Ed. Note: This post was supposed to include a new Gray Graham song but unfortunately editorial (that would be me) screwed up and it didn’t. Good news? We will have more Graham-goodness later in week WITH the tune. My apologies to Gary and those readers confused by this, but it’s still a damn fine standalone editorial. And to answer a commenter’s question, no I wasn’t drinking, just careless. — JN
So I’ve been plinking around at my main hobby – music – for years. Just playing for my own amusement, or so it started out. Now I’ve got a band, we sound pretty good, we gig around town sometimes… (played for the wounded warriors’ Ride-2-Recovery event in Ventura, and we’re playing two gigs for the “Republican Party Animals” – one at the end of May and another in June)… and between that and film and TV assignments, I keep fairly busy.
Flashback to the last presidential campaign, 2007. I meet a bunch of conservatives in Hollywood. Who knew?! In liberal Hollywood, there are actually a bunch of folks who work in the film industry and think a lot like I do. Limited government, more personal freedom, individual responsibility, yada yada. I’d been a conservative for some time but the risks to our nation now seem much more pronounced and pressing than at any other time in my life.
And the primary threat I see is not from without – but from within.
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I realized some time ago we are in a culture war. On the one side we have those who love America, warts and all, and are proud to live in a country that stands as a beacon for freedom to the rest of the world. And on the other side, we have those who don’t think much of our country or our heritage. They blame America first for all the ills of the world; they mock and ridicule our time-honored traditions and cultural institutions like family, church, and country; they espouse the notion that our Constitution is a “living document” to be altered and “shaped” at the latest indignant whim of a Liberal activist judge. Our guiding document – the United States Constitution – they regard as a mere vestige of a stained and spotted past, an anachronistic relic irrelevant to our times. This side of the argument works tirelessly to “fundamentally transform” our shining City on the Hill into something unrecognizable, something European…something foreign. This side apparently has a big problem with a nation of rugged individualists who believe in Honor, Virtue, Freedom, and the unfettered and equal opportunity to, on your own, achieve a dream, limited only by your own talent, ambition, and perseverance.
The vitriol is ramping up – between those demanding personal responsibility and those pushing entitlements. Those who want liberty and self-reliance, and those who want to be taken care of. A nation of doers and builders and innovators, or the nanny state.
I’ve seen firsthand both sides in action – and though the Tea Party keeps it relatively civil and orderly -the Leftists use raucous, intimidating and at times violent tactics to push their agenda.