Category Archives: Food for Thought

May 8, 2015 · 9:21 pm

The power of free thinking

To understand the power of free thinking, I recommend reading , “My Bondage and My Freedom” by Frederick Douglass. Here is a free gutenberg.org version, but I have it downloaded on my kindle, so here is the free kindle version too.

Frederick Douglass was born an American slave in 1818 in Maryland and he died a champion of human rights, an abolitionist, a writer, renowned orator, but most of all a FREE man in 1895. (short bio here).

Douglass relates how as a slave, learning to read was forbidden, but a white mistress undertook teaching him to read for a short time, before being reprimanded by her husband. From that point on, Douglass embarked on a secret, dangerous mission to educate himself:

“Seized with a determination to learn to read, at any cost, I hit upon many expedients to accomplish the desired end. The plea which I mainly adopted, and the one by which I was most successful, was that of using my young white playmates, with whom I met in the streets as teachers. I used to carry, almost constantly, a copy of Webster’s spelling book in my pocket; and, when sent of errands, or when play time was allowed me, I would step, with my young friends, aside, and take a lesson in spelling. I generally paid my tuition fee to the boys, with bread, which I also carried in my pocket. For a single biscuit, any of my hungry little comrades would give me a lesson more valuable to me than bread. Not every one, however, demanded this consideration, for there were those who took pleasure in teaching me, whenever I had a chance to be taught by them.”

Douglass, Frederick (2009-10-04). My Bondage and My Freedom (p. 85). Public Domain Books Kindle Edition.

Douglass heard some white boys mention a schoolbook, The Columbian Orator, and determined to acquire a copy. He bought a copy for fifty cents. The Columbian Orator was a popular 19th century schoolbook filled with speeches and essays, geared to promote republican virtues (in other words, good citizenship, if you are living in a republic like the United States of America) and patriotism. To quote Douglass:

“I had now penetrated the secret of all slavery and oppression, and had ascertained their true foundation to be in the pride, the power and the avarice of man. The dialogue and the speeches were all redolent of the principles of liberty, and poured floods of light on the nature and character of slavery. With a book of this kind in my hand, my own human nature, and the facts of my experience, to help me, I was equal to a contest with the religious advocates of slavery, whether among the whites or among the colored people, for blindness, in this matter, is not confined to the former. I have met many religious colored people, at the south, who are under the delusion that God requires them to submit to slavery, and to wear their chains with meekness and humility. I could entertain no such nonsense as this; and I almost lost my patience when I found any colored man weak enough to believe such stuff.”

Douglass, Frederick (2009-10-04). My Bondage and My Freedom (p. 87). Public Domain Books. Kindle Edition.

He continued:

“Once awakened by the silver trump of knowledge, my spirit was roused to eternal wakefulness. Liberty! the inestimable birthright of every man, had, for me, converted every object into an asserter of this great right. It was heard in every sound, and beheld in every object. It was ever present, to torment me with a sense of my wretched condition. The more beautiful and charming were the smiles of nature, the more horrible and desolate was my condition.”

Douglass, Frederick (2009-10-04). My Bondage and My Freedom (pp. 87-88). Public Domain Books. Kindle Edition.

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Filed under American Character, American History, Education, Food for Thought, General Interest

May 6, 2015 · 5:23 pm

The ‘white experience’ and me by Claire Hawks

I’m white, female, and like every other person alive, my race and sex is an accident of birth not a choice, and like every other person alive, my color is only skin-deep. I’m finally fed up with hearing about the “black experience&….

This story is written by a 70 year old white lady who shares her American experiences and views on the “white privilege” mantra.

The new mob rule model

The news media, across the board, keeps trying to sell us on issues based on polls. Today, we’re being told that the American people support a deal with Iran. Now, what does that even mean? First, “a deal” is a vague term, as evidenced that this “deal” on a “framework” has the Obama administration walking away with one understanding of the “deal” and the Iranians hitting the airwaves spouting a much different understanding.

Most Americans can’t even locate Iran on the map, have no clue about the ramifications of Iran acquiring a nuclear arsenal and quite frankly “most Americans” haven’t bothered to learn even the rudimentary facts about this situation to offer an opinion worth paying any attention to. This is the problem with our entire culture – we’ve got a clueless citizenry that is easily led, we’ve got venal politicians who will lie, cheat, and say just about anything to remain in power and we’ve got a lazy, ignorant bunch of clowns masquerading as “professional journalists” who feed us meaningless drivel like this endless stream of poll numbers. So, even though the vast majority of Americans know absolutely nothing about Iran or the deal, the President and his minions, thanks to pollsters and the gullible media, can proudly announce that the American people support a deal with Iran.

Government by popular opinion equates to the new mob rule model. I await a politician to have the guts to stand up and say, “My stance on this issue IS NOT popular, but let me explain my principles and view of the issue.”

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Filed under Food for Thought, Foreign Policy, General Interest, Politics

March 8, 2015 · 9:21 am

Lecture – Hillsdale College Online Courses

Lecture – Hillsdale College Online Courses.

Here’s a free online introduction to The Federalist Papers, which every American should read and understand.

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Filed under American History, Food for Thought, General Interest, Politics, The Constitution

March 3, 2015 · 10:13 am

Willful ignorance: Bondage for the modern era?

Sometimes, well, let’s make that often, progressive politics appears to be very much a “cut off your nose to spite your face” childish temper tantrum. The ongoing flights of these social justice loco birds’ loopy reasoning can leave you dazed, dizzy and decidedly dumbfounded, but be brave and wade through the entire linked blog post, “Why Grammar Snobbery Has No Place in the Movement”, discussed in a piece, “Proper English Grammar is Now Racist”, at The American Thinker this morning.

The grammar snobbery post comes from Melissa A. Fabello, a self-described social justice warrior and an English teacher. Let’s bow our heads and pray that none of our children or grandchildren end up subjected to her politicized propaganda that setting standard English as the standard is a form of class privilege and inherently oppressive. Ms Fabello’s arguments on ‘”privilege” appear, not surprisingly, on a blog called “Everyday Feminism”. She writes:

But there’s a difference between understanding standard grammar and demanding it, between believing there’s a time and a place for so-called “proper” English and ridiculing anyone who steps outside of what you deem “acceptable.”

There’s a difference between appreciating language and being a snob.

And the last place that we need grammar snobbery is in social justice movements.

And not just because getting hung up on the correct use of homonyms or subject-predicate agreement is distracting to the job at hand, but also because purporting one form of English as elite is inherently oppressive.

In Fabello’s view, “it’s important to note that any time we create a hierarchy by positioning one thing as “better” than another, we’re being oppressive.” ( all bold-faced statements are hers, not mine). Yes, the American march to mediocrity follows the beat of some decidedly off-beat drummers. Obviously, she was not reared by my mother, the strictest teacher on there’s a right way to just about everything in life, from how to fold your underwear to how to help your neighbors.

Patricia L. Dickson, author of The American Thinker piece mentioned above, sums up this bizarre alter-universe of progressive political thought:

“The entire article is a futile attempt to justify the failure of the public school system. The author is using the soft bigotry of low expectations under the guise of social justice.”

Read more: http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2015/03/proper_english_grammar_is_now_racist_.html#ixzz3TKkOup8e
Follow us: @AmericanThinker on Twitter | AmericanThinker on Facebook

Some of the very practices American slave owners used to keep their black slaves submissive now appear to be sold as “empowering”. In the words of Frederick Douglass, a writer whom Ms Fabello should study closely:

“Slavery does away with fathers, as it does away with families. Slavery has no use for either fathers or families, and its laws do not recognize their existence in the social arrangements of the plantation. When they do exist, they are not the outgrowths of slavery, but are antagonistic to that system. The order of civilization is reversed here. The name of the child is not expected to be that of its father, and his condition does not necessarily affect that of the child.”

Douglass, Frederick (2009-10-04). My Bondage and My Freedom (p. 29). Public Domain Books. Kindle Edition.

Laws were enacted in some states forbidding slaves to learn to read or write, in the belief that their education was a threat to the slavery system (http://www.pbs.org/wnet/slavery/experience/education/docs1.html).

Learning standard English, if not the language in the home, should be viewed as an opportunity toward advancement, just as acquiring any other foreign language can open many doors too. Promoting willful ignorance in the name of “social justice” will keep many black children locked in poverty, hopeless and dependent on the largesse of government welfare programs – from cradle to grave. Perhaps, that is the intention. Is this bondage for the modern era?

Modernity meets the Amish

G. Murphy Donovan’s latest article at The American Thinker, “Arrested Development and the Internet” discusses a book, Mind Change, written by a British neuroscientist, Susan Greenfield, the Baroness Ot-Moor, who also sits in the House of Lords. He writes:

“Susan Greenfield’s Mind Change is a courageous broadside at cyber culture, a dose of reality therapy for the Internet, social networks, video gaming, cyber gadgets, and the damage they might do to malleable, developing minds.

The key word is minds, not brains, mind you. You can think of your brain as a mind only if it has a personality. Clearly, cyber millennials have brains, but Susan’s lament suggests the jury might still be out on adult personalities. Greenfield is concerned for the most part about the growth of self, not cells.”

Read more: http://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2015/02/arrested_development_and_the_internet.html#ixzz3T6L7F4xa
Follow us: @AmericanThinker on Twitter | AmericanThinker on Facebook

More than a decade ago, the internet seemed to me to be like the Wild West, vast open space to explore, few rules, and no defined culture. We allowed our children to roam free in this new terrain with very little supervision, guidelines, or guidance. Sure, commercial entities sprang up offering pricey services to serve as electronic internet babysitters for our children – parental controls. The video gaming landscape ran red with blood and mayhem, where murder and violence fed every psychopathological and sociopathological trait, in the imaginary persona young people (mostly boys) took on in ever-increasingly violent “role playing”.

The American cyber “culture” never developed as a “culture” in the sense of people connected together by traditional ethnic/religious/social values and therein lies the danger. Political propagandists, big business entities , and many far left academics built a Potemkin village, where we and our children lead imaginary lives.

That criminal entities and terrorists should find safe haven operating on the internet should not come as a surprise. Islamic fascists seized the internet technology as a cheap means to take their movement global, actually creating a unique internet culture, utilizing high-tech videography to sell their rebranding of a 7th century death cult. Of course, back in the 90s, American left-wing pols warned of right-wing zealots forming militias using the internet to communicate, collude and conspire too. And a plethora of criminals, deviants, and assorted organized criminal elements all found the internet an appealing new terrain to exploit too.

I have not read Greenfield’s book, so I followed GMD’s links in his article and then googled Greenfield to read a bit more about her and her book. In this The Telegraph article, “Susan Greenfield: “I’m not scaremongering”, Tom Chivers writes:

“Susan Greenfield is keen to make it known that she is no technophobe. “I’m not a Luddite, I’m not Amish. No scientist could be a technophobe – I couldn’t do what I do if I were a technophobe.”

The issue has come up because for years, she has been warning about the dangers (and the possible benefits, she would be careful to add) of screen technologies. She is – fairly or unfairly – associated with newspaper headlines such as “Social websites harm children’s brains: chilling warning to parents from top neuroscientist” and “How Facebook addiction is damaging your child’s brain”.”

Greenfield’s asserting that she isn’t Amish nor a technophobe led me to think about a book I’m currently reading, “Amish Peace: Simple Wisdom for a Complicated World”, by Suzanne Woods Fisher, which offers some interesting insight into this discussion of technology’s impact on children’s developing minds. Growing up in PA and being PA Dutch (although not Amish), I thought of the Amish as being backward and to borrow Greenfield’s description, “technophobes”. Well, here’s what I’m learning – the Amish aren’t technophobes. The Amish were some of the earliest embracers of solar power. They have practical, debated positions on new technology within their churches:

“The acceptance of the scooter reflects an Amish-style “selective modernization.” When something new reaches into the Amish community, the church leaders might give it a period of probation, weighing out its long-term effects, and each church district comes to its own conclusions. And, always, the church leaders consider where a change could lead the younger generation. They try to see beyond the immediate benefits of change to the effects it could have down the road. How could this new technology or gadget tempt someone away from the church? Or to disobey God?”

Fisher, Suzanne Woods (2009-09-15). Amish Peace: Simple Wisdom for a Complicated World (p. 39). Baker Publishing Group. Kindle Edition.

Fisher continues:

“The Amish consider the long-term consequences of something new and how it will affect the community’s welfare. They appreciate comfort and convenience but realize it’s not the ultimate reason for our being here. They make decisions with higher purposes in mind. Before accepting or buying a new technology, have you ever thought, what will this lead to? Consider making today’s purchase with your ultimate goals in mind. Look around your house. How many gadgets do you see that promise to save you time, effort, or money? Have they lived up to their promise? The Amish have a saying: Once drawn, lines are hard to erase. Where do you draw the line on what technology is acceptable for your family and what isn’t? How does recognizing that “line” (or priority) simplify decision making?”

Fisher, Suzanne Woods (2009-09-15). Amish Peace: Simple Wisdom for a Complicated World (p. 40). Baker Publishing Group. Kindle Edition.

From another chapter in Fisher’s book, the backward Amish offer up the time-tested child-rearing value of character development and providing good adult role models:

“The work ethic of the Amish had already been instilled in Elizabeth, even at her tender age. The Amish are known for their precise craftsmanship, be it quilting, carpentry, cooking, or blacksmithing. Doing something well is a virtue. Even in school, children learn a concept thoroughly before moving on to the next assignment. They value thoroughness over haste, completion over speed. To the Amish way of thinking, a task takes the time that it takes. They also value giving a task the time it requires to do a job well. Elizabeth didn’t feel frustrated or impatient with herself, as so many do— including adults— while on the steep learning curve. So how do the Amish instill such a work ethic in their children? It’s not as complicated as it sounds. In fact, it’s something we all do, whether we intend to or not. It’s called modeling. Elizabeth’s community is made up of living examples— good ones—of how to work, how to live, and how to love others. She is surrounded by a covey of females: mothers, grandmothers, sisters, and cousins who pass on their knowledge and expertise about how to cook , clean, quilt, and be keepers of the home —all of the components that make up an Amish woman’s life— as naturally as sharing the air they breathe.”

Fisher, Suzanne Woods (2009-09-15). Amish Peace: Simple Wisdom for a Complicated World (pp. 84-85). Baker Publishing Group. Kindle Edition.

Many modern families behave like strangers living in the same house. Look around you and it’s almost impossible to share a meal or carry on any conversation with other Americans that isn’t intruded upon by technology – usually the cell phone, but I often see toddlers engrossed by tablets, totally oblivious to their surrounding too. Of course, I’m not advocating we all go join the Amish, but perhaps their much maligned and ridiculed lifestyle centered on simplicity and their higher purpose of serving God offers some sage wisdom on child-rearing and technology.

Almost without exception, American parents insist education and showering their children with things are very important. Our media bombard us with “studies” and “experts” regaling us with catchphrases and psychobabble on how to rear our children. In the 1980s feminists conjured up a sap to working mothers, “quality time”, to assuage their guilt over devoting more time to career than to their children. Stay at home mothers continue to be maligned and the chattering “experts” continue to assault home-schooled children, despite consistent testing demonstrating that home-schooled children score higher on the standardized metrics used by the public education establishment. A large percentage of home-schooling parents, just like the Amish, opt out of the public education system based on their religious beliefs, making them a prime target for the liberal academics and left-wing politicians. They choose to actively, on a daily basis, guide their child’s character development.

The Greenfield cautionary view of cyber-technology on the development of children’s minds and the resulting backlash should come as no surprise. Leftist politics pervades academia in Western civilization, where any evidence that runs counter to the politics falls prey to the knives of mainstream media and ends up buried in the obituaries as a “fringe theory”, a notion discredited by real “experts” and if all else fails they destroy the messenger’s character.

From this stay at home mother, here are some personal observations on the development of children’s minds. Children thrive in a structured environment, with a stable family, an established daily routine and where “rules” get daily reinforcement. The carnage from shattered families proves lie to old 80s feminist trope that “quality of time” can make up for the lack of quantity of time spent rearing children. Young children learn from repetition, whether it be wanting you to read the same story over and over and over to repeating the same phrases for days on end. Which stories and phrases you teach your child matter, because a child’s mind flows naturally to imitation.

The teen years, where children vacillate between childish tantrums and adult behavior, offer challenges to parenting, where vulnerable young minds often test new values, new beliefs and fall prey to peer pressure. Without a firm family foundation, parental participation, and constant monitoring, the teen years are when kids minds strike out looking for an autonomous identity – who and where they receive their inspiration at this juncture matters a great deal. If young people spend more time focused on their digital life than on real life, perhaps the common sense deduction that these “harmless” digital contacts might not be as innocuous as the cyber industry would have us believe rests as truth, not technophobia. Sorry if your kid spends all his/her waking hours outside of school engaged in texting, using social media or playing video games, he/she isn’t reading or gaining inspiration from Dr. Eliot’s Five-Foot Shelf list of books commonly known as the Harvard Classics.

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March 1, 2015 · 7:04 am

January 21, 2015 · 7:03 pm

A Naked Phrase Goes Clothes Shopping

By Minta Marie Morze

The President in the 2015 SOTU used the terms “fearful and reactive”. He also used the phrase “violent extremist”.

Consider these lines from the SOTU:

“Will we approach the world fearful and reactive, dragged into costly conflicts that strain our military and set back our standing? Or will we lead wisely, using all elements of our power to defeat new threats and protect our planet?”

Here, I believe: “Fearful” could translate to, for example, the NRA, Bible Clingers, Pro-Lifers, Tea Partiers, the Right, and so forth. “Reactive” could be a reference to the known term ”Reactionary”, which means Conservatives, the Right Wing, Climate Change Deniers, and in short, it also could include everyone who is “fearful”, etc.: the “Fearful Reactionary Them” on the Right against whom the Progressive “Courageous Anointed Us” is in perpetual conflict.

People wonder why the President and his Administration won’t use the phrase “Jihadi violent extremism” or “Muslim violent extremism”. Even in the SOTU, he used the term “violent extremism”. He has said elsewhere that he is going to convene an international conference on “Violent Extremism”.

From the SOTU:

“. . . and assisting people everywhere who stand up to the bankrupt ideology of violent extremism.”

While there are many reasons for the Administration to insist on these terms and against the others, against any term relating to Islamists, I believe that a major reason for the omission—a very, very important reason—is simply this:

If you use the phrases “Jihadi Violent Extremism” or “Muslim Violent Extremism”, and if you call for an international conference to deal with the problem, then Islamist Violence/Terrorism will be what it is about. If you simply say “violent extremism” and “violent extremist”, you can have conferences and make laws and policies and regulations about generic “Violent Extremists”. Then, at any time, by inserting numerous qualifiers before the term, you can make the laws, regs, and policies turn, with full force of the law, against all of the people and groups on the Right, all of those “fearful and reactive” people who hurt the Progressives.

“Pro-Life Violent Extremists”
“Tea Party Violent Extremists”
“NRA Violent Extremists”
“Right-Wing Violent Extremists”

See how easy it is? Now all the laws and regs and policies made to deal with “violent extremism” apply to these factions too!

A naked phrase can be dressed in any attire you choose to clothe it in. Just select the necessary qualifier. After all, note how the Administration’s spokespeople carefully say things like, “There are many people who use violence to further their cause”, and other such phrases. (It’s called “priming the pump” or “preparing the ground” or “working the room”.)

Examples:

JOSH EARNEST [WH Spokesman]: Because violent extremism is something that we wanna be focused on and it’s not just — it’s not just Islamic violent extremism that we want to counter there. There are other forms of –

(http://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2015/01/12/ed_henry_grills_earnest_on_obamas_anti-extremism_summit_why_isnt_this_specifically_on_islamic_extremism.html)

Martha Maccallum of FOX interviews a spokeswoman for the State Department:

MARIE HARF: . . . . But that’s not the only way that you counter this kind of extremism. Much of it Islamic, you’re absolutely right, but some of it not. So we’re gonna focus on all the different kinds of extremism with a heavy focus on people who do this in the name of Islam, we would say falsely in the name of Islam, but there are other forms of extremism. . . . . Well, I — I — I think all of these leaders have made very clear the serious threats we face. If you look at the president’s speech at West Point, if you look at the things Secretary Kerry has said. It’s not as easy as — as defining at the way you just did. We have to look at each threat individually. All of those threats you just mentioned are from different groups and different places.
[Interviewer MARTHA MACCALLUM asks: “Tell me, what other forms of extremism are particularly troubling and compelling to you right now?”]
HARF: Well, look, there are people out there who want to kill other people in the name of a variety of causes. Of course, Martha, we are most focused on people doing this in the name of Islam. As we’ve talked about with ISIL, part of our strategy to counter this extremism is to have other moderate Muslim voices to stand up and say, they don’t represent our religion. They speak for their religion more than we do certainly, and we need those voices to stand up in addition to all the other efforts we’re undertaking.

(http://insider.foxnews.com/2015/01/12/maccallum-state-dept-deputy-spokesperson-marie-harf-why-islamic-extremism-so-hard-say)

And we can add qualifiers like “Hate-Speaking Violent Extremist”.

This can be tied all together, those who speak, incite, behave, etc., in ways that make any qualifying faction a “Designated-Group Violent Extremist”.

“White Privilege Violent Extremist”

Note that, still in the 2015 SOTU, the President said:

“A better politics is one where we appeal to each other’s basic decency instead of our basest fears.
A better politics is one where we debate without demonizing each other; where we talk issues, and values, and principles, and facts, rather than “gotcha” moments, or trivial gaffes, or fake controversies that have nothing to do with people’s daily lives.
A better politics is one where we spend less time drowning in dark money for ads that pull us into the gutter, and spend more time lifting young people up, with a sense of purpose and possibility, and asking them to join in the great mission of building America.”

“Fearful-Demonizing-Gotcha-Fake-Controversy Contriver-Dark-Money-Ad-Producing-Guttersniping Violent Extremist”

So of course I remember the President’s UN speech in 2012, which words I noted at the time, where he said:

“Today we must declare that this violence and intolerance has no place among our united nations.

“In this modern world, with modern technologies, for us to respond in that way to hateful speech empowers any individual who engages in such speech to create chaos around the world. We empower the worst of us if that’s how we respond.

“However, I do believe that it is the obligation of all leaders in all countries to speak out forcefully against violence and extremism.

“It is time to marginalize those who, even when not directly resorting to violence, use hatred of America or the West or Israel as the central organizing principle of politics, for that only gives cover and sometimes makes an excuse for those who do resort to violence. That brand of politics, one that pits East against West and South against North, Muslims against Christians and Hindu and Jews, can’t deliver on the promise of freedom.

“It is time to leave the call of violence and the politics of division behind.

“It’s time to heed the words of Gandhi, “Intolerance is itself a form of violence and an obstacle to the growth of a true democratic spirit.”

“And we must remain engaged to assure that what began with citizens demanding their rights does not end in a cycle of sectarian violence.”

Yah, we all know that citizens demanding their rights leads to violence. With this reasoning, any laws against “’Qualifier’ Violent Extremists” and “’Qualifier’ Violent Extremism” can magically transform to deal with “the demand for rights”, “intolerance”, “hate speech”, “division”, “factions”, etc. Repeating what the President told the UN, (ignoring a Prog ruse de guerre, the ”baseball, motherhood, and apple-pie”-sort of invocation of “America”, “the West”, and “Israel”, which verbalization is a normal Progressive subterfuge):

“It is time to marginalize those who, even when not directly resorting to violence, use hatred of America or the West or Israel as the central organizing principle of politics, for that only gives cover and sometimes makes an excuse for those who do resort to violence.”

Gosh! We wouldn’t want anyone, while themselves “not directly resorting to violence”, to do anything to “give cover to” or “excuse” “those who do resort to violence”.

“Fearful-Demonizing-Gotcha-Fake-Controversy Contriver-Dark-Money-Ad-Producing-Guttersniping-Not-Violent-Themselves-But-Givers-Of-Cover-To-Or-Excusing Violent Extremists or Extremism”

They.Must.Be.Stopped.

So, as a closing thought, maybe there are more reasons than people have suggested for why the President and Holder didn’t attend what was, after all, a demonstration in favor of “Free Speech”, including speech that “incites” and “offends”—you know, like “Hate Speech”.

A demonstration that marched against, oh, you know, “They-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named-By-Anybody-At-Any-Time Violent Extremists”.

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Filed under Culture Wars, Food for Thought, Foreign Policy, General Interest, Islam, Politics, Terrorism, The Media

January 17, 2015 · 9:20 am

Bill Whittle: The Road to Hell | Truth Revolt

Bill Whittle: The Road to Hell | Truth Revolt.

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Filed under Culture Wars, Food for Thought, General Interest, Politics

December 28, 2014 · 8:04 pm

A memorial?

Last month, I came across reports in several conservative blogs, quoting a CNN story about Mike Brown, of #Ferguson fame, residing in an unmarked grave. The timeline speaks of priorities. Mike Brown died August 9, 2014. He was buried August 25, 2014. His mother, Lesley McSpadden and a group of thugs, allegedly attacked Mike Brown’s grandmother and a group of friends and family selling “Justice for Mike Brown” T-shirts on October 18, 2014. McSpadden and her group allegedly stole $1500 worth of merchandise, $400 cash and one person went to the hospital for injuries sustained in the attack.

This grieving mother could gather a gang to fight over who should profit from her son’s death, while her son lies in an unmarked grave. The MSM and black grievance industry have been carting McSpadden and her drug dealer husband, Louis Head around to drum up anti-police sentiment and fuel racial tensions, yet she hasn’t even had a headstone or marker put on her son’s grave. Likewise, the family of Staten Island police victim, Eric Garner,has been in a media whirl too. Garner was buried in July 2014 in a cemetery in Linden, NJ and surprisingly his grave also sits untended and unmarked.

Now, to complete this bizarre tale of memorializing the dead, along comes this story today of a Ferguson police officer, Timothy Zoll, being put on administrative leave for referring to a makeshift pile of mementos in the middle of the street, euphemistically dubbed a “Mike Brown Memorial”, as a pile of trash. Someone drove through the memorial in the middle of the street and idiots, yes, I said idiots posted photos of the carnage wrought and also if you scroll down there’s a photo of the memorial restored.

Is this really what memorializing the dead has come to in America – a pile of stuffed animals, dead flowers and assorted cheap bric-a-brac placed in the middle of a street? Where’s the outrage that all of these people profiting from Mike Brown’s death, to include his mother, can fight over T-shirt revenues before even caring for his grave? The silence is deafening. Yet, the Washington Post wants to sensationalize the police officer speaking the truth – it’s a pile of trash in the middle of the street.

Perhaps, at some of these protests, the black grievance leaders can take up a collection for decent headstones for the black men, whose names they’ve cheaply commercialized, with catchy, “hands up” and ” I can’t breathe” advertising gimmicks, to further their political aims.

If that months old, moldering pile of trash in the middle of the street is a memorial to a young life lost in America, the devaluation of human life plummeted far lower than most of us could ever have imagined.

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Filed under Culture Wars, Food for Thought, General Interest, Politics, The Media, Uncategorized

December 25, 2014 · 7:23 am