Department of Re-Education

To get an idea of how wonderful the public education system is here in the United States, go back and read some of the Federalist Papers. Somehow the founding fathers were able to articulate whole thoughts through complex and succinct language. Yet they were able to express themselves intellectually without the benefit of the Department of Education. Look how far we have come ... or should I say, look how far we have fallen. What we have now should really be called the Department of Re-education. We have produced a population of younger individuals that are prone to propaganda and the dispensation of hearsay as news. Despite the abundance of instantly available information, we have a population that is less informed than  their counterparts of two hundred years ago.

Many students in Wisconsin, upon being interviewed about their participation in the protests in Madison, do not even know what they protesting. It is amazing to me that we have become a giant herd of sheep.

I put this comment in the golf blog because I was thinking about another great piece of literature. It is titled, The Art Of Golf, by Sir Walter Simpson. It is a fine display of the art of language. I encourage all golfers to read this book.

The all sport correlation

I want to do for golfers what this young lady does for surfers.

The Indoboard is something I have yet to try ... but I imagine it to be a wonderful tool for balance. Golf is similar to surfing because the act of getting up on the board requires an explosive movement ... a core based willingness to move with precision ... to move in the moment. Golf is similar ... the willingness to snatch the right moment ... with the quiet mind ... and place the hands into orbit ... whereby they are whisked away out of their orbit down to smite the ball. In both cases a wave is being ridden. This is the secret. Each activity requires a mind that has reached the moment of singularity ... the it before the big bang. This sounds deep ... and it is.

Surf Camp! I think I just added one to the Bucket List.

Yasi

Here we are a day later and Yasi is displaying a beautiful Golden Spiral at the bottom.

The bottom line in golf ... there is a self-correcting nature in form when the mass of the body becomes aligned with this waning and accumulating motion. Look! It's the Yin and the Yang of nature.

Here is the text I am about to post to a golf forum.

... Praying for safety of the Australians caught in this monster storm.

-----------------------------------------------------
This photo pretty much says it all.

This photo pretty much says it all.

Has this thread been beaten to death?

Does everyone agree that there absolutely no way that a pure golf swing can be separated from this powerful expression in the natural world? How could it be possible? This action moves beyond the contemplation of hitting vs. swinging, left vs right, up vs. down, in vs.out. Likewise in golf, the mechanical mind must release itself to that now moment. Golf, to me, is an act of simply placing the hands into orbit and removing them from orbit. If the hands are stable, the clubhead is stable. This was the Ernest Jones understanding ... he said, "the swinging club through the hands, finds its own center." I believe that all mass, through time, seeks to organize itself along this spiral. If we allow an eye wall to develop inside the body, this powerful wave can be accessed. Here then arises the notion of power through efficiency. When this efficiency is realized, time shrinks to nothingness, and the pure strike emerges ... ahh, a fine shot indeed.

So this is the nature of the Golf To The Core workshop. My purpose is to help the client realize and enhance the body's ability to find this efficiency ... reveal techniques on how to develop the inner eye-wall and how to develop the inner eye.

goldengolf

Yasi

Here is another spectacular weather spiral ... Cyclone Yasi is hitting Australia.

The monster winter storm of 2011

That's a big beautiful spiral!


ZOOM

The next frame. Here I frame the spiral against the upper right hand corner. As the sun sets the spiral looks like a zygote floating in the womb.

Meeting the cable golf guru

Last week I contacted Dave Geier about the Golf To The Core seminar I have been putting together. We spent a good three hours together. I watched him give a lesson and later we had lunch at the driving range across the street. If you watch cable TV in Northeast Ohio, you probably have seen his commercial for www.golf-insideouttraining.com .

He has quite a good following. He has published a book and developed a very intensive training module for golf. He is quite enamored with the Golfing Machine and personally knows David Lee of Gravity Golf fame. I leafed through the Golfing Machine book as he was giving his lesson. It is the first time that I had ever turned a page in that book. I must say, it is detailed and complex ... and open to interpretation. Several teachers have developed their own methodologies based on that book, the Stack and Tilt method being just one of those. I am considering working with Mr. Geier as a member of the integral team he is assembling. I see myself as more of a group seminar guy. I am interested in core training and balance training via the blending of Yoga and martial arts. These are the things that will enable the golfer to get more out of personalized instruction. See Golf To The Core.

At the Golf To The Core site, I note that I am attempting to complete the Ernest Jones method. During our meeting, I made a specific reference to Mr. Jones. For those that don't know, Ernest Jones was a sweet swinger back before World War I. Ernest Jones ended up fighting in the war, and had one of his legs blown up. He ended up getting one of his legs amputated below the knee. There is a picture of him in his book Swing the Clubhead playing golf while standing on one leg. And he wasn't hacking it up. He played good golf while standing on that one leg. When I imitated Jones swinging on one leg for Mr. Geier, I purposely chose the opposite leg to stand on. I was disappointed that Mr. Geier did not catch my purposeful "mistake." He should have. Correctly imitating Jones would only have added credence to his own thinking. Oh well.

The reason I post this notice of our Wed. January, 26th meeting is simple: I have already been ripped off by that weasel, crony capitalist, Tony (pony tail) Little ... when he stole the Gazelle For Golf idea I gave him. Does anyone remember the "Rock and Roll Stepper?" That product was a direct result of information I passed on to him. I wanted to be a handshake kind of capitalist, but I guess I let my idealism get in the way of business. More the fool am I. I was thinking value added ... he was thinking, "how can I rip off this brilliant insight". It serves him right that his crony product was mass produced in China, laden with smelly, nasty, caustic rubber ... either returned to HSN or in the back of the closet warding off moths with its caustic smell. I hope Fitness Quest took a big, big hit on that ... serves them right!

My product is made in the U.S.A.

Kiss my butt "Pony" Little, and pass that on to your opportunistic, scammer brother of yours.

But I digress. I want to protect my intellectual property. So I am making a note here on this blog of our meeting last week.

He advertises on cable ... I don't. He can espouse the ideas I may have given him ... and call them his own. The ego is a tricky thing. I would like to be part of his integral team in a positive win/win situation. A large part of capitalism is mutual cooperation.

Maybe I should give Pony Tail guy a second chance. Maybe I should sue him ;~]

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GOLF GAMBLERS TAKE NOTE

There are a lot of big time golf gamblers out there. If you are one of them and are looking a golf miracle, I think I can help. I believe that if you attend my seminar, you will win more money than you could possibly imagine. I believe my seminar is worth thousands and thousands of dollars to the gamblers out there. However if you are looking for instant jolt of quick and lasting improvement, I am willing to travel and work intensely with you ... for a substantial fee. Fees are based on travel expenses, accommodations, and time. If you are a big time gambler and need to find the edge ... I know I can deliver.

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The Power of the Golden Spiral

This is a satellite photo of huge snow storm that hit the East coast over the the 2010 Christmas holiday. Nature proves to us that it is very powerful and dynamic when it organizes itself and expresses itself through the form of the golden spiral. Since we are inseparable from nature, there is every reason to believe we as individuals can summon similar power on a smaller scale.

I incorporated the spiral into a dartboard backboard that I constructed back in the mid 1990's. It is decorated with hundreds of wine corks I had collected over the years. This  was very time consuming ... drinking all that wine ...  just kidding. No, I mean that actual construction of the backboard. Working in fine dining establishments made cork collecting fairly painless. The board came out great! You will notice that the golden spiral on the board below starts in the lower left hand quadrant exits and then re-enters the left side of the board, drops off and re-enters the bottom of the board, juts off the right side of the board and re-enters in the top right quadrant. If you compare the spiral on the board with the photo above, you will notice that the spirals mirror each other. The construction of this board was not accidental. You will also notice a dark curved line cutting across the center. This represents and arm that is swinging a paddle. In this piece the dartboard represents both a compass face and a paddle. The picture does not do justice to this piece. I looks great hanging on the wall ... if I may say so myself.

Get a Free Golden Swing Thing

I have decided to give away 12 Golden Swing Things.

The product featured below is called The Golden Swing Thing TM. There are only 50 to 60 models of the product as depicted below. The original lot of Swing Things had insufficient Centre connections. So I had some of these custom modified at great expense in order to achieve the level of quality I expected out of myself. Each of the 12 will come with solid brass center pieces, a stainless steel laser engraved center ring, a leather tether, a hitting ball, laser engraved wood turnings, and a carrying case. Each custom Swing Thing balances on Centre. Every component of the product was made in the USA. I have a strong commitment to quality.

When I first produced this quality product, my intent was to peg the price of this product to the price of gold. It is after all "The Golden Swing Thing." I thought it was easily worth one fifth the price of gold. My original target price for this product was around 80 bucks. That was when gold was trading at $400 ... With the price of gold around $1350, the question begs. Is this product worth $270 now? Who knows. All I know is that these units are rare ... maybe they will be a collectible item long after I'm dead and gone. Hell! ... I even torched a bunch of these. I cut up and burned up many of the ones that didn't meet my standard of quality.

So I'm giving away twelve of these things. What's the catch? All I ask is that you become a wholesale distributor in my card network. As an added bonus, I will also include the Swingpointer TM in the free package for the first 12 people. Why did I join this network? Click Here for my answer.

The Final Obama Rally Before The November Election

I infiltrated this rally with another Tea Party favorable acquaintance. I didn't make an ass out of myself ... I'm above that. Here is a link to the full post on fishypeech.

On the way to the rally I was walking by Carl Monday of Action19 news. His mike was down and he was kind of perusing the crowd. I walked by with my "enough" sign and was showing a good bit of vigor. He came up to me, with the camera rolling, and started to interview me. He asked, "What do you think of the fact that when Obama came to Cleveland during his campaign, he racked up $40,000.00 in extra security costs to the city of Cleveland and has yet to reimburse the city." I said something like "that's very typical" .... "what about flying his entourage all over the world, renting out every room in the Taj Mahal hotel ... vacation after vacation ... constantly golfing! ... and what about golf? ... I've never seen the guy swing ... what is he? Kim Jong Il? ... shows us your scorecard Obama!" OK I'll admit, I went a bit off the rails.there. There is video out there of Obama swinging the club. But my point was this: He is exhibiting every telltale sign of an elitist authoritarian. At least Clinton admitted that he was a perpetual stroke shaver. Obama protects his personal image like a thin skinned dictator. The golf point is an example of just one of many manifestations of the elitist attitude. With the city of Cleveland, it is the same thing. It's as if Obama is saying, "The city of Cleveland should be honored that I am gracing it with my presence. Someone else will pick up the tab."

I see Obama as a mini Chavez. I was a bit fired up when I read that Chavez wants to confiscate golf courses in Venezuela and turn them into (so-called) better use. Sure Chavez, just destroy the game of golf like the Taliban destroys ancient Buddhist statues in Afganistan. What a tool! Hey folks ... Chavez is the model! Do we want to be Venezuela? Do we want to be France right now? I don't think so.

Fishyspeech link

How stupid do you think I Am?

The Golf Thread

Below is an expanded response to a thread in the Advanced Ball Striking forum. The thread starts by referring to this article.

Here is a link to the original thread.

We can all agree that the game as it is set up presupposes the man vs, nature battle. This is the nature of the game.

When you slip into that nascent freedom which emerges from ease and trust, formless beyond intention, the pure shot expresses itself. Then you look at this tree and see a it in a unique way. You assess the fractal beauty. The tree takes on the essence of a beautiful form before the mind can assign a title or a name to the object. In fact, it could be called an altered state. This is the state of mind that is known as the Uncarved Block. Normally when I see a tree, it's just a tree. But in the altered state of pure swinging, I see a different thing. For example: Observe the tree pictured above. It's just a tree, on a street, in a yard. When in a zone state, I see a giant neural brain with tentacles of wooden neurons. My point: It is impossible to ignore the aesthetic aspects of the game because the game of golf is itself embedded within the natural world. So I don't see the golf swing so much as battling nature. The battle is already established when one commences to cut out from groves of trees and rolling landscapes a course of play. Instead of hitting a stone into a rabbit hole with a Shepard's crooked staff, we hit a manufactured ball into a standardized hole with a manufactured club. The course is thus a manufactured landscape drawn from a natural canvas. Man vs. Nature is therefore defined. I believe we must become part of nature if we are to master the game ... and ourselves. After all, we already are part of it. Why should we resist?

We learn from nature when we become it ... when we absorb it. However, in the everyday state of mind, our consciousness causes us to analyze and come up with concepts and explanations. We come up with things like the Golf Machine and all manner of method to take us to the Holy Grail. I believe that the original intent of this thread was to explain the appearance of the golden spiral in strobe photography of pure golf swings. My contention is that when the endpoint of the sensuous sphere has a perfect reciprocal relationship with the True Centre, the spiral expresses itself. If you peruse the goldengolf website you will find that I call this final point the "final metacenter." We cannot cause this relationship be correct. We can only allow it to be correct. The nature of the motion creates the form. We can only allow it to work through us. A pure motion will then work through a variety of methods. Nearly any method will work (at least temporarily) so long as there is trust and one can pump through a pure trustful motion. There are people that use the "Natural Golf" method (a Moe Norman inspiration), the "Stack and Tilt," and the "Peak Performance" method. You have "Gravity Golf" and a million others. I like to tout goldengolf.com as the method of no method.

When speaking of a good player, Sir Walter Simpson says, "... he plays well, because his style is a natural product of a single-minded concentration on hitting clean. The duffer got his swing in another way, namely, by mimicry. The copy is fairly good, but not quite exact. The hands are Esau's, but not the club, which, being flat, compels him to add some movements not indulged in by his master." He then goes on to say, "The one thinks of hitting, the other about his manner of threatening to do so." In an earlier passage Simpson says, "Style, in other words, is not nearly of so much importance as accurate hitting." His point is that the development of a style can never eclipse the entrance of the individual into a zone state, whereupon the ball is seen pristine and the action of smiting commences. Seamus Macduff, the visionary golfer in Golf In The Kingdom, references the same action as occurring when the seven veils of consciousness have been removed. This is the mystical, and dare I say, spiritual side of the game.

If you recall, Seamus Macduff had a fascination with the concept of "True Gravity." I firmly believe that the golden mean and true gravity are connected. At goldengolf.com I lay out how the golden spiral bounces back and forth (at 90 degree intervals) on either side of the true value of phi by obeying Newton's second law of motion. ... the inverse square law. This layout of the Fibonacci sequence and the manner of its deviation is not meant to show some practical way to apply this perception to the golf swing. This is only done to show that the golden spiral has a connection to "True Gravity" and that the spiral is a significant force in the self correcting action of nature. It refines itself more and more as it grows and grows. This explains why the spiral is so prevalent in nature over grand scales ... from the spiral arm of a galaxy all the way down to the spiral action of our own DNA.

There are many pearls of wisdom in The Art of Golf. "Imitating one's own style is only less bad than copying a neighbor's." My favorite, of course, is this one, "Either may go astray, or either may discover the golden mean (emphasis mine) before becoming set in the tricks they have excogitated." I believe Simpson is expressing the opinion that says, "when we enter into a true state of leisure, encompassed by a truly playful state of mind, all of our intent can be directed at smiting the ball. We have then discovered the golden mean. We don't create the motion ... we tap into a motion that already exists. We don't create the motion ... the motion creates us!

Further, I believe the whole discussion of swinging vs. hitting is just a semantic distraction. So long as there is "slogging" and "smiting" all is well. Sir Walter Simpson put it this way, "...and if the beginner must have advice, let him consult a really first-class player, who will probably tell him he knows nothing about grips, or elbows, or following, and that all he has to do is to stand firm and smite hard." So these words, beyond reminding me that I am far from a first-class player, points to the inconsequential nature of specific forms. The pure motion, working through any form, will edify it and correct it through a real time intuitive process. This is the meaning of Simpson's words.

When we are swinging from a pure initial condition, there is harmony and ease. When we tweak our initial state with the zygote of a formless thought, there is disharmony and struggle. When I speak of initial conditions, I am specifically referencing chaos theory and the propensity of golfers to press through the entropy barrier. This is why mastery in golf is so fleeting. Slight changes in our emotional or mental substrates can result in wildness and big numbers ... the dreaded "disaster hole." This is why the bell curve in golf scores remains. Despite all the advances in technology, breaking 100, breaking 90, and breaking 80, still remain significant barriers for most players.

I believe one of these zygotes of thought revolve around the insistence on validity of the Vardon grip. Part of the answer to dismantling the tension of thought requires a dismantling of the Vardon grip. This has to do with the telephone game advice I indirectly gave to Michael Allen the week before he won at Canterbury. He has been a pretty hot player on both the Senior and PGA Tours ever since. I believe he has two runner ups in Majors this year on the senior circuit.

I see Michael Allen is on top of his game today out in San Fransisco. He just shot a 61 out there today for a tournament record. I noticed that he has switched to the split grip putter. I am not aware of when he made the switch. But based on what I passed on to Mr. Allen through Stephanie (his caddy's girlfriend), this putter change completely makes sense.I myself may move in that direction.

I refer to my advice to him, back in 2009, as The Jelly Doughnut Insight. He went on to win the Senior PGA that weekend. Stephanie and Michael introduced me to Mr. Allen, and I got to shake his hand at the practice round and plug the goldengolf site to him. I like to keep alive the idea that I somehow influenced his play. I don't know. What I do know is ... that he bought his caddy Michael a brand new Harley after he won the Senior PGA ... Me? ... I got nothing! ... It's OK ... I'm not bitter. ;~)

The Jelly Doughnut Insight deconstructs Vardon and puts it back together in a reasonable manner. Only upon reconstruction is there hope for a revelation in the game.

I know that I subject myself to criticism for bringing up Vardon. To do so enters into a field of speculation that Sir Walter Simpson himself derided. I could criticize myself for falling into the belief that the Stack and Tilt was the answer ... or that any particular aspect of form was important. It just so happened that by attending to this Stack and Tilt form on a particular day, one of the veils of consciousness was lifted for me. I was able to see the ball pure for a window of time. The eureka moment was soon replaced by the disappointment I encountered upon the attempt to replicate that form. Hence the veil was immediately replaced. Simpson addresses these issues in chapter 4 when he says,  "Even minor sensations, too earnestly attended to, may, however, do a great deal of harm. When, by patiently keeping his attention fixed on hitting, the golfer has got into his best driving form, he is tempted to luxuriate in the sweet balls; to note how he gets his shoulders into the work; or how he feels like a whipcord, from the point of his toe to the head of his club; and to determine that in the future these joys shall be repeated every shot. Fool!"

So long as we golfers luxuriate on the physical effects of pure motion, we are doomed to struggle. We are prone to invent opinions on the nature of mechanics and delusional ideas as to what is considered good form. We can never forget that golf remains as: Einstein space in a Van Gogh sky.

Now I'm Really Ticked

Chavez wants to seize golf courses in Venezuela

Time Wave

I think of it as accessing a time wave ... upon accessing it the mind loses perception of time. Suddenly you find yourself swept up in it. You become time itself ... inseparable from the object. This is sort of what I mean when I say that the club handle glues itself to the hands. There is no time for manipulation of form through time. The form, for the fact that the time wave has been accessed, becomes self correcting. The intuition of intent becomes the only mechanic.

The Real Answer in Golf

Sometimes (I should really say always) the answer is just to hold the club so lightly, that if you held it any more lightly, it would fall from your hands ... and keep it that way throughout the swing ... There has to be trust that we are not so much holding the club as we are allowing the club to become glued to our hands through the nature of the waning motion ... ahhh! magic!

The struggle of method entices the hands to inject themselves. The thumb on the cymbal represents the hands in the swing. Can we dance the hands so lightly on the cymbal that the Centre does not become deadened. This kind of thought is the culmination of a long struggle for me personally in my own game. Attempting to let the hands go and really letting the hands go are two different things. One is a contemplation that innervates the hands, the other is a sense of trust that develops as you attempt to hold the club more lightly, and more lightly, and more lightly. Suddenly the pure view of the ball ... commence movement. swish!

Now putting ... that's been a true thorn lately. But I think the same line of reasoning applies.

My Post to an Instruction Blog

Go here to see context of this reply.

I first noticed the chambered nautilus in the golf swing way back in the 1980's. A strobe photo appeared on a golf instruction book that I was perusing. I cannot recall the title of the book right now. If anyone out there remembers, that would be great. It wasn't until reading Robert Prechter's book, The Elliot Wave Theory that I came to piece together a golf theory based on this aesthetic constant.

I believe that when the mind is completely clear, absent of any thought (be it a thought in a larval state or a thought as a full blown conceptual butterfly) ... free of all this ... then and only then can trust persist throughout the movement ... then and only then can the ball be seen in a pristine primordial state ... then and only then will the nautilus appear in the swing. All physical manipulations are worthwhile only in the context of the trust in which the tinkering occurs. Pure shots can be had in the stack and tilt context. Pure shots can be had in the conventional swing context. Pure shots can be had in the Moe Norman context. Nearly any manner of configuration can be successful if there is absolute trust in the motion as it is expressed.

A while back I had an extraordinary experience playing a round (or should I say "playing around") with the stack and tilt method. BTW I have never read The Golfing Machine, but I believe that the idea of the Stack and Tilt is derived from this material. Subsequently, I deluded my sentient self into believing that there was something to it. But here's the thing. It was not that the method was preferable to any other. It was simply that (for some reason) I fell into a spell of trust which, in that instance, allowed a pure expression of the motion to be borne out. Application of the method itself is not the answer. Finding a sense of trust that is not dependent on method is the answer. This is a high order primary key. Method and it's distractions is like putting your thumb somewhere on the flat plane of a ringing cymbal. The cymbal continues to vibrate outside of the place where you touch it ... but everything goes dead inside of it. The tension of consciousness is just like the thumb ... deadening the possibility of the pure strike. The key is to ring the cymbal without touching it ... the question is how we become the ringing cymbal from the Centre to the periphery and from the periphery to the Centre ... thus, facilitating a reciprocation and harmonization of interacting waves ... like the seeds of a sunflower. So I believe that the golden spiral is more than just observable ... it is experiential. In other words, when you know inside that you have "pured" it and the ball is sailing straight to the pin, a strobe photo of that particular swing would reveal a nautilus property.

I shudder to see what a strobe photo would look like if it were taken during the commencement of a shank or a topped shot. If the strobe picture were taken of an inexperienced golfer, twisted into knots, attempting to strike the ball, I don't believe the nautilus strobe effect would manifest itself. I believe you would still see a spiral ... but it would be truncated or distended ...evidence of an impure expression.

The bottom line is that we as golfers cannot create the golden swing we can only surrender to it and trust that it will create itself ... if we just allow it to happen! Therein lies the paradox of the game.

Taylor Spalding

www.goldengolf.com

About Tiger

Although I have been writing about Tiger for nearly twenty years, I have refrained from commenting in writing on the whole Tiger situation.  Much of the Tiger commentary on goldengolf.com was made between 1990 and 2004. This was a time when the world experienced an paradigm shift in the nature of the game. Tiger took golf to level that even experienced tour veterans rarely enjoyed. During the years of Tiger's coming up, I was fascinated that he seemed to embody the militaristic discipline of his Vietnam veteran father, and the humble influence of his Buddhist mother. He seemed to me to be the perfect example of sentient detachment. At the time, I believed that the more we can detach from sentient entanglement the better we could step into the moment and hit pure golf shots. I still believe this. However, now I have a different perspective. It is not the state of your moral condition that determines the level of your play; it is your ability to detach from the implications of your off course actions, the conflicting thoughts that accompany those actions, and the hints of doubt that such thoughts might evoke. In a way, it's a disappointment. For once upon a time I thought that by reducing moral conflicts, one would reduce the need for such detachment. Such is not the case.

In respect to moral turpitude, golf may in fact may be a safe harbor ... a place where one can escape from the pernicious thoughts of personal shortcomings and failings. This may explain why Tiger is on his best start ever in the Masters.

I think the conflict for Tiger is not the fact of his infidelity, but his attempt to have a foot in both worlds.




Obviously he wanted to have children in world where a wealthy man can be afforded a stable of quality concubines. I know this sounds sexist ... too bad. Here is a guy in the prime of his life, boyishly handsome, and sitting on hundreds of millions of dollars. Finding girls that want to shag you won't be a problem.

If he wanted to have both worlds, he should have just payed someone to bear his children and put all the cards on the table. He should have said to the future mother of his children, "Look, here's one hundred million dollars to have my children. I'll be the dad, but don't try to control my behavior. I am not a monogamous man. I have a mountain of cash and there are hundreds of supermodel women that want to sleep with me. Don't expect me to ever be faithful."

He may have received criticism from the press and social rejection. But he wouldn't have to be trying to work payoff deals with his paramours through a staff of attorneys.

John Daly: The Five Stages of Grief

You can't help but root for John Daly. I have been catching "Being John Daley" on The Golf Channel lately. The narrator speaks of the five stages of grief.

The Five Stages of Grief:

Denial
Anger
Bargaining
Depression
Acceptance

Right now America is in the anger stage. If we move to bargaining .... were toast. If America bargains with the atrocity unfolding before us, we truly begin to accept that we are sheep.

I apologize for injecting politics into all facets of this blog project ... but right now this is more important than golf. I need to find fellow patriot golfers.

Freedom

Freedom is what makes this country great ... the envy of all individuals of the world who seek to escape despotism.

Great Quote from Libertarian Nation

This quote comes from page 25 of Libertarian Nation, The Call for a New Agenda , by James Walsh:

"Fashionable political philosophers complain that people who live in advanced economies focus too much on selfish interests. But the self ownership at the foundation of rational social interaction (and advanced economies) isn't the same thing as selfishness.

In fact, cooperation--or altruism or any selfless act--only has meaning if the person chooses it voluntarily, from a position of self ownership. Slaves can't cooperate or volunteer."

To me, this is one of the most rational explanations of the benefits of capitalism I have ever encountered.

.... and why the government is wicked!

This is what Rush Limbaugh means when he talks about the difference between selfishness and having a legitimate self interest.

This concept is completely foreign to elitists, statists, and all manner of tyrants.

That is why I am praying for the good health of the five conservative Supreme Court justices. If Obama gets to replace one of the conservative justices .... you can just about stick a fork in the good old U. S. of A. folks. The redistribution plan will go on despite any re-taking of the House or Senate in 2010.

My Plea

On Monday November 3, the day before the election of 2008, I wrote a letter to one of my best friends. It was my plea to him to reject the leftist agenda of Barack Obama. I am posting this for the public record.

________________________________________________


My Friend:

I know it’s a little funny to hear Mr. McCain say “my friends” all the time. You have chided me a bit about it over the last few months. I hope I have taken your ribbing with good humor. He is not the smoothest guy around. I know he likes to hold up his “air quotes”. That’s a little goofy too, I know. I’ll be honest. He hasn’t run a great campaign either. I know you were a Hillary guy. I was more of a Thompson guy. But I’m going to vote for John McCain anyway on Tuesday. I know that you have expressed a preference for Obama. As a fellow red blooded American, I respect your decision. I would never want to lose a great friend over a political issue. This happened to my grandfather and a good friend of his back in the 1930’s. It was an issue and a grudge that they took to their graves. I won’t live like that. You will be my friend no matter what happens this Tuesday.

I think that we became friends because we shared certain core values. It is on that basis that I would like to make a heartfelt plea for you to re-consider your vote.

I know you are an investor and belong to a small investment club. You know me as someone with a strong entrepreneurial streak. We have both made it known to each other that we would like to start our own businesses in the future. So let’s just talk business for a second. Let’s take away the emotion and the “cult of personality.” You know, as an investor, that the goal of a publicly traded company is to produce a product or service in an efficient manner, make a reasonable profit on that product or service, and provide a reasonable return to the everyday people who invest in that company. I would venture to say that your investment club does not look to buy stock in companies that are consistently losing money. There are many costs that a corporation must bear on the way to that profit. There are raw material costs, labor costs, distribution costs, and a host of others. Of course taxation is also one of those costs.

On Halloween day (of all days) Barack Obama, citing the news that Exxon had earned record profits again (22.6 billion), said this to the swooning crowd, “THAT’S YOUR MONEY!” Everyone cheered. I guess everyone at the Obama rally were shareholders in Exxon! … Oh They were not? They were just the general public? Oh, I see. Obama conveniently left out the fact that Exxon also paid out a record in taxes as well (61.7 billion!). They paid out more than two and a half times their net profit in taxes. According to Investor’s Business Daily, “ExxonMobil will pay more taxes this year to the U.S. Treasury than the bottom 50% of all taxpayers – combined.” That is a staggering fact. So let me get this straight. According to Barack Obama, not only do the taxes that Exxon paid belong to the general public, the profits Exxon made also belong to the general public? Outrageous! That is a Halloween story that should scare everyone. The only thing missing is the campfire and smores!

There is nothing more disturbing than the bandit that smiles and speaks softly as he inserts the knife. You think I’m being a bit dramatic. But truly, it isn’t so much socialism I’m fearful of (we have already shamefully leaned toward it); It is the incubation of autocracy that gives me the jitters. With the help of a complicit and possibly filibuster proof congress, Obama represents a veto pen that will never see his fingerprints! This triumvirate of unchecked power will result in an America that would be unrecognizable to the founding fathers. America became the engine of innovation and progress in the world because of the rugged individuals that risked their blood and poured out their sweat to create a better life.

Of course there are a litany of other reasons to say no to Obama.

We already have the second highest capital gains tax in the world. Obama wants to raise it. We have a problem with outsourcing now. If this tax is raised, companies will simply shutter the doors or move to another country altogether. Could you imagine if Coca Cola pulled up its tent stakes and decided to move its headquarter to Ireland (low capital gains taxes there)? Atlanta would be devastated!

He has promised to bring the military into the twenty first century. This means he will essentially weaken it and dismantle our nuclear deterrent. All this as the newly emboldened Russia sends ships to Cuba and Iran defies the world in its race toward the bomb. Obama dreams of a world free of nuclear weapons … How is that for naivete? He and many in congress falsely believe that only the economically disadvantaged volunteer for military service. Out of “fairness” he will likely re-instate the draft or some quasi-military form of community service.

On David Letterman, Obama said that the “Navy Seals are an “elite team” of special forces.” He then added, “We need “elite people” running the government.” What did he mean by that, “a specialist?” What happened to “of the people, by the people, and for the people?”

His radical associations are undeniable. These radical Marxists didn’t just stumble upon him. He sought them out! Don’t deceive yourself. Bill Ayers dedicated his book “Prairie Fire” to political prisoners and named Sirhan Sirhan as one of them. This is the man that assassinated Robert Kennedy! Appalling! I know you were for Hillary. I think that anyone who supported the far more moderate Democrat in the primaries should think about that for a minute before they pull that lever on Tuesday. His association with a former spokesman for the PLO is also very troubling. He spent twenty years listening to a radical America hating preacher. Yet he claims he did not hear those hateful words. He never heard those hateful words, yet in these final days it sounds like he learned the Reverend’s style of preaching. He’s lying, of course. Can we please save the religious fervor for the church?

His middle class tax cut is a hoax (more like an outright lie). Early in his campaign he said you were safe if you made less than $250,000 per year. Then it was $200,000. Then Biden (currently residing in the panic room with a gag in has mouth) spouts out $150,000. For the Obama infomercial it was back to $200,000. Then surrogate Bill Richardson comes up with $120,000. What gives? The message here is that the number is arbitrary. The powers that be will decide whether or not you are “rich.” As wealth gets destroyed under an Obama administration, the definition of “rich” will get lower and lower.

I believe that history tends to repeat itself. Let’s look back at the Great Depression and its primary cause. Most people believe that the stock market crash of 1929 caused the Great Depression. Wrong! The economy was actually recovering a good bit after the crash. The Great Depression really began in late 1931 when Hoover raised the tax rate on people making over $100,000 per year from 20% to 55%. Back then the dollar bought a lot more. Today it would probably take a million dollars to buy the same amount of goods. People that owned businesses simply shuttered them up. “I’m taking my ball home. I don’t want to play anymore.” Let’s not let history repeat.

Then, of course, there is Joe the Plumber. He makes a legitimate point; Obama lets his guard down and reveals his true ideals. What happens next? This everyday American gets impromptu background checks from government computers. There was outrage about the government listening in on international phone calls in the name of national security. Where is the outrage now? Is this going to be the method of operation for an Obama administration? Then we have one of the few media members that refused to drink the Kool-Aid and asked Joe Biden some tough questions. Now that very same media outlet has been cut off from access to the Obama campaign. I guess they won’t be asking any more tough questions about the “dear leader.” Further, the LA Times is suppressing a videotape of Obama’s interactions at a party with the former PLO spokesman Rashid Khalidi. Protecting sources? How about releasing a transcript? Every Jewish voter should take note.

He broke his promise to stick to public campaign financing. This allowed him to take in millions (some from questionable sources) and make a run at buying the election.

His connections to ACORN are undeniable. There are widespread allegations of voter fraud against this organization. He worked closely with this organization and represented them in a lawsuit some years ago.

His connections to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are also there. These institutions force-fed easy money to banks in the name of social and economic justice. And Wall Street feasted as well. Now we are supposed to believe that the arsonists should be in charge of putting out the fire. Pathetic! You can’t argue this point. I watched hours of congressional testimony on the irresponsible oversight of these institutions and calls from the present administration to revamp and regulate these two monsters. Why isn’t the media interviewing John Snow?

Obama will likely sign a bill into law (The Employee Free Choice Act H.R. 800 is currently under consideration in congress) that will remove the ability of an employee to keep secret his preference for or against unionization in the workplace. Union leaders will know who wants a union and who doesn’t. No secret ballot! Can you say “knuckle sandwich” out back by the Dumpster?

He will likely roll back your legal right to own a gun. He will probably save that one for later or choose the “slow erosion” of rights technique. Nevertheless, this will leave the illegal guns in the hands of the thugs. Not good.

Finally, Obama believes that the constitution is a document of negative rights. He wants to change that. He says that the constitution expresses what the government cannot do to you. He wants to change that and spell out what the government must do for you.

When you put all this together, it is the duty of every sane individual to say no to the radical leftist agenda of Barack Obama.

That is my plea.

Your friend always,

Jeff

P.S. When the bloom falls off the rose, you are left with the thorns.

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AKA: Jeff “the bartender”


Update: The “Creepy” factor is starting to kick in hard. I live in the Cleveland Area. I just watched Mr.“Senator Government” pontificating on TV. He looked preachy and autocratic. He only smiled with glibness, in response to his own well turned phrase. He had to egg on the crowd when they didn’t quite seem to cheer loud enough. The crowd got louder, but only in that “yeah!!!, yeah!!, yeah!? … I think I’m excited, but I’m feeling some doubt in the pit of my stomach.” The masses are starting to scratch their heads. He tried to hide the fact that he had to look at a crib note to remember the names of Bruce Springsteen’s family members. I wasn’t put off that he had to read the names, It’s the fact that he tried to appear that he wasn’t reading. The real Obama is tipping his hand. McCain really needs to hit Obama hard on the Exxon record tax and his comment that, “It’s your money.” Even if he didn’t mean it in the confiscatory fashion, it is still not their money. It’s money that they traded for a product.

Must see this video!!!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tt2yGzHfy7s

Every good dictator needs a "goon squad!"

Must hear audio!!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hdi4onAQBWQ

…. And he wants to bankrupt the coal industry!!!!!