Jefferson Review

"Your Liberty is Our Interest"

Home /  Archives / Search / Links / Quotes / Book Reviews / Advertise /Contact us / Subscribe / Calendar

TERRY’S TIDBITS

By Terry Gray

BUSH AND SOCIAL SECURITY

President Bush ran his last campaign with one of his promises being to revamp our Social Security woes.  It would appear that “Operation Iraqi Freedom” got in the way of our own stuff.  Now he can use Social Security reform as a platform again in 2004 and promise to get around to it this time.

IRAQI FREEDOM

Speaking of Iraqi Freedom, the latest item on the agenda of “Freeing” these persecuted people is to take away their guns.  Our constitution expresses gun ownership as a fundamental right, a right that has survived 200 years of exhaustive attempts to amend it away.  How can we preach democracy, per our rules, if we do not encourage the same freedoms for the people to whom we are espousing the benefits?

GUNS

This issue will not go away as long as there are Liberal Democrats that think that guns kill people.  All of the arguments bounce around and all of the rhetoric meanders through cycles of time and circumstances.  But to me it still boils down to the Liberal way of thinking being that of preemptive (preventative) punishment.  Folks, everything is dangerous but the potential for harmful use lies completely in the hands of the user.  Let’s make punishments for crimes, not the potential for crimes; then let’s make crimes worthy of being called crimes.

"The society of late twentieth century America is perhaps the first in human history where most grown men do not routinely bear arms on their persons and boys are not regularly raised from childhood to learn skill in the use of some kind of weapon, either for community or personal defense - club or spear, broadsword or long bow, rifle or Bowie knife. It also happens to be one of the rudest and crudest societies in history, having jubilantly swept most of the etiquette of speech, table, dress, hospitality, fairness, deference to authority and the relations of male and female and child and elder under the fraying and filthy carpet of politically convenient illusions. With little fear of physical reprisal Americans can be as loud, gross, disrespectful, pushy, and negligent as they please. If more people carried rapiers at their belts, or revolvers on their hips, It is a fair bet you would be able to go to a movie and enjoy he dialogue from the screen without having to endure the small talk, family gossip and assorted bodily noises that many theater audiences these days regularly emit. Today, discourtesy is commonplace precisely because there is no price to pay for it."

Samuel Francis

As Heinlein put it,

"An armed society is a polite society."

Did you know that in England the most popular weapon of assault is the beer glass?  Now they are considering beer glass control.

CITY COUNCIL STATUE

The Louisville City Council has voted to leave in the budget $25,000 for a statue to commemorate merger.  Actually the Democrats voted to leave it in.  I wonder who cares and why?  The new laws and regulations will speak loudly enough of merger without a statue to remind us that government got bigger.  Why didn’t we just merge the entire state, make it Louisville and call ourselves the largest city in the world.  Now that would deserve a statue.

CITY LAY OFFS

I think that Mayor Jerry probably took delight in the layoffs.  There was so much push on Living Wage that had he bucked it he would have been in big trouble.  So he went with it and as a result there are fewer people making more money.  He could have fought Living Wage and still had layoffs, though.  That would have been very good.  Now when I have to stand in line a minute or two longer because Marge lost her 35 hour-a-week job, 20 hours when you deduct for coffee and donuts, I’m waiting for someone doing the same half-assed job but being paid more.  That was pretty mean for me to say and not all together true.  I’ve had a few good experiences with some city workers.  My apologies to you who do your jobs.

HEALTHCARE BILL

Fox News reported that the Healthcare Bill swept through the house.  It won by one vote.

NO SMOKING IN LEXINGTON

They’ve done it.  Julie Bracket and her group of Neo Nazis have gotten passed a law that prohibits smoking in bars and restaurants.  It will happen here unless Louisville bar and restaurant owners stand up now.

These people don’t understand that a private company is a private company.  They don’t understand that non-smokers don’t have to go into an establishment that allows smoking.  They don’t understand that what they think is right isn’t right for everyone.  They do not respect the Constitution and the Bill of Rights.  They want all of us to live by their rules.

When will the common man fight back? 

I was talking with a guy from California and he said that the anti-smoking thing out there was the pits and he wasn’t even a smoker.  California has or had a clause that if all the restaurant or bar employees signed a waiver saying they were okay with working around the smoke then the restaurant or bar could permit smoking.  The smart owners fired those that didn’t want smoking.

A comedy club owner in Lexington made one night a week smoke free at his club.  His bar sales went down by 1/3.  Julie Bracket believes that it won’t impact business.  HEY JULIE, that isn’t the point.  The point is that it is none of your business.  Don’t go into a place that allows smoking if you don’t like it.  Nobody is forcing you to patronize the establishment.  You on the other hand are forcing patrons to do what you want.

I want to give you a scenario that is a very real possibility.  You get Lexington, then Louisville, and then the whole state with no smoking in privately owned buildings.  You work your way into banning smoking in public totally.  Then you start coming after smoking in private homes and on private residential property.  At this point someone will probably have already silenced you in some fashion but the ball is rolling.

Soon, all tobacco products are made illegal.  The only place to get tobacco is on the streets.  We suddenly have a whole new “terrible” crime on our hands that is more uncontrollable than drugs.  We have thousands of new criminals, people that never broke a law in their lives.  They are now patronizing the dealers and sneaking around in their own homes with the curtains drawn.

It’s only a matter of time before a neighbor rats them out and the cops break down the door and arrest them.  The prisons become even more overcrowded.  The courts system is stood on its ear by the shear numbers of “criminals” traipsing through the “halls of justice”.  And to add insult to injury, the taxes that were once enjoyed by government from the sale of tobacco are long gone.  To finance the law there comes a great push to take every home, car and other personal item that has been associated with the use of illegal tobacco.  Thank you, Julie.  I hope that you are reincarnated as a tobacco pipe.

I say that someone should open a “Smokers Club”.  The purpose of the club would be to provide people with a place to go and smoke.  Then as an added service to them, food and beer and cocktails could be served.  They could even have dances and big screen televisions and things like that.  It would be just like a restaurant/tavern type place but it would be a “Smokers Club”.  Cool, huh?  It would be for members only though, sorry Julie.

Weather (Louisville) / Mapquest / Search / White Pages / Business Search / CNN / Dictionary / E-card / MSN