Thanksgiving 2022

Marie Barone was ahead of her time with her tofu turkey

ALOHA, ALL!!

As we prepare to give thanks, think about how different our country looks now than even a few years ago.  What will it look like in the future?  How will we be celebrating holidays like Thanksgiving?  The following look into the future is courtesy of HDR reader Steve.  While I’m thankful for all we have, there is a feeling of uncertainty in the pit of my stomach.  A feeling that I’m sure many of you have as well.  While we ponder our many blessings, let’s also vow on this Thanksgiving to not let the following scenario happen.  It’s not a pretty picture.  

GOD BLESS AMERICA – PASS THIS ON!!!

“Winston, come into the dining room, it’s time to eat,” Julia yelled to her husband.

“In a minute, honey, it’s a tie score,”  he answered.

Actually Winston wasn’t very interested in the traditional holiday football game between Detroit and Washington .  Ever since the government passed the Civility in Sports Statute of 2017, outlawing tackle football for its “unseemly violence” and the “bad” example it sets for the rest of the world,” Winston was far less of a football fan than he used to be.  Two-hand touch wasn’t nearly as exciting.  Yet it wasn’t the game that Winston was uninterested in.  It was more the thought of eating another Tofu Turkey.  Even though it was the best type of VeggieMeat available after the government revised the American Anti-Obesity Act of 2018, adding fowl to the list of federally-forbidden foods, (which already included potatoes, cranberry sauce, and mincemeat pie), it wasn’t anything like real turkey.

And ever since the government officially changed the name of “Thanksgiving Day” to “A National Day of Atonement” in 2020, to officially acknowledge the Pilgrims’ historically brutal treatment of Native Americans, the holiday had lost a lot of its luster.

Eating in the dining room was also a bit daunting. The unearthly gleam of government-mandated fluorescent light bulbs made the Tofu Turkey look even weirder than it actually was, and the room was always cold. Ever since Congress passed the Power Conservation Act of 2016, mandating all thermostats – which were monitored and controlled by the electric company – be kept at 68 degrees, every room on the north side of the house was barely tolerable throughout the entire winter.

Still, it was good getting together with family. Or at least most of the family.

Winston missed his mother, who passed on in October, when she had used up her legal allotment of life-saving medical treatment. He had had many heated conversations with the Regional Health Consortium, spawned when the private insurance market finally went bankrupt, and everyone was forced into the government health care program.  And though he demanded she be kept on her treatment, it was a futile effort.  “The RHC’s resources are limited,” explained the government bureaucrat Winston spoke with on the phone.  “Your mother received all the benefits to which she was entitled. I’m sorry for your loss.”

Ed couldn’t make it either.  He had forgotten to plug in his electric car last night, the only kind available after the Anti-Fossil Fuel Bill of 2021 outlawed the use of the combustion engines – for everyone but government officials.  The fifty mile round trip was about ten miles too far, and Ed didn’t want to spend a frosty night on the road somewhere between here and there.

Thankfully, Winston’s brother, John, and his wife were flying in.

Winston made sure that the dining room chairs had extra cushions for the occasion.  No one complained more than John about the pain of sitting down so soon after the government-mandated cavity searches at airports, which severely aggravated his hemorrhoids.  Ever since a terrorist successfully smuggled a cavity bomb onto a jetliner, the TSA told Americans the added “inconvenience” was an “absolute necessity” in order to stay “one step ahead of the terrorists.”

Winston’s own body had grown accustomed to such probing ever since the government expanded their scope to just about anywhere a crowd gathered, via Anti-Profiling Act of 2022.  That law made it a crime to single out any group or individual for “unequal scrutiny,” even when probable cause was involved.  Thus, cavity searches at malls, train stations, bus depots, etc., etc., had become almost routine.  Almost.

The Supreme Court is reviewing the statute, but most Americans expect a Court composed of six progressives and three conservatives to leave the law intact.  “A living Constitution is extremely flexible”, said the Court’s eldest member, Elena Kagan.  ” Europe has had laws like this one for years.  We should learn from their example,” she added.

Winston’s thoughts turned to his own children.  He got along fairly well with his 12-year-old daughter, Brittany, mostly because she ignored him. Winston had long ago surrendered to the idea that she could text anyone at any time, even during Atonement Dinner.  Their only real confrontation had occurred when he limited her to 50,000 texts a month, explaining that was all he could afford.  She whined for a week, but got over it.

His 16-year-old son, Jason, was another matter altogether.  Perhaps it was the constant bombarding he got in public school that global warming, the bird flu, terrorism, or any of a number of other calamities were “just around the corner”, but Jason had developed a kind of nihilistic attitude that ranged between simmering surliness and outright hostility.  It didn’t help that Jason had reported his father to the police for smoking a cigarette in the house, an act made criminal by the Smoking Control Statute of 2018, which outlawed smoking anywhere within 500 feet of another human being.  Winston paid the $5,000 fine, which might have been considered excessive before the American dollar became virtually worthless as a result of QE13.

The latest round of quantitative easing the federal government initiated was, once again, to “spur economic growth.”  This time, they promised to push unemployment below its years-long rate of 18%, but Winston was not particularly hopeful.

Yet the family had a lot for which to be thankful, Winston thought, before remembering it was a Day of Atonement.

At least, he had his memories.  He felt a twinge of sadness when he realized his children would never know what life was like in the Good Old Days, long before government promises to make life “fair for everyone” realized their full potential. Winston, like so many of his fellow Americans, never realized how much things could change when they didn’t happen all at once, but little by little, so people could get used to them.  He wondered what might have happened if the public had stood up while there was still time, maybe back around 2012, when all the real nonsense began.

Saying grace before carving the turkey at Thanksgiving dinner (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

“Maybe we wouldn’t be where we are today if we’d just said ‘enough is enough’ when we had the chance,” he thought.  However, that would not have been accepted as being “politically correct” by the then administration.

Maybe so, Winston. Maybe so.

Mark Twain once said: “It’s easier to fool people than to convince them that they have been fooled.”

Hump Day Report: Let Them Eat Shave Ice

ALOHA, ALL!!  It looks like the 0bama Royal Family has arrived for their Hawaii vacation.  But wait….King Barry isn’t here yet.  He “needed” to stay back in DC a little longer to make sure the payroll tax cut issue got resolved (Really?  What the heck was he gonna do about it??)  Anyhow, Queen Michelle and the two little princesses couldn’t wait for Barry so they headed out by themselves – with Barry to follow shortly after.  Wasteful, much?  Ah, but that’s what royal people do – they spend the peons’ money disregarding cost.  After all, aren’t they due?  Oh yeah…estimated cost for the 0bama adventure this year is $4,135,038.  You can get a lot of shave ice with that much money.   With More Vacation Days and Separate Travel, Price of Obama’s Annual Hawaiian Holiday Rises | Hawaii Reporter

UPDATE:  Maybe Barry won’t be able to come to Hawaii at all.   House Republicans Rebel Against Democrat-Controlled Senate Bill, Want Year-Long Payroll Tax Cut | CNSnews.com  “”The president said we shouldn’t be going anywhere without getting our work done,” Boehner said on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” referring to President Barack Obama’s oft-repeated promise to postpone his Christmastime trip to Hawaii if the legislation was not finished. “Let’s get our work done, let’s do this for a year.”  Wanna bet Barry gets out of Dodge despite his bluster about getting the job done????

Hey….a hoodie for the hood and all the gangstas in the 0bama administration?  

This makes sense – so it probably won’t happen.  How Can We Replace Today’s Bloated and Inefficient Tax Code? – AskHeritage  “America’s tax code needs reform, plain and simple. The current tax system discourages saving, investment, and entrepreneurship. It’s a drag on productivity, job growth, international competitiveness, and wages. It’s complicated beyond belief, and it needs to change.”

ICYMI:  DOJ Memo: Solicitor General Kagan ‘Substantially Participated’ in Obamacare-Related Case | CNSnews.com  “Exactly two months before the Judiciary Committee Republicans asked Kagan these questions, however, her top deputy, Neal Katyal, had written her a memo informing her that she had “substantially participated” in Golden Gate Restaurant Association v. San Francisco—a case that Kagan’s own office tied to Obamacare.”

Barry thinks he’s fourth best.  This didn’t make it into the 60 Minutes interview you saw last week.  Maybe because it makes him sound like…well..an egotistical maniac?  (Shaka to Scott.)  

But he’s Israel’s BFF!  Articles: Scintillating Chutzpah: Obama at Reform Judaism’s Confab   “In a display of scintillating chutzpah, after bidding everybody “Shabbat Shalom,” Obama linked himself to the biblical Joseph — the chief character in this week’s Torah portion. When Joseph’s father Jacob told him to join his brothers in their pasturelands, Obama pointed out, Joseph stepped forward and obediently said one word, “Hineni” – ” Here I am….Obama assured his audience that he also was ready to declare “Hineni” in responding to Israel’s struggles…”  ARE YOU KIDDING ME?????  DID THE PEOPLE IN THE AUDIENCE REALLY FALL FOR THIS SHIBAI??? (Hawaiian word)

Time for some NewsBusted:  “Camels don’t have back seats” – LOL!  

Dear Leader is dead – long live Dear Leader.  North Korea mourns dead leader, son hailed as “Great Successor” – Yahoo! News  “Earlier a tearful North Korean television announcer, dressed in black and her voice quavering, said the 69-year old ruler died on Saturday of “physical and mental over-work” on a train on his way to give field guidance — advice dispensed by the “Dear Leader” on trips to factories, farms and the military.”   Here’s how the new Dear Leader mourned his father’s death: Surprise! New Dear Leader conducts missile test « Hot Air

Barry didn’t like this.  Gee, I wonder why??  Lawmakers Offer Bipartisan Plan to Overhaul Medicare | Committee On The Budget  “A Democratic senator, Ron Wyden of Oregon, and a Republican representative, Paul D. Ryan of Wisconsin, unveiled a bipartisan plan on Wednesday to revamp Medicare and make a fixed federal contribution to the cost of coverage for each beneficiary. The lawmakers aim to reshape the debate over the giant health insurance program by addressing concerns that have provoked fierce opposition to similar ideas in the past.”

Final Thought:  “The right to rise.”  Paul Ryan, describing the concept of economic freedom.  “In freedom lies the risk of failure, but in statism lies the certainty of stagnation.”  Jeb Bush, Wall Street Journal editorial

GOD BLESS AMERICA – PASS THIS ON – REMEMBER IN 2012!!

(HDR Readers:  A very Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays.  I won’t be sending as many posts in the next couple of weeks….I’ll be celebrating Christmas, and the New Year.  I also have a book to finish!  Enjoy the warmth and beauty of the season.)