The Patriot Post® · A Bridge Too Far?
It’s no secret that the Socialists who, these days, call themselves Democrats, are constantly using their puppets in the media to demonize President Trump and those of us who support him. But I have a hunch that the constant barrage of negative propaganda has finally backfired. And not just on Joe Biden and his son Hunter, who went from being a cocaine addict to being the over-paid pawn of Chinese tyrants and Ukrainian oligarchs.
Just because the Leftist sheep are the ones reading the New York Times and the Washington Post and tuning in the idiots on CNN and MSNBC, people like Elizabeth Warren, Bernie Sanders, Peter Buttigieg and Kamala Harris, assume the rest of us have swallowed the swill. Therein lies the inherent problem with living and campaigning in an echo chamber.
I believe they’ll be in for a rude awakening on November 5, 2020, when they discover that most Americans don’t believe that protecting our borders is a racist plot; that religious rights aren’t the exclusive property of Muslims, Satanists and Atheists; that illegal aliens aren’t entitled to free health care just because they demand it; that trimester abortions are cold-blooded murder, no matter what the “mother” says about her own body; that it’s evil people, not guns, that kill; and that legalizing pot just so politicians can replenish state coffers that they’ve gutted in order to provide welfare to illegals and lazy ne'er-do-wells is a lousy idea.
All of these sound observations come with a warning. As I wrote to a friend after he let me know his system for predicting presidential elections, which was based on studying the Stock Market reaction to the two opposing campaigns: “I have my own system. I go with my gut. And my gut told me in 2012 that Mitt Romney would defeat Barack Obama and, in 2016, that Mrs. Clinton would defeat Donald Trump. This year, I’m shopping for a new gut.”
Samuel Adams, who has been dead for 216 years, has sent us a timely message from the grave: “If the time should ever come, when vain and aspiring men should possess the highest seats in government, our country will stand in need of its experienced patriots to prevent its ruin.”
Although he didn’t envision vain and aspiring women, he clearly would have added Nancy Pelosi, Maxine Waters, A O-C, Rashida Tlaib, Ilhan Omar, Kamala Harris, Mazie Hirono, Dianne Feinstein and Sheila Jackson Lee to Chuck Schumer, Cory Booker, Adam Schiff, Jerry Nadler, Richard Blumenthal, Peter Buttigieg, Bernie Sanders and Joe Biden. And I dare say if he spotted the gun-confiscating Beto O'Rourke headed in his direction, Sam would have wasted no time going for his trusty musket.
After I recently related the time I met writer Jack Prelutsky, I recalled another occasion when I met someone who thought we might be related, although he spelled his last name Prelutski. After exchanging a few emails, we agreed to meet at a local coffee shop one evening.
Typically, I arrived a little early. Neither of us knew what the other looked like and, as luck would have it, when I entered the place, there were five men all sitting by themselves in booths. But when nobody looked around, I concluded I had arrived first.
After I sat down, there were now six men sitting by themselves. While I kept my eye on the door, a couple more men arrived by themselves. The place was beginning to look like a weekly meeting of the DMA (Divorced Men Anonymous.
But as none of the men looked around, clearly none of them was Prelutski. After a while, I figured he was a no-show. But then another single guy entered, glanced around and immediately walked over to my booth.
I was flabbergasted. I asked him how he knew it was me. He laughed and said: “We all look alike, no matter if we spell the name with a ‘y’ or an ‘i.’ We all come from this one small section of the Ukraine.”
“In other words, we’re like Jewish hillbillies?”
“That’s it.”
It was rather deflating, but I decided not to put too much stock in it. For one thing, I didn’t think he and I looked that much alike, although I have to confess that he didn’t hesitate for even a second before spotting me.
On the other hand, neither of my older brothers looked alike and neither looked like me. Ed had blonde hair and blue eyes, Ted had black hair and hazel eyes and I had brown hair and brown eyes. And any boorish scoundrel who dares make unfounded assumptions about my mother’s morals will be challenged to a duel.
The late comedian George Carlin once observed that “Everyone appreciates your honesty, until you’re honest with them, and then you’re an ass—-!” (Mr. Carlin never minced his words, so I had to do it for him. Which would probably make me an ass–— in his eyes.)
Bob Hunt sent me a meme that had a picture of Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez on it and a quote attributed to her, which went “Under Capitalism, man oppresses man. Under Socialism, it’s the other way around.”
Mr. Hunt couldn’t confirm that she had actually said it and neither could I. But it sounded so much like so many other dopey things she has said, I figured it was worth sharing for its amusement value.
Like me, Wesley Forgue would like to see us get out of Afghanistan but wondered how we could do it without having it look like a defeat.
I suggested that we announce victory, as we pretty much did in Korea and Vietnam. Trump could blame the war on the other party, just as Republicans Eisenhower and Nixon did in the past. And so far as Donald Trump and I are concerned, George W. Bush was the other party.
After I explained that Jerry Lewis’s $2,000 haircuts cost him less at the time than my $5 haircuts cost me, based on our relative incomes, Stephen Hanover let me know that he’d heard that Lewis would throw away his socks after wearing them once.
That in turn reminded me that he allegedly tossed out his tuxedos after wearing them once, supposedly because he was allergic to dry cleaning solvents.
But I suspect he tossed them because he grew up poor and wanted to experience the luxury of being able to treat expensive tuxedos like trash.
That, in turn reminded me that many years ago, I interviewed Ross Bagdasarian in his office. He was the boyhood friend of the Armenian-American actor Mike (“Mannix”) Connors and the cousin of William Saroyan, with whom he had collaborated on the hit tune “Come Ona My House,” but he made his real killing when, calling himself David Seville, he was the composer, lyricist, producer, conductor, publisher and did multiple vocals on “The Chipmunk Song.”
It was noted at the time that it was the first time in history that one person would collect all the money off a record sale. The novelty tune sold millions of records both here and overseas.
In time, his Chipmunk franchise would lead to more hit records and even an animated TV series.
So by the time I met him, he was rolling in money. Seated in his office, amid photos of his wife and three children, I saw a black and white photo of a large metal piece of equipment that seemed strangely out of place. I asked him what it was and he explained it was a vat in his vineyard. He went on to say that he enjoyed going out to the place and opening its valve for a few minutes and watch his wine run into the soil. I asked him why he’d do that.
“Because I can,” he said, saying it all for every poor man who ever became rich.