"The entire country may disagree with me, but I don't understand the necessity for patriotism. Why do you have to be a patriot? About what? This land is our land? Why? You can like where you live and like your life, but as for loving the whole country... I don't see why people care about patriotism."--Natalie Maines, Dixie Chicks

There ya go. Yet another good argument for abortion.

I enjoyed a kayak trip up north a ways in Bradford County this past January only to come home to the adobe and learn that this site came up while Joe Leonardi was on WILK’s The Sue Henry Show. This past Saturday I manned a kayak for the second time this year and for the second time this year this site was mentioned on WILK’s Corey O’Brien Show.

(Note to self: Take the pocket radio along on future kayak trips.)

I wouldn’t have known anything about being mentioned on WILK had Gort not made mention of it, so I sent him an electronic pulse and asked him for some more details. The following explanation was quickly provided. Thanx. As I said, V’ger needs to know.

From what I understand the subject was the English only nonsense in Hazleton. Some one mentioned that there was a good debate about it online and mentioned us. Corey asked what websites they were reading and the caller mentioned W-B Online and Gort42.

Oh, no! Now even Corey O’Brien knows I’m an idiot? Dammit!

I’m not sure that I was directly debating anyone as much as I was merely adding to the ongoing…ahem, “debate.” To be quite honest, there is no debate to speak of. Lou Barletta proposed his new legislation and the apoplectic folk leaning left went berserk again as if by rote. There hasn’t been any honest debating going on since Al Gore couldn’t bring himself to concede an election he came close to winning and managed to totally enrage the embittered losing side--Gore Nation.

Debate? What fu>king debate?

Here’s what Chia Kev had to say today on WILK:

"This is the behavior of bigots."

Of course it is. The folks not of his “all-inclusive,“ namby pamby political stripe are all bigots, racists, homophobes and bible thumpers from remote trailer parks. Right? No matter what we do, say, or believe; we’re all bigots? That’s it. That pretty much covers the totality of the argument coming from the left side of the ledger. Enforce laws? Demand assimilation from folks resisting it with all of their might? Lead, rather than poll for the answer? Why…that’s bigotry!!!

We’re bigots if we do and racists if we don’t. (?) Is that all you people got in your debate team bag of tricks? Accusatory tones? Incendiary attacks? Inflammatory rhetoric? Judgments from the folks claiming a complete aversion to being judgmental? And complete bankruptcy whereas solutions to problems are concerned? If that somehow passes as a debate, I’m Kevin Lynn’s long lost illegitimate brother. In other words, the good son.

You lose a bitterly close election? We’re the cheaters.

You’d prefer to sit on your hands in the face of devastating attacks? We’re all good with genocides for oil.

You love the flea-bitten caribou at some far-flung corner of the world? We’re destroying the planet.

You don’t mind being overrun by illegal invaders? We’re the bigots.

You embraced “white flight” years ago and beat it out of town? We’re the racists.

You have no limits, no dislikes (yeah, right!) at all? We’re the homophobes.

You’re all for sucking the brains out of full-term babies? We’re the unfeeling.

Debate? Is global warming frying what little that remains of your cognitive functions? There hasn’t been a debate in this country since 2000 when everything suddenly became a loon job conspiracy theory, everyone leaning toward the GOP starting being called Nazis and the MoveOn.org moonbattery became synonymous with the mentality of the majority of the Democrats.

No my left-leaning friends, you’re not bigots and racists like the lot of us. You’re on your own imaginary planet where the air is obviously dangerously thin, but you’re not bigots. You’re very easily led. You mistake repetitive prevarications with facts. You have no backbone to speak of. If you did, you’d do more than repeat what the previous nut job had to say. If you did, you wouldn’t be so willing to concede defeat every time the bullets start flying. You are of one mentality, an ersatz political Borg if you will. You have very, very selective memories. To you, a philandering Republican is a hypocrite, while a philandering Democrat is all but ignored. You are too completely poll driven. You are shackled by your own political correctness. You absolutely fear moral absolutes. (Care to explain?) You are near blinded by your own creation--your rage. And you probably smell funny, too. Like dope.

But…I’m the bigot, the racist and the homophobe. We're the liars, the cheaters, the people like...well, you.

The typical leftists’ response to everything? That’s all you got?

Gotcha. That’s what I thunk.

Thanks for the spirited debate.

(???)

The Chamber of Commerce may be playing coy about whether Barnes & Nobles and Starbucks are really coming to the downtown real soon like, but I saw me a Starbucks pop-up ad at the Citizens’ Voice’ Web site yesterday morning.

Anyone care to ‘splain that?

I know the overriding question most of you have is, Mark, why are you so screwed up? Well, it’s probably because I sit all alone in dark crawl spaces all day and mess with termites heads.

Watch the video and have pity on me. The lighting was tricky, but what you’ll see is me breaking open termite mud tubes with my buck knife and then waiting for the little pricks to sprint from one opening to the next.

Watch very closely or you’ll miss ‘em.

(Background noise by Sue Henry. She goes with me wherever I may crawl.)

It really is exciting, isn’t it? I wonder if the mayor’s biggest critics will finally have a sudden change a heart and admit that they were clueless all along. Nah. They’ll latch onto some other issue and get to blathering away all over again. It must suck beyond belief to be so completely negative all the time. Whatever. They can sit in their underwear and sulk while I enjoy all of the new amenities.

Hey, you can always blow off a few more clients and make an appearance at the block party. You’re young yet. Your liver will survive. Maybe.

Stay in touch, dude.

Being that arguing about Lou Barletta‘s “English only” proposal has become the rage in these parts, tell me how many times you’ve heard this one.

Well, my grandparents came here from the old country, spoke maybe 75 words of English and they managed to get by okay.

Yeah. And how completely sad is that? In, say, fifty years time they didn’t bother to learn the language? Couldn’t read a menu at Stop & Go? Ever wonder why they were limited to digging for coal deep underground, or becoming seamstresses in sweatshops?

My grandparents came here from France, learned the language and became quite successful in the Denver area. And they demanded even more from their two kids. My AWOL dad’s room was a library, and he could play eight musical instruments by the age of ten. He went on to college, the air force and became a senior design engineer in the aerospace industry by the time he was 30. Are we seeing a difference in approach here?

Wilkes-Barre was once home to the Grundik, a polish-language newspaper that was published in the downtown until the late 1950s. If your grandparents were Polish and never bothered to learn English, now you know why. Because they were not forced to.

Should we repeat the same mistakes all over again just because it’s politically expedient for the left-leaning to be able to shout Bigots! from their hastily-prepared soap boxes? Would it make more sense to have Hispanics saying “Well, my grandparents came here from the old country, spoke maybe 75 words of English and they managed to get by okay” fifty years from now? Should we make it easy for them too to shun our language and limit their opportunities for the entirety of their lives in one fell swoop? If we’re really so completely concerned about appearing compassionate for our fellow cocktail liberal friends, wouldn’t it be in an immigrants best interest to assimilate as much as and as fast as they can?

Or should we keep publishing crutches so as to keep the landscaper’s bill down?

Ah, what do I know? I’m a bigot.

Gotta go.

Later