On Bozos and Other Thoughts

The United States is not alone in having Bozos for political/government leaders. I think Canadia [sic] has a real clown for a prime minister, Justin Trudeau. According to one report I read, from a reliable source, Trudeau recently addressed the beheading of a man in France for the man's criticism of Islam and Muhammad. Trudeau claimed he would "always defend freedom of expression," before going on to add, “Freedom of expression is not without limits.... We owe it to ourselves to act with respect for others and to seek not to arbitrarily or unnecessarily injure those with whom we are sharing a society and a planet." We (or at least Canadians) apparently aren't guaranteed freedom of speech if it offends snowflakes; no, we can't make anyone uncomfortable. Regarding the context of Trudeau's comments, a question about the beheading of a Paris teacher who showed his students a cartoon that put Islam and Muhammad in a bad light, I wonder if Trudeau thinks beheading people for what they write, say, worship, etc. which "arbitrarily or unnecessarily injures" anyone, is OK. It sure seems ignorant giving a moral equivalence to a critical cartoon, novel, or even personal religious preference to lopping off one's head. To summmarize, "I believe freedom of expression except when I don't." Here is an article I think should be required reading for all Americans, especially those who seem unwilling to even consider alternates to shutting down the economy, quarantines, masking, social distancing (I still hate that term!), etc. https://imprimis.hillsdale.edu/sensible-compassionate-anti-covid-strategy/ (You may have to copy and paste the URL into your browser.....) I have sent this link to folks in e-mails and have received very positive responses. The elections are very close, for President and for the US Senate seat in Michigan. In Detroit/Wayne County (and in other cities such as Philadelphia) large numbers of votes have once again mysteriously appeared/been found, well after the polling places closed. And, also mysteriously, those votes are overwhelmingly for Joe Biden and the Democrats. Is anyone surprised at this? That large numbers of votes were "found?" That they were found in political entities controlled by the Democrats? That the vast majority of those found votes are for Democrats? But isn't this what Democrats do? Are there ever any reports or jokes about Republican cemetery votes? Ask Richard Nixon v Kennedy in '60. Ask Coke Stevenson in '48 (who lost to Lyndon Johnson for the Senate seat in Texas by 87 votes, after the cemeteries were searched for voters. Allegedly, Johnson brushed off any thought of wrong-doing with "Dead people have a right to vote, too."). I stole this thought from an Amherst mate trying to find solace in today's political atmosphere. He cited Abraham Lincoln's Second Inaugural Address. (To me, his Gettysburg Address was his best, the best political speech in all of US History. But the Second Inaugural is a very close runner-up. Some Lincoln scholars rate it his best. That gets no argument from me.) Lincoln reminded his battered countrymen, North and South, of the Founding Fathers' aspirations "to create a more perfect Union." The Civil War wasn't over; not yet. Personally, too, he had suffered. He had lost his son to illness and lost close friends and family to the war. ABout 700,000 or more of the population of North and South had died in combat. My classmate wrote, "One can't imagine the bitterness, the fatigue, the rush to retribution that faced him and the country on that cold March day." My fellow Lord Jeff went on, "Yet there he stood and had the wherewithal to say [these words]: 'With malice toward none; with charity for all; with firmness in the right, as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in......'” Lincoln went on to finish the sentence, "to bind up the nation's wounds; to care for him who shall have borne the battle, and for his widow, and his orphan....." It certainly is a thought well worth considering--often.