Every year I am delighted to be asked to emcee our annual Sturgis Falls Days parade. It’s essentially our local founder’s day event and every year the Black Hawk County Republicans have a float, and the Democrats, as well, and every year there are several candidates from both parties running for office who work the…
Month: June 2012
Malcolm in the Middle
I grew up in the middle of America, in the middle of the middle class and was weaned on the middle of political ideology. I was given a perspective that lends itself to making reasonable observations and, perhaps, less myopic than a scientific approach might require. I relate to Malcolm Gladwell, the journalist who wrote the books, The Tipping…
Tree Huggers, Tea Baggers, and Baby Seals
I don’t like extremism. I’m not so far left that I can’t recognize left wing extremism and I will acknowledge that sometimes I cringe at their antics. I have remarked, “You know you might be taken more seriously if you weren’t in a thong while protesting the chemical plant.” Usually, the left stages dramatic support…
Fairy Dust
I’ve been watching politics for several decades and there are trends I have noticed that stay pretty consistent. When George Bush Sr. was campaigning against Michael Dukakis I heard my father coin the term “Political Fairy Dust.” It was his dismissal of a strategy that he noticed every election cycle; Republicans always promise “lower taxes,”…
Wasted, Exhausted, and Murderous
The Mosque of Zero
This weekend I was in a conversation with a politically conservative friend and we discussed the former controversy surrounding the Islamic Cultural Center built in the area of Ground Zero. Even though the controversy more or less subsided after it opened last September to very little protest and many conservatives have submitted that it was…