Burt: Great column, as usual. However, the problem with discussing the weather is that it leads to "global warming" or "climate change." You can't win when the "science is settled."

Burt - You listed a dozen reasons why I don't go to movies. Even though some of them, I heard the name, but don't have the slightest idea what they look like. And when you consider the TV propaganda (oops news) and the idiotic or inane programs no need to have a TV. I guess I can always read Shakespeare and a few other good books. BTW, are we still allowed to read Shakespeare? Also the last movie I saw was Patton. I went to see it because he was my father's boss when he had his all expense paid tour of Europe.

The hell of it is, they are generally pretty likeable people, it's just that their ideas suck so bad it's almost impossible talk to them intelligently.

You have struck the cord Burt, the vast majority of my family are liberals. It's rare that we do talk and when it happens it's small talk "hi, how are you and the children"? "what's new", "how is everyone....." trying to talk about anything of substance quickly turns ugly to say the least. I have found it very easy to stop viewing movies, shows or any product ads where liberals appear there is no sense in me putting money in their pockets or the pockets of those products they advertise.

Burt, it's pretty obvious that you living on the Left Coast and having been a democrat colors your opinions. You even admitted as much in one commentary in a, well, roundabout way. That explains to me your continued defense of RINOS and moderates. That said, I enjoy your commentaries ands the responses to them. You see, I have some liberal and moderate friends also.

Perry. As a Texan, it pains me to agree with you. I have been a supporter of Perry as Texas governor. He's been consistently conservative here: no state income tax (as many Democrats have desired), strong backer of Second Amendment rights, and very pro-business. But, as a presidential candidate, I find him lacking. And, okay, arrogant to some degree, stupid to some degree. Oh, yes, he's a horrible debater. To the point of your commentary, I don't care for any of the candidates that much, because they are too liberal, or to use the tired expression you don't care for, they're RINOS. Except Ron Paul, who unfortunately, won't be able to cut one trillion in one year, won't be able to remove 4-5 totally unnecessary government departments because according to moderates like you, Burt, he can't be elected.

Hey Burtrum: You really telling the truth that in your youth you weren't at least a little liberal? After all, liberal back then sounded soo appealing and noble to us young post-war kiddies.

'Twas Goldwater that awoke my nascent core feelings and Reagan who consolidated my thinking.

Tex, I've supported Perry as my governor too, but mostly because he has been, in his elections, far the lesser of two evils (or three, on those occasions when Kinky tosses his hat in the ring.)

I can't agree though that he's been "consistently conservative here." The Texas DREAM Act, the trans-Texas corridor, the aborted kerfuffle over his Gardisil mandate... none of these strike me as particularly conservative.

Nor would I agree with those who underestimate the importance his admittedly abysmal debate performances. Ronald Reagan is thought of as the prototypical conservative, but were he in office today, he would be considered a middle-right politician. That was good enough, and it's probably about all the country was ready for at that period. Where Reagan shined though was in his unmatched ability to communicate the conservative vision to ordinary Americans who had for too long not heard such unassuming and undeniably sincere patriotism, and to make them take up the same dream of a revitalized America.

A man can have great vision, but unless he can lead others in those same paths, his vision will not come to fruition. That sort of leadership requires communication skills, and a character that refutes any charge of hypocrisy of insincerity.

I just don't know if Rick Perry measures up on either point.

I was never a Democrat because true conservatives who are knowledgeable about the history and true ideology of Democrat party CANNOT be Democrats. At least not since the turn of last century (1900 that is)

Not going to movies is not a problem for me as,for the most part I hate movies.There are a few exceptions such as Quigley Down Under, but they are few and far between. I haven`t watched the Lame Stream Media since Reagan was president, and I never watch the so-called sitcoms with their laugh tracks. If it needs a laugh track to tell you it`s funny, it isn`t.

Richard Ryan

Lamar,Missouri - Birthplace of Harry S Truman:Temporarily transplanted to California

I have a real problem with the Hollywood loons you mention in that I appreciate their work (excluding Whoopi & Janene) but despise their politcal agendas. I am always amazed that they are so willing to open their yaps and offend one half of their potential viewing audience.

Rodendo: It also surprises me that loony left entertainers are so open about their contempt for Republicans. But I am no less surprised that newspapers and magazines behave in similar fashion even as they see their subscription numbers plummet.

Richard: Finally, someone else who loved "Quigley Down Under." A great movie.

American Patriot: Cut me some slack. I was born in the home of Russian-Jewish immigrants. The surprise isn't that I was ever a Democrat, but that I didn't remain one.

Tex: The reason that I have good things to say about RINOs and moderates is because I am a realist. America is a slightly right-of-center nation, which is a fact that Reagan understood because, one, he was a slightly right-of-center Republican and, two, he knew that a hardline conservative would be doomed to suffer the same fate as Goldwater, who only garnered 38% of the popular vote and 52 electoral votes in 1964.

akaangry: I beg to differ. Liberals are not all that likeable, unless you have a soft spot for folks who are arrogant, ignorant, self-righteous humorless.

Alex: Why would you doubt me? A conservative who is willing to admit he was once a Democrat is a man who has no reason to lie about anything.

JAC: An excellent point.

Howard: I have never understood why people boast about never going to the movies or ever watching TV. As with most things, the wiser path is to use moderation. There are some terrific movies every year and a good deal on the tube well worth watching. The old saying about cutting off one's nose to spite one's face leaps to mind.

Regards, Burt

rodendo, they can offend their viewing audience for the same reason this country is in trouble. Ignorance, complacency, greed, self centeredness, laziness,

ignorance because people are not informed and don't care to spend time or money being informed partly because they feel like their contribution won't change anything anyway-complacent because they feel like their contribution won't change anything anyway-greed because they want things the way they already are which is their way and they feel like their contribution won't change anything anyway-self centered because they're different so they should be able to watch shows with the scum commies in them and they feel like their contribution won't change anything anyway- lazy because it takes commitment and effort to secure freedom and they're along for the free part and, you guessed it, they feel like their contribution won't change anything anyway.

TERM LIMITS-IMPEACH-PROSECUTE

Burt, thanks for the column. My wife and I have many liberal acquaintenances and I have refused to go places when I know they will be there. She thinks I am an absolute wing-nut because I can't stand to be around them. When I do go, the talk always turns to politics or religion and I end up getting wound up and "making a scene", as my wife puts it. And, again, she thinks I am a wing-nut for acting like that. And the reason I "act that way" is because I, too, think they are helping to destroy this country.

Anyway, I am going to print your column and give it to her so she can see that I am not the only one who can't be around libns socially. Whether or net she reads it...

Thanks Burt for your candor. I was a John Kennedy Democrat for a number of years, till I got dope-slapped by Carter's admin. Then I dutifully became a Republican, until disillusioned by the Bushes. JFK might be regarded today as a conservative. And I don't mind saying that there is a number of "conservatives" whose sense of rectitude prevents them from considering any other point of view with any objectivity.

It gets me when libs and progressives conveniently omit glaring facts when making arguments -- usually when they themselves are deprived of any access to facts. And yet, oftentimes liberals' own sense of rigid rectitude prevents them from exercising any objectivity. The pathology of liberalism infects them too deeply. It also gets me when purist "conservatives" cannot accept practical reality as you, Burt, have expressed. I do not question your motives or call you a RINO. Among the Founders there was quite a diversity of opinion and viewpoint, yet there was unanimity of purpose in founding a nation. Notice the differences between, say, Jefferson and Hamilton. We still read the Federalist Papers and find much to agree with Hamilton's writing, don't we?

I did like Perry's entry into the race, but now I too am disappointed. But nowhere near as horrified and dismayed as I am with King Obama's regime. Now if the R candidates can quit carping at each other, and fearlessly go after Chairman Obamao and his Czars, maybe we could at least get this stuck-in-ice ship of state moving forward again.

A nice article, as always, on Liberal dysfunctional thought and actions.

I have found the hard way not to trust a Liberal even in the slightest.

From my experience, they are loud mouths, narcissistic, retributive, always believe they are right, won't accept facts when proven wrong, and are just ornery, dysfunctional, unhealthy people in general.

The last time I sent an email to the editor of my local newspaper, specifically identified and intended for his eyes only, he decided to print it in a newspaper as the opinion of my agency. I was expressing my dislike for his partisan habits for select Democratic candidates and let him know that. I told him I, and the majority of the people at my agency, were discontinuing our subscription to their newspaper. As well, I told him we would no longer use their advertising services if they weren’t fairer and gave equal coverage in their reporting.

This is why I say they are retributive. There was a malicious attempt to harm my business, and there can be no other reason for their actions.

And when I confronted the editor by phone, he made up all kinds of excuses and reasons for printing the email. He offered to rescind the article, but in my opinion the damage was already done, so I thought to best leave it alone.

Nevertheless, that experience, as well as others over the years, makes me really loathe Liberals in their thoughts, actions and ways.

I believe they are a disgraceful bunch, cowards by nature and nurture, and only resort to name calling, defamation, and attempts at injury when they feel threatened or don't get their way.

I have some friends who are democrats, but I like to call them affectionately Blue Dogs. They have their views which I will debate with them, but they do not try to injure others for a disagreement. Additionally, there are some conservative bones in most of them.

Liberals are a plague on the human race and a threat to our country and constitution; and no one will convince me otherwise.

Burt, thanks for the column. My wife and I have many liberal acquaintenances and I have refused to go places when I know they will be there. She thinks I am an absolute wing-nut because I can't stand to be around them. When I do go, the talk always turns to politics or religion and I end up getting wound up and "making a scene", as my wife puts it. And, again, she thinks I am a wing-nut for acting like that. And the reason I "act that way" is because I, too, think they are helping to destroy this country.

Anyway, I am going to print your column and give it to her so she can see that I am not the only one who can't be around libns socially. Whether or net she reads it...

Burt, thanks for the column. My wife and I have many liberal acquaintenances and I have refused to go places when I know they will be there. She thinks I am an absolute wing-nut because I can't stand to be around them. When I do go, the talk always turns to politics or religion and I end up getting wound up and "making a scene", as my wife puts it. And, again, she thinks I am a wing-nut for acting like that. And the reason I "act that way" is because I, too, think they are helping to destroy this country.

Anyway, I am going to print your column and give it to her so she can see that I am not the only one who can't be around libns socially. Whether or net she reads it...

Burt

Re: Perry, racism, etc.

If you recall, GWB via his attorney said PRECISELY the same thing--that anyone opposing the Dubai Port deal with xenophobic pure and simple.

While he was 1000x better than the miscreant we have now, I parted ways with GWB then and there.

God bless

Burt: U said, "I also was bright enough to know that when a nation's border consists of sand, deportation isn't going to be much of a deterrent. Even I, at my present advanced age, can easily scale a non-existent wall." Brings to mind the time Bush was advocating -Comprehensive Immigration Reform- & I was watching [ :,} ],Ur favourites Hannity &Colmes. Colmes was interviewing one of the Minutemen Militia leaders who had gone help patrol the Mexican border. There is a 12ft wall from Imperial Beach,CA that runs most of the CA-Mex border, & Colmes -stupid as ever- said that the wall was no deterent because a recently apprehended family had driven 300 miles, to walk across to the US where there was no wall... Picture this left libtard & no doubt environmentalist advocating driving using fossil fuels, 300 horizontal miles to avoid 12 vertical feet, & surmising that a WALL is not a deterrent to illegal aliens.

I have to leave the presence of my own dear mother when she tells me that Obama "seems like a nice young man who has some good ideas to improve the country, if only those evil Republicans would let him do what he wants."

All her political ideas come from TV. She is a TV addict and has no idea that the mainstream media is in Obama's pocket, and when I tell her that, she just laughs and calls me a conspiracy theorist. She reads nothing, and believes everything TV tells her.

I love my mother, but when politics come up, I have to leave or hang up the phone, or there will be fireworks.

Mom has no understanding of the workings of government, or politics, and like so many liberals I meet, she only understands nice appearances, smooth voices, big smiles, promises of free goodies, and reassuring words.

And I am a lover of the Constitution who studies it and the ideas of the Founding Fathers, who supports limited government, individual freedom, free market capitalism, and everything that has made this nation great. I understand that there is no free lunch. And for all my effort, her vote cancels mine out every time.

Thomas Sowell has said that we are destined for Socialism. He says that under Republicans we move in that direction slowly, and under Democrats we move toward it faster, but we are always moving that way, because Socialism represents the utopian fantasy that many naive people, especially ignorant ones like my mother, crave. Like Sowell, I fear that our Republic is doomed to be slide inexorably into tyranny.

There may be a natural trajectory to all civilizations, and we seem to have passed the zenith and are on our way down. Like Thomas Sowell, I am growing pessimistic that there is anything we can do about it.

Hello America,

Is it any wonder that Mr. Pretlusky is in the top five of my favorite conservative columnists. Like Ronald Reagan, you can't know a party unless you have worn that parties shoes. I come from a family of Democrats of the conservative kind. These people chose the party when it belonged to the working class American, well before the mentally deficient lefties it shanghied it. I love my family, but I feel bad that they still cling to the old party affiliation knowing who owns it now.

Maxine Waters called Allan West an "oreo". Well if Rep. West is an "oreo" she is the persona of the old slavery name for a woman of loose morals . . . Jezebel. Actually, the Bama would more fit the physical terminology for 'oreo'. Let's not forget whose Black and White like an 'oreo' cookie. What ever happened to the term 'Uncle Tom'. It rankles Black leftist officials when one of their own becomes a success story without depending on the slavery caste system still in effect on the Americus Plantation.

The Turban Torpedo

Burt,

I am probably a decade older than you. I have lived as a Republican in a family that were staunch Democrats. When they were voting for FDR, I was rooting for Wilke. I have lived under Presidents from Hoover thru to Obama,but the last is the worse I have ever seen. It is my hope that this election will restore the office to the GOP, but we must also focus on retaking the Senate and expanding the margin in the House.Where is Coolidge when we need him?

“That may strike some people as petty – “ Not petty, honorable. “To thine ownself be true, and it follows as the night the day that thou canst not then be untrue to any man” Shakespeare. To be anything less is to rightly earn the ignoble epithet, “hypocrite”.

@ p3orion: I guess I have to agree with you on Perry. The things you listed are not conservative ideas or ideals. My list consisted of things that were of foremost importance to me, and I thank you for pointing out the less than conservative issues. And, you're definitely right about his lousy communication skills, which, especially in a debate with Obama, is a most important factor.

Robert Burger

Indeed Sir.

We live in an age of unrestrained lawlessness, and this election will tell us just how many Americans are willing to live under the rule of law or not. If more than a majority wish to be lawless, then tyranny is not far behind.

No small thing we do in a few months.

God bless

"Honor, justice, and humanity, forbid us tamely to surrender that freedom which we received from our gallant ancestors, and which our innocent posterity have a right to receive from us. We cannot endure the infamy and guilt of resigning succeeding generations to that wretchedness which inevitably awaits them if we basely entail hereditary bondage on them." Thomas Jefferson.

Burt - how can you be moderate about CRAP? I don't even know or care what is in the movies or on TV. And I don't want to give any of my money to communists, morons (should not insult morons), drunks or crack heads. Then again the morons are the ones who watch this crap. We don't have cable (none available where we live) or satellite (why pay for crap). But I must admit I did watch TV last evening, a station we pick up from the Peoples Republik of Denver has "Alfred Hitchcock Presents".

Thanks Burt, for your forthright honesty.

Howard: I'm not sure how you can be so certain that all the movies and TV that you don't watch is crap. Most of it is, but not all of it, and nobody is forcing you to watch what you're not interested in, but I can assure you that you are missing out on quite a bit.

Robert: I agree that Obama is the worst in my lifetime. FDR was pretty bad, but at least he contributed Lend Lease to the Brits and oversaw our last good war. Carter was awful, and I assumed he would be the worst president, but now that we've had Obama, Carter will have to settle for being the worst ex-president in our history, although Obama may ultimately best him there, too.

Jim S: Three messages? I hope you wife doesn't found out about this. It appears that you're already walking on thin ice.

Regards, Burt

Amen. Still, it's easier to drop a liberal friend than it is to drop liberal relatives. The problem with a lot of liberals is that they are 1. ignorant about economics (the positive power of free markets and competition) and 2. are naive enough to believe that government is the key to helping the vulnerable. And 3 - double down on that naivete': they believe in their bleeding hearts that goodness prevails in government, greed prevails in capitalism, to the detriment of the vulnerable -and that profit is a selfishness as a fault. Those are the "nice" liberals. Then there are those who know damn well what is really going on: the grab for power that comes from creating the dependence that ensures them the votes. Their arrogance is unparalleled in the belief that they can decide better what is better for you than you can. And their hypocrisy and dishonesty know no bounds.

I don't know how you do it Burt - I want to save almost every column you write and use it as reference or send it to others. So often you say what I think but had no idea how to put it, and you add to it with fascinating facts and insight I don't have. You're a national treasure. :)

I've been realizing that my liberal-minded "friends" are bullies for awhile now - they freely spout off about their beliefs and gripes and favorite politicians, but the minute I start to explain why I disagree, or just make a casual statement that reveals my leanings, they decide we "shouldn't discuss politics." And I've decided that I don't feel like "being nice" anymore when their attitudes and votes are destroying my country. After all, they can go anywhere - Europe, Canada, etc - to have exactly what they're advocating, but where do I go to have the freedom I'm asking for?

My grandfather used to claim to be a Democrat, but he'd admit that he hadn't voted for one since Eisenhower. He was a conservative and didn't even know it. Your juxtapositions of political affiliation and beliefs resonates.

My daughters will both be voting for the first time in a national election next year. One told me yesterday she was researching the candidates. I sent her your column "Handicapping the Contenders." I'm sending today's too. The younger one still lives at home - she gets a steady dose of Burt P. :)

As a Texan, when Rick Perry announced his candidacy I cringed. I've voted for him, but as the lesser of evils (@p3orion - Kinky does liven the debate a bit, doesn't he?). You've nailed it with him too.

I admire your realism. Keep preaching it. (Pretty please:)

Oh yeah, I love Quigley Down Under too.

Richard:

Okay, you hate sitcoms, and most of them are LAME. But try LAST MAN STANDING, it really IS funny...and clean. My kids can watch it.

Why is it a bad thing to punish the children of illegal aliens who actually broke the law, but a good thing (Affirmative Action) to punish children whose parents probably broke no laws?

Burt, thanks for the column. My wife and I have many liberal acquaintenances and I have refused to go places when I know they will be there. She thinks I am an absolute wing-nut because I can't stand to be around them. When I do go, the talk always turns to politics or religion and I end up getting wound up and "making a scene", as my wife puts it. And, again, she thinks I am a wing-nut for acting like that. And the reason I "act that way" is because I, too, think they are helping to destroy this country.

Anyway, I am going to print your column and give it to her so she can see that I am not the only one who can't be around libns socially. Whether or net she reads it...

@Barbara Lund: You are absolutely on target as is Burt. Liberalism is almost like a mental disease: Most liberals think only with their emotions and lack capacity to reason in an analytic, logical manner. If they could reason in a logical manner, they would see the logic in conservative thought concerning liberty and freedom and opportunity.

We have created an entitlement society where liberalism is fostered. Liberals have no capacity to understand systems and processes or the impacts of decisions on those systems and processes. If they did, they might understand that fundamentally, the liberal system cannot sustain itself. Collapse is inevitable. So is serfdom.

Although I agree with TexHorn and p3orion, I feel compelled by Texan pride to spring to the defense of Rick Perry. In the first place, ... On the other hand, ... And furthermore, ...

Well, he's not as bad as the best of your California liberals, Burt.

Truth! Great article.

A long time ago, there used to be a country called the United States of America. It was not a perfect place, but we had something in common with our next door neighbor. We all loved our freedoms and we all had jobs. The government didn't stick their nose into our business and left the teaching of our children to the states and the teachers were just like us, and they taught real American History. We grew up loving to hear about our country and how it overcame great obstacles to become the greatest nation on earth. We didn't see anything wrong with pledging our allegiance to the flag (because after all, this was OUR COUNTRY), land of our birth. It didn't bother us at all to say the Lord's prayer in school. If you didn't want to say it, you didn't have to; after all, it was a free country.

However, what we didn't realize that was during this time, there was planning going on behind our backs. There were communists, socialists, Marxists, Islamists, and just the good old downhome radicals planning and plotting to take down our great country.

Right now, today they just do it openly and smile at us.

Your vote is a precious right. Be extremely careful who you vote into office. Beware of glitz and glamour. Beware of the ever-changing stance on policies important to our country. THINK long and hard before you vote. Our country's future depends upon it! You must set the bar and decide what you will and will not accept in your candidate! Stick by your guns!

I think this is why the party went so hard-left and left behind so many just like you, Burt:

http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2008/10/archives_prove_obama_was_a_new.html

"October 8, 2008

Archives prove Obama was a New Party member

The New Party was a radical left organization, established in 1992, to amalgamate far left groups and push the United States into socialism by forcing the Democratic Party to the left. It was an attempt to regroup the forces on the left in a new strategy to take power, burrowing from within. The party only lasted until 1998, when its strategy of "fusion" failed to withstand a Supreme Court ruling. But dissolving the party didn't stop the membership, including Barack Obama, from continuing to move the Democrats leftward with spectacular success.

More to read at the website of American Thinker

Great article except the one phrase that makes my skin crawl - reverse racism. Using the term "reverse racism" implies that the "natural" flow of racism is from white to non-white. Let's just call it what it is, racism. We often use the term reverse racism without thinking about it, but the implications are clear and the subliminal message is harmful. Racism is racism, regardless of who practices it.

RiverKing: You'll get no argument from me. I am constantly amazed that when I was young, California was a conservative state. Now we constantly elect the likes of Boxer, Feinstein, Brown, Newsome, Pelosi, Waxman, Waters and Lee. I was pretty excited when Perry threw his Stetson in the ring, but no more. It isn't just that he doesn't speak well, but that he seems to be an extremely petty man with a very unfortunate temperament.

David Ross: Your wording confuses me. If you're opposing Affirmative Action, I'm with you.

Rochesternative: I've never seen "Last Man Standing," but re-runs of "Frasier" are on all the time, and that is the single funniest sit com that has ever been on. And I am happy to go on record because I never had the opportunity to write a single episode, so I'm not patting my own back.

Barbara & Country Girl: I agree with both of you. Keep up the good work.

Regards, Burt

Burt, it’s great to see that you did not forget about my fav, Maxine WaWa, while on vacation. If BaBa WaWa could get Maxine and Col. West together on The View, which for all TV non-viewers is the daytime confab of the most distasteful, progressive, fat and smelly sluts ever assembled, then the great unwashed conservatives could judge for themselves the differences between an Oreo and a 63% Cocoa Hershey Bar with nuts. Dare I say, for the long flight home Nancy Pelosi prefers her Oreo dipped in Maxine Waters.

@countrygirl: Like your grandfather, my father was a Democrat, but the Dems of their era are today’s conservative Republicans.

@Richard Ryan: If you don’t watch modern sitcoms, how do you know how to identify the behavior of a flaming homosexual? Oh, I forgot, C-Span is always broadcasting from Queerville!

Most of my father's family have been life-long Democrats, and he was likely to become one as well, having been born in 1934 in rural North Carolina, an area which, like most places, was hard-hit by the Depression, and in which people looked to FDR for deliverance.

However, three things changed that destiny. For one thing, he was the first of his family to attend college. In the early '50s, universities were not quite the liberal hotbed they now are, and the ability to think clearly tends to make anyone question Democrat dogma. Secondly, he rejected to casual racism that was prevalent in the South in which he grew up, and which was almost universally associated with Democrats (although it could hardly have been otherwise, as there were essentially no Republicans in office.) Finally, as a young man he joined the National Guard, and saw first-hand some of the unsavory aspects of leftists politics when his unit was called a couple of times to confront striking union rioters in the late '50s and early '60s.

Although we never really discussed politics as I was growing up, I guess I owe at least the basis of my conservatism to his example. A pity then that, to his eternal embarrassment, my grandfather gave him the middle name Delano.

Re: Magcourse,

Didn't you know that racism is only applicable to white, conservatives?

Likewise, like "reverse racism," reverse discrimination is a term that has been largely ignored by liberal law-makers and the liberal media, just like affirmative actions can only be applicable to and benefit blacks.

The race card has been and will continue to be played to the hilt, even after electing a "black" president.

You, me and everyone that reads and contributes to the Patriot Post are and always will be the White Racists for not agreeing with others' views. Might as well get use to it.

Holmes: We agree about The View. But it could be even worse. They could have Rosie O'Donnell in the group.

p3: The poor guy. Carting around "Delano" for his entire life compares to having a scarlet "A" carved on his forehead.

Burt

Burt & gang;

As always, good writing & thoughts. Yours '...easily scale a non-existent wall...' cracked me up, although, my mischievous mind could see you trip over a sandy molehill.

I, too, like Quigley & am very disappointed by Perry. I couldn't put "The Witness" down; Chambers is a very good writer.

Lastly, as I said here before, what a blessing growing up in a truly traditional, independent & conservative family that stood up against Bolsheviks, Nazis & commies yet raised us w/ focus on independence & education & merit; it worked.

My daughter was born in Chicago & raised by a MN uber-liberal-Mondale-lib. Due to her mother's hatred, we've seen each other less than a year in the past 21 years. However, I also succeeded by focusing her on independent thinking, observation of realities of life, noblesse oblige & broad education. Even today, she laughs when making a decision: as you were saying, dad, 'use your noodle my shweet tuikey...' Travels to EU helped too & our family history & my testimony re: our liberties. Btw, already as a child in grade school, she loved to hear stories about our dangerous & funny pranks we did against the Red goons as students. Unbeknownst to me, she told all her friends in school & when I came to visit her in St. Paul, I was the coolest Dad in the country. She is a gracious, sweet & conservative young lady today. I am doubly grateful to God for my family & my daughter.

Sorry I've been absent Burt. Getting ready for the "Move", and finding out I've been hauling (and packing) my honey's crap around for too darned long, has kept me from commenting but, as always, reading your column puts the sunshine in my day!

Know what you mean about being an ex-Dem. My Dad was and my Mom was the R in our family. People thought it must have been like war but that was not true at all. My Dad was as you described yourself. He saw the light long before Carter and company too!

Merry--Where are you moving from and to? You have my sympathy. The real purpose behind packing up to move is to warn some of us to shape up before it's too late. It gives us a taste of what Hell must be like.

Robert--Congratulations on helping to raise a clear-thinking young daughter. Looking at the riffraff occupying Wall Street, it's easy to see how awful the alternative can be.

Burt

Just a "short" move Burt. Far north Scottsdale to the little town of Cave Creek about 10 miles away. Regardless, a move is a move whether it's 10 or 1000 miles! I had been a corporate gypsy's wife and lived in four different states before finally landing here. Best thing about that is the company pays people to pack you and, if the cat isn't moving, it'll get packed along with the half filled trash can! Oh, the good ol' days...

Like the idea of the warning...does this mean I have your blessing to start chucking my honey's junk? :-D

Merry: I used to have a friend who lived in Cave Creek. He passed away, unfortunately. Good luck with the move.

You do have my permission to toss your husband's junk. I only wish I could toss my wife's stuff. It is amazing the way that pack rats manage to snare neat spouses.

Regards, Burt