are told in order to stay employed.

Thursday, August 24, 2017

Last Day of Chemo for My Hubby

On hubby's first day of chemo six months ago, our cubicle was next to an elderly colonel who talked on the phone the entire six hours we were there. We were scared in this environment of desperately sick people who wanted the miracle toxic cure cursing through their veins but also privacy to make peace with their diagnosis of cancer. There was no room for politics or the mundane affairs of a loud mouth who behaved as if he owned the place.

This old colonel broke everybody's serenity and peace with his rudeness. Yet nobody said anything to him. Each time, for the next six months, his boorish behavior continued. I suppose, he was accustomed to be the loudest in the room and all his minions bent to his every whim and order. What was the point of telling him now that the world did not revolve around him, that there were billion others who deserved respect and silence?

On the last chemo treatment we were unlucky again to be placed next to this man and his equally loud and obnoxious wife. We were in our favorite chemo bay by the window. As soon as this couple arrived, they started to loudly bash President Trump to the staff and his illegitimacy to the presidency. And how a female criminal would have been so much better!

We were separated by a thin curtain, it was so close as if they were talking in my ear. The wife was telling the nursing staff how stupid Trump was because he went outside during the solar eclipse and stared at the sun. I went outside too and took pictures, but both the President, his wife, and I wore protective glasses.  She then concluded that Trump was mentally deranged. Her husband, a retired colonel, agreed wholeheartedly.

I really wanted to ask them when they examined and evaluated the mental sanity of the president and when did they get their M.D. degrees. But then I recognized the MSM talking points echoed in their loud pronouncements.

Perhaps I should have asked them how our President had built an empire from a $700,000 inheritance instead of stealing it from taxpayers, political action packs, or bribes. But I didn't. Some people are not worth having a logical conversation with because they are illogical in their hate.

No time or place to say something today. Some people have no compass or manners. As a former soldier the man violated his oath of office to respect the office of the president regardless of his feelings for the current president. But, I did no expect much from his culture. A chemo clinic should be a calm and healing place, not filled by racist hate.

I bit my lips and kept quiet.

Sunday, March 5, 2017

Paul Blumstein's Argument Why Politics Does Not Belong in Science

From an email from my friend, Paul Blumstein, posted with his permission:

"My background is in science. Around 1960, my uncle gave me a large box full of Scientific Americans he had saved from the fifties. I binge-read every issue!

When I had a source of income, I subscribed to Scientific American, Popular Science, Popular Electronics and Science News. Much later, I added Wired.

A number of years ago, I began noticing that some articles in Scientific American were colored by politics. That is not what science is supposed to be about. I went to the masthead and saw that John Rennie was the Editor in Chief. It didn’t take long for me to discover that he was a member of the CFR: a globalist political organization. I didn’t renew.

Lately, I’ve become more and more miffed about articles in Wired. They have become blatantly political. I’m not miffed because it has different political opinions than I do: when I read a science/technology magazine, I expect to find science/technology articles. There are way too many political opinions all around us hitting us in the face. When I want politics, I want to go to it, not have it come to me.

My subscription ends February 2018 so I called Wired and said “please cancel.” They said that I took out the subscription with Amazon and had to cancel through them. So, I went to Amazon to discover that in 2015, I paid for a one year auto-renew subscription. It was very easy to cancel and get a refund. It even had an optional comment box to let the publisher know why I canceled.

Politics does not belong in Science. Be careful of the things you read because it may be influenced by politics."

Tuesday, February 9, 2016

Interview Across Cyber Space with Mircea Brenciu - Part II

On the question, why would people put their faith in career politicians, fighting with each other fiercely on social media, looking for purity, honesty, and perfection in a person’s character, qualities that are often lacking in the political world, Mircea Brenciu’s answer was not a surprise.

The main stream media models and shapes the news and the thinking of the voting populace based on the candidates and what platform they offer – the more socialist, the more popular. The problem arises after the election when, in the “laboratories of democracy,” the two Parliamentary chambers, behind closed doors, unabashedly vacate the will of the voting people.

There is no law that prohibits the candidates elected to migrate to other parties and to change representation to that party’s interest and ideology. “Influenced by blackmail, bribery, and other means, some representatives leave their parties under whose banner they ran for office, and join another party or political organization, thus altering the results of the general vote.” This way, a party or an alliance that was previously in a majority, becomes a minority, further eroding the will of the voters.

These Machiavellian political alliances, made before or after the election, often lack the ideological unity necessary to address the strategic, political, or economic issues of the day and thus decisions are generally made arbitrarily and not in the best interest of the population.

Parliament members are inhibited by fear that they will be arrested under real or trumped up charges and would have to defend themselves for years in a court of law and potentially serve time. Romanian politics must pass through the microscope of the bureaucracy called the National Anti-Corruption Directorate. (DNA)

In Brenciu’s opinion, the DNA is necessary but often abusive. Those who control this institution, also control the direction of national politics. For example, Brenciu added, the “infractors of the Social Democrat Party (PSD) are treated differently than the Liberal Democrat Party (PDL) of former President Traian Basescu.”

Some corrupt politicians are better protected under the law than others, escaping prison, which results in a loss of trust by the general public in the fairness and justice of government.  Using this loss of trust, other politicians shamelessly campaign under the slogan of curbing abuse, corruption, and illegality, and deliver nothing.

While the politics of corruption continue unabated, national interest is forgotten, “with a disgrace and arrogance worthy of historical traitors,” said Brenciu, and the idea of nation-state and sovereignty overlooked in the wave of internationalism coming from Brussels.  “The negotiation of individual liberty is the only politics in Romania that seem worthy of sincere, huge, and herculean efforts.”

Take for example, the development funds allocated to Romania by the European Union in Brussels. Based on passed history, under the banner of curbing corruption, the funds are draconically controlled, and those who are charged with dispersing them realize that it is almost impossible to obtain or demand bribes, and it is thus not in their interest to try very hard to allocate the funds to those who need them for development.

It is difficult to prove such financial corruption; however, why should someone complicate their lives with foreign funds from EU when there is nothing to be gained from the effort, only a lot of paperwork, hard to obtain approvals, and the long wait for funds that must be spent exactly as they were earmarked and in the given amount of time.

“For the EU bureaucrats, this would justify to view Romanians as an inferior category in the grand multinational scheme of EU wannabes.” Romania’s membership in the EU is important but their land, strategic, and economic potential are much more important to these globalist elites.

As Brenciu explained, following in the footstep of history when colonists eliminated people who already resided on the lands sought after, history has an annoying tendency to repeat itself.  He explained, “Romania must be emptied of Romanians, as they are incapable to resist the western bulldozer, and must leave the gold for the explorers who came to the Old Continent in the name of the Crown with 12 gold stars and a blue flag.”

On the question of the economic situation in Romania, following the execution of the communist dictator Nicolae Ceausescu in 1989, Brenciu had this to say.

After the Revolution of December 1989, the first government, that of Petre Roman, launched the competition which Brenciu dubbed, “Getting Rich at Any Cost,” an effort to privatize the economy.

One such method of privatization called MEBO, gave factories, industrial complexes, and economic centers to the new managers, chosen by workers’ meetings, supposedly democratic. In this new brand of “savage and primitive capitalism, devoid of any rules and regulations,” the newly appointed managers robbed everything and anything that belonged to Ceausescu’s communist state and thus became owners without any payment made to the state.  The “proletariat,” who continued to work for the new owners, received shares in this new “enterprise,” shares which they later sold to the new owners/directors who became millionaires overnight.

Brenciu clarified that the majority of the new owners/directors were former security officers and communist apparatchiks who were traitors to the communist regime, turning the anti-communist tide into their financial favor. They were opportunists, aided and abetted by a corrupt judicial system and a mentality of two wolves and a lamb deciding what’s for dinner.

The poor of yesterday, members of the proletariat, the much touted “workers,” remain the poor of today.  Many jobs have disappeared thanks to the sale of unproductive factories, piece by piece, or the sale to foreign investors who bought entire plants, whether productive or unproductive, to dismantle them or to modernize them, and thus eliminate any competition possible.

Even though Romanian economy functioned under communism with old and outdated technology, it had an industrial base. Today, Brenciu added, Romania has become an “industrial-agrarian, tourist, and service economy.” And the agricultural sector is also suffering as more arable land is left unused, while food is imported from far away.

TO BE CONTINUED

 

 

Tuesday, October 27, 2015

October Beach Days

Photo: Ileana Johnson Oct. 2015
I am so enchanted by the sparkling emerald green waters of the Gulf of Mexico and its white quartz sand beaches.  I must have been a mermaid in a previous life, living in the aqua blue crystal clear waters.

Even though I am not the best of swimmers, going into the ocean has been a fascinating dance between excitement, apprehension, velvety sand, and elation driven by charmed curiosity.  I am lured by the crashing waves, the marine life swimming about, and that exquisite sea shell in which a tiny creature finds its temporary home. Sometimes the strong undercurrents try to pull me further out to sea.

The ocean is glassy and fluid – I can see clearly to the bottom floor. Tiny white sand sharks swim slowly around my feet, while an occasional flash of silver streaks fast in front of me, chased by pelicans and sea gulls, eager to dive around me in hopes of catching a tasty meal.

The days are perfect. The sun shines with few white clouds on the horizon. The days are balmy 80s, the water is warm, and the waves are too small for the impatient surfers and occasionally even placid like a stagnant lake.  The undercurrents can be seen in the wavy sandy bottom that resembles little sugary dunes.

Photo: Ileana Johnson Oct. 2015
 
I trudge my chair, towel, and water cooler to the water’s edge to relax in the ocean surf sounds and the salty aroma of the spraying mist.  The sea gulls appear suddenly when I open the cooler top to get a bottle of water. They’ve learned quite fast that those marvelous little boxes contain food. I brought chips in hopes that an injured sea gull I spotted the day before would show up again. He was dragging one foot behind but was still able to fly. I wondered if he could still hunt for fish to survive.

Photo: Ileana Johnson 2015
 
Not even a painful encounter with a small nesting stingray dampened my desire to enjoy the most beautiful beach in the U.S. I stepped on the creature in thigh-deep ocean. I was treading water instead of shuffling through the bottom like the locals have told me to do. Normally shy creatures, the vibrations cause the stingrays to swim away from humans.

Photo: Ileana Johnson Oct. 2015
 
Surprised, the stingray shot its tail with barbs into my right heel. The toxin caused instant excruciating pain and bleeding. The ER doc told me later that I was lucky – it missed my Achilles tendon and the X-rays showed no barbs left inside.

Every so many seconds, toxin-driven pain shot through my entire leg in spite of pain meds and soaking in very hot water.  I did not fuss much – I treaded in their world and disturbed their tranquility. Stingrays bury in the sand 3-10 feet from the water’s edge and usually nest from April to October.

I cannot complain, after 36 years of going to the Gulf’s beaches, this is the first time I was stung. Mims was joking that next time, I might encounter Jaws. Considering all the sandbars so close to the shore, it was a distinct possibility.

Siesta Key
Photo: Ileana Johnson Oct. 2015
 
The edge of the beach was protected habitat where turtles nest and native flowers, bushes, and weeds grow wild and undisturbed. When dark falls, it is really hard to see anything. Ambient light is very low, street lighting is banned, and most homes have no outdoor lights on.


Photo: Ileana Johnson Oct. 2015
Not to be outdone by the atheist crowd that plasters religious COEXIST bumper stickers on their cars, environmentalists have come up with a Coexist t-shirt that sports an endangered animal marine species for each letter. Under a shady grove of palm trees and other tropical plants, a sign sponsored by atheists and secular humanists urged beach goers to protect their environment by adopting a park. Politics is ever present even at the beach.

Photo: Ileana Johnson 2015
 
Many stores are shuttered for the winter season. The local hangouts are busy and the dimly lit Walmart is open 24 hours. We loved it so much, we went four times. It was fantastic to hear nothing but English spoken in every store and to see American waiters, store clerks, and medical personnel trained in the United States.

The bookstore chain did not disappoint with its liberal staff. An elderly employee, with a Brooklyn accent, asked for my “teacherdom I.D.” when I purchased a book on Florida’s history. I had asked him about Donald Trump’s and Michael Savage’s books due out any day. He shrugged his shoulder as if I spoke a foreign language and, with a dumb grin, directed me to a helpful and more professional person.

Even though the beaches and water are perfect for a late October, the town is semi-deserted of tourists, save for small groups from France and Germany.  I could hear their animated conversations around me.

A few string-bikini clad young American women were strutting at the water’s edge, proud of their impropriety. The notoriously nudist European women were surprisingly subdued. But some of their men were letting it all hang out in string-bikini speedos, leaving nothing to the imagination.

Photo: Ileana Johnson Oct. 2015
What a great place to walk on the beach, watch sunrises and sunsets, admire pelicans and seagulls dive for fish, read a book, or fall asleep under an umbrella, lulled by the constant roar of waves crashing against the sugary-white sandy beaches.

Leaving this Floridian paradise, going through two beautiful airports in Tampa and Miami, where TSA agents were actually nicer to us in their freedom-robbing attempt to keep us “safe” from invisible terrorists, and returning home to cold weather and crowding in northern Virginia and to the dingy, smelly, and dilapidated Reagan National Airport, I cannot help but think, what a metaphor this is for all that is corrupt and dirty in Washington, D.C.

 

Saturday, October 12, 2013

District of Columbia, The Seat of Power and Corruption

Washington, D.C. and its surrounding suburbs are interesting places to visit. Populated by over two hundred different nationalities, legal and illegal, it is a hodge-podge of humanity stuck in bumper to bumper traffic on most days and nights.

One of the most densely policed places in the world, it is easy to lose yourself in the many purposefully narrowed streets to make them difficult to vehicular traffic, the roads with double names, one name before it crosses a major highway and another name on the other side, the barricaded buildings, the check points, and the unmarked police cars and menacingly-looking plain-clothed police armed for urban assault.

On the best of days, the District of Columbia is a lovely place to visit if you are a museum lover, an admirer of the many monuments and memorials on the National Mall, the Reflecting Pool, the botanical gardens, the art galleries of the Smithsonian, the green parks with creative and intricate statues, the Natural History Museum, the Spy Museum, Madam Tussauds Wax Museum, and the Ford Theatre where President Lincoln was assassinated.

On the worst of recent days, D.C. was a dangerous place for an unarmed young mother with a toddler in the back seat of her car who got so lost and frightened, trying to escape from so many men and women pointing guns at her, she did not stop in time and was shot. Did she deserve to die? Should they have shot her tires first or used road spikes? Life used to be precious to our Western culture, not death.

On the worst of days in September, a crazed gunman with employment credentials and revenge on his clouded mind shot a lot of innocent people in the office building in which he had easy access and clearance to enter.

On the best of days of spring, D.C. is a fragrant symphony in pink cherry blossoms, surrounding the Tidal Basin and dotting the landscape of the surrounding buildings. The 1912 gift of 3,000 cherry trees from Mayor Yukio Ozaki of Tokyo becomes a joy every year during the month of April, snowing flowers everywhere.

On the worst of government shutdown days, overzealous and petulant D.C. bureaucrats who claimed to serve the people turned away WWII veterans from their own memorial for which they’ve paid dearly in blood and treasure. Politicians wanted to make life as miserable as possible for American citizens during the unnecessary government shutdown. The government was too broke, they said, to stay open but found money to hire armed police and personnel to man barricades in an open-air monument that otherwise does not require much maintenance or guarding.

On the worst of days this week in D.C., the vets, who were arrested for crossing over the barricades at the Vietnam Memorial, were shocked when illegal aliens who broke our laws and crossed our borders illegally were allowed to rally on the National Mall, demanding amnesty. The illegal aliens and their progressive activists and lobbyists have more power and rights under this administration than American citizens do.

Breitbart News reported that an elaborate set of “four Jumbotrons, port-a-potties, special event fencing, tents, and raised and lighted stages” were set up across the National Mall for illegal aliens who invaded the U.S. in violation of our law.  Meanwhile, veterans who fought in Normandy, Europe, Iowa Jima, North Africa, and freed Europe of the scourge of Nazism were told by gun-carrying park police to back off and move along from the monuments they paid for with their blood and treasure.

On the best of days, D.C. witnessed millions of peaceful tea party marchers who were taxed enough already, yet most of the MSM ignored them and wrote them off as a few thousand radical right wingers with extreme views, an “AstroTurf movement” as Nancy Pelosi so derisively called them.

On the worst of days, D.C. is a place to fear and the seat of power, corruption, and pettiness. Big rigs drivers understood that. Unlike the past when truckers caused gridlock in Washington with their demonstrations, few American truckers showed up this time to protest their bloated government that does not seem willing to stop spending, taxing its citizens, and devaluing the American dollar. Truckers were afraid – the implied threat of the National Guard was promoted on Social websites and many retreated in fear of their government. Those who did show up and had to obey the closed roads signs spent upwards of $1,500 one way in fuel alone to make a stand against the tyrannical government.

The District of Columbia is the seat of government for the select few, the globalists with money, the lawyers, progressive education policy deciders, and the powerful lobbies that determine the fate of 307 million Americans and indirectly the economic fate of the rest of the world.

Washington, D.C. is our nation’s capital but it appears more like the capital of everyone-who-hates America and its culture, where deals are made secretively in the dead of night, where the American stellar health care enjoyed by generations has been destroyed in the name of progressive Marxist fairness, social justice, and community organizing, replaced by rationing and death panels.

D.C. is now a place where extreme leftists reign, undermining the rule of law. Michael Reagan said, the “law is applied through a filter of how the application affects a group, instead of being applied impartially regardless of the group or individual circumstances.” (reaganreports.com)

On a cloudy day, when the District of Columbia was cloaked in a gray mantle of drizzling rain, I went to the mall to walk. One of the chain store windows displayed 3 oversized, bright red signs with the unfortunate words, “SALE! Thank Congress; Thank Mr. Obama, Government Shut Down SALE!!! Extra 20% off, up to 70% off.”

Commerce is good for the country, we are a consumer-oriented economy, and two-thirds of our GDP is consumption. Some might even say there is too much conspicuous consumption.

Should we thank Congress for not doing its job and passing a budget in four years? Should we thank Mr. Obama and Congress for passing the unaffordable Affordable Care Act in the middle of the night with only Democrat votes? Should we thank Nancy Pelosi for telling us that we must pass the bill in order to find out what’s in it? We did find out, Rep. Pelosi, and we don’t like it one bit.

Should we thank our president for taking a wrecking ball to our stellar healthcare? Health insurance did need revamping, several  million Americans did not have insurance, could not afford it or were dropped because of preexisting conditions, but why replace it with one-payer government-run ineptitude which turns out to be much more expensive? How are those exchanges that cost taxpayers over $693 million working out so far? After all, they were quite pricier than originally quoted ($93 million).

On sunny days D.C. is a place of green parks, paved streets, and heavily shuttered and protected glass and concrete buildings occupied by faceless bureaucrats in grey suits, carrying heavy briefcases stuffed with new regulations, rules, laws, and taxes that the American proletariat must follow and obey.

 

 

 

 

 

Tuesday, July 9, 2013

Traditional Marriage and Equal Rights

The institution of marriage has worked well over the centuries in spite of challenges. Marriage is never easy, it is not just about love and companionship, it is an obligation and a covenant. Pope Francis declared the definition of marriage as a union between a man and a woman.

Justice Anthony Kennedy reasoned that the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) was passed in 1996 by 342 members of the House, 85 Senators, and President Bill Clinton as an anti-gay move, to “disparage,” “injure,” “degrade,” “demean,” and “humiliate” a certain group of Americans.

Most Americans believe that redefining marriage for the majority of Americans in order to include a minority who feels discriminated against is certainly a convoluted and destructive way to give Americans the same access to insurance, inheritance, civil unions, hospital visitations, and other perks that a traditional married couple enjoys, including divorce and higher taxes.

The existence of orderly society is based on reproduction resulting from the union of a man and a woman. The resulting children need both a man and woman in order to be successful, well protected, cared for, loved, and for society to survive over time and grow independent of government.

Marriage predates government but the government conveniently recognizes, protects, and promotes marriage in order to insure its survivability and the survivability of our species.

When marriage is promoted and protected, other relationships are not banned. There are common-law couples, heterosexual couples who never marry, homosexual couples, and single individuals who choose not to be in a relationship. The government does not force these adults to make the choice of marriage and thus no one should have the right to redefine marriage for everyone else.

Ryan T. Anderson said, “Redefining marriage would legislate a new principle that marriage is whatever emotional bond the government says it is.” (The Heritage Foundation, March 11, 2013)

Marriage is not about having a party, a wedding cake, distributing legal property, insurance, or the right to divorce. Marriage is about survival of the species, “monogamy, exclusivity, and permanence.” If you redefine marriage, the so-called “marriage equality,” you open the Pandora’s Box of other ills. If same sex couples “marry” why not have polygamy, marriages to animals, and marriages to cousins, polyamorous relationships, and pedophilia sanctioned by the state?

Anderson argues that there is no such thing as “parenting,” there is “mothering” and there is “fathering;” each has an important and irreplaceable individual role in the upbringing of a healthy child who will grow into a healthy adult.

Marriage has been recognized as the union of a man and a woman in Jewish and Christian traditions, in philosophy, in ancient Greek and Roman law, even in primitive cultures that had no concept of sexual orientation.

Recently, “Marriage has been weakened by a revisionist view of marriage that is more about adults’ desires than children’s needs.” By breaking down marriage, civil society is weakened and limited government will explode into government control. Ryan T. Anderson of the Heritage Foundation cites numerous studies that show that man-woman relationships and their marriage promotes economic well-being because society does not need to care for children who are born out of wedlock.  One of the studies by Professor W. Bradford Wilcox of the University of Virginia’s National Marriage Project summarized, “The core message…is that the wealth of nations depends in no small part on the health of the family.” http://www.heritage.org/research/reports/2013/03/marriage-what-it-is-why-it-matters-and-the-consequences-of-redefining-it

“Government can treat people equally – and leave them free to live and love as they choose – without redefining marriage.” There is no ban on the same-sex love, there is freedom to have same sex unions, to live together, to buy a house together, own property, worship in churches that bless same sex union, and work in places that offer joint benefits.

“Redefining marriage threatens religious liberty.” Religious groups will stop running adoption agencies if they have to violate their religious principles. Under the directives of Putin, Russians have suspended adoptions for same-sex couples from the United States. Americans who refused services related to same-sex marriages were successfully sued in court. Their religious beliefs were trampled by the wishes of a minority who sought to redefine marriage and won.

Nonie Darwish, author, spoke with Silvio Canto Jr. recently about the marriage redefinition. She discussed her recent article, “Marriage is an obligation, not a right.” Born a Muslim in Egypt, she lived as a child under Islamic Law which encourages polygamy. She moved to the United States where she became a Christian and embraced monogamy because “respect of the Christian marriage is the only way to have peace, stability, and civilization.”
www.blogtalkradio.com/cantotalk/2013/07/05/todays-message

Nonie Darwish described the premise of marriage under Islamic Law where men don’t promise loyalty to their wives but the wives pledge loyalty to their husband. Muslim women live together and Muslim men live together. This creates a gender-segregated society. Darwish wondered if we are going to have a gender-segregated society with lesbian couples and homosexual couples. She mentioned the Australian lesbian activist who said that the purpose of gay marriage is to destroy the institution of marriage.

When children are brought up by gay couples, society will change. Such unions are based on artificial and false premises of inheritance, hospital visitations, employment benefits, things that do not define a family. Such unions can never produce a biological child without the help of a third party.

Marriage is not a right guaranteed by the state. Some heterosexuals never marry because it is a big responsibility to marry and divorce rates are high. Arranged marriages still take place in many cultures and are not based on love – some learn to love each other, some never do. “The marriage institution was not created to regulate love. Marriage developed naturally out of the need to raise the next generation.” Nonie Darwish concluded that, in spite of the liberal media bombardment with shows promoting the happy gay lifestyle, “just because it is legal, it is not normal.”

My favorite department store just celebrated June as gay “pride month.” Upon entering the store, a large board was quoting one of its employees, urging shoppers to “Be Inspired.” I am certain that I will be inspired to stop shopping in this store - I don’t like to buy my clothes in any place that engages in politics. This is the same store selling “sustainable shoes.”