Reading through my facebook posts and seeing people of all circles commenting, I figured I'd contribute to the love of cats, but I suppose it's proper to use my pulpit here at my own blog to express my thoughts, so I'll tell you mine....
a. People are sick of the Bush/Clinton and their extensions and the lack of consistency of law.
If anyone of us had done the things the Clintons/Bushes have done (it's all documented), we'd be sitting behind bars with a healthy jail sentence for a good amount of years. Yet the Clintons/Bushes keep getting away with these things because they have all their people in place. The vote for Trump is a response to these things happening. We often times hear that justice is for the rich and powerful from liberals or from other people of various circles, law for me, but not for thee kind of thing. The Clintons are the prime example of this exact principle happening in public. No one should be supporting this kind of corruption and placing themselves above the law of the land.
The consistency of law; of course, doesn't just apply to politicians, but to those who break the law, in a particular illegal immigration. Yes, our land was built on immigrants, and those seeking a better life, it was also built before the major advent of immigration law. Something that I've mentioned before, the right to move is conditional to following the laws of wherever one is moving. People are sick of watching people breaking the law taking advantage of our country. It's quite interesting at least in my circles that the majority of people who are against illegal immigration came here legally, waited patiently, dealt with the beauracracy of the government, and rightly feel taken advantage of by these people who are breaking the law. The ends don't justify the means, no matter how wonderful and saintly those intentions may be. Evil can't be done to justify a good. Are there exemptions to the law? Of course!, but it's not up to us as individuals to take those exemptions into our hands. In short exemptions need to be taken on a case by case basis, and not via mass amnesty. Everyone's probably all freaked out that illegals are going to get magically deported, and a big giant wall on the southern border is going to get built. Everyone is innocent until proven guilty, and people can't be searched unless there's justifiable cause (aka with a warrant) according to law. (Now whether people follow that law is completely different). If an illegal immigrant doesn't do anything stupid, they'll more than likely be left alone. As for that wall...do we not have fences at our own houses? Do we not have doors? But if any of you are familiar with CalTrans and the efficiency (or rather the lack thereof) in the way they deal with projects...you can bet that wall will not be built anytime soon. Of course, if Caltrans isn't helping, it might be built a bit faster. Mexico more than likely will not be paying for the wall. Realistically, the only thing that will likely be happening with immigration is the enforcement of the actual laws that are on the books....which are fairly strict, but not as strict as say.....our sourthern neighbours Mexico.
I'm sure that everyone's also worried about the Muslims, that Trump has proposed a temporary ban on all Muslims entering the country until we figure out who is associated with who. Let's start by understanding that this kind of thing has happened before under Carter's administration, so it's not new. Realistically, what is more likely to happen rather than a ban as such is that people will be vetted more closely and let in on a case by case basis rather than a mass entering as we have it now. It's been playing in our heads by the media that everyone's heads that bad things are going to happen, everyone's going to get deported, the government's going to come with an irn fist....STOP THE FEAR....It's not the end of the world, you can still read this, can't you?
I suppose now would be a good time to synthesise what will not be ending.
1. Muslims, Illegal immigrants, LGBTQ people will NOT be shipped out the country in mass planes.
2. The government is not going to suddenly magically end abortion, and walk in and start canceling them.
3. The rights of everyone are not going anywhere, women will be able to vote, so will minorities, it takes a ton of work to overturn a CONSTITUTIONAL AMENDMENT (Good luck getting 2/3rds of state legislatures and 3/4ths of the states to agree). Seriously, relax it's not going to change.
4. The means that people have to defend themselves....also not going anywhere....
What people do need to realise is that politicians are not saviours. From their distant porch, they are not going to make any situation better or worse in of themselves, or even through the passing of laws. The way situations get better is through the principle of subsidiarity, individuals working together, not depending on an external source to get things done. This; of course, isn't to say that there isn't a role for the government to play. But the governemnt being super far away from our daily issues, perhaps should be more like a coach rather than a dictator. They can point things out, but ultimately it is up to us as individuals to better situations. It's how we live out the laws and things that ultimmately make things better. A perfect example I can think of is like in education. When I as the teacher point out an error or a mistake that my students did in a problem, they have options: They can learn from the error and do their best not to make it again...or they can continue making the same mistakes. The same ultimately when it comes to law and government. We can learn, or we can continue to wallow in our mistakes....I'd definitely avoid choosing the latter.
b. What about...comment x, shortcoming y, thing z.
Colour me not surprised when I say that people are stupid. say stupid things, have shortcomings, etc. People are not defined by their shortcomings, comments and various other things in both the positive and negative light...(Yet somehow all of us manage to do this to varying degrees: I know I myself do have some people that are defined by something bad even though their dignity in the image of God is much greater than i could express). Are we not supposed to forgive trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us? It's true that being forgiving doesn't mean being stupid, but do we not allow people to grow from their mistakes, and grow from their commentary? More often than not, I feel that there's a ton of projecting onto those that are conservative, or those who disagree with the typical narrative. The thing is most people don't recognize "insert your buzzword here" when it actually is in front of them. For example, it's not homophobic to disagree with the gay lifestyle...however, to kill them and throw them off of a cliff, yes, that is so. It's not xenophobic to want to protect the boarders from those breaking the law. But to say "insert culture here" are "insert insulting word here" definitely would be so. If one's going to throw around words, the least one can do is be accurate with them.
c. The vast majority of Liberals do NOT want to destroy the country
The vast majority of my friends, or people in my circles have liberal points of view, or sympathise with what one would call liberal positions politically. Do they want to destroy the country? No, they simply have a different idea of what means are best for the country to go. And although more often times than not, I think they're wrong, I don't wish evil upon them or think that they're horrible people just because of their viewpoints. Tolerance is a two-way street, we don't have to agree, but we do have to respect one another's opinions and personhood. This the reason that there wasn't a mass deleting spree during this political season. Everyone's opinion has value (even if they're wrong). While yes, there is objective Truth as a whole, this doesn't mean that there aren't things within that can be considered relative, or with prudential judgment that two people can't disagree on. Often times, people try to paint a uniformity where one doesn't exist...It's hard enough to get two people to agree on something....(though if I put a cat picture here, everyone should go awwww :p). There's often from the conservative side people that think that the country will be destroyed because of liberalism....which in of itself isn't true. Ideas if left unchecked of course can go off the rails, but it's important that we're able to have a free exchange of ideas....especially if we disagree with the people involved.
d. Sooo, who did you vote for?
I voted for the mathematically best candidate that I thought would defeat the one I thought was pure evil. It's interesting to me that the two women I think are the most evil in the country start with the same letter in their name, they get prayed for daily of course, but I find it quite interesting. If people didn't figure out who I was against, after I said she who has already been president...I'll let that go :p
e. The inditement against the media et al.
It's hilarious watching the media report back on what has happened. Pretty much any source of information has a liberal bent or leans left...Academia, entertainment, journalism, you name it, everything has been filtered through this lens. The election of Trump is a big fudge you to the media, basically telling them, be objective, keep your opinions to yourself, and tell the facts of the story/news, etc. Which is all that anyone wants. It's not of course that these people can't have opinions...Opinions do need to be substantiated and formed by actual substance, not by reading into different statements and taking various points out of their context. I don't think it's too much to ask, if someone says a quote to give the quote in full, THEN afterward state this is my opinion on the quote instead of making some giant click bait headline, or just report opinion as fact. I hope the media takes their lesson from this and learns.
f. Now what do we do?
Don't blow anything up!, No fear-mongering!, No stupid things! We work with what is given and try to make things better for our society at a local level. Victory alcohol is available downstairs. Sulking alcohol is available upstairs. This post was scheduled to go up as i am at work at present, pray for our country, we still need it, even if a minor battle has been won.
