Pray, Write, and Vote

If you do not take an interest in the affairs of your government, then you are doomed to live under the rule of fools.

PLATO

There is a certain type of person that disengages completely from the world of politics and current events. Wanting to be left alone and be blissfully ignorant, they bury their heads in the sand. This works for a season until some jackboot pulls your head out of the sand and marches you away in handcuffs and leg irons for whatever fate awaits you in the tyranny you did nothing to stop. Some will say that doing something is futile. It is possibly futile. Doing nothing is absolutely futile. There are three things that I choose to do--pray, write, and vote.

1. Pray

Prayer is the most potent weapon in a person's arsenal. Consistent and persistent prayer changes things. Without prayer, you are wasting your time with everything else. With prayer, your efforts have great effect. Now, some will say that prayer is worthless. It can only be worthless if God doesn't exist. If God doesn't exist, then nothing else matters at all. Without God, you have nothing.

I believe God is in control of everything. Yes, bad things happen but only with God's permission. Personally, I think God tests our faith in hard times to teach us to rely upon Him in our struggles and trials. Hard times make good people because good people pray themselves out of hard times.

2. Write

I have zero interest in running for political office. We live under the illusion that power rests with the political leaders when it actually rests with the people. If this were not so, politicians wouldn't waste so much time, money, and energy trying to convince people to vote for them or at least not bring out the pitchforks and torches.

In my lifetime, the person who has had the most influence over the people has not been a president like Ronald Reagan but Rush Limbaugh. Everyone else is following in that man's footsteps. Rush never held elective office but simply spoke to the people through a radio microphone. His words and thoughts had a profound impact on the mind of the public. Others after him like Andrew Breitbart said that politics was downstream from culture. Those who change hearts and minds are the ones with the real power.

I am not a radio pundit but a writer with a blog. I don't have the reach of someone like Rush Limbaugh, but I can and do add my small voice to the chorus of other conservative voices. Others with lesser talents create and share memes. If these didn't matter, the powers that be wouldn't go after them so hard. Free speech matters, but it has to be used regularly to make a difference.

3. Vote

The last option is the most controversial because it makes the least difference. This is voting. Your single vote has virtually no weight in comparison to all of the other votes out there. So, why bother? The answer to that is simple. If all the good people stayed home from the polls, evil would love that immensely. The reality is that your single vote is never alone. It is added to the weight of all those other good people letting their voices be heard. Even in a rigged election, those votes matter because the tyrants are told what they are facing.

I was disinclined to vote until 2012. This is because I was a libertarian at the time. I voted for Ron Paul in the GOP primary and Bob Barr in the general election. Neither man had a chance of winning. Mitt Romney had a chance of winning, but I couldn't bring myself to vote for the lesser of the two evils. This left the greater of the two evils to win. I could have done without those four extra years of Obama.

I doubt my voting for Romney would have changed the outcome. But it taught me that the lesser of two evils is the way to vote. You can vote your principles in the primary as I did with Ron Paul, but you always pull the lever for Republicans in the general election. Yes, Republicans let you down. So, what? Why is letting the Democrat win a better strategy?

I hold my nose when I vote. No candidate is good enough for my tastes. But I have my chance in the primary to put real conservatives in office. At the end of the day, I vote straight ticket Republican not because I support RINOs so much as oppose Marxist Democrats.

Voting third party is just throwing away your vote. When a third party candidate has any measure of success, it is enough to throw it to the Democrats. This is letting the perfect be the enemy of the good. I recommend that true conservatives try and take over the Republican Party rather than opposing it in the general election.

Working for change in the Roman Catholic Church

The Church is just like the government. The only difference is that you don't get to vote for your bishops, cardinals, and Pope. What the laity have is something even better than a vote. We get to vote with our dollars. I choose to give only to my parish and those apostolates that reflect and promote Catholic orthodoxy. On top of this, I also pray and write towards the end of restoration and renewal of the Roman Catholic Church. Because the Church has run off the rails, this has had a corrosive effect on our culture and our governments. Working for political change while ignoring ecclessiastical change makes no sense. Before there was Rush Limbaugh, there was Archbishop Fulton Sheen who had as much or more influence than Rush Limbaugh. We need to support our good bishops with our prayers.

The Benedict Option Idiots

The people most inclined to stick their heads in the sand are the ones influenced by Rod Dreher and his Benedict Option idea of hiding in a hole until it all blows over. This is the same idiot who was scandalized into schism by leaving the Roman Catholic Church and joining the Eastern Orthodox. His wife also divorced him for whatever reasons she had. Schism and divorce always go together. Rod Dreher is an effeminate with no ounce of fortitude whatsoever. Why would anyone take advice or find an example in him?

The world remains civilized and safe because good people don't quit but stay and fight. Don't think The Benedict Option. Think Lord of the Rings. The goal is not to make a heaven on earth like the Marxists and libertarians wish but to prevent hell on earth. God is on our side in this fight, but we need to be on His side.

Conclusion

I can't do much, but I can do all I can. That is the bottom line. I leave the winning up to God, but the fighting is on me. Even if I lose, at least I did something which is more than I can say for those who chose to do nothing. I despise the do-nothings.

Silence in the face of evil is itself evil: God will not hold us guiltless. Not to speak is to speak. Not to act is to act.

DIETRICH BONHOEFFER

Annoying Things

I don't have pet peeves like some people. I have whole kennels of irritation.

WHOOPI GOLDBERG

This is one of those curmudgeonly posts where I do a fair bit of complaining about things. That alone is an annoying thing. Yet, irritation provides the motivation for improvement. Here are things that I find annoying along with solutions for those things.

1. Watches without numbers

I prefer a digital watch. This began for me in the 1990s when I began wearing a Timex Ironman Triathlon watch before switching to the arsenal of Casio watches I wear now. I forget the year I switched, but I will guess it was 2016.

I do not wear analog watches. I considered getting a Casio Duro except that the watch doesn't have numbers on the dial. It just has those numberless notches. I hate this. What is worse is those watches that get rid of the notches altogether presenting a minimalist guessing game on the time with two hands on a bare face. I don't need this level of sophistication. I like watches that tell the time without me needing to think about it.

2. Decaf coffee

A Nazi invented decaf coffee. I can't understand why he did that, but he did. What I also can't understand is why people drink this crap. Would you smoke a cigarette that didn't have nicotine? Would you drink whiskey that didn't have alcohol? If you don't want caffeine, drink water or orange juice. Leave my coffee alone.

3. Self-checkouts

A self-checkout is where you do the work, and they pay people to keep you from stealing stuff. They could actually check you out, but somehow, the company makes more money paying these people to watch you check yourself out. Meanwhile, there will be one or two real checkouts with massively long lines. This insanity is why I refuse to shop at Walmart now except in extreme circumstances.

4. Buttons on the tops of baseball caps

When I buy a ballcap, the first thing I do is whip out a screwdriver and pair of pliers and remove the dreadful button on the top of the thing. These buttons serve no function except for aesthetics except no one notices that my button is missing. The reason I find these things annoying is they hurt when you bump your head into the roof of a vehicle or when you wear protective ear muffs with the connecting part sitting on top of the button. I am bald, so that button does not feel good being pushed into my bare skull.

5. Wireless earbuds

Apple has to be making bank on these expensive earbuds especially when you lose one of them. I have never used them because I know I would lose them. Plus, they have to be charged first. I will stick with the wired earbuds. The wire is a bit aggravating, but it is cheap and doesn't get lost or need charging.

6. Touchscreen devices

I use a flip phone and a computer with a keyboard. The primary thing I like about my devices are the physical buttons. I despise smartphones, tablets, and touchscreens in vehicles. Somehow, Steve Jobs thought the world would be a better place if it was filled with screens covered in greasy fingerprints. The number one accessory for the iPad is a physical keyboard. Why not get a Chromebook or a real laptop?

7. Vinyl records

Audiophiles love vinyl records. I am not an audiophile. I had vinyl records as a kid. I took my boombox and recorded those albums to cassette tapes. I never played those records again. Since then, my preferred formats are tapes and CDs. My wife has a boombox in the kitchen that plays tapes and CDs. It gets heavy usage. We own no vinyl. Records scratch and break.

8. Sweatbands

I could use a sweatband because I sweat a great deal which rolls into my eyeballs causing stinging and irritation. The problem is that tight band around my skull gives me a splitting headache. My solution is to wear a bandanna under my boonie hat which solves the sweat in the eyes problem. I call it my "blue collar sweatband."

9. Wirebound notebooks

I stopped using wirebound notebooks in high school. The wire had the tendency of snagging on things. The wire would also get crushed making the pages impossible to turn. Then, there is the dreaded notebook dandruff you get if you tear out a page. My preference is loose notebook paper in a binder notebook. I would use a clipboard for taking notes and store the notes in the binders. As for pocket memo pads, I can recommend Rite in the Rain notebooks because their wired ends are uncrushable. Those memo pads beat other notebooks by staying open when you take notes. As for the cheap pads, they just get crushed in my pocket.

10. Stick shifts

I am a Gen Xer which means that I can drive a stick shift. I even drove a stick shift for the entirety of the 1990s. I thought my left knee was going to wear out pressing the clutch pedal. Today, I choose automatic transmissions. My left knee has been very happy since then.

11. LED headlights

These LED headlights must help drivers see because they blind everyone else on the road. My wife really hates these things. I think they are a nuisance and should be banned.

12. Winter vests

A winter vest is a coat with the sleeves cut off. I never understood why people buy them and wear them. I have never owned a winter vest. I need a real coat when I get cold.

13. Convertibles and open top vehicles

I have never owned a convertible. I would never buy one. I have known people who have owned convertibles, and they always ended up with a leak. I can say the same for sunroofs, Jeeps, and the rest. It's sad when the interior gets ruined and reeks of mildew after a rain. Convertibles are dumb.

14. Granite countertops

Imagine buying a surface that is ridiculously expensive, weighs a ton, and is fragile as glass. Yet, housewives love those granite countertops. It's a fair guess to say they don't expect to spend much time cooking. The kitchen is just for looks for these women. 

15. Glass tumblers

I used to drink out of cheap plastic cups I saved from the convenience store and fast food restaurants. These things were tacky and probably killing me with BPA chemicals or something. Anyway, I ditched those cups and went with some heavy glass tumblers from Walmart. These things work great until you drop one. Then, they become a bomb of broken glass. We now use higher quality plastic cups like they use in the cafeterias and family restaurants and Pizza Hut.

16. Pens with caps

I like pens that are one piece with the clicky button at the end. I don't like pens with the caps because those caps are going to get lost. I will use whatever is handy for writing, but my preference is for a clicky pen.

17. Expensive footwear

I have a pair of sandals that I call "Fakenstocks." They resemble Birkenstocks except they only cost me $20. Birkenstock hates this and decries it as theft. What they leave out is that they charge $150 for their sandals. Who is getting ripped off here? If you want to get more money, why not charge less for your sandals and make more sales? Yes, the cheap ones probably don't last as long, but I can still buy 5 of them for one pair of Birkenstocks.

When it comes to other shoes, I refuse to spend more than $100 for a pair of shoes. I will spend more for a pair of boots because they have more material, but I keep that below $150. I believe in quality footwear but not expensive footwear.

18. Expensive sunglasses

I wear tinted safety glasses from Harbor Freight. The pair I have now cost me $5, and I have been wearing them for at least 8 years now. Harbor Freight doesn't even sell that style anymore. I also wear a pair of cheap sunglasses I got after my eyes surgery. I call them my "geriatric terminator shades." They fit over a pair of eyeglasses.

I had a coworker who bought a pair of expensive Ray-Bans. I think they were close to $200. They looked real nice until he dropped them and scratched them up. I thought he was going to cry when that happened. This is why I don't buy expensive sunglasses.

19. HP printers

HP runs this scam where they sell you a thing that looks like a printer except it doesn't print. You get a few prints before you have to buy a new ink cartridge for the thing that costs more than a new printer. I wised up and bought a Brother printer. I will never buy another HP printer again.

20. Cartridge razors

This is the same scam that HP does with their printers except Gillette does it with their ridiculously expensive cartridge razors. This is just another way to rape you in the wallet. This is why I use an old school safety razor.

21. Candybar phones

I am a dumbphone user, but that dumbphone has to be a flip phone for me. I have been flipping for almost 20 years, and this is one of the reasons I don't want a smartphone. Candybar phones share one trait with smartphones--butt dialing. I like the fact that when I close my flip phone it is hung up and stays that way.

22. Hair

I have been shaving my head since I was 30. Before that, I buzzed my head with a pair of electric clippers and cut it as close as I could to the scalp. That is the long way of saying that I don't understand why men wear their hair long. When I had a mop of hair, I struggled with dandruff and keeping a hat on my head. Even if I didn't have male pattern baldness, I would still shave my head.

23. The sports report

I listen to the morning news on the talk radio station, and I love it until they get to the sports coverage. I have given up sports entirely now, so I consider it a waste of time to hear the scores each morning. My local newspaper publishes once a week and half of it is devoted to local sports. Finally, I hate when some sports story ends up in the hard news feed because of something political in the world of sports. Sports are a distraction from what really matters in the world.

24. Chicken littles on YouTube

To get clicks on YouTube, there are folks who come up with the most sensational doomsday headlines and stories that turn out to be nothing. I believe that things can and will get worse, and I prepare accordingly. But they almost never get as bad as these chicken littles claim. I unsubscribe from these false prophets of doom when I catch on to their grift.

25. Boycotts

I don't believe boycotts work. Folks will point to the Bud Light story as a success until you realize that most Bud Light drinkers switched to another brand sold by the same company. I don't drink beer, but I do drink coffee. People want to do to Dunkin' Donuts what they did to Bud Light. I wish my town had a Dunkin' Donuts, so I could boycott it. This is my smart aleck way of saying that I wish we had a Dunk. If I boycotted every company that ran afoul of my politics, I couldn't function in life. This would include blogging on this platform. When it comes to protesting, I stick with the old standby known as preaching.

That's enough complaining about annoying things. Hopefully, it was more entertaining than annoying for you, Gentle Reader. There is no end to annoyances, so you can expect a second edition of annoying things.