Thursday, Sept 5th - Hero: Ticos

This is what people in Costa Rica are called. Ticos.

They are lovely people, the second happiest people in the world.

If I was to try and say why, I'm not sure I could put my finger on any one thing really. Of course, the country is phenomenally beautiful. They have white sand beaches, black sand beaches, pink sand beaches, beaches made out of ground up seashells. They have Dry Tropical forests, rainforests, cloud forests, and just plain out jungles. They have swamps and mangroves, high desert and low desert, gulfs, cays, and wide open beaches that have waves big enough to draw World Championship Surf tournaments.

The wild life is amazing. As you drive down the road you see great big scarlet macaws flying around. Walking down a trail you will encounter sloths, capuchin monkeys, spider monkeys, howler monkeys, deer that will walk right next to you, and every kind of lizard and reptile you can imagine. The hummingbirds are enormous and the most brilliant colors of purple and green and red imaginable.

Still, there are other brilliantly beautiful places on this earth whose people don't have that 'Tico' pleasantness. Could be their government, which doesn't support a national military and can therefore provide free education and free medical care to all their citizens. Might be the fact that their largest GDP is tourism and they deal with happy vacationing people most of the time. Their other large GDP is Agriculture (coffee, bananas, palm oil) so they are outside a lot.

Sure, sure. All that rolls up to equal happiness, but as we made several different treks through numerous small towns we were told that the 'center' of every town no matter how big or how small was the church.

AHHHHH...

God. At the center. Happiness. I see now.

All that beauty was just the icing on the cake! Kind of like the Angels having to cover their eyes with their wings at God's beauty as their bowing at his majesty...

Peace, Love, and GOD,
Tracy

Tuesday, August 5th - Hero: American People

Here's one that I didn't foresee ever posting a few years ago!

I have been watching the news the last few days and have been so proud of the Americans that have been showing up at the Town Halls the Democrats are holding around the country where they are trying to 'sell' us on Obamacare.

Well, it ain't going well for them. The American people are fed up. They are mad as hell and they aren't going to take it any more!!!

Of course, the Media has taken up the torch for their Messiah Obama. They are calling these 'orchestrated protests', angry mobs, and "stupid Republican gimmicks". They claim we are planted by the Insurance Industry. White House spokesperson Robert Gibbs even said these people were "less grass roots movement and more astroturf". Seriously, I couldn't make something that stupid up.

Here's a link to just one of these: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J-Bpshk5nX0&feature=topvideos. After looking at that one, you can view many others like it. This particular one is Arlen Specter and Kathleen Sebelius, who is just a delightful woman. Maybe after this bill passes she can have the 42 inch stick removed from up her anus...

Now, after seeing these videos I ask you; Do these look like angry mobs? Do these look like wild-eyed psycho people? Personally, they look like people I live next to, work next to, and go to church with. They look like AMERICANS.

AHHHHH. Now I see the problem. The Media and those in Washington? They can't recognize Americans. We look thoroughly alien to them. See, they have convinced themselves that Acorn, Americorp, SEIU - those are Americans.

It's about time we reminded them. BRAVA, America, BRAVA!!!

Peace, Love, and GOD,
Tracy

Tuesday, July 21st - Zero: Michelle Obama

***EDIT***WARNING***THIS WILL MAKE YOU CRAZY***
I just saw a news item where Obama was questioned during a townhall by a blogger about one of the revisions in the Healthcare Bill (1000 pages) and Obama ADMITTED that he wasn't familiar with that particular reform!!! This JACKASS is pushing to have this bill done and passed before Aug 1 and HE DOESNT EVEN KNOW WHAT'S IN THE FREAKIN BILL!!!! Once again, can anyone spell M-O-R-O-N????*******

This is going to be a rant about the audacity of this woman to stick her foot in the bottomless muck-pit of Government sponsored Healthcare reform.

Why now is Obama trotting the Missus out after keeping her in the shadows the last several months? Could it be that he's......desperate? That even he's starting to realize that the perfume is wearing off and America is starting to realize that they bought a huge stinking TURD last fall??

After all, if there's anyone the media fell harder for than Mr. Obama, it's Ms. Obama. So, let's bring out the GLADIATOR. Get her to help sell the Socialized, uhhh, I mean Universal Healthcare Plan. She WAS Vice-President of University of Chicago's Medical Center and developed a wonderful program there called the Urban Health Initiative.

You say you've never heard of this? Well, that's because there has been a very well executed plan to whitewash her name from the program. Because it stank - to high heaven. I finally found some credible sources that hadn't been completely erased. Take a gander...


The University of Chicago Medical Center has received a good deal of justly bad press over its policy of "redirecting" low-income patients to community hospitals while reserving its own beds for well-heeled patients requiring highly profitable procedures. Substantial coverage was given to a recent indictment of the program by the American College of Emergency Physicians. ACEP's president, Dr. Nick Jouriles, released a statement suggesting that the initiative comes "dangerously close to ‘patient dumping,' a practice made illegal by the Emergency Medical Labor and Treatment Act, and reflected an effort to ‘cherry pick' wealthy patients over poor."


Oddly absent from most of the unflattering press coverage of UCMC's patient-dumping scheme is any mention of the role our new First Lady played in devising the program. A laudable exception has been the Chicago Sun-Times, which reported last August that "Michelle Obama -- currently on unpaid leave from her $317,000-a-year job as a vice president of the prestigious hospital -- helped create the program."


On the rare occasions when other "news" media have bothered to connect the Urban Health Initiative to its glamorous creator, they have attempted to whitewash this tawdry program. Typical of such disingenuous coverage was a story in the Washington Post, which described it as "an innovative program to steer the patients to existing neighborhood clinics."


But no amount of journalistic lipstick can hide the reality that Mrs. Obama's initiative is a patient-dumping scheme. Such "cherry-picking," as Dr. Jouriles accurately describes it, was, at one time, fairly common. Prestigious institutions like the University of Chicago Medical Center routinely "dumped" Medicaid, uninsured and other unprofitable patients on less mercenary community hospitals. Many patients suffered needlessly, and more than a few actually died, as the result of this practice. So, in 1986, President Reagan signed the Emergency Medical Labor and Treatment Act (EMTALA) into law. EMTALA made such "redirection" illegal, but many high profile hospitals still chafed at being forced to treat poor patients. Enter Michelle Obama, UCMC's "Vice President for Community and External Affairs."


Mrs. Obama first hatched the UCMC program as the "South Side Health Collaborative," which featured a gang of "counselors" whose job it was to "advise" low-income patients that they would be better off at other hospitals and clinics. The program was so successful in getting rid of unwanted patients that she expanded it, gave it a new name, and hired none other than David Axelrod to sell the program to the public. According to the Sun-Times, "Obama's wife and Valerie Jarrett, an Obama friend and adviser who chairs the medical center's board, backed the Axelrod firm's hiring." Axelrod helped the future First Lady formulate a public relations campaign in which the "Urban Health Initiative" was represented as a boon to the community actuated by the purest of altruistic motives.


The resultant PR campaign was a study in Orwellian audacity. Chicago's inner city residents soon began hearing that UCMC's patient dumping program would "dramatically improve health care for thousands of South Side residents" and that the medical center was generously willing to provide "a ride on a shuttle bus to other centers." Likewise, the people who ran the community hospitals to which these unwanted patients were being shuttled began to read claims in local media to the effect that the Urban Health Initiative was good for them as well. Dr. Eric Whitaker, the Blagojevich crony who succeeded Mrs. Obama as Director of the program, repeatedly assured gullible reporters that the financial impact on these hospitals would be positive: "The initiative actually is improving their bottom lines." The CFOs of those hospitals were no doubt relieved to learn that treating Medicaid and uninsured patients is profitable.


But you just can't please some people. In one of the few frank passages of the Post article, we discover that many members of UCMC's medical staff believe the program is nothing more than an "attempt to ensure that the hospital retains only affluent patients with insurance." And another association of emergency physicians has joined ACEP in denouncing the Urban Health Initiative. The Chicago Tribune reports that Dr. Larry Weiss, president of the American Academy of Emergency Medicine is unhappy about UCMC's failure to consult its own ER physicians before initiating the program: "Not including emergency-room physicians ... would be analogous to changing the way surgery is performed in an operating room without involving any surgeons." Dr. Whitaker assures us, however, that such critics are merely "opposed to change."


Presumably, he would be similarly dismissive of Angela Adams, who brought her son to the medical center's ER after his lip had been partially torn off by a pit bull. As the Tribune puts it, "Instead of rushing Dontae into surgery ... the hospital's staff began pressing her about insurance." Unfortunately for Dontae, he was covered by Medicaid. So, all he got from the UCMC emergency department was a shot, some antibiotics, and instructions to "follow up with Cook County." Angela had to take her son across town to John Stroger Hospital, where he was immediately admitted for reconstructive surgery. Like doctors Jouriles and Weiss, Angela is having trouble seeing the community benefit of the Urban Health Initiative.


Meanwhile, the program's parents, Michelle Obama and David Axelrod, have moved to Washington. As the First Lady and the President's closest advisor, they wield enormous power. If these two characters were willing to betray their Chicago neighbors -- the South Side's most vulnerable citizens -- with a disgraceful program like the Urban Health Initiative, what sort of havoc do you think they have in mind for us rednecks of flyover country?

Monday July 6th - Hero : The Declaration of Independence

I don't know how many of you have read this amazing document, or if you have how recently, but I thought maybe it was time to read it again:



JULY 4, 1776

The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America

When in the Course of human events it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. — That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security. — Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.

He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.

He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.

He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.

He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their Public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.
(Sound a little like delivering 1300 page bills to Congress at 3am and demanding a vote on it a 9am the next morning?)

He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.
(Sound a little like having a criminal organization like ACORN performing the US Census that draws congressional districts?)

He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected, whereby the Legislative Powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.

He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.
(Take a look at the new Cap-n-Trade bill - there are penalties and incentives based on where you buy a home - incentive for urban areas, penalties for rural areas).

He has obstructed the Administration of Justice by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary Powers.

He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.

He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harass our people and eat out their substance.
(Can anyone say Czar??)

He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures.

He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil Power.

He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:

For quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:

For protecting them, by a mock Trial from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:

For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world:

For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent:
(Stimulus, TARP, ObamaCare, Cap-n-Trade...)

For depriving us in many cases, of the benefit of Trial by Jury:

For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences:

For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these Colonies

For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:

For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.

He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us.

He has plundered our seas, ravaged our coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.

He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation, and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & Perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.

He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the executioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands.

He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.

In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince, whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.

Nor have We been wanting in attentions to our British brethren. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace Friends.

We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare, That these united Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States, that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do. — And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes, and our sacred Honor.


Oh man, it gives me chills to read. These guys wrote this knowing that they were basically declaring war on one of the strongest armies in the world. But they didn't care. They preferred that to the intolerable future of servitude that their grandparents and great-grandparents fled from in the first place. That many of them gave their very lives for in order for them to not suffer under.

That's what we are about to leave for our kids and grandkids - a future of unbearable servitude and slavery. Our Spirit of Independence is but a mere glimmer of what it once was. Our Creator did not create us to live with a spirit of fear, but of one of HOPE and LOVE and JOY.

LET'S TAKE IT BACK!!!!!!

Peace, Love, and GOD,
Tracy

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jeYscnFpEyA

Saturday, June 27th - Zero: The Czar of Czars

It's been a couple of weeks since I have blogged, because first the TOP of my HEAD exploded when the Pay Czar was appointed (the 18th YTD). Once that was fixed (through my free choice employee provided health care doctor) the new $1.6 Trillion (or is it $3 Trillion) Health care plan was announced and my HEAD popped COMPLETELY OFF MY NECK!
Got that fixed, and along came the announcement that the Cap and Trade program is passing the House has caused a curious BLEEDING FROM MY EYEBALLS!!!!

Can I just say it out loud finally? Obama is the WORST PRESIDENT IN THE HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I knew he would be, but the speed that he has accomplished this moniker has astonished even me. Folks we are rats and he's the Pied Piper and there is a cliff in our immediate future if we don't WAKE UP.

For any of you out there saying "Well, sure he's making some mistakes but, but, but what about Hoover or, or maybe Jimmy Carter?"

Here's why Obama is worst than them: Hoover was, at heart, a patriot who really wanted America to succeed. He tried everything he could to bring America out of the Depression without putting Americans on the 'dole'. It didn't work, true, but not out of any malice on his part. Jimmy Carter was a disgrace as a President, of course, but he was just a complete and total idiot. Total nincompoop.
Obama on the other hand is brilliantly sly, clever, and is doing what he is doing ON PURPOSE. He wants the current way of life in America TO FAIL. He hates the idea of Free Market Capitalism and loves the idea of Marxist Communism.

It is past time for us to lose the 'PollyAnna' attitude of "that can't really happen here, it's America! We're the land of the Free". Sorry folks, but that is crap. You can stick your head in the sand all the way up until the point they show up at your house and take your cars, guns, and your kids.

For example, anyone else noticed the fact that Obama has appointed 18 (maybe more by now) CZARS? These range from Car Czar to Great Lakes Czar to Health Czar to Border Czar to the latest - PAY Czar. These Czars report directly to the president and no one else. They have Executive privledge which means they have special prosecution protection and don't have to answer for their actions to Congress. This is directly against the United States Constitution.

The Constitution specifically laid out three branches of the government as a system of checks and balances so that no one office would have too much power. Even some of the Democratic Senators have begun to complain about this unprecedented 'power grab'.

This is just the beginning of our conversion to a Marxist society. The Czars are in charge of Trillions of dollars of budget and as we all know - the Golden Rule - he who has the gold makes the rules. Scared yet? Think about this. The Pay Czar? Obama has asked him to review the Pay levels of ALL Executive pay of corporations in the US. Not just those that are on the TARP program - ALL of them. The other item in this guy's "to do list"? To evaluate if there needs to be a government forced "Savings Account" for people who choose not to participate in 401k plans at their employers. So, they will decide if you are saving enough and if not, they will take it from your pay and 'save' it for you.

Has your eyes started bleeding yet??? That's right. ANOTHER SOCIAL SECURITY plan. You know, the plan that is GOING TO BE BANKRUPT BY 2017!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

And there's not a flippin thing you can do about it. You want a job, you have to participate. Still feel like you live in the land of the free there, polly????

UGGGH. I gotta go do some yoga and pray. God is our only hope. He saw this coming, and He knows what will get us out. I know without a doubt, though, that He wants us to increase our knowledge. Our brains are our best weapon.

Don't be complacent, do some research. Look up the Cap and Trade bill and see just how much money it is going to cost you in your utility bills. Then, look up Saul Alinsky's Rules for Radicals and see what it is that is driving Barack Obama. That book lays out his vision for America.

Then get involved, write your senators and congressmen. Vote for the right candidates. I pray every day that we can somehow get out of this 2 party system that we are held hostage by. We NEED some Libertarian candidates out there.

May God have mercy on our country!

Peace, Love, and GOD,
Tracy

Saturday, June 6th: Hero - My Dad

It's a little early for Father's Day but I just wanted to say a little something about my dad that I have been reminded of through this whole experience of my daughter purchasing her first home.

When children are born some dad's are in the hospital waiting room and some are in the delivery room. Some can't be there but wish they could and some are scumbags that choose not to be.

When a child is laid in their father's arms for the first time, the father looks down at the child and many emotions will run through their hearts and souls; love, wonder, amazement, joy, pride, fear. They will look forward to the things they will teach the child and all the experiences they will have.

One thing that I know for certain that my Dad looked down at me and pledged from his heart to my heart was that he would be there for me no matter what, that he would take responsibility for me as a father should. That should I ever lose my way, he would be the one to find me and bring me home. Over and over again if needed, and with patience that only Job would understand.

And what I have discovered in the past few weeks is that this pledge that speaks from his heart to mine is spoken between him and my daughter, as well. As a mother I can't even begin to tell you what this amazing gift means to me.

My dad is a quiet man who doesn't require any attention or praise. He's never wanted riches or adoration. But he has more respect from the people who know him that any other single person I know. He's a man of tremendous integrity. His yes means yes and his no means no. So the fact that he's proud of me and thinks that I have done a good job in my life blows my mind.

Erika was pretty unluckly in the dad department, but won the Grandpa lottery. My Dad has shown her what quiet strength, work ethic, being true to your word, and responsibility is all about. Her Papa Dennis has shown her affection, kindness, gentleness, shared a love of animals, and given her a good example of how a man should love a woman.

We're some lucky girls!

Peace, Love, and GOD,
Tracy

Sunday, May 24th : Happy Memorial Day

Tonight I want to wish a Happy Memorial Day to everyone. We have been having rain here so the campers may have mixed feelings, but I have enjoyed it.

My husband, Bobby, is on the road in Indianapolis and his kids are camping. Which leaves me in a rare position of being alone for several days. I have been reading a new book by Douglas Preston / Lincoln Child called The Cemetary Dance. If you've never read any of their books, they are amazing. I have all of the Agent Pendergast series, and I would be happy to lend them to you!

So, earlier this afternoon I was sprucing up the back deck and as I was standing on the step ladder, hanging these really cool japanese lanterns I found on clearance at the World Market I realized that I have a serious addiction.

Hello, my name is Tracy and I am addicted to Flowers. Real or silk, doesn't matter. Annuals, perinneals, grasses, trees, doesn't matter. Flower beds, vases, window boxes, pottery urns, you name and I will plant something in it. I love them. I have always been awed by how much beauty God gave us through these creations. But still, I may have a little bit of a problem. I'll post pictures some time and you guys can decide for your self..

This being Memorial Day, I wanted to list a few of my favorite memories of the veterans in my life:

My Grandpa Curtis:
Papa was larger than life to me. He was my daddy's dad and that was part of what made him so awesome, I think. He also was incredibly playful. He would get down on the floor and play and he never got tired of playing puzzles with us. I remember that he took naps a lot, and I only recently found out that it was because he was suffering from a bout of cancer when I was young. I know that he quit smoking then, and took up sucking on coffee candy. He always had them, always. He also always had on his blue maintenence shirt with his name sewed on to an oval patch.
Maybe because of his fights with illness, Papa felt a special empathy with me. I was born with a joint dysplysia that had me in casts, then braces on my legs. One of my earliest memories at about 3 or 4 was of him putting his hand on my head and looking me in the eyes and telling me not to worry that I would be riding bikes and running the fields too, he promised. At the time, it felt like God Himself was promising.

My Grandpa Smith:
Poppy was my example of what a spiritual leader of a family was. Not because he was dominant or held the power. Because he loved my Grammy more than I have ever seen any man love any woman before. He loved her the way Christ loves us - with wild abandon, with no regard for his own needs, with a true and complete sacrificial love. His greatest acheivements in life, the things he was proudest of, were his children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren.
I remember him playing Saxaphone records for me on Saturday night and I would dance around the living room. And watching Hee Haw and Love Boat and Fantasy Island. Another big memory is of him when we would go camping. He was always piddling around and fixing something.
Another thing about Poppy was that he had such a soft heart for kids and animals. Poppy had such a soft spot for the neighborhood cats. If there was a cat in the neighborhood, he would feed it and invite it in for 'visits'.

I was so blessed to have both of these men in my life, I thank God that they lived through WWII so that I could meet them. Papa Curtis was in the Army, and received a Purple Heart. Poppy Smith was in the Navy in the South Pacific.

Before I sign off, I want to acknowledge the other men in my life that have served in combat:
My Dad - Rex Curtis - the Army - Vietnam War
My step-brother - James Robinson - Army National Guard - Iraq Gulf War
My Father-in-law - Bob King

Thank you to these men, and to any of you (and your loved ones) out there that have served. It takes extraordinary bravery and sacrifice to commit to serve in a way that may claim your life. 90% of our population will never ever understand what that's about and won't come close to truly appreciating it, but you do it anyway. I thank God for you.

Peace, Love, and GOD,
Tracy

Thursday, May 21st : Nancy Pelosi is a big fat LOSER

Well, I'm back after a long hiatus. Doctor's orders, he said if I didn't lay off the politics I was going to stroke out, but I think with the pills he gave me I should be okay now... :)

I'm actually thinking about making this blog dedicated to a daily watch of what STUPID thing the Pelosi-led Congress is going to do. But, I guess that would leave out the antics of Biden and Obama. I swear, the word Moron has never been used so much!

So, before I start the rant on Nancy, I want to point out a new blog I'm following. It's my friend Alan's and it's called 'Wanna hear something funny?' and TRUST me you will be in stitches... The link is over there to the right.

I am furious over Nancy Pelosi's absurd accusation and denigration of the CIA. She gave a press conference in which it was so obvious that she was reading a statement that someone else wrote for her. She couldn't even answer the freakin questions and was caught in two different lies (oh, excuse me, mis-statements - you can only be accused of lying if you work in a job where you might have to die in service of the country).

Then she outright accused the CIA of lying to the Congress!!! Says it happens all the time. Throws that stink bomb out there then walks off. No details, nothing to back the statement up - AND THERE NEVER WILL BE. That's the part that just chaps my butt. These people in Washington are so corrupted by their own sense of power that they don't think the rules apply to them any more. She truly thinks she is above the law. She can stand up there and say any freaking thing she wants and no one can do anything about it.

And know we have Senators Graham and Spector coming out and piling on. Saying 'Yeah, CIA? Lying bunch of bastards over there!" Shoot, Graham even went on that most revered Democrat news organization The Comedy Channel to talk badly about our government agency. Again, did either of them offer any evidence? Nope. Nothing, Nada, Zilch. Morons. I hope all those people who voted Democrat in 06 and 08 are suffering an EPIC case of heartburn about now. Seriously. Bunch of morons.

Now, the bottom line of why this CIA bashing pisses me off so badly. First of all, nearly all of the CIA operatives are lifetime military servicemen or women. These are people who have chosen to live their lives in the service of their country protecting the rest of us. They don't do it to get rich and they certainly don't do it for the perks. Can't imagine the typical CIA agent gets to spend a lot of time at home with the family. They don't do it for fame, because they have to do their jobs anonymously for the most part. So, now they have to hear Congress going around calling them liars and discrediting the one thing they had going for them - their super badass reputation. What's left?

We need those people, folks. We need them infiltrating the terrorist organizations overseas and finding all the secrets they do and whatever it is that they do. I personally don't care how they do their jobs, but if it keeps me and my family safe then more power to them. It would be pretty dang hypocritical for me to cry and mourn for the people who lost their lives in the Twin Towers, or OKC, or any of the Wars, but say that I disagreed with the tactics it takes to keep innocents safe.

I would love to ask Ms. Pelosi who she thinks will protect her when the National Guard, the Military, and the CIA, are all gone? When she has successfully alienated all of those folks and her little city of San Fran or DC gets invaded, who's gonna protect her?

Maybe Joe Biden will invite her down in his top secret bunker where no one will be able to find them. Oh wait... never mind. They're screwed.

Peace, Love, and GOD,
Tracy

Thursday, Feb 12th - Zero: Stimulus (Part Deux Deux)

Well, this week there were lots of layoffs around the country, but the worst is yet to come. It seems as though America as we know it is about to be fired as of tomorrow. Because it seems as though the out of control Spending Bill (or Socialism 101 Bill) will be passed by the traitors in Washington DC.

Obama recently sneered at us 'chattering class' who seemed to think we are economists, but anyone who has taken high school economics knows: subsidize something and you will get more of it, tax it and you will get less of it... So what are we subsidizing? Unwed welfare mothers, people with STD's, and Liberal pet projects. You know where I'm going with this...

So, now I want to point out two of the most chilling bills I have ever read that are being snuck through:


First: The 1996 Welfare Reform bill marked the first time any government entitlement had ever been rolled back. Despite liberal howling and foot-stomping, not subsidizing illegitimacy led, brace yourselves, to less illegitimacy.

Welfare recipients got jobs, as the hard-core unemployables were coaxed away from their TV sets and into the workforce. For the first time in decades, the ever-increasing illegitimacy rate stopped spiraling upward.

As proof that that welfare reform was a smashing success, a few years later, Bill Clinton started claiming full credit for the bill.

Well, that's over. The stimulus bill goes a long way toward repealing the work requirement of the 1996 Republican Welfare Reform bill and rewards states that increase their welfare caseloads by paying unwed mothers to sit home doing nothing.

Second: bureaucrats at Health and Human Services will now electronically collect every citizen's complete medical records and determine appropriate medical care.

No, I am not joking. Read it and weep.

HHS bureaucrats will soon be empowered to overrule your doctor. Doctors who don't comply with the government's treatment protocols will be fined. That's right: Instead of your treatment being determined by your doctor, it will be settled on by some power-hungry half-wit loser in Washington who couldn't get a job in the private sector.

And a brand-new set of bureaucrats in the newly created office of "National Coordinator of Health Information Technology" will be empowered to cut off treatments that merely prolong life. Sorry, Mom and Dad, Big Brother said it's time to quit being selfish and die already!

At every other workplace in the nation -- even Walmart! -- workers are being laid off. But no one at any of the bloated government bureaucracies ever need fear receiving a pink slip. All 64,750 employees at the department of Health and Human Services are apparently absolutely crucial to the smooth functioning of the department.

With the stimulus bill, liberals plan to move unfirable government workers into every activity in America, where they will superintend all aspects of our lives.

Robert Kennedy famously said: "There are those who look at things the way they are and ask, 'Why?' I dream of things that never were and ask, 'Why not?'"

Obama's version seems to be: "There are those who look at things and ask, "Why on earth should the government be paying for that?" I dream of things that never were funded by the government and ask, "Why not?"

I weep for our once great country. :(

Peace, Love, and GOD,
Tracy

Saturday, Feb 7th - Zero: Obama's "Stimulus" Bill

I never blog on the weekend, but this thing has me so fired up I couldn't help but put it out there. If you feel even remotely the same as I do, please, please, go to google, search for your state's senators and congressmen and send them an email or call them and tell them NOT to pass this $937 BILLION TURD!!!!!!

There is only one reason Mr. President is getting his panties in wad about passing this thing so fast: the longer they delay, the more details are leaking out, and the more this thing STINKS! Apparently by "Change" he meant standing behind the podium and getting pissy with us AMERICANS who dare to question his Rescue Plan..

Here's a few of the nastier nuggets -

Let's start with $3 billion for "prevention and wellness programs, including $335 million for "education and prevention" of sexually transmitted diseases. FRC reports that recent government expenditures in this area include a transgender beauty pageant in San Francisco that advertised available HIV testing. Then there was the event called "Got Love? — Flirt/Date/Score" that taught how "to flirt with greater finesse." Does this strike anyone as a plan to jump-start the economy, instead of someone's sex life?

The Senate (and the House) somehow think it's a "stimulus" provision to give an additional $50 million to the National Endowment for the Arts. Kiff Gallagher, a former Clinton staffer, protested to the Los Angeles Times that the arts "get the shaft" in spending battles because their impact seems fuzzy. "But the new president shows that a higher social, empathic intelligence is required to solve hard-core issues."

If we have enough "empathic intelligence," we might imagine how we fix the mortgage-banking mess with more spending on ballet.

On the tax-cut side, the Senate bill included a tax break worth up to $246 million over 11 years for outside investors in big-budget Hollywood movie projects. "Tax cuts for the wealthy" are OK apparently — as long as the wealthy are making movies. But bad publicity and pork-busting Sen. Tom Coburn pressed the Senate (including 13 Democrats) to scrap the tax break.

The "green" lobby is thrown a pile of bones in the "stimulus" bill, including $10 million for bike and walking trails, $200 million for plug-in electric car stations, $400 million for climate change research by NASA scientists, $600 million to buy new "green" cars for government workers, $800 million for more cleanup of "Superfund" pollution sites, and $1.5 billion for the construction of new "green" school buildings.

Then there's just plain self-dealing by the Democrats. The Washington Times reported on a $2.25 billion provision in the House bill for the National Parks — almost equal to the National Park Service's total yearly budget, and a eyebrow-raising increase of almost three times the $802 million the Senate Appropriations Committee put in its "stimulus" bill. The chief lobbyist for the National Parks Conservation Association is Craig Obey, the son of House Appropriations Committee Chairman David Obey.

- $6.2 billion for home weatherization
- $50 million for port modernization and water and wastewater infrastructure needs in Guam
- $100 million for children to learn green construction
- $800 million for Amtrack
- $150 million for the Smithsonian Institute
- $198 million for U.S. military benefits for Filipinos who fought for the U.S. during WWII
- $75 million for "smoking cessation activities"
- $87 million for the "design of a new polar icebreaker"
- $335 million for HIV/STD screening
- $14 million for the Accountability and Transparency Boards TRAVEL EXPENSES!!

Don't take my word for it, people. Go to www.readthestimulus.org.

You know the real shame of this? There is a lot of REALLY good stuff in this bill. It could be effective. But the unbelievable self-interest of the MORONS in DC is completely ruining it.

To put it in perspective, this bill equals out to $5205 for every person in the United States over the age of 18. That is how much more YOU are going into debt so the MORONS can make their lobbyist buddies happy. After all, if the lobbyists aren't happy, the MORONS can't keep getting their free vacations in the French Riviera, or buy those vacation homes in Aspen...

Peace, Love, and GOD,
Tracy

Wednesday, Feb 4 - Zero: Nancy Pelosi

The Speaker of the House - 3rd in line to the presidency, mind you - told a room full of (so-called) journalists that it is vitally important for Congress to pass the newest Stimulus package (900 BILLION and counting).

The reason it is so vitally important? Glad you asked.

Because, "500 million Americans lose their jobs each month that goes by" without it.

Wow. That's a staggering number! Especially considering there are only 300 million people living in the good ole US of A.

Now, I knew you could be a total moron and be in the Congress. That's obvious. But, seriously, early last year there was such a big hoopla over the 300 millionth person born in the US, you would have had to have had your head up your butt to not hear it.

Anyway. Next group of losers I would like to point out are the so-called journalists in the room. You want proof that 99.5% of the media are in the Liberal Tank (face first, sucking it up through a straw)? Not a single one of them called her on it to her face.

Again, not surprised. The liberal movement in our country is re-writing our children's textbooks with lies and propaganda. Why should a little fact like how many people live in our country get in the way of their scare-mongering agenda?

Peace, Love, and GOD,
Tracy

Monday, January 19th - Zero: Pain

Pain is an interesting thing. There are lots of different forms: mental, physical, spiritual. It can be sharp, stabbing, dull, aching. It can be quick, like ripping a band-aid off, or long term like an old bone break that just heals wrong.

I've been close friends with pain for most of my life. I can remember suffering horrible headaches as a young child, and I remember pain in my legs but it's much more abstract. As I grew older I had the bad fortune to have bad female problems, ulcers, and, always, the headaches. From my early 30's on, pain has become a constant companion. I still have the headaches, brought on by the slightest smell of someone's cologne or perfume or cleaning products, etc, etc. But the worst of all is the pain in my lower body joints. I thought it was bad, but I found out this week that it's so bad that I didn't even notice that I have a rib out of place. Crazy stuff, there.

On tonight's House episode there was a young father who tried to kill himself because of the overwhelming burden of living with constant pain. Interesting because House also lives with the pain on a constant basis. Both of them were at a point where the drugs were no longer working well for them. That's a fear, as well as the fear of what the drugs do to your kidneys and liver. I could sympathize with the father, because I have often wondered what's the difference between living in a constant drug haze and being hooked up to a machine? Of course, it's House, so I knew they would fix him! YAY, House..

A person learns to live with pain, usually. As far back as the Apostle Paul with his 'thorn in the flesh'. Some people take drugs, some people become shut-ins, some people become alcoholics, and some people become mean. Pain affects those that love those people, too. It's not fair to them, especially to the spouse. Because while we save all our 'good' moments for our co-workers and friends, we keep the venom for those in our house. I am devasted by the cruelty of that truth, but like so many of our own faults, I feel powerless, most of the time, to change it. It's one of those things that for some crazy reason I feel like it's up to me to fix, like I am so ashamed of it that I can't give it over to God. I feel like a little kid in the Ball Pit. You know the one, she scoops up an armful of those balls and loses her balance. Down she goes and can't get back up. You, on the outside, tell her to drop the balls and she can get up, but her desperation to hang on to those balls outweighs everything else so she struggles and struggles, but just sinks further down. I wallow in the Ball Pit on a regular basis. Because admitting that the pain exists means I am weak. Weakness is something I have learned from an early age to be completely and totally ashamed of.

How crazy is that. I can admit my weakness here, on this blog, but in the intimate conversation with my Father, my Creator, my weakness - my pain - is off-limits! In some way, I think part of the reason is that I feel like I deserve it.

There is a reason for everything, and similar to Paul, I feel like if pain weren't my constant companion my life would be almost too good. My pride would be an enormous hurdle. It definitely keeps me humble, because I have to watch my temper always. I also have started to have to admit that I can't do it all myself. I need help doing small chores and activities. That's big for me, cause I have always been a solitary person. I would have made a terrific monk, probably. But, that wasn't God's plan, obviously.

Praise God that He doesn't give up on us! My prayer is that I will get it right sooner rather than later.

Peace, Love, and GOD,
Tracy

Monday, January 12th - Hero: Bill Connor

This is a guy I met on an airplane last year. I don't really remember which flight, except that it was a connection flight to Dallas.

I remember him though. He was a very nice guy who was with the Army Air Guard. He lives in San Antonio and that is what got us to talking. San Antonio is one of my favorite cities!

We talked to whole flight. He had daughters and we talked about them, and we talked about religion, but we mostly talked about traveling. He traveled alot, too.

In the course of conversation I mentioned how much I loved Argentina and Costa Rica which got us to talking about the fact that you can drive Highway 1 (or 101) starting at the northern most tip of the states all the way down to the tip of Patagonia in Argentina. That led us to talk about the book 'The Motorcycle Diaries' which chronicles a couple of young guys journey along this highway.

So guess what shows up in my mail today??? A DVD copy of the movie 'The Motorcycle Diaries' from Bill. He also sent a letter telling about the Hurricane work his unit has been doing and some training videos they have been shooting.

So, Bill Connor is my Hero today for reminding me that while travel can be a chore and sometimes unpleasant, there are some really great people out there - just waiting to be met.

Peace, Love, and GOD,
Tracy