This has the potential...

[Pumpkin_Man]

In terms of hypocricy, over taxation and encroachments on my personal freedoms, Illinois is right up there with California if not worse. At least in Cali, I can buy and light off fireworks on the 4th of July without having to worry about a 15000 fine.

Mike

[Kolchak]

I know I am but what are you? Cali could beat Georgia with one hand tied behind its back.

In terms of taxation and denial of personal freedom, dirty cops and gang bangers, then yea, you're right.

But if you're talking in terms of Football, not a chance. Do they even play football in Cali?

In 2002 my SWAT team kicked LAPD and LA County Sheriff's Dept. Hiney in the national SWAT competition held each year in Orlando. It's the PREMIER SWAT competition in the whole country.

LAPD and LA county were embarrassed so bad that they don't even go back anymore.

LAPD=Lazy Azz Pansy Dweebs!

[Kolchak]

Well, I am politically conservative myself, so I actually agree with your political analysis, Kolchak. I guess I am a bit of a hypocrite, though, because I do love to visit out there.

I have always been a regionalist, a Southerner, but sometimes I worry that our country has gotten so divided we won't be able to hold together as a nation.

When your country has no outside enemy, it will always look for enemies from within. This was going to happen to us as soon as the USSR was no longer considered a threat.(I think Russia still is imho)

I was giving nevermore a hard time, but I have family and friends out in California too, and by and large I've enjoyed all my time there. But to say that California is a state of freedom and liberty is just wrong.

I'm a very much dyed in the wool Southern boy, and I fear we are losing our heritage and culture just as other parts of the country are losing theirs. The sad thing is so many young kids in the South have bought into the lies of the leftwing media and far left public educational system. I know you and your husband are teachers and my criticism is not aimed at teachers, but big mouth parents who have zero control of their kids pushing their agenda on the school boards and teachers. Its an old trick the left uses. In order to keep you from seeing how messed up their own little worlds are, the try and divert attention away into areas that they have no business going. Kids in the South are being told to be ashamed of who they are and where they come from. The only approved ethnic group that can still be made fun of, in the eyes of the politically correct are people from the South.

Of course here in Georgia, we have local and outside born politicians who will gladly sell out our culture and heritage to anybody with deep enough pockets.

It happened in California starting in the early 80s and you see where its lead. We're next on the list.

Contrary to what the history books tell us, this country has never had a Civil War. That thing between 1861 and 1865 was a revolution, a rebellion for independence. Maybe we're do for another one.

I've spent all my life in uniform defending the United States abroad and at home. I've been carrying a gun since 1980. I just hope if it does come, I'll be able to get my ancient butt out and help.

[Murfreesboro]

I hear you about Southerners being fair game for ridicule & criticism. I was a child in the 1960s in Mississippi, and I have always believed most passionately that the South was scapegoated during the Civil Rights era, as if we were the only ones who had ever held racial prejudice. The North (and yes, even California) are rife with it, even today.

I also agree with you about the Southern perspective on the War between the States, how it was intended to be a second American Revolution, only it failed. From the Southern perspective it was never about the slaves. History gets written by the winners, so of course it was described the way the North saw it. However, it is hard to know how the history of the 20th century might have played out if there had been two nations rather than one USA.

The biggest issue in the 1860s, as the South saw it, was domination of the states by the national government. In fact, many of the problems we have today spring from how weak the states have become.

[Pumpkin_Man]

Kolchak, I totaly agree with you about the direction this country is going in. It's down right scary, but I would not want to see another Civil War. Yes, I do realize that you call it a rebellion. I'm just going what the history books are saying. I would like to see the nation as a whole get together against the left wing agenda, rather then violent confrontation, civil war and succession from the union as a whole. As for foreign enemies, we still have plenty of them, including Russa, and to a lesser degre, China. China is wipping our butts in the trade war.

Here in Illinois, I work at a local public community college. I am not allowed to say "Merry Christmas," or "Happy Easter." When I was a kid, it made no difference if it were a private school or public. Christmas vacation was allways CHRISTMAS vacation, not "Winter Break," or "Holiday Break." That junk philosophy of 'political correctness' is predominant through out the state of Illinois. Communities that have displayed manger scenes at Christmas time are now banned from doing that, lest they offend the 1 or 2 atheists who may be living there. Here in Illinois, it's illegal to buy, posess or detonate fireworks with the exception of very few items, such as smoke bombs and sparklers. It's even illegal to burn trash, and they want to make it illegal for everyone to even burn wood in their livingroom fireplaces. If that isn't bad enough, we pay the highest state income tax in the country, or at least one of the highest. We pay among the highest sales taxes in the country, and that was BEFORE our illustrious governor Quinn raised our income and sales taxes. Our utility bills are among the highest, once again, because of Illinois state taxes. Back in 2010 when I bought my Mercury, I was looking at two different Milans. The one I have now and the Hybred. The hybred was priced only 5000 more then the regular, because that was Mercury's last year and they were clearing them out. If not for the rediculour sales taxes, I could have bought the hybred. Instead I had to go with the regular type, because the taxes put my car payment way beyond what I could afford. It was the same deal a year later when I bought my Harley. I looked at the 08 Electra Glide standard (the bike I have now) and a left over 2010 Electric glide classic. Again, it was the sales taxes that killed the sale, so I bought the standard.

Well, I can rant about th is until the cows come home, but I would rather end it here as the discussion is starting to turn to politics, and some times it just gets me crazy.

Mike

[Boogeyman]

And for once Mike, it wasn't me that stirred it up again.

[Murfreesboro]

I have already said that I am politically conservative and generally agree with much of what others have written here, but I did want to add that there are a lot of decent people out in California, among whom I number my own family members and my son's friends. I don't think they all vote the way I do (at least not in every election cycle), and, yes, I am concerned about the direction our country is taking. But many of my friends and relatives on the other side of the political fence also consider themselves to be patriotic
Americans. I don't think all these people are necessarily "true believers" in the leftist agenda, at least, not all of it. There are lots of nuances in people's political thought.

I do think the educational system got infiltrated by Marxists, perhaps as long ago as the 1960s, and maybe beginning in the teachers' colleges. I think lots of people have been taught a version of US history that does not serve our country well.

[Pumpkin_Man]

Well that being said, I still think California is slightly better then Illinois in terms of personal liberties, but I sure wouldn't want to have to pay some of their taxes. I drove to California down old route 66, and I met up with a lot of wonderful people during my travels. Monterey and Oxnard are both great towns, and the people there are very nice.

Mike

[NeverMore]

Just heard a story on the radio about a mayor of some small town in New Jersey who built his house years ago for around $350K. Recently, the property was reevaluated at something like $1.5 million so now he owes property taxes of around $30K a year. Says he can no longer afford to live there. Glad we have prop 13 here.

I love living in San Diego but it's expensive. Can't afford to do a lot of things I would like to do. I guess any place you live is bound to have it's problems. And yes Kolchak, Cali does have a football team, The Rams. Oh... wait...

As for the political discourse, I used to think there would be a civil war between the followers of the two parties but now I like to think that people are waking up to the fact that it's two paths to the same destination. I vote strictly third party, and have for a long time. Figure if more people did so then maybe we could start filling government positions with folk who aren't puppets of the true power brokers of this world. If it must be revolution let's do it with ballots over bullets.

[Pumpkin_Man]

NeverMore, I think the ever widening gap between left wing and right wing in this country is THE problem. In the past, the Republicans and the Democrats would often compromise. It was the best way to run the country because neither pure socialism or pure capitolism just don't work. Back in the 50s and 60s we had a good ballance between the two. We had enough conservatism to keep business in this country, and yet we had enough liberalism in this country to make our standard of living the highest in the world. Now a day, we have to choose between two extrems, and that is how a lot of free nations became empires or dictatorships. Ancient Rom was a republic before the rise of Julias Ceasar. Because of the extreamism in their senate, Rome went from being a republic to an empiral dictatorship.

We need a balance, not a socialist "nanny" state, that taxes everyone into oblivion and takes away our personal freedoms, andnot a corporate state where only the interest of the seriously rich is looked after.

Mike

[Boogeyman]

With all due respect Mike, compromise is how we got to where we are. And it is almost always the republicans that did the compromising. Compromise is how we got Medicare and Social Security which are both going bankrupt, for example. Compromise is also how we got the 1986 immigration bill. And Reagan agreed to raise taxes with the future promise of spending cuts that never came. And we have Obamacare even without compromise. Not one republican voted for it and it still got shoved on America. So compromise is overrated

[Murfreesboro]

Increasingly I have stopped thinking in terms of "Democrat" and "Republican" and have started thinking more along the lines of underlying political philosophies, such as Progressivism (or Socialism, if you prefer) and Constitutionalism.

I realize that this thread has veered in a direction that is pretty far afield from where it started, but if anyone is really interested, he/she should check out the on-line courses offered by Hillsdale College. They are free and very informative, no matter where you place yourself in this debate.

[Boogeyman]

As have I Murf. But it just bothers me when people start talking about both sides working together. Because that has worked out so well the last 100 years.

[Murfreesboro]

I agree with you. To the Democrats, it seems that "compromise" means, "You do what I want." And for some reason the Republicans won't stand their ground. They seem to think they have to become more like the Democrats in order to win elections, but that isn't actually working for them. My husband was a poli sci major in college, and he has frequently told me the anecdote about Harry Truman, whose advisers wanted him to become more like the Republicans when he was up for election. He commented, "Give the people a choice between a Republican and a Republican, and they will choose a Republican every time." Truman understood that you have to have the courage of your convictions, even if you fail (which he didn't, BTW). But the current crop of Republican leadership doesn't seem to have any convictions at all.

I studied Latin forever when I was in school (7 1/2 years, including an undergraduate major and a year & a half in grad school). It used to puzzle me how the Roman Republic went down because of the weakness in the Senate, but I feel now as if I am seeing it played out before my very eyes. The supposed Opposition Party isn't really opposing anything. They are primarily concerned with maintaining their own positions, not with the good of the country at all.

[Kolchak]

I'm a Catholic kid, Murph, so I know all about Latin. We used to have a saying in Latin Class.....

Latins a dead language
As dead as it can be
Once it killed the Romans
And now its killing me

I don't have any confidence in any party or any politician. I believe they all have a price and you can't trust one any further than you can throw them. If a low life scum bag were on a sinking ship, he would get on the lifeboat before YOUR mother. A politician would get on the lifeboat before HIS OWN mother.

I've been active for the rights of gun owners going back to my time in high school in the 1970s. These days, gun rights and veterans rights are my two biggest issues.

When Al Gore was a congressman he received an "A" rating for his pro gun stance. But when he moved up the power ladder from the House of Representatives to the U.S. Senate and later as Vice President, he did a complete 180 degree turn and wound up with an "F" rating.

He's not the only one. Many others have done it and others have ran on platforms of more freedom to only win election and turn around and do the exact opposite.

Murph is right about what the democrats mean about compromise. To them it's real simple...What's mine IS mine. What's yours is NEGOTIABLE.

I've never been big on compromise myself. I make my money and the politicians tell me what I can or can't do with it? Oh He!! No!!.

Good old boys have a saying in Texas. "The only thing you find in the middle of the road are yellow lines and dead armadillos." I agree with that. You fight and fight hard for what's important.

They get a free pass from most of the news media too. The utter arrogance from the media to treat us like children and thinking they're smarter and better than us, and then turn around and with a straight face say they are unbiased and neutral, is just disgusting.

If all the politicians, lawyers, news media and insurance companies died off tomorrow, we'd be much better off imho.