MikeFairbanks said:
Society isn't going to collapse. . . our government continues to grow and grow and collects more and more power. This is not a liberal thing. It's a government thing.
It grew under Clinton, Bush Jr. and Obama. That's a fact. We can point fingers and say it grew more under Bush (Patriot Act, Homeland Security, color-code system, No Child Left Behind, doubling of the military budget, huge bailouts, etc.) or point fingers at Obama (largest annual deficits in history, huge bailouts, etc.).
The funny thing is, you engage in the behavior that I consider big government's best friend: You gloss over with the vague statement and avoid addressing the truth of it.
The truth being that the always vocal Ronald Reagan coalition refuse to admit that it was Reagan that did more building of big government than all 3 that you named. They want to pretend he was against the things that he personally brought about. more than tripling the national debt in 8 years, desensitizing people to so many issues, the only job growth being state and local government jobs, (2 out of 3 hires in the Reagan years were by the Federal Government) etc. It didn't really have serious growth under Clinton. But statements of the absolute facts puts people off, they'd rather make the vague complaints and leave it at that.
Which is why, January 2010, that idiot Barbara Boxer felt free to let loose with the most foollish, cackling laugh in a life interview on KNX radio in LA. When told of the huge opinion against the Obamacare and noone wanting it, she demonstrated why the LA Times says she lacks the intellect to be a Senator (You might remember her getting mad at an Admiral for saying 'Ma'am.') by laughing as she said government is here to force people do do whatever it wants. But why didn't the republican party hit her over the head with it during the election that was just starting up? Because they, too, wanted government to be about making everyone do what IT wants. As low as the opinion of Boxer has always been, she once again was able to be reelected because the republicans complacently nominated a completely unelectable candidate to run against her.
That said, I'll take a large collection of mountain bikes or dual sport motorcycles....maybe a Jeep.
But I don't want to live in the Mad Max world. I like civilization.
I guess that all depends on what you think a 'Mad Max' world is. In the first film he's in the calm city, it's the occasional freak from the desert that livens things up. The second and third are about people trying to get to the civilized city, while he's so lost in despair he avoids it. I took those films as meaning it's already a 'Mad Max' world, we're just living in RallySTX's 'Easier areas of Armageddon.' The whole reason some people argue we've been fighting World War III for 40-50 years is because there's always been parts of the world that have been rather Armageddon-like, though there was a lull under Clinton. 'Kony 2012' won't accomplish anything, but they'll feel better because THEY were talking.
If you don't want to bother reading, you can watch a video of it. (Narrated by the actual voice that would make famous the Broadway songs 'If I were a Rich Man' and 'TRADITION.') I'll link it so you can at least read the comments. Oh boy. I guess I could also post 'The Monsters are due on Maple Street.'
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dEPSIAkmzAE
. . . .with no voice there
to cry "Stay!" ... for me in the empty square.
THE HANGMAN
By Maurice Ogden
Into our town the hangman came,
smelling of gold and blood and flame.
He paced our bricks with a different air,
and built his frame on the courthouse square.
The scaffold stood by the courthouse side,
only as wide as the door was wide
with a frame as tall, or a little more,
than the capping sill of the courthouse door.
And we wondered whenever we had the time,
Who the criminal? What the crime?
The hangman judged with the yellow twist
of knotted hemp in his busy fist.
And innocent though we were with dread,
we passed those eyes of buckshot lead.
Till one cried, "Hangman, who is he,
for whom you raised the gallows-tree?"
Then a twinkle grew in his buckshot eye
and he gave a riddle instead of reply.
"He who serves me best," said he
"Shall earn the rope on the gallows-tree."
And he stepped down and laid his hand
on a man who came from another land.
And we breathed again, for anothers grief
at the hangmans hand, was our relief.
And the gallows frame on the courthouse lawn
by tomorrow's sun would be struck and gone.
So we gave him way and no one spoke
out of respect for his hangmans cloak.
The next day's sun looked mildly down
on roof and street in our quiet town;
and stark and black in the morning air
the gallows-tree on the courthouse square.
And the hangman stood at his usual stand
with the yellow hemp in his busy hand.
With his buckshot eye and his jaw like a pike,
and his air so knowing and business-like.
And we cried, "Hangman, have you not done,
yesterday with the alien one?"
Then we fell silent and stood amazed.
"Oh, not for him was the gallows raised."
He laughed a laugh as he looked at us,
"Do you think I've gone to all this fuss,
To hang one man? That's the thing I do.
To stretch the rope when the rope is new."
Above our silence a voice cried "Shame!"
and into our midst the hangman came;
to that mans place, "Do you hold," said he,
"With him that was meat for the gallows-tree?"
He laid his hand on that one's arm
and we shrank back in quick alarm.
We gave him way, and no one spoke,
out of fear of the hangmans cloak.
That night we saw with dread surprise
the hangmans scaffold had grown in size.
Fed by the blood beneath the chute,
the gallows-tree had taken root.
Now as wide, or a little more
than the steps that led to the courthouse door.
As tall as the writing, or nearly as tall,
half way up on the courthouse wall.
The third he took, we had all heard tell,
was a usurer..., an infidel.
And "What" said the hangman, "Have you to do
with the gallows-bound..., and he a Jew?"
And we cried out, "Is this one he
who has served you well and faithfully?"
The hangman smiled, "It's a clever scheme
to try the strength of the gallows beam."
The fourth man's dark accusing song
had scratched our comfort hard and long.
"And what concern," he gave us back,
"Have you ... for the doomed and black?"
The fifth, the sixth, and we cried again,
"Hangman, hangman, is this the man?"
"It's a trick", said he, "that we hangman know
for easing the trap when the trap springs slow."
And so we ceased and asked now more
as the hangman tallied his bloody score.
And sun by sun, and night by night
the gallows grew to monstrous height.
The wings of the scaffold opened wide
until they covered the square from side to side.
And the monster cross beam looking down,
cast its shadow across the town.
Then through the town the hangman came
and called through the empy streets...my name.
I looked at the gallows soaring tall
and thought ... there's no one left at all
for hanging ... and so he called to me
to help take down the gallows-tree.
And I went out with right good hope
to the hangmans tree and the hangmans rope.
He smiled at me as I came down
to the courthouse square...through the silent town.
Supple and stretched in his busy hand,
was the yellow twist of hempen strand.
He whistled his tune as he tried the trap
and it sprang down with a ready snap.
Then with a smile of awful command,
He laid his hand upon my hand.
"You tricked me Hangman." I shouted then,
"That your scaffold was built for other men,
and I'm no henchman of yours." I cried.
"You lied to me Hangman, foully lied."
Then a twinkle grew in his buckshot eye,
"Lied to you...tricked you?" He said "Not I...
for I answered straight and told you true.
The scaffold was raised for none but you."
"For who has served more faithfully?
With your coward's hope." said He,
"And where are the others that might have stood
side by your side, in the common good?"
"Dead!" I answered, and amiably
"Murdered," the Hangman corrected me.
"First the alien ... then the Jew.
I did no more than you let me do."
Beneath the beam that blocked the sky
none before stood so alone as I.
The Hangman then strapped me
...with no voice there
to cry "Stay!" ... for me in the empty square.
Want my advice? BE THE BEST YOU CAN!
As much as I am a multihuller, while our thoughts are flying high I might go for something a little sportier...