Memory Lane
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Monday, March 17, 2014
Memory Lane ... thx Fred R!
Columbus Dispatch 3/17/14
Jonah Goldberg commentary: Millennials will grow and, likely, change
Now, I often find generational stereotyping annoying. For instance, there was no “greatest generation.” Sure, there were a bunch of great Americans who stormed the beaches of Normandy. But is some guy who was in jail in 1943 for petty larceny deserving of respect because he was born around the same time as a guy who won the Medal of Honor during WWII?
Honor, glory and respect are earned individually, not collectively.
Politicians pander to young people, and lots of young people fall for it. And that speaks well of neither. Politicians pander to “youth” because it’s a time-saving way to trawl for votes and volunteer door-knockers wholesale. It’s the difference between using a gill net and a fishing pole. “You’re great because you were born more recently than other people” is the lamest form of flattery I can think of.
When politicians invoke generational stereotypes, what they are really doing is saying, “Act your age.” What’s pathetic is when young people unwittingly follow that advice.
For example, Barack Obama won the youth vote by huge margins in 2008 (66 percent among under-30s) and 2012 (60 percent). He did this in no small part by pandering to the vanity of young people. Sure, he addressed “youth issues” such as student loans. Yes, he also mirrored their views on some social issues (though not gay marriage in ’08). Obama’s ambivalence toward seemingly clichéd patriotic gestures (remember the endless controversy about whether he would wear a flag pin?) sent an important signal to young voters raised on the snark of The Daily Show and weary of talk of “freedom fries.”
But the overall gestalt was more about fostering a sense of inclusion in a “movement” of some kind; “We are the ones we’ve been waiting for,” and all of that nonsense. Obama promised that government could be the vehicle that would carry us to the sunny uplands of history. He took the aesthetic of a Pepsi marketing rollout and pasted it onto a presidential campaign.
But, as Mario Cuomo once said, politicians campaign in poetry but govern in prose. And the prose of the Obama years has been an incoherent and disillusioning run-on sentence. His signature achievement, Obamacare, was designed from the outset to screw young people, overcharging them for products they don’t need in order to subsidize older Americans. Young people loved it when Obama called George W. Bush’s deficits “unpatriotic” because they saddled millennials with debt. That was $7 trillion borrowed dollars ago.
“Idealistic” Democrats have spent the Obama years circling the wagons around parasitic teachers unions at the expense of poor minority kids (rich people have school choice already). The shovel-ready jobs were a fraudulent talking point used to justify pouring money into constituencies that already have jobs. Obama is hell-bent on raising the minimum wage, which will help people with jobs — particularly well-paying union jobs that tie compensation to multiples of the minimum wage. But it won’t help young people get their first jobs, which are harder to find these days than legal weed.
Senate Democrats just held an utterly bogus pseudo-filibuster on global warming against a legislative body they control. They proposed no legislation, preferring instead to put on a kabuki show for rich donors justifiably wondering what Obama’s “Year of Action” actually means.
It’s true, millennials remain more liberal and look more favorably toward big government than other age groups. But people grow up. They may well learn that their cynicism towards marriage and God — time-honored sources of happiness — was misplaced as the single life gets old and they find the one or the One they were waiting for.
Similarly, the hot embers of their ardor for big government may cool as they realize the poetry rarely gets translated into prose. And for that, Barack Obama will deserve a fair share of the credit. For nothing breeds disillusionment and cynicism more than the failure to deliver.
Jonah Goldberg is editor at large of National Review Online.
jonahscolumn@aol.com
Sunday, March 16, 2014
How wolves change rivers ... Good and sent to me by excellent correspondents Clay V, Sarah R, and Ramey H!
Saturday, March 15, 2014
The Lord's Prayer ... He knew that of which he spoke - Beautiful! Thanks Nita E and Jack H!
The Lord's Prayer
To:
The
Lord's PrayerThe
moment you receive it, say:Our
Father who art in heaven,hallowed
be Thy
name,Thy
kingdom come,Thy
will be done, on earth as it is in
heaven,give
us this day our daily breadand
forgive us our trespassesas
we forgive those who trespass against
usand
lead us not into temptation,but
deliver us from evil,for
Thine is
the kingdom and the power and the
glory,now
and foreverAmen...
GOD WANTED ME TO TELL YOU, it shall be well with you this coming
year. No matter how much your enemies try this year, they will
not succeed.
You have been destined to make it and you shall
surely achieve all your goals this year.
For the remainder of
2014, all your agonies will be diverted and victory and
prosperity will be incoming in abundance. Today, God has
confirmed the end of your sufferings sorrows and pain because HE
that sits on the throne has remembered you. He has taken away
the hardships and given you JOY. He will never let you
down.
I knocked at heaven's door this morning, God asked me,
My child! What can I do for you?
And
I said,'Father,
please protect and bless the person reading this
message.'It
has never been broken. Within 48 hours send to family and
friends, as many as you can? God does know if you don't have 20
people to send it to.
It's
the effort and intent that counts. This is a powerful Prayer.
Couldn't hurt can only help...
Let's pray for one another,
there’s
no superstition involved here, we are just asking for Gods will
to be done here on earth.GOD
BLESS YOU!
angels are in your world. Ten of them are sleeping,
nine are playing, one is reading this message.
Please read.... not joking..... God has seen you
struggling with something. God says it is over. A
blessing is coming your way. If you believe in God,
send this message on, please don't ignore it, you
are being tested.God
is going to fix two BIG things tonight in your favor.
If you believe in God, drop everything and pass it
on. Tomorrow will be the best day ever. Send this to
ten friends. As soon as you get five replies,
someone you love will quietly surprise
you."It
is amazing how much can be accomplishedif
no one cares who gets the credit."John
Wooden=
AMEN"I will repay you for the years the locust have eaten"Joel 2:25
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