Through no fault of their own, the many U.S. Border Guards, according to Rep. Poe of Texas, are apparently guarding Interstate 10, which is a number of miles from the U.S.-Mexico border.  That makes a lot of sense, doesn't it?

The guards have been told specifically not to do what most of us would describe as "guarding the border."  That, in case any politicians happen to be reading this, means actually standing guard at the border and refusing entry to border-hoppers.

The guards have, according to Rep. Poe, been ordered to let people into the U.S. more quickly, that is, with fewer checks.  It takes less time that way.  Yes, indeed, it takes less time to allow more illegal entry into my country. 

This makes me very, very angry.  I have attempted for months and months to believe that I must be mistaken about what I could see happening before my very eyes.  The veil has been lifted, and what I see ain't pretty. 

The American people have been taken -- and are being taken -- for absolute fools.  What has happened to the spirit that, a few years ago, would cause us actually to guard our borders?  (Fight to keep that Second Amendment, my fellow Americans.)

I would like for some politician to tell me -- and quickly -- what happens when we become a third-world nation?  What happens when the majority of the hospitals close because they cannot afford to provide free health care from cradle to grave?  There are many questions to ask along these lines.

One very important question I would like to ask the politicians is this: 

WHERE IS THE FENCE?

I would like to know because I would like to boot some of those politicians right over it so that they hit the southern side with a nice, satisfying splat.

This blog post was inspired by a column today in Townhall (link follows), along with a comment thereto by "jlohman."  

http://www.townhall.com/columnists/BillSteigerwald/2007/09/01/uh-oh,_canada?page=full&comments=true

To believe the Democrats (if elected) will "fix" the Medicare Prescription Drug Plan program is pie-in-the-sky hogwash.

Democrats wanted to give away even more of the farm than the Republicans did.

If elected, the Democrats will do exactly that:  they will give away even more of your grandchildren's retirement future, including whatever assistance they may have hoped for in the prescription drug realm.

The only thing any elected party could do to make this plan more palatable to its participants is to restructure that "doughnut hole" during which the entire "negotiated" price for a drug must be paid by the participant.

Just for the fun of it, see if you can check a Medicare Prescription Drug Plan "negotiated" price against a retail price for someone walking into a drugstore off the street -- someone with no drug insurance whatever.  That "negotiated" price would be found to be staggering of its own weight.

What is the sense in that?  My answer:  none.

In my opinion we were "done wrong" by the Republicans when they voted in this travesty and when the President signed it into law that December day. 

The Democrats should be reminded, however, that two wrongs do not make a right.  

Too many middlemen spoil the soup.

Continuing my tirade against prescription drugs from China, the fact is that we do not know exactly in what countries our drugs are manufactured, nor do we know whether the ingredients are "safe" (quotes used here because hardly any drug or ingredient can be thought of as completely safe to every potential consumer). Are there unsafe ingredients known to the manufacturer?  We will never know.  Who would make such an announcement?

I can see the headlines now:

    "___________ PHARMACEUTICALS ANNOUNCES DRUGS MANUFACTURED IN CHINA"

   "___________ Pharmaceuticals list all drugs it manufactured in China"

This post was inspired by an AP news article on 8/14/07 concerning Giuilani and his promise to stop illegal immigration in its tracks, and to get a bead on those illegals already here.  The title:  Giuliani Vows to Stop Illegal Immigrants."

The link to that article is as follows: 

http://www.townhall.com/news/politics-elections/2007/08/14/giuliani_vows_to_stop_illegal_immigrants

I would vote for Tiny Tim if I truly believed he could stop illegal immigration and get a track on the ones here, sending them to the "back of the line" if they want to be here so badly. 

I would vote for the Cookie Monster if I truly believed he could cause the capture, trial, conviction and lifetime sentencing (or death) for child perverts.  For murderers.  For drunk drivers.  For drunken vehicular murderers.  For jaywalkers, for heaven's sake. 

What in the world do you suppose would happen if somebody was trying to get into Mexico illegally?  Venezuela?  Germany?  England?  I believe that in the first two countries, the trespassers would be shot dead on the spot. 

Are we the only nation in the world that does not provide for border security?  What in the name of common sense has come over our government?  Our lawmakers?  Our courts?  Our law enforcement?  (Of course, we know what happens to U.S. Border Patrol Agents when they try their best to protect our borders.  They wind up with stiff prison sentences, that's what.  While the raggedy-rear-end illegal drug runners/murders run back and forth free as a breeze.  And not a pardon in sight for those unjustly imprisoned Border Guards.) 

Are we the only nation in the world that does not keep track of foreign "visitors" until they are here so long they just blend into the woodwork? 

Are we the only nation in the world where "catch-and-release" is an unfortunate description of what really happens to repeat offenders among the illegal alien population?  For this, are we the laughingstock of the world?  We should be, I am ashamed to say.  Repeat child rapists who are also illegal aliens have no place on earth, and certainly not roaming our country, also free as a breeze. 

How many terror cells have been created by not porous but completely open borders?  Is it not true that we have enough crackpot terrorists among our own citizenry so that we surely do not need any more from outside? 

As I said, I would vote for Tiny Tim or the Cookie Monster or just about anybody who could do what Giuliani is now promising.  Incidentally, this is the sticking point that lost McCain for most of us.  It's really too bad.  However, with that illegal immigrant attitude ..... well, that's the way it goes. 

This blog post is inspired by Phyllis Schlafly's 8/13/07 column entitled "Americans Need China-Free Food.  The link is as follows:  

http://www.townhall.com/columnists/PhyllisSchlafly/2007/08/14/americans_need_china-free_food 

Look at the tags in any piece of apparel you're wearing right now.  Odds are that at least one is from China. 

That is not as worrisome, however, as the idea that prescription drugs are manufactured in China. 

How much, and by whom?  Now there's a question for the sages. 

Next question:  who at the FDA inspects every little bottle and vial of prescription medication that reaches our shores from China?  Who? 

We already know that the FDA's resources are stretched to the limit.  Therefore, we cannot expect the FDA to assure us -- I mean really, really assure us -- that drugs from China are safe. 

The Federal government makes a big case out of the fact that there is no other country with safer drugs than the United States.  And that, my friend, is why there is absolutely, positively no "free trade" when it applies to an individual U.S. consumer. 

While it is true (per one of my U.S. Senators) that if an individual purchases drugs for his personal use from a foreign country, Customs will not hold it up.  However, the possibility hangs over one's head. 

I have drugs purchased four miles from home that are jet-setters of the first water:  they arrive from Ireland, England, Canada, and Germany, to name a few. 

Who inspects these drugs?  Who?  Aren't they drugs "from foreign countries"? 

There is nobody in the world who can assure me that my drugs are safe.  Certainly not the FDA. 

Drugs are beginning to be manufactured by the millions in China.  Do you want some?  Not me.  But who, pray tell, will advise me about this matter, particularly if the drug has been repackaged by the local pharmacy or by a Prescription Drug Plan mail-order company?

Would you rather have drugs manufactured in Canada or in China? 
This is part I.  The press of other matters calls me away from this subject which is one about which I care passionately.
There will be a Part II.  This subject needs press. 

Those are heavy subjects.  Politics.  Immigration.  Wars.

Faced with the mere words themselves, I realize what a lightweight I am.

Nevertheless I will weigh in. 

Politics stink.  Most politicians reek.  Recently I commented to a blog by Sandra Lea Wise ("A Word to the Wise") wherein Sandra stated it seemed America was now leaning left. 

A dilemma arises when one leans neither right nor left and is left standing alone with little support. 

The reason for my standing alone, sensing no support, is that the choices among the presidential hopefuls are in my opinion nonexistent.  Not one appears to have the intensity or fire or desire or a proper philosophy to go for it.  And until that happens I shall continue to stand alone, leaning neither right nor left. 

Politicians have in large part left me with the feeling they're all slopping at the trough with others of their kind.  This is not exacerbated in the least by the realization that I personally have little slop to add to the trough, while lobbyists for corporate interests seemingly have endless supplies of it.  Slop, that is. 

That is where I am on the subject of politics. 

Immigration is an issue that is, I believe, enraging most Americans, one leaving us with a profound sense of impotence.  It seems that all we can do is rage.  And rage.  And rage.  While politicians (oops -- the subjects are overlapping) in Washington are doing the equivalent of fiddling while we burn in rage. 

For 20 years the illegal alien problem has grown and festered to the point of eruption, and still our government does nothing creative or realistic about  it. 

Known alien criminals repeat offenses against our laws, and there is little if anything being done to allay our belief that justice will be served, either now or in the foreseeable future. 

Drunk alien drivers kill hundreds of Americans each year; yet that problem continues. 

Convicted alien pedophiles and child molesters and rapists continue to lurk, molest and rape; yet that problem continues. 

For 20 years illegal aliens have been allowed to slither, crawl, swim, climb around or over any of our ineffectual barriers on our southern border.  Yet that problem continues. 

Our U.S. Border Patrol has been prevented from doing the job it has been instructed to do:  protect our borders.  In fact, it seems to be just the ticket to catch Border Patrol members, accuse them of doing their jobs, try them, convict them, and throw them in prison with the types of criminals they were charged with apprehending.  All this while the U.S. (that's you and me) pays off the criminal to testify against our people, and then allows the criminal to continue to ply his trade unimpeded, back and forth across the border. 

There is something terribly wrong with this picture. 

Three to seven miles of 700 miles of promised fencing have been built.  There has been no news that anyone is working feverishly to complete the remaining approximately 693 miles.  All the average American can do is to keep up the repetitive "Where is the fence?"  Just where is the fence? 

Who is it that is charged with enforcing our immigration laws?  Here's my opinion:  they are falling down on the job. 

On the subject of war:  we are in it.  Using the politicians' war cry, are we in it to win it? 

Have we become such paper tigers that we arm our enemies to the teeth, hoping, apparently, that doing so will prevent their ganging up on us and flattening us -- so descriptively suggested as "wiping us off the face of the earth"? 

I could perhaps be called a hawk, suggesting, as I have to my U.S. lawmakers, that we show "those people" -- and everyone knows what people are meant here -- who has the biggest gun. 

Or shall we wait until we no longer have the biggest gun?  Do we have a death wish?  Rather, does our esteemed executive branch have a death wish for us?  Do our politicians (there they are again) have a death wish for us? 

Are we forsaking one of our best allies and friends, Israel, for a farthing?  Are we selling them out?  Are we selling ourselves out? 

Let's ask the politicians. 

So now we're at a point where we need to consult other countries, such as Mexico, before we pass any laws. 

That's one of the items picked out of the transcript of an exchange between Glenn Beck and the beseiged mayor of Hazleton, Pennsylvania after a judge had ruled against his town in an immigration matter. 

It would seem that even though the federal government will not enforce its laws against illegal aliens, it will not allow city governments to create and enforce their own such laws. 

My understanding is that Hazleton has grown like Topsy with its influx of illegal aliens, that crime has increased, and that the city deemed it proper to draw up a few rules to keep the problems in check.  One of the proposed new laws was that landlords could not rent to illegal aliens.  Another one of the laws was that employers could not hire such aliens.  My understanding may perhaps be somewhat fuzzy as to the details, but those are roughly the facts as I perceive them. 

My gorge rises with the thought that our federal government, which is presumably made up of a bunch of individuals known as "we, the people," will not, absolutely will not, I tell you, enforce immigration laws.  It has come to the point where political correctness must win out over all, and that we must not call these aliens what they are:  lawbreakers. 

The aliens are lawbreakers when they first slither around, jump over, crawl under, swim over, dig under, or do any other thing to enter our country illegally.  Anything that happens after that fact is second to the first broken law. 

The first item of business upon finding any illegal alien is this:  deport them. 

My regrettable conclusion with respect to our esteemed president is that he has no intention, had no intention, never will have an intention, to enforce immigration laws.  For that I am angry.  

We managed to kill the "immigration reform bill" recently, and for that I am grateful.  My understanding is that we tied up Senate telephone lines, and that e-mail messages were pouring in like rain in a thunderstorm.  Fax machines were overworked as well. 

However, that does not mean that we must sit back and say everything is okay now.  It means that our lawmakers in Washington need to get on track first of all to have the promised fence built, and to see to it that our existing laws are enforced. 

We cannot let our lawmakers off the hook without these actions.  I say that with their increased salary, they show their gratitude by working through the month of August, rather than taking the month off (what are they, psychiatrists?).  They are supposed to be working for us, rather than the other way around. 

And one other thing:  if the federal government will not enforce its own immigration laws, then allow cities and states to create and enforce their own -- without the permission of any other country.  Without the permission of the federal government.  Without the permission of anyone or anything except a majority of the voters of that city or state. 

Recently a two-page tightly written letter was addressed to my State Senator and State Representative giving them the invaluable benefit of my opinion concerning the parole and sentencing of sexual predators. 

The gist of this message was roughly this:  there should not be parole for these creatures.  One-strike-and-you're-out convictions should make sentencing an easy matter.  Send the Beelzebub students to prison for the rest of their unnatural lives. 

There was a case not so long ago where the judge, in her inimitable (one hopes) style, gave a child rapist parole, and no prison, for the simple reason the rapist was short and that his life might be in danger if he were sent to prison.  Really?  How many people give a rat's hindquarters? 

How short was his victim? 

Is there a minimum size for monsters before they can be sentenced to interminable prison? 

That case is being reviewed, thank goodness.  Maybe there will be a judge who can recognize evil for what it is and not have any qualms about meting out whatever the maximum sentence is.  And fast. 

This writer happens to be supremely indifferent as to the life span of perverts.

There was also a recent case where a convicted child rapist was given, I believe, 30, 60 or 90 days in prison, rehabilitation counseling, and parole for four years. 

Rehabilitation counseling is the concoction of sleazy psychologists who simply want to guarantee themselves employment.  There would be no dearth of "patients," thus providing at least a living wage for the rest of their miserable, worthless lives.  As anyone with a grain of sense knows beyond any reasonable doubt, rehabilitation is a pipedream. 

My state was considering providing psychological counseling to youngsters who abuse animals.  In my opinion, for youngsters who have already begun to abuse animals and derive pleasure or enjoyment in that act, there is no longer any hope.  They are exactly like the perverted savage beasts who prey upon children. 

Does this opinion need to be expanded?  I think not. 

Yes, that about sums it up rather neatly. 

These barbarians have no hope.  They see no future for themselves or for those like them:  other ignorant, pitiful creatures.  In their warped and unsalvageable minds it appears that it would build them up to destroy the lives, accoutrements and mere possessions of people who have more than they. 

They are true barbarians.  They do not know how to create; therefore they destroy.  None but barbarians would behave this way. 

So many lives wasted because of nothing but pure hate and, dare I say it, jealousy. 

This blog post is in response to the AP news column of May 29, 2007, entitled "Obama  Offers Universal Health Care Plan."  This column can be found at: 

http://www.townhall.com/News/NewsArticle.aspx?ContentGuid=a2df01da-e49e-4376-8a1c-7135bdbb101b

We might ask Obama if his calculations include the 20 million estimated illegal aliens now among us, and if they include the estimated 500,000 immigrants to be swarming into the country yearly after this bogus proposed immigration bill passes.

Actually, thought of in that way, it may as well be "universal" health care.   

Here's my question to Obama and any other nonthinking presidential hopeful who "offers" health care to all:  Who pays for this?  I know, Obama said that, more or less, everybody pays.  Specifically, he mentioned the following groups as being responsible for paying for this offering of his:

The government, which, incidentally, comprises we, the people, will pay;

Businesses, many of which are strapped already, will pay; and

"Consumers" will pay. 

May I please remind Obama that "consumers" are already included in the above three categories. 

When nobody has any money, and this includes businesses, most of which cannot afford their own, let alone anyone else's insurance, how do doctors function?  How do hospitals function?  How do nurses function? 

What is "health care"?  Who actually provides this service?  I guarantee you it's not going to be Obama. 

Has Obama (or any half-wits talking about "universal" health coverage) forgotten the source of health care? 

Besides doctors, hospitals, nurses, and laboratories, how will we pay for the FDA and all its minions? 

How will we contribute to the National Institutes of Health? 

How will we contribute to the Center for Disease Control?

How will we continue to subsidize drug research?

How will we continue to subsidize drug advertising? 

How will we continue to subsidize what is generally called "Big Pharma"? 

How will we continue to subsidize those "drug detailers" who show up in doctors' offices, whose ubiquitousness is almost guaranteed each time you enter a doctor's office?   

Next time somebody "offers" "universal health care" to you and other residents of the United States, ask him or her the above questions.  It would be worth it just to see their jaws drop. 

While you're at it, ask him or her how much they and their offspring personally will be contributing in perpetuity to this "offering."

Sounds more like a "taking" to me. 

This blog was inspired by Phyllis Schlafly's column today entitled "Easy to see why U.S. jobs move overseas." The link is:

http://www.townhall.com/columnists/PhyllisSchlafly/2007/04/30/easy_to_see_why_us_jobs_move_overseas

*     *     *     *

A while back Burt Prelutsky wrote a column entitled "Let's hear it for chocolate!" It may have been around Valentine's Day.

I wrote Burt a short email message describing how, when we were little, my sister and I would occasionally be given a nickel each (it was a long time ago) and permission to go to the little store a block away so we could buy Hershey bars.

I described in excruciatingly mouth-watering detail the joy my sister and I experienced eating those Hershey bars and making sure none of the melted chocolate on the inside wrapper had an opportunity to escape our thorough appreciation.

This Hershey bar love affair has lasted through the decades without any abatement in enjoyment and complete salutary satisfaction. 

Sometime after that Prelutsky column and my message to Burt, I learned that Hershey, PA will no longer be home to -- surprise!  the Hershey bar. Who knows what country or galaxy will have the pleasure of making those candy bars? But, then, who cares?

I have a stash of two Hershey bars in my house for emergency use only. When they're gone, they're gone. I'm not stupid enough to throw them away -- they were made here in the U.S.A. However, that's it. When Hershey bars are made in who-knows-where, who does care? I would rather give them up than give Hershey the satisfaction of future purchases.

I have not informed Hershey of this decision – and of course it won't make any difference to them – but I will so inform them. They can just keep their Hershey bars in the future.

Meanwhile -- now if I could just remember where I stashed those Hershey bars.

I haven't heard or seen or been written to by any politician who has any idea at all what the American people want. They are or do a good job of pretending to be as deaf as posts.

Politicians do not want to hear that Americans want all members of the U.S. National Guard to be armed and to be able to defend themselves against armed and dangerous illegal aliens. They were armed in New Orleans in the aftermath of Katrina. Why, then, can't they all be armed at the border?

Politicians do not want to hear that Americans want no part of amnesty. It didn't work 20 years ago; it's not going to work now.

Politicians do not want to hear that Americans don't give a hoot in a "holler" what Mexican President Calderon wants.

Politicians do not want to hear that Americans want a real fence (I believe one with razor wire will do) – not a fence one may walk through at will.

Politicians do not want to hear that it is too expensive to dismantle the football-field-sized (and smaller) tunnels between Mexico and the U.S.  Did they (the politicians) ever hear of dynamite?

Here is a repetition: Politicians do not want to hear that Americans want to deport illegal aliens.

Politicians are deaf, do you hear?

When election time comes around, maybe they will wish they had cleaned their ears out.

It is my understanding that the government produces nothing.  The government makes nothing.  The only thing the government has is what it takes from those who work. 

If nobody works, the government is incapable of assessing taxes.  If the government is incapable of assessing taxes, who will take care of "life's losers"? 

Who will take care of all the minorities?  Who will take care of the elderly, the young, the unemployed, the illegal aliens?  In fact, who will be left to take care of us? 

I want my share of the spoils.  But who provides the "spoils"?