Webster

The Constitution was made to guard the people against the dangers of good intentions." --American Statesman Daniel Webster (1782-1852)


Saturday, May 30, 2015

Rules of Bacon and other intemperate thoughts...



     I was cooking breakfest this morning and I was putting some bacon in the pan,
Yeah I know....Turkey Bacon..but trying to eat healthy


  I was cooking the bacon, had finished the grits(Yes this is the south) and was fixing to start on the eggs and the biscuits were in the toaster oven,  I was drinking coffee out of my grumpy mug..
Yeah...That is the one...

   I started thinking(Yes dangerous I know...) I have noticed the proliferation of Bacon related items.. from the Rules of Bacon:
    From posters to animals...
and various meme's
    
     I started wondering that the love of bacon is a subliminal rejection of the healthnazi's and other people that are being super busybodies that like getting all in other peoples business by telling them what they can or can't do.  I started wondering if this is the average American 's response to the big government agenda and they are doing it on a personal level.  
     I remember when I was little, bacon was just something that was eaten in the morning and there was nothing about it.  But now Bacon has its own food group. I believe that there is a pushback going on in the culture war. 

   
 Even Jesus is in on it....

Wednesday, May 27, 2015

What the heck is going on with Scouting? and other musings....Yes it is a rant....

Before I go on a tear, I need to show another present my brother gave me...

                                                            And the other side...

Notice the "bullet holes"

     A couple of things have happened recently and I have been dismayed by them. For those that don't know, I am a scout leader, I was a Cub scout Leader, now a Boy Scout Leader.  I was in the boy scouts in my youth and made it all the way to Life scout and working on my eagle project and ran out of time, you have to complete it by your 18th birthday.  My son is in the Boy Scouts, I want him to learn the timeless values that are taught in the Boy Scouts, I believe in the mission statement of the B.S.A. " To turn good boys into good men".
      First off..the national President Dr.  Robert Gates addressed the National annual meeting in 2015.  I have cut and pasted an exerpt of his speech in its entirety dealing with the membership issues.  I will first off post the exerpt then I will say my piece on the issue.  The entire speech link is Here

     Robert Gates Bio is Here

      
FINALLY, LET ME ADDRESS MEMBERSHIP POLICY.
I TOLD YOU A YEAR AGO THAT I WOULD OPPOSE REOPENING THIS ISSUE DURING MY TWO-YEAR TERM AS PRESIDENT OF THE BSA. I HAD HOPED THEN FOR A RESPITE DURING WHICH WE COULD FOCUS ON HEALING OUR DIVISIONS FROM THE 2013 DECISION, IMPROVING OUR PROGRAM, STRENGTHENING OUR FINANCES AND ENDING OUR DECLINE IN MEMBERSHIP.
HOWEVER, EVENTS DURING THE PAST YEAR HAVE CONFRONTED US WITH URGENT CHALLENGES I DID NOT FORESEE AND WHICH WE CANNOT IGNORE. WE CANNOT IGNORE GROWING INTERNAL CHALLENGES TO OUR CURRENT MEMBERSHIP POLICY, FROM SOME COUNCILS – LIKE THE GREATER NEW YORK COUNCIL, THE DENVER AREA COUNCIL, AND OTHERS – IN OPEN DEFIANCE OF THE POLICY, TO MORE AND MORE COUNCILS TAKING A POSITION IN THEIR MISSION STATEMENTS AND PUBLIC DOCUMENTS CONTRARY TO NATIONAL POLICY.
NOR CAN WE IGNORE THE SOCIAL, POLITICAL AND JURIDICIAL CHANGES TAKING PLACE IN OUR COUNTRY – CHANGES TAKING PLACE AT A PACE OVER THIS PAST YEAR NO ONE ANTICIPATED. I REMIND YOU OF THE RECENT DEBATES WE HAVE SEEN IN PLACES LIKE INDIANA AND ARKANSAS OVER DISCRIMINATION BASED ON SEXUAL ORIENTATION, NOT TO MENTION THE IMPENDING U.S. SUPREME COURT DECISION THIS SUMMER ON GAY MARRIAGE.
I AM NOT ASKING THE NATIONAL BOARD FOR ANY ACTION TO CHANGE OUR CURRENT POLICY AT THIS MEETING. BUT I MUST SPEAK AS PLAINLY AND BLUNTLY TO YOU AS I SPOKE TO PRESIDENTS WHEN I WAS DIRECTOR OF CIA AND SECRETARY OF DEFENSE. WE MUST DEAL WITH THE WORLD AS IT IS, NOT AS WE MIGHT WISH IT TO BE. THE STATUS QUO IN OUR MOVEMENT’S MEMBERSHIP STANDARDS CANNOT BE SUSTAINED.
WE CAN EXPECT MORE COUNCILS TO OPENLY CHALLENGE THE CURRENT POLICY. WHILE TECHNICALLY WE HAVE THE AUTHORITY TO REVOKE THEIR CHARTERS, SUCH AN ACTION WOULD DENY THE LIFELONG BENEFITS OF SCOUTING TO HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS OF BOYS AND YOUNG MEN TODAY AND VASTLY MORE IN THE FUTURE. I WILL NOT TAKE THAT PATH.
MOREOVER, DOZENS OF STATES – FROM NEW YORK TO UTAH – ARE PASSING LAWS THAT PROTECT EMPLOYMENT RIGHTS ON THE BASIS OF SEXUAL ORIENTATION. THUS, BETWEEN INTERNAL CHALLENGES AND POTENTIAL LEGAL CONFLICTS, THE BSA FINDS ITSELF IN AN UNSUSTAINABLE POSITION. A POSITION THAT MAKES US VULNERABLE TO THE POSSIBILITY THE COURTS SIMPLY WILL ORDER US AT SOME POINT TO CHANGE OUR MEMBERSHIP POLICY. WE MUST ALL UNDERSTAND THAT THIS PROBABLY WILL HAPPEN SOONER RATHER THAN LATER.
IN 2010, A FEDERAL DISTRICT JUDGE IN CALIFORNIA OVERTURNED THE MILITARY’S DON’T ASK, DON’T TELL LAW AND THE REVERSAL WAS APPLIED NATIONWIDE IMMEDIATELY. ONLY A STAY GRANTED BY THE APPEALS COURT – GRANTED, I BELIEVE, MAINLY BECAUSE WE WERE IN THE PROCESS OF CHANGING THE LAW – PREVENTED DRAMATIC DISRUPTION IN THE ARMED FORCES.
WE CANNOT PREDICT IF OR WHEN THIS MIGHT HAPPEN TO US, BUT I PERSONALLY BELIEVE OUR LEGAL DEFENSES HAVE WEAKENED SINCE THE DALE CASE. AND IF WE WAIT FOR THE COURTS TO ACT, WE COULD END UP WITH A BROAD RULING THAT COULD FORBID ANY KIND OF MEMBERSHIP STANDARD, INCLUDING OUR FOUNDATIONAL BELIEF IN OUR DUTY TO GOD AND OUR FOCUS ON SERVING THE SPECIFIC NEEDS OF BOYS. WAITING FOR THE COURTS IS A GAMBLE WITH HUGE STAKES.
ALTERNATIVELY, WE CAN MOVE AT SOME FUTURE DATE – BUT SOONER RATHER THAN LATER – TO SEIZE CONTROL OF OUR OWN FUTURE, SET OUR OWN COURSE AND CHANGE OUR POLICY IN ORDER TO ALLOW CHARTER PARTNERS – UNIT SPONSORING ORGANIZATIONS – TO DETERMINE THE STANDARDS FOR THEIR SCOUT LEADERS. SUCH AN APPROACH WOULD ALLOW ALL CHURCHES, WHICH SPONSOR SOME 70% OF OUR SCOUT UNITS, TO ESTABLISH LEADERSHIP STANDARDS CONSISTENT WITH THEIR FAITH. WE MUST, AT ALL COSTS, PRESERVE THE RELIGIOUS FREEDOM OF OUR CHURCH PARTNERS TO DO THIS.
OUR OATH CALLS UPON US TO DO OUR DUTY TO GOD AND OUR COUNTRY. THE COUNTRY IS CHANGING AND WE ARE INCREASINGLY AT ODDS WITH THE LEGAL LANDSCAPE AT BOTH THE STATE AND FEDERAL LEVELS. AND, AS A MOVEMENT, WE FIND OURSELVES WITH A POLICY MORE THAN A FEW OF OUR CHURCH SPONSORS REJECT – THUS PLACING SCOUTING BETWEEN A BOY AND HIS CHURCH.
THE CHALLENGES ARE BEFORE US NOW. THE EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE, THE NATIONAL EXECUTIVE BOARD AND OUR LEGAL COUNSEL WILL WORK TO DETERMINE OUR RESPONSES AND OUR BEST STRATEGY. WE WANT AND VALUE YOUR THOUGHTS ON ALL THIS, RECOGNIZING THE IMPORTANCE OF PROTECTING OUR CORE VALUES.
THE ONE THING WE CANNOT DO IS PUT OUR HEADS IN THE SAND AND PRETEND THIS CHALLENGE WILL GO AWAY OR ABATE.
QUITE THE OPPOSITE IS HAPPENING. I KNOW MY REMARKS ON THIS SUBJECT UNSETTLE MANY OF YOU. SOME OF YOU MIGHT BE ANGRY THAT I RAISE THIS SUBJECT AND WITH WHAT I HAVE SAID. BUT THIS MOVEMENT SHAPED MY LIFE AND MY ONLY PURPOSE – MY ONLY REASON FOR ASSUMING THIS LEADERSHIP ROLE – IS TO PRESERVE THE BOY SCOUTS OF AMERICA IN RECOGNITION OF ALL IT HAS DONE FOR THIS COUNTRY, AND ALL IT CAN AND MUST DO IN THE FUTURE. SCOUTING IS NEEDED IN THIS COUNTRY NOW MORE THAN EVER.
I ASSURE YOU THAT I HAVE NO HIDDEN AGENDA. I WANT ONLY TO APPRISE YOU OF THE NEW REALITY I SEE: THAT BOTH INTERNAL AND EXTERNAL EVENTS AND PRESSURES OVER THE PAST YEAR AND LOOKING TO THE FUTURE WILL REQUIRE ACTION AT SOME POINT.
FOR NOW, I ASK THAT, IN THE DAYS AND MONTHS AHEAD, EVERYONE HERE REFLECT AND PRAY ON OUR PATH FORWARD. WE CAN ACT ON OUR OWN OR WE CAN BE FORCED TO ACT BUT, EITHER WAY, I SUSPECT WE DON’T HAVE A LOT OF TIME.
FOR ME, I SUPPORT A POLICY THAT ACCEPTS AND RESPECTS OUR DIFFERENT PERSPECTIVES AND BELIEFS, ALLOWS RELIGIOUS ORGANIZATIONS – BASED ON FIRST AMENDMENT PROTECTION OF RELIGIOUS FREEDOM – TO ESTABLISH THEIR OWN STANDARDS FOR ADULT LEADERS, AND PRESERVES THE BOY SCOUTS OF AMERICA NOW AND FOREVER. I TRULY FEAR THAT ANY OTHER ALTERNATIVE WILL BE THE END OF US AS A NATIONAL MOVEMENT.
EVERY DAY, IN EVERY COMMUNITY IN AMERICA, SCOUTING IS CHANGING THE LIVES OF BOYS AND YOUNG MEN – TEACHING THEM SKILLS AND LEADERSHIP, HELPING THEM BUILD CHARACTER AND INTEGRITY. EVERY DAY, IN EVERY COMMUNITY, SCOUTING MAKES THOSE COMMUNITIES BETTER PLACES TO LIVE. WE HAVE BEEN DOING THIS FOR 105 YEARS. I AM CONFIDENT WE WILL DO SO FOR ANOTHER 105 YEARS AS LONG AS WE STAND TOGETHER, UNITED IN OUR SINGULAR MISSION TO SERVE AMERICAN YOUTH.
I AM HONORED TO WORK WITH ALL OF YOU TO GIVE OUR YOUNG PEOPLE THE WISDOM, DIRECTION AND CONFIDENCE TO BE THE BEST THEY CAN BE.
THANK YOU.

     I have a lot of respect for Robert Gates, to broach this issue takes Guts...but I also am pissed, we are having 3% of the population(According to the CDC) totally drive the issues, we have been soo cowed into silence by the outrage machine that is the "LGBT" community.  For many years they have asked for "Tolerance" for different beliefs than the mainstream...now they are forcing their beliefs and anybody that disagreees with the issues are immediately flattened so to speak by the outrage machine that I call the "Gay Mafia"
       
They have totally cowed all opposition to their agenda.....What the hell happened to "tolerance"? 
     Now if you disagree with their assertions, they will try to destroy you, get you fired from your job...ask the former head of Mozilla and a Vermont State trooper about the outrage campaign that was launched against them by the SJW's out there.  Where is the vaunted tolerance of the left?   They are only tolerant if you agree with them, then you are "en-lighted".  If you disagree with them, then you are a homophobic knuckle draggin Neanderthal that deserves to be destroyed publicly and financially.     The same people that is driving this issue if they had any kids...they would never be in the boy scouts.  This is purely agenda driven.  the GayMafia has brought enormous social pressure on the Boy Scouts to change their policy on openly gay leaders.  I use an alias here, I try with varying success to keep my real identity under cover so there are no no splash-back with my risk adverse employer who would can me in a new york minute if somebody was to complain.  It is a shame that a persons beliefs can get him canned.  I keep wondering what happened to freedom here in America.  
    
     I am aggravated, sexuality has no business in the Boy Scouts.  I am not advocating a don't ask, Don't tell policy...it is nobody's business what the orientation of the leaders are.   The membership of the boy scouts have been dropping, for several years.  People put their kids into boy scouts to help instill in the boys a moral code that has stood the test of time.  The scout oath and law if you follow it, will help guide you through life and if you fall off the path, the knowledge of the Oath and law will help you find your way again.  Now like I said, the last few years, the membership has been falling and secular and faith based groups are getting the people moving over.  They are capitalizing on the turmoil surrounding the B.S.A.   
     Also there is another issue....The B.S.A. is reiterating a policy of No "Water-gun fights".   Really?    Watergun fights have been a B.S.A tradition since I was a boy scouts....but back then, we  also used BB guns.....Now those things hurt.....But now they are forbidding watergun fights?   What is going on?   Are we turning into a nation of pansies? The B.S.A. is soo afraid of "liability"
     We are turning into a "nerf" or a bubblewrap society, have we lost out spine?  the greatness that is America?   We were once portrayed as a nation of Individualist and rough and ready frontiersman.  We would fight anybody else if the cause was just.   Our heroes used to be John Wayne......Now they are Justin Bieber...
  
      

Monday, May 25, 2015

Monday Music "Got my mind set on you" by George Harrison

 Remember the reason for the Holidays, it honors those that made the ultimate sacrifice.  We honor them by remembering their sacrifice.  


We went to Florida to see my brother and his family.  He just came from Afghanistan  as a contractor flying helicopters.  It was glad to see him and his family.  He gave me this patch,  I will stick it with my other stuff in my bonus room.



 This song came out while I was in Europe, I heard the song at one of the stores at Robinson Barracks, I was visiting one of the little shops there when the song came on the MTV Europe station and the music caught my ear.  I liked the song and the video and went to the PX and bought the CD.  Hows that for marketing?


"Got My Mind Set on You" is a song written by Rudy Clark and originally recorded by James Ray in 1962. An edited version of the song was released later in the year as a single on the Dynamic Sound label. In 1987, George Harrison released a cover version of the song as a single, and released it on his album, Cloud Nine.


Of Harrison's three number-one singles in the US, it was the only song not written by Harrison and the only one without religious overtones. Not only was this the last US #1 hit by Harrison, but from any of the ex-Beatles in the US. When the song hit #1, it broke a three-way tie among Harrison, John Lennon, and Ringo Starr, all of whom had two #1 hit singles as solo artists (discounting Paul McCartney's work with Wings). It also happened to be the #1 single in the US the week immediately preceding the induction of The Beatles into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, making Harrison one of the few inductees to have an active single on the U.S. record charts at the time of induction. Billboard ranked it as the No. 3 song for 1988.
The single's B-side is "Lay His Head", a remixed version of the unreleased song from Harrison's originally intended Somewhere in England album. The 12-inch version of the single also adds an extended version of "Got My Mind Set On You".
In the UK the single spent four weeks at number two. It was kept off the number 1 spot by T'Pau's "China in Your Hand".
The song was included in the Harrison compilation albums Best of Dark Horse 1976-1989 (1989) and Let It Roll: Songs by George Harrison (2009). A live version was recorded for his Live in Japan (1992) album.
In 2010, AOL radio listeners chose "Got My Mind Set on You" as one of the 10 Best George Harrison Songs, appearing at number 4 on the list.


Two music videos were released for the cover version.
The first (directed by Gary Weis) starred a young Alexis Denisof vying for the heart of a girl in an amusement arcade. It featured Harrison and the band inside of a movie viewer, while the young man tries to win a toy ballerina for the girl.
The second, also directed by Weis, is Harrison sitting and playing in a study. As the song progresses, furniture and knick-knacks (like a stuffed squirrel, sentient chainsaw, and mounted stag and warthog) begin to dance along with the song. In the middle of the video, Harrison (through the use of a stunt double) performs a backflip from his chair and follows it with a dance routine before jumping back to his seat.
The second received significant airplay, and was nominated for three MTV VMAs.

Friday, May 22, 2015

Ain't got nothing......work all the time.

  This will be a short post, I have worked a lot of overtime and I am tired.   On a good note, the Ranger is Fixed!!!
   A friend of mine came over....We were able to muscle the bed in place and then I got the bolts and wires hooked up.   I am happy!!  If Chuck Norris was there, the bed would have jumped up there by itself and hooked up rather than annoy Chuck.  ( Thanks for the suggestion Momma Fargo;)

     At work (Where else...) one of the mechanic's (Same one that finds all the strange video's, every group has one...) was playing a video called "The devil went to Boston".  It is hilarious and definitely NSFW due to language.  


Please check out my blogroll, there are a lot of good people there...

Tuesday, May 19, 2015

Monday Music "Jump" by Van Halen

This edition of Monday Music is again out on Tuesday.   I got off work, had to swim home while driving a motorcycle...got home then took my son to the Dr's office.  The chiggers, mosquito's and ticks had a field-day with him.   He said that "I used the off...but they ate through it..."    Somehow I doubt it....Well we got home and I started working on my Ranger...First off I accomplished the repairs.
  I replaced the damaged hose and also replaced the return line for I saw it cracked.   I also used exra material to protect the hoses from rubbing.  I then tried to install my bed on the Ranger with my son..with mixed results.
  I am going to have to find an adult with upper body strength.   Oh well, will try to get it handled this weekend. 

     I decided to go with "Jump", I can't remember if I featured it in the past.  I really liked this album, I graduated in 1984. This song and the album was very well done.  Every time I hear it, this song takes me back to my senior year.   


"Jump" is a song by the American rock band Van Halen. It was released in December 1983 as the lead single from their album 1984. It is Van Halen's only single to reach number one on the U.S. Billboard Hot 100. The song differs from earlier Van Halen songs in that it is driven by a rolling synth line (played on an Oberheim OB-Xa), although the song does contain a guitar solo, which Eddie Van Halen claims is his favorite solo he never wrote. This refers to the fact that it was spliced together from multiple takes.
"Jump" is one of Van Halen's most popular and instantly recognizable compositions, perhaps because it encompasses aspects of two genres widely associated with 1980s popular music in America: synth-driven pop and "arena"-style hard rock. David Lee Roth dedicated the song to martial artist Benny Urquidez, of whom he was a student. The song changed the future and style of Van Halen from being a predominantly hard rock band to one of more radio-oriented popular music.
     The synth line was written around 1981 by Eddie Van Halen but it was refused by the other members of the band. In 1983, producer Ted Templeman asked Roth to take a listen to the unused song idea. Riding around in the back of his 1951 Mercury, with band roadie Larry Hostler driving, Roth listened repeatedly to the song. To come up with a lyric for it, he remembered seeing a television news report the night before about a man who was threatening to commit suicide by jumping off of a high building. Roth thought that one of the onlookers of such a scene would probably shout "go ahead and jump". Roth bounced this suggestion off of Hostler who agreed it was good. Instead of being about a threatened suicide, the words were written as an invitation to love. Roth later told Musician magazine that Hostler was "probably the most responsible for how it came out."

    
This stylistic change was further cemented when it seemed to create severe tensions between Eddie Van Halen and David Lee Roth. It has been claimed Roth wanted the band to avoid using synthesizers and focus more on traditional hard rock. This conflict eventually ended in Roth's departure from the band. In the 1995 Rolling Stone cover story on/interview with Eddie Van Halen (RS #705, dated April 6) the circumstances surrounding Roth's leaving are discussed. In this interview Eddie claims that the main reason for the split was that Roth and [long-time Van Halen producer] Ted Templeman both disliked the fact that he had built his own studio and was able to work on music away from their influence. He said that "the first thing I did up here was 'Jump' and they [Roth and Templeman] didn't like it. I said 'take it or leave it', I was getting sick of their ideas of what was commercial ... At first [Roth's solo EP] Crazy from the Heat was great because Roth laid off me a bit. Little did I know he was testing the waters. Then he called me up and asked me to go to his house and said he was going to make a Crazy from the Heat movie. He had some deal that fell through. But at the time I was depressed. I cried, then I called my brother and told him the guy quit."
Nevertheless, Roth and Templeman did work on "Jump" at Eddie's disputed new studio, with Roth providing the lyrics and the vocal melody.
Ted Templeman recalls that "'Jump' was recorded at Ed's studio. [Engineer] Donn [Landee] and Ed put the track down alone in the middle of the night. We recut it once in one take for sonic reasons. Dave wrote the lyrics that afternoon in the backseat of his Mercury convertible. We finished all vocals that afternoon and mixed it that evening".
The song thereafter secured its place among rock music's most popular songs, and is now considered by some to be one of the most influential rock songs of all time.
Live performances of "Jump" are preceded by Eddie's synthesizer solo "1984". During the reunion tour with Roth, the two songs were used for the band's encore. Roth often waved a large red flag during the synth section while the stage was still coated in dark cover lights.
According to Daryl Hall of Hall & Oates, "[Eddie] Van Halen told me that he copied the synth part from 'Kiss on My List' and used it in ‘Jump.’ I don't have a problem with that at all."

   
The music video for "Jump" was directed by David Lee Roth. It is a straightforward concept, much like many of the hard rock videos of the time. It shows the band performing the song at a mock concert. It was nominated for three MTV Video Music Awards, and won "best stage performance" for the video.
The version of the song used for the video differs slightly from the album version. During the keyboard solo prior to the final refrain, David Lee Roth is heard (and seen) yelling out. He did this during the band's mock performance for the video's filming, and it is believed that afterwards he overdubbed this yell especially for the video version since it is not present in the song to begin with.[





Saturday, May 16, 2015

Fast Food Facts II

This is on the scheduler thingie I use....I am at camp running a range for the Boy Scouts...again.   I have been camping 3 out of 4 weekends......I don't mind, but things around the house need to get done and my Ranger is still disassembled in the front yard.  I need to get her done so when I go camping......again I can use my truck as is proper....rather than my Mercury.    Something about ground clearance I guess...


   Here are some more fast food facts....I tripped over them surfing on the internet and quickly saved them because I knew that I would be "out of town" camping and I hate to leave my blog with something on it at least a couple of days.   I will post some pics once I have them.

-While fast food is known to make those fat rolls grow, it can actually make your brain shrink. Studies have shown that diets high in trans-fats are linked to the same brain shrinkage associated with Alzheimer's disease. 

-After receiving complaints that their "footlong" sub was only 11 inches long, Subway released a statement that said ""With regards to the size of the bread and calling it a footlong, 'Subway Footlong' is a registered trademark as a descriptive name for the sub sold in Subway Restaurants and not intended to be a measurement of length".

-McDonald's is Brazil's largest employer.

-Nearly 90 percent of America's children eat fast food on a monthly basis, and one-third of children visit these foods on a daily basis. Mix that fast food fact with the startling statistic that fast food children gain six more pounds each year than they should, multiply that by 15 years and do you really wonder why your fat kid is fat?

-Subway is the largest restaurant chain in the world. There are more Subways in the world than McDonald's.

-When McDonald's opened an outlet in Kuwait shortly after the end of the Gulf War, the line of cars waiting to eat there was seven miles long.

-The McRib doesn't have any rib bones in it because it's actually "restructured meat" made from pig innards, tripe, heart, and scalded stomach. Then it's doused in salt and all blended in a salt water solution which acts as glue to keep the meat mixture together. This bad boy contains 70 ingredients, one of which is azodicarbonamide, a flour-bleaching agent used in the production of foamed plastics like yoga mats.

-To accommodate workers at the World Trade Center construction site, Subway created a mobile restaurant that moved up the building as they finish each floor.

-Because McDonald's initially did not want its customers to stay and socialise, they installed uncomfortable chairs to deter customers from lingering.

-When you order a Quarter Pounder (or something similar at other fast food chains), what you're really getting is a quarter pound of additives including, lanolin -made from raw wool- and castoreum, which is an extract made from the anal secretions of beaver.

-A genetically engineered hormone called rBGH is given to cows in the U.S. to increase milk production - even though its chemical by-products may be carcinogenic. Residues of rBGH have been found in meat products, such as hamburgers sold in fast food chains.

-A single McDonald's hamburger can contain beef from up to 100 different cattle.

-Pizza Hut sued Papa John's once because they thought that "fresher ingredients" didn't really make "better pizza".

-Caffeine is the most commonly used drug in the world, and high doses can have serious health effects, including muscle weakness, heart irregularities, and infertility. Children and teenagers consume more than 64 gallons of soft drinks per year.

-McDonalds chicken McNuggets come in four basic shapes; the bell, bone, boot and ball.

-Pizza Hut uses 300 million pounds of cheese each year. That's about 3% of all the cheese produced in the United States.

-The spread of E.coli and mad cow disease are just a few of the dozen examples of food-born pathogens linked to beef. Some meatpackers have considered radiating meat to kill the bacteria in tainted meat. Some scholars also claim hamburger meat may cause Alzheimer's disease.

-Arby's got its name from the acronym "R.B." which stands for "Raffel brothers" who are the founders of the restaurant.

-Eating fast food can result in high levels of insulin, which has been linked to rising incidences of Diabetes. 

-The large fries at Five Guy's are the unhealthiest fries in America. They have nearly 1,500 calories and 71 grams of fat.

-A person would need to walk nine miles to burn off the 923 calories found in Burger King's Double Whopper with cheese. French fries and a large cola brings the total calories to an amazing 1,500 calories (2/3 of an adult man's recommended daily caloric intake).

-The first 100 people who go to a new Chick-Fil-A when it opens get a free meal every week for a year.

-About two new Starbucks have opened every day since 1987.

-When it was revealed in 1990 that McDonald's used beef tallow to flavour its French fries, Hindu vegetarian customers in Mumbai (formerly Bombay), India, ransacked a McDonald's restaurant and smeared cow dung on a statue of Ronald MacDonald.

-You're never more than 115 miles away from a McDonald's in the continental USA.

-The original Dunkin' Donut had a handle to make dunking easier.

-French fries are the single most popular fast food in America. In 1970, French fries surpassed 
regular potato sales in the United States. In 2004, Americans ate 7.5 billion pounds of frozen French fries.

-Domino's Pizza cancelled their "30 minutes or less" guarantee because drivers kept getting into accidents while rushing to deliver pizzas. The guarantee led to at least one fatality.

-In-N-Out Burger is one of the few fast food restaurants that actually slice each potato by hand shortly before it is placed in the deep fryer.

-Dairy Queen Restaurants in Texas have a different menu from all other DQ restaurants. You can only get a Steakfinger Basket at a Texas Dairy Queen.
 .
 A 32 ounce McDonald's sweet tea has more sugar in it than two Snickers bars. A Snickers bar has 27 grams of sugar and a McDonald's Sweet Tea has 69.

-IHOP adds pancake batter to their omelettes. They claim it makes them "fluffier".

Ben and Jerry's ice cream has chunks because Ben has anosmia, which means he can't smell, so he relies on "mouth-feel" while eating.


-The invention of the meat grinder in the mid nineteenth century gave rise to the hamburger.

Currently, between 40,000 and 50,000 meatpackers, many of whom pack meat for fast food chains, are injured every year, making meatpacking one of the most dangerous jobs in the United States.

-Because of the restaurant's reputation to stay open after disasters, the "Waffle House Index" was created as an informal assessment of the damage caused by a storm.

-McDonald's is the largest purchaser of beef, pork, and potatoes and the second largest purchaser of chicken in the world. Its annual orders for French fries constitute 7.5% of America's entire potato crop.

-By the end of the twentieth century, one out of eight American workers had at some time been employed by McDonald's and 96% of Americans had visited McDonald's at least once. It was also serving an estimated 22 million Americans every day and even more abroad.
-White Castle is the first fast food restaurant.

-High-fructose corn syrup (which tricks your body into wanting to eat more and to store more fat) first appeared in 1967, and the average American now consumes 63 pounds of it a year. It is ubiquitous in fast foods. 

-Colonel Sanders' claimed that his favorite food was White Castle.

-In 1965, a college student named Fred De Luca and family friend Dr. Peter Buck started Subway in Bridgeport, Connecticut. The first restaurant was called Pete's Super Submarines. Subway currently is located in 87 countries.

-The founders of Outback Steakhouse never visited Australia.

Thursday, May 14, 2015

Some Fast Food Facts....some of it scary....others well strange.



I am really feeling under the weather, I had to go home from work yesterday, they suspected a combination of exhaustion, food poisoning and dehydration.....I was ticked...I missed overtime:(.  I am taking it easy today.  I stayed home from work and am just relaxing a bit.  I was surfing around and saw this tidbits....I will post a second edition tomorrow.  I normally add pictures but I ain't feeling it right now.....Still feeling rough from yesterday.   After reading some of this stuff, My appetite is still suppressed.   And speaking of work, We had our annual bring our anklebiter to work day last Friday and I brought my son.  He got a tour of Techops and worked with me for half of the day.  I believe he enjoyed it.  



FAST FOOD FACTS WILL JUST MAKE YOU HUNGRY...

-Burger King's Triple Whopper with cheese has an amazing 1,230 calories. Hardies Monster Thickburger has 1,420 calories and 2,770 grams of sodium. Carl's Jr.'s Double Six hamburger has 1,520 calories and 111 grams of fat. Most people need only 44-66 grams of fat per day, and most of them should come from sources like nuts, fish, and olive oil.

-McDonald's hamburgers don't really rot. The burgers have very low moisture content, which basically leaves the meat dehydrated. It's more like jerky than burger.

-Every month, approximately nine out of 10 American children visit a McDonald's restaurant.
-In a study it was found the average fast food consumer ingests around 12 pubic hairs a year.
-McDonald's Filet-O-Fish was originally developed for Catholic customers, since they generally abstain from eating meat on Fridays.

-In 1970, Americans spent about $6 billion on fast food. In 2006, the spending rose to nearly $142 billion. Nowadays its estimated Americans spend $1200 a year on fast food.

-Certain fast food chain fries are riddled with preservatives to prevent any sort of bacterial or mould growth. In this case it lasts for over three years.

-Burger King is called Hungry Jack's in Australia.

-During the early 1900's, the hamburger was thought of as  food for the poor. Street carts, not restaurants, typically served them.

-Cheese products labelled as processed are actually loaded with additives, chemicals and flavouring that make up 49 percent of the product. Half the product isn't even cheese.

-Wendy's founder Dave Thomas went back to school to earn his GED at the age of 61. He didn't want people to see his success and feel inspired to drop out of high school.

-Proportionally, hash browns have more fat and calories than a cheeseburger or Big Mac.

-The salads are actually loaded with propylene glycol to keep the leaves crisp. This ingredient can also be found in antifreeze and sexual lubricant.

-An Alabama law firm once sued Taco Bell, claiming that their meat mixture "does not meet the minimum requirements set by the U.S. Department of Agriculture to be labelled as beef.

-To keep salaries low, McDonald's and other fast food chains have intentionally engaged in anti-union activities.

-Taco Bell has attempted to open stores in Mexico two different times. Their food was labelled as "American Food".

-There are more than 300,000 fast food restaurants in the U.S. alone.

-Silicon dioxide (aka sand) is used as an anti-caking agent in multiple fast-food items like buffalo wings and chili. The sand helps it to be able to stay in a heater for days. 

-Singer Jason Mraz supplies avocados to the local Chipotle restaurant.

-Due to anti-German sentiment during WWI, an alternative name for a hamburger (which was derived from the Hamburg steak sandwiches eaten on immigrant ships between Hamburg, Germany, and America in the 1800's) was "Salisbury steak". It was named after Dr. Salisbury who prescribed ground beef for patients suffering from anemia, asthma, and other illnesses.

-If you eat something that is bright red at a fast food joint, chances are that it has Carmine; a bright red food dye. It's made of the crushed abdomen of a female Dactylopius coccus - an African beetle-like insect.

-There is a secret menu item at Chipotle called a "quesarito". It's a burrito that's wrapped in a cheese quesadilla instead of a tortilla.

-The popularization of the automobile resulted in "flashier" fast food restaurant architecture to catch the attention of drivers. This lasted until the 1970's when communities began to complain about the exaggerated buildings.
-You know those grill marks on fast food burgers? They're actually put there during production in the factory.

-After he left KFC, Colonel Sanders grew to hate the company. He once described the food as "the worst fried chicken I've ever seen" and said the gravy was like "wallpaper paste".

-Television greatly expanded the ability of advertisers to reach children and try to develop brand loyalty early in life. Today the average American child sees more than 10,000 food advertisements each year on television.

-Most fast food milkshakes contain over 50 chemicals.

-Two companies prepare KFC's Original Recipe chicken

. One company only has half of the secret recipe, and the other company has the second half. The complete recipe only exists in one place: locked inside a vault at KFC's headquarters.

-Fast food companies, the movie industry, and theme parks have a long and financially lucrative relationship. The companies seek to promote and "product place" one another for incredible profit.

-The average fast food taco salad has more grams of fat than 16 average Boston crème pies.

-Subway's Italian B.M.T., is named after the Brooklyn Manhattan Transit.

-In 1949, Richard and Maurice McDonald opened the first McDonald's restaurant in San Bernardino, California: the McDonald Brothers Burger Bar Drive-In.

-Pizza Hut made a delivery to the International Space Station in 2001. It cost around $1,000,000.

-The popularisation of the drive-thru led car manufacturers in the 1990's to install cup holders in the dashboards. As fast food drinks became larger, so did the cup holders.

-Before 2013, Pizza Hut was the number one purchaser of kale. They didn't even serve it though - they used it as a decoration in their salad bars.

-According to Waffle House, if you laid all of the bacon they serve in a year end-to-end, it would wrap all the way around the equator.

-McDonald's is one of the largest owners of real estate in the world and it earns the majority of its profits from collecting rent, not from selling food.

-White Castle burgers have five holes in them so that they can cook all the way through without being flipped.

Tuesday, May 12, 2015

Monday Music Blondie "Rapture"

  I have been very busy...again. Monday Music is out on Tuesday.  This time because the Ranger decided to break a fuel line.I don't complain...a 21 year old truck will have stuff break on it.  It could have been worse.....like a busted tank or a pump. 

 This is what I saw after I removed the bed.

Cleaned up the area and covered the tank entrance.

...So I spent Monday afternoon until scouts working on the Ranger.


    So I had to remove the bed.....


And now I have Ranger parts in the yard.....



     Today I also worked Overtime:)  so I still have Ranger parts in the yard.   Perhaps Tomorrow I will have time to get the Ranger running...unless they offer overtime.....



    I decided to roll with "Rapture", Momma Fargo wanted me to feature "Rap" this week, and she is my favorite blogbabe so I had no problem with this.  I remembered when this song first hit the scene, it was soo different than the boring stuff that was around then, Disco had gotten too strange and over time top and the high-water mark was reached and the genre was  was fading and the music scene appeared to be really boring, there wasn't any real noteworthy songs around this time.  Well this song was soo different that it immediately captured the imagination of the music public.  I had this song on my Ronco album and and I played it "Loud".  the talking and rhyming was really unique.....It was the precursor of "Rap",   That is very popular today.  I like the"old school" rap that came out later, the "gangsta" rap I didn't care for much.   Although some of it is good from Coolio and Emimem and a few others. 
     "Rapture" is a song by the American rock band Blondie from their fifth studio album, Autoamerican (1980).
In January 1981, "Rapture" was released as the second and final single from the album. The song reached #1 on the U.S. Billboard Hot 100 chart, where it stayed for two weeks. It was the first #1 song in the U.S. to feature "rap." The song peaked at #4 in Australia and #5 in the United Kingdom.

"Rapture" is a combination of disco, funk, and hip hop with the rap section forming an extended coda. The song title "Rapture" served to indicate this element. While it was not the first single featuring rapping to be commercially successful, it was the first to top the charts. Its lyrics were especially notable for namechecking hip-hop pioneers Fab Five Freddy and Grandmaster Flash.



The music video made its television debut on Solid Gold on January 31, 1981, and became the first rap video ever broadcast on MTV. Set in the East Village section of Manhattan, the "Man from Mars" or "voodoo god" (dancer William Barnes in the white suit and top hat) is the introductory and central figure. Barnes also choreographed the piece. The final shot is a one-take scene of Debbie Harry dancing along the street, passing by graffiti artists, Uncle Sam, a Native American and a goat. Fab Five Freddy and graffiti artists Lee Quinones and Jean-Michel Basquiat make cameo appearances. Basquiat was hired when Grandmaster Flash did not show for the filming.

Saturday, May 9, 2015

To all innocent 5th columnist....A speech from Ayn Rand in 1941

I never got exposure to Ayn Rand until I read the book "Atlas Shrugged" in the early 90's.  There was a talk show host named Neil Boortz that was encouraging us to read this book and Frederick Bastiat "The Law".   The book was loong read but it stuck with me especially with the part about Hank Rearden forced to use the "Rearden Metal" as the state dictated not as the market dictated.  They were using his sweat for their own purposes and it wasn't to the benefit of Rearden Metal.  he had a lot of government interference in his business and it seemed that the producers were were supporting the system and there were a lot of "receivers" of government largesse's and they were relying on the producers to keep working.   Atlas shrugged was on the premise that the producers or Atlas are carrying the full load and shrugged was when they finally decided to say "Screw it" and shrugged off the burden of carrying society and "Going Galt"





   Ayn Rand was a very wordy author, nothing wrong with that for it was her style.  She was very familiar with tyranny for she had been born in Russia and was there when the Bolsheviks(or the Reds) took over from the white Russians.


To All Innocent Fifth Columnists
Ayn Rand - 1941

You who read this represent the greatest danger to America.

No matter what the outcome of the war in Europe may be, Totalitarianism has already won a complete victory in many American minds and conquered all of our intellectual life. You have helped it to win.
Perhaps it is your right to destroy civilization and bring dictatorship to America, but not unless you understand fully what you are doing.
If that is what you want to do, say so openly, at least to your own conscience, and we who believe in freedom will fight you openly.
But the tragedy of today is that you — who are responsible for the coming Totalitarian dictatorship of America — you do not know your own responsibility. You would be the first to deny the active part you're playing and proclaim your belief in freedom, in civilization, in the American way of life. You are the most dangerous kind of Fifth Columnist — an innocent subconscious Fifth Columnist. Of such as you is the Kingdom of Hitler and of Stalin.
You do not believe this? Check up on yourself. Take the test we offer you here.

1. Are you the kind who considers ten minutes of his time too valuable to read this and give it some thought?
2. Are you the kind who sits at home and moans over the state of the world — but does nothing about it?
3. Are you the kind who says that the future is predestined by something or other, something he can't quite name or explain and isn't very clear about, but the world is doomed to dictatorship and there's nothing anyone can do about it?
4. Are you the kind who says that he wishes he could do something, he'd be so eager to do something — but what can one man do?
5. Are you the kind who are so devoted to your own career, your family, your home or your children that you will let the most unspeakable horrors be brought about to destroy your career, your family, your home and your children — because you are too busy now to prevent them?
Which one of the above are you? A little of all?
But are you really too busy to think?
Who "determines" the future? You're very muddled on that, aren't you? What exactly is "mankind"? Is it a mystical entity with a will of its own? Or is it you, and I, and the sum of all of us together? What force is there to make history — except men, other men just like you? If there are enough men who believe in a better future and are willing to work for it, the future will be what they want it to be. You doubt this? Why then, if the world is doomed to dictatorship, do the dictators spend so much money and effort on propaganda? If history is predestined in their favor, why don't Hitler and Stalin just ride the wave into the future without any trouble? Doesn't it seem more probable that history will be what the minds of men want it to be, and the dictators are smart enough to prepare these minds in the way they want them, while we talk of destiny and do nothing?

You say, what can one man do? When the Communists came to power in Russia, they were a handful of eighteen men. Just eighteen. In a country of [170,000,000] population. They were laughed at and no one took them seriously. According to their own prophet, Karl Marx, Russia was the last country in which Communism could be historically possible, because of Russia's backwardness in industrial development. Yet they succeeded. Because they knew what they wanted and went after it — historical destiny or no historical destiny. Adolf Hitler started the Nazi Party in Germany with seven men. He was laughed at and considered a harmless crank. People said that after the Versailles Treaty Germany could not possibly become a world power again, not for centuries. Yet Hitler succeeded. Because he knew what he wanted and went after it — history or no history. Shall we believe in mystical fates or do something about the future?

If you are one of those who have had a full, busy, successful life and are still hard at work making money — stop for one minute of thought. What are you working for? You have enough to keep you in comfort for the rest of your days. But you are working to insure your children's future. Well, what are you leaving to your children? The money, home, or education you plan to leave them will be worthless or taken away from them. Instead, your legacy will be a Totalitarian America, a world of slavery, of starvation, of concentration camps and of firing squads. The best part of your life is behind you — and it was lived in freedom. But your children will have nothing to face save their existence as slaves. Is that what you want for them? If not, it is still up to you. There is time left to abort it — but not very much time. You take out insurance to protect your children, don't you? How much money and working effort does that insurance cost you? If you put one-tenth of the money and time into insuring against your children's future slavery — you would save them and save for them everything else which you intend to leave them and which they'll never get otherwise.
Don't delude yourself by minimizing the danger. You see what is going on in Europe and what it's doing to our own country and to your own private life. What other proof do you need? Don't say smugly that "it can't happen here." Stop and look back for a moment.
The first Totalitarian dictatorship happened in Russia. People said: well, Russia was a dark, backward, primitive nation where anything could happen — but it could not happen in any civilized country.

The next Totalitarian dictatorship happened in Italy — one of the oldest civilized countries of Europe and the mother of European culture. People said: well, the Italians hadn't had much experience in democratic self-government, but it couldn't happen anywhere else.
The next Totalitarian dictatorship happened in Germany — the country of philosophers and scientists, with a long record of the highest cultural achievements. People said: well, Germany was accustomed to autocracy, and besides there's the Prussian character, and the last war, etc. — but it could not happen in any country with a strong democratic tradition.

Could it happen in France? People would have laughed at you had you asked such a question a year ago. Well, it has happened in France — France, the mother of freedom and of democracy, France, the most independent-minded nation on earth.
Well?
What price your smug self-confidence? In the face of millions of foreign money and foreign agents pouring into our country, in the face of one step after another by which our country is [moving] closer to Totalitarianism — you do nothing except say: "It can't happen here." Do you hear the Totalitarians answering you — "Oh, yeah?"


Don't delude yourself with slogans and meaningless historical generalizations. It can happen here. It can happen anywhere. And a country's past history has nothing to do with it. Totalitarianism is not a new product of historical evolution. It is older than history. It is the attempt of the worthless and the criminal to seize control of society. That element is always there, in any country. But a healthy society gives it no chance. It is when the majority in a country becomes weak, indifferent and confused that a criminal minority, beautifully organized like all gangs, seizes the power. And once that power is seized it cannot be taken back for generations. Fantastic as it may seem to think of a dictatorship in the United States, it is much easier to establish such a dictatorship than to overthrow it. With modern technique and modern weapons at its disposal, a ruthless minority can hold millions in slavery indefinitely. What can one thousand unorganized, unarmed men do against one man with a machine gun?

And the tragedy of today is that by remaining unorganized and mentally unarmed we are helping to bring that slavery upon ourselves. By being indifferent and confused, we are serving as innocent Fifth Columnists of our own destruction.
There is no personal neutrality in the world today. Repeat that and scream that to yourself. In all great issues there are only two sides — and no middle. You are alive or you are dead, but you can't be "neither" or "in between." You are honest or you are not — and there is no neutral "half-honest." And so, you are against Totalitarianism — or you are for it. There is no intellectual neutrality.
The Totalitarians do not want your active support. They do not need it. They have their small, compact, well-organized minority and it is sufficient to carry out their aims. And they want from you is your indifference. The Communists and the Nazis have stated repeatedly that the indifference of the majority is their best ally. Just sit at home, pursue your private affairs, shrug about world problems — and you are the most effective Fifth Columnist that can be devised. You're doing your part as well as if you took orders consciously from Hitler or from Stalin. And so, you're in it, whether you want to be or not, you're helping the world towards destruction, while moaning and wondering what makes the world such as it is today. You do.
The Totalitarians have said: "Who is not against us, is for us." There is no personal neutrality.
And since you are involved, and have to be, what do you prefer? To do what you're doing and help the Totalitarians? Or to fight them?

But in order to fight, you must understand. You must know exactly what you believe and you must hold to your faith honestly, consistently, and all the time. A faith assumed occasionally, like Sunday clothes, is of no value. Communism and Nazism are a faith. Yours must be as strong and clear as theirs. They know what they want. We don't. But let us see how, before it is too late, whether we have a faith, what it is and how we can fight for it.
First and above all: what is Totalitarianism? We all hear so much about it, but we don't understand it. What is the most important point, the base, the whole heart of both Communism and Nazism? It is not the "dictatorship of the proletariat," nor the nationalization of private property, nor the supremacy of the "Aryan" race, nor anti-Semitism. These things are secondary symptoms, surface details, the effects and not the cause. What is the primary cause, common to both Soviet Russia and Nazi Germany, and all other dictators, past, present, and future? One idea — and one only: That the State is superior to the individual. That the Collective holds all rights and the individual has none. Stop here. This is the crucial point. What you think of this will determine whether you are a mental Fifth Columnist or not. This is the point which allows no compromise. You must choose one or the other. There is no middle. Either you believe that each individual man has value, dignity and certain inalienable rights which cannot be sacrificed for any cause, for any purpose, for any collective, for any number of other men whatsoever. Or else you believe that a number of men — it doesn't matter what you call it: a collective, a class, a race or a State — holds all rights, and any individual man can be sacrificed if some collective good — it doesn't matter what you call it: better distribution of wealth, racial purity or the Millennium — demands it. Don't fool yourself. Be honest about this. Names don't matter. Only the basic principle matters, and there is no middle choice. Either man has individual, inalienable rights — or he hasn't.

Your intentions don't count. If you are willing to believe that men should be deprived of all rights for a good cause — you are a Totalitarian. Don't forget, Stalin and Hitler sincerely believe that their causes are good. Stalin thinks that he is helping the downtrodden, and Hitler thinks that he is serving his country as a patriot. They are good causes, both of them, aren't they? Then what creates the horrors of Russia and of Germany? What is destroying all civilization? Just this one idea — that to a good cause everything can be sacrificed; that individual men have no rights which must be respected; that what one person believes to be good can be put over on the others by force.
And if you — in the privacy of your own mind — believe so strongly in some particular good of yours that you would be willing to deprive men of all rights for the sake of this good, then you are as guilty of all the horrors of today as Hitler and Stalin. These horrors are made possible only by men who have lost all respect for single, individual human beings, who accept the idea that classes, races, and nations matter, but single persons do not, that a majority is sacred, but a minority is dirt, that herds count, but Man is nothing. Where do you stand on this? There is no middle ground.
If you accept the Totalitarian idea, if the words "State" or "Collective" are sacred to you, but the word "Individual" is not — stop right here. You don't have to read further. What we have to say is not for you — and you are not for us. Let's part here — but be honest, admit that you are a Totalitarian and go join the Communist Party or the German-American Bund, because they are the logical end of the road you have chosen, and you will end up with one or the other, whether you know it now or not.
But if you are a Humanitarian and a Liberal — in the real, not the prostituted sense of these words — you will say with us that Man, each single, solitary, individual Man, has a sacred value which you respect, and sacred inalienable rights which nothing must take away from him.
You believe this? You agree with us that this is the heart of true Americanism, the basic principle upon which America was founded and which made it great — the Rights of Man and the Freedom of Man? But do you hear many voices saying this today?

Do you read many books saying this? Do you see many prominent men preaching this? Do you know a single publication devoted to this belief or a single organization representing it? You do not. Instead, you find a flood of words, of books, of preachers, publications, and organizations which, under very clever "Fronts," work tirelessly to sell you Totalitarianism. All of them are camouflaged under very appealing slogans: they scream to you that they are defenders of "Democracy," of "Americanism," of "Civil Liberties," etc. Everybody and anybody uses these words — and they have no meaning left. They are empty generalities and boob-catchers. There is only one real test that you can apply to all these organizations: ask yourself what is the actual result of their work under the glittering bromides? What are they really selling you, what are they driving at? If you ask this, you will see that they are selling you Collectivism in one form or another.
They preach "Democracy" and then make a little addition — "Economic Democracy" or a "Broader Democracy" or a "True Democracy", and demand that we turn all property over to the Government; "all property" means also "all rights"; let everybody hold all rights together — and nobody have any right of any kind individually. Is that Democracy or is it Totalitarianism? You know of a prominent woman commentator who wants us all to die for Democracy — and then defines "true" Democracy as State Socialism [probably a reference to Dorothy Thompson].
You have heard Secretary [Harold] Ickes define a "true" freedom of the press as the freedom to express the views of the majority. You have read in a highly respectable national monthly the claim that the Bill of Rights, as taught in our schools, is "selfish": that a "true" Bill of Rights means not demanding any rights for yourself, but your giving these rights to "others." God help us, fellow Americans, are we blind? Do you see what this means? Do you see the implications?
And this is the picture wherever you look. They "oppose" Totalitarianism and they "defend" Democracy — by preaching their own version of Totalitarianism, some form of "collective good," "collective rights," "collective will," etc. And the one thing which is never said, never preached, never upheld in our public life, the one thing all these "defenders of Democracy" hate, denounce, and tear down subtly, gradually, systematically — is the principle of Individual Rights, Individual Freedom, Individual Value. That is the principle against which the present great world conspiracy is directed. That is the heart of the whole world question. That is the only opposite of Totalitarianism and our only defense against it. Drop that — and what difference will it make what name you give to the resulting society? It will be Totalitarianism — and all Totalitarians are alike, all come to the same methods, the same slavery, the same bloodshed, the same horrors, no matter what noble slogan they start under, as witness Soviet Russia and Nazi Germany.

Principles are much more consistent than men. A basic principle, once accepted, has a way of working itself out to its logical conclusion — even against the will and to the great surprise of those who accepted it. Just accept the idea that there are no inalienable individual rights — and firing squads, executions without trial, and a Gestapo or a G. P. U. will follow automatically — no matter who holds the power, no matter how noble and benevolent his intentions. That is a law of history. You can find any number of examples. Can you name one [counter-example]? Can you name one instance where absolute power — in any hands — did not end in absolute horror? And — for God's sake, fellow Americans, let's not be utter morons, let's give our intelligence a small chance to function and let's recognize the obvious — what is absolute power? It's a power which holds all rights and has to respect none. Does it matter whether such a power is held by a self-appointed dictator or by an elected representative body? The power is the same and its results will be the same. Look through all of history. Look at Europe. Don't forget — they still hold "elections" in Europe. Don't forget, Hitler was elected.
Now, if you see how completely intellectual Totalitarianism is already in control of our country, if you see that there is no action and no organization to defend the only true anti-Totalitarian principle, the principle of individual rights, you will realize that there is only one thing for us to do: to take such action and to form such an organization. If you are really opposed to Totalitarianism, to all of it, in any shape, form, or color — you will join us. We propose to unite all men of good will who believe that Freedom is our most precious possession, that it is greater than any other consideration whatsoever, that no good has ever been accomplished by force, that Freedom must not be sacrificed to any other ideal, and that Freedom is an individual, not a collective entity.
We do not know how many of us there are left in the world. But we think there are many more than the Totalitarians suspect. We are the majority, but we are scattered, unorganized, silenced and helpless. The Totalitarians are an efficient, organized, and very noisy minority. They have seized key positions in our intellectual life and they make it appear as if they are the voice of America. They can, if left unchecked, highjack America into dictatorship. Are we going to let them get away with it? They are not the voice of America. We are. But let us be heard.
To be heard, however, we must be organized. This is not a paradox. Individualists have always been reluctant to form any sort of organization. The best, the most independent, the hardest working, the most productive members of society have always lived and worked alone. But the incompetent and the unscrupulous have organized. The world today shows how well they have organized. And so, we shall attempt what has never been attempted before — an organization against organization. That is — an organization to defend us all from the coming compulsory organization which will swallow all of society; an organization to defend our rights, including the right not to belong to any forced organization; an organization, not to impose our ideology upon anyone, but to prevent anyone from imposing his ideology upon us by physical or social violence.
Are you with us?

If you realize that the world is moving toward disaster, but see no effective force to avert it — If you are eager to join in a great cause and accept a great faith, but find no such cause or faith offered to you anywhere today —
If you are not one of those doomed jellyfish to whom the word "Freedom" means nothing —
If you cannot conceive of yourself living in a society without personal freedom, a society in which you will be told what to do, what to think, what to feel, in which your very life will be only a gift from the Collective, to be revoked at its pleasure at any time —
If you cannot conceive of yourself surrendering your freedom for any collective good whatsoever, and do not believe that any such good can ever be accomplished by such a surrender —
If you believe in your own dignity and your own value, and hold that such a belief is not "selfish," but is instead your greatest virtue, without which you are worthless both to your fellow-men and to yourself —
If you believe that it is vicious to demand that you should exist solely for the sake of your fellow-men and grant them all and any right over you —
If you believe that it is vicious to demand everyone's sacrifice for everyone else's sake, and that such a demand creates nothing but mutual victims, without profiting anyone, neither society nor the individual — If you believe that men can tell you what you must not do to them, but can never assume the arrogance of telling you what you must do, no matter what their number —
If you believe in majority rule only with protection for minority rights, both being limited by inalienable individual rights —
If you believe that the mere mention of "the good of the majority" is not sufficient ground to justify any possible kind of horror, and that those yelling loudest of "majority good" are not necessarily the friends of mankind —

If you are sick of professional "liberals," "humanitarians," "uplifters" and "idealists" who would do you good as they see fit, even if it kills you, whose idea of world benevolence is world slavery —
If you are sick, disgusted, disheartened, without faith, without direction, and have lost everything but your courage —
— come and join us.
There is so much at stake — and so little time left.
Let us have an organization as strong, as sure, as enthusiastic as any the Totalitarians could hope to achieve. Let us follow our faith as consistently as they follow theirs. Let us offer the world our philosophy of life. Let us expose all Totalitarian propaganda in any medium and in any form. Let us answer any argument, every promise, every "Party Line" of the Totalitarians. Let us drop all compromise, all cooperation or collaboration with those preaching any brand of Totalitarianism in letter or in spirit, in name or in fact. Let us have nothing to do with "Front" organizations, "Front" agents or "Front" ideas. We do not have to proscribe them by law. We can put them out of existence by social boycott. But this means — no compromise. There is no compromise between life and death. You do not make deals with the black plague. Let us touch nothing tainted with Totalitarianism. Let us tear down the masks, bring them out into the open and — leave them alone. Very strictly alone. No "pro-Soviet" or "pro-Nazi" members of the board in our organization. No "benevolent" Trojan horses. Let us stick together as they do. They silence us, they force us out of public life, they fill key positions with their own men. Let us stick together — and they will be helpless to continue. They have millions of foreign money on their side. We have the truth.
As a first step and a first declaration of what we stand for, we offer you the following principles:
We believe in the value, the dignity and the freedom of Man. We believe:
— That each man has inalienable rights which cannot be taken from him for any cause whatsoever. These rights are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.
— That the right of life means that man cannot be deprived of his life for the convenience of any number of other men.

— That the right of liberty means freedom of individual decision, individual choice, individual judgment and individual initiative; it means also the right to disagree with others.
— That the right to the pursuit of happiness means man's freedom to choose what constitutes his own private, personal happiness and to work for its achievement; that such a pursuit is neither evil nor reprehensible, but honorable and good; and that a man's happiness is not to be prescribed to him by any other man nor by any number of other men.
— That these rights have no meaning unless they are the unconditional, personal, private possession of each man, granted to him by the fact of his birth, held by him independently of all other men, and limited only by the exercise of the same rights by other men.
— That the only just, moral and beneficent form of society is a society based upon the recognition of these inalienable individual rights.
— That the State exists for Man, and no Man for the State.
— That the greatest good for all men can be achieved only through the voluntary cooperation of free individuals for mutual benefit, and not through a compulsory sacrifice of all for all.
— That "voluntary" presupposes an alternative and a choice of opportunities; and thus even a universal agreement of all men on one course of action is neither free nor voluntary if no other course of action is open to them.
— That each man's independence of spirit and other men's respect for it have created all civilization, all culture, all human progress and have benefited all mankind.
— That the greatest threat to civilization is the spread of Collectivism, which demands the sacrifice of all individual rights to collective rights and the supremacy of the State over the individual.
— That the general good which such Collectivism professes as its objective can never be achieved at the sacrifice of man's freedom, and such sacrifice can lead only to general suffering, stagnation, and degeneration.
— That such conception of Collectivism is the greatest possible evil — under any name, in any form, for any professed purpose whatsoever.

Such is our definition of Americanism and the American way of life.
The American way of life has always been based upon the Rights of Man, upon individual freedom and upon respect for each human individual personality. Through all its history, this has been the source of America's greatness. This is the spirit of America which we dedicate ourselves to defend and preserve.
In practical policy we shall be guided by one basic formula: of every law and of every conception we shall demand the maximum freedom for the individual and the minimum power for the government necessary to achieve any given social objective.
If you believe this, join us. If you don't — fight us. Either is your privilege, but the only truly immoral act you can commit is to agree with us, to realize that we are right — and then to forget it and do nothing.
There is some excuse, little as it may be, for an open, honest Fifth Columnist. There is none for an innocent, passive, subconscious one. Of all the things we have said here to you, we wish to be wrong on only one — our first sentence. Prove us wrong on that. Join us.
The world is a beautiful place and worth fighting for. But not without Freedom.