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Monday, October 20, 2008

What a Difference a Millennium Makes

It occurred to me today that it might be instructive for me to ponder how I came to my strongly held anti-liberal-left political views, since it wasn't always so. Then I decided that my personal political questing might be of some general interest to those who may visit this site.

My parents and I (as a seven-year-old boy) came to America in the aftermath of the Holocaust of World War Two. We were grateful for America's welcoming as symbolized by Lady Liberty in New York Harbor. It was October 24, 1949, our personal Day of Liberty, 59 years ago almost to the day.

President Truman had been elected the previous year to supplement his inheritance of FDR's 4th term, and since both Democrats presided over Nazi Germany's defeat, it was logical that my parents became lifetime Democrats. I had inherited my mainstream liberal political views from my parents, just as if they were bestowed on me like my mother's fair skin was, as well as my father's dark brown hair. Incidentally, I almost chose "Harry" (in honor of our President) to be my anglicized version of Heinrich, though after what was a very agonizing struggle for a young boy, I finally settled on Henry because it just appealed to me more. Perhaps that was the first crack in my solidarity with mainstream liberalism (but I doubt it; I was too young then to realize that was to be my political inheritance).

Even when General Eisenhower, esteemed by my parents only slightly less than the Deity for leading American and British forces against Germany on the Western Front, ran for President, my parents did not forsake their chosen political party in the 1956 Election. They lamented Adlai Stevenson's losses, but managed to be happy for the General of the Army, nevertheless. We became American citizens during Eisenhower's first term in Office, but I was not eligible to vote for President (because of my age) until the 1964 Election.

From the 1964 Election, my first time voting for President (Lyndon Johnson), until the Election of 2000, when I voted for Al Gore, I voted Democratic come hell or high water. I was elated by the outcomes for Johnson, Carter, and Clinton. I was dejected by the outcomes for Nixon, Reagan, Bush I, and the first election for Bush II. In particular, when Bill Clinton was subjected to the tyrannical Starr prosecution with the gleeful support of all those cynical Republicans, I had vowed I would never vote Republican for any office unless Abraham Lincoln was miraculously resurrected. So much for eternal vows made in the heat of battle.

Then came September 11, 2001. Unlike any other event that occurred in my lifetime, even including Nazi Germany's crimes against humanity, which mercifully I was too young to comprehend while I survived them, this outrage against Americans effected my jarring metamorphosis from a naive and overly trusting idealist into a thinking, distrusting realist. When President Bush went after the bastards who attacked us he became my hero instantly. I wanted revenge, known as justice in polite conversation, and American armed forces provided it in spades (no, you morons, it's not a racist remark; it's an American idiom).

If they want to kill us, it is incumbent on us to kill as many of them as we can before they have a chance to kill any more of us. During the shock and awe phase of Iraq II, after Saddam's sons were killed, I was really taken by a joke that Dennis Miller told at their expense. It went something like this: Qusay Hussein yells to his brother "Uday! Uday!" Miller supplies the answer to the supposed questions 'Who they? Who they?' — "Them's the Marines motherf*cker!"

And that is precisely why I am voting for John McCain. Sarah Palin is just the hot icing on the cake, so to speak. As for Obama, Biden, Pelosi, Reid, Dodd, Barney "Rubble" Frank, and all the other inmates of our liberal insane asylum, well, "F*ck 'em if they can't take a joke."

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