Why I am where I am

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How did I get to this place in my life? I am speaking philosophically here and about my views on politics national or state.

When I was in 6th grade the president was John F. Kennedy and of course we had current events every morning and for school we had to watch the news, read the paper and whatever else to bring content to school. It was a good idea to help kids to start paying attention to the world around them, to expand their view from I am here to so are they.

I got to a point where I would listen to the grownups talk politics as well. I remember my Dad a Republican, saying that when Kennedy stood up and called the Bay of Pigs failure his failure showed a lot of courage and leadership. He was impressed with the way Kennedy stood up to Russia. Other things of note were his tax cuts, education, space race, and the view that America is a great country because of its people.

Soon I was a Democrat. Everything was democrat, not based on what we were doing or saying but based on an ideal in my head of what a democrat was. They helped people, they were liberal they helped the African Americans, the downtrodden, the old. It was great! Those old republicans were conservative and just wanted everything to stay the same and not progress. That was my and many others view of conservatism, old stuck in the mud, never change. What I did not know at the time is that I had fallen into a trap laid out by the very Democrats that I served. The misunderstanding of the conservative movement. Needless to say I voted for Carter, that would be the last Democrat for President I would ever vote for, at least so far.

Next I was in this “I don't care for politics” stage. I had no opinions on anything political, whatever they want they can have, just leave me alone. This pretty much went on till my son Robert came a long in 1983. He was adopted. There was a lot on the news about abortion and I was watching a pro- abortion rally and really did not care that much one way or the other but thought that a Woman had a right to choose as I mean it is her body! Then all of a sudden I looked across the room at Robert and it hit me right between the eyes! He could have been aborted but for the love of his birth mother. My son Robert could have been aborted! I tell you that was a powerful moment. I don't think I cried any harder holding him at that moment of time than any other time in my life and I came out the other side thinking that it does matter what I believe. Why were we punishing the innocent victims? Does it matter if it was rape, or inconvenience? The child had nothing to do with even being there as that was a decision of other men and women, right or wrong. The child was paying the price with his life for the shortcomings of men and women.

Over the next few years I really started to pay attention to what was actually said by the parties and what they did in Congress. The more I looked at and analyzed what I actually believed in, the more it aligned with the conservative movement. Notice I did not say Republicans. We have a two party system, Democrats and Republicans but a multi-philosophical system. Originally we had conservatives and liberals and socialists and libertarians all in both parties to one degree or the other but now it seems that we have socialists, conservatives and a lot of people in the middle. Unfortunately the more the middle of the roaders grow the more dangerous we are to losing the very essence of our country. I can understand that the middle of the roaders don't want to take sides, for many reasons from the fact that they feel the political discourse is to acetic to not wanting to appear un-PC. Some just have ptrouboe making up their mind about which side they want to align, certain things about each party entices them but not all. Years ago when there were many different kinds of political debate in each party they could go with the party they felt most often displayed their beliefs with the idea that there were at least some like minded idealists to side with the other parts of their political beliefs.

Today many of those middle of the roaders feel disenfranchised with both parties. That is why it is no longer in my opinion they side with any party. You need to look at your core beliefs and go with that, be they liberal, conservative or socialist. That is why now I am a conservative.

What beliefs do I have that make me align that way? Here they are in a nut shell. (1) I believe in American Exceptional-ism. That as a country that was built with the best and brightest of people from all around the world we pooled our ideas and became the most country, the most free, the most wealthy, the most powerful. I do not apologize for that. The rest of the world may want me to but I do not have to. We are what we are because we are exceptional. Period. (2) Freedom from Government. If you have not read the Federalist papers then you need to do so, for the understanding of why our Country was founded the way it was and why it is important even today. You will find that the constitution was developed to put laws in order to restrain the government not the people. It spells out what the Government cannot do. Government no matter how “good” will tend to be less so the more power they abscond. We the people are the Government but its a Republic not a Democracy. We have a representative government, we elect certain of our kind to represent us in this Government. IF they do not do what we want we send a new set. Very simple. The people always have control of the Government. (3) The freedom of the individual is what made us Exceptional. The Government did not invent the Railroad, the telegraph the telephone, the radio, the TV or anything else for that matter. It was individuals driven to succeed that did the things we take so much for granted. (4) Life is precious and is something that needs to be protected from the Cradle to the grave. It is a gift and not to be taken so lightly as to be thrown away. Once we loose the idea that life is precious we are on the way out as a society. A society cannot long survive if they have so little respect for life. They will end up taking itself out. (5) There is a Moral code higher than that what we make up. If there is no higher code of morality, call it what you will, then were do we stop and put an anchor in the ground to stand against its destruction. Our Declaration of Independence stats that laws and policies that violate the natural law are abuses of government power that must be resisted and reversed.

One could go on and list many others but I always thought these ideas a basis for my conservative ideas. You don't have to be a Protestant or even a believer, you can be Black or White or Yellow you can be Straight or Gay and these principles of our founding fathers still hold true and are valuable in today's world.

We have sent many of our young men around the world to fight for Freedom, against tyranny socialism and communism, and it is very hard to watch the United States today to take those dangerous steps toward the very things so many have given their life for. Very Hard indeed.