It’s Christmas Eve and I doubt many will be blogging today; for whatever reason I find myself on the upstairs HP confuser listening to Porcupine Tree’s Stupid Dream album. I am alone tonight. My fiance had to work today, as this is her “Monday.” She works Christmas Day and to Wednesday. I have tomorrow off. She works and lives in Sacratomato. I live high in the Sierra Nevada mountains.
I went train chasing today and caught a beautiful UP consist heading downhill over the Long Ravine Bridge towards Colfax.
I came home after a bout of photography and began cleaning up after the Early Christmas. I put all my Christmas things away (on Christmas Eve, of all times!) but left my wreath on the front gate. I organized even more thoroughly for next year, placing all the Christmas items in my Grandmother’s trunk from Scotland, which rests in my living room. Everything fit wonderfully. I cleaned out more spaces around the house and vacuumed, oiled the antiques, reorganized the cupboards. As I write this I’m doing multiple loads of wash; I’ve already broomed off the decks in anticipation of more snow this week. I loaded more wood. The stove is already stacked with a load ready to light. My pantry is stacked with bottled water and canned food. The propane tank is up to around 70% — more than enough to get me through the worst of winters.
When I finished, I opened a nice Merlot, lit some candles, and reflected on the work I’ve done since 2004.
I exited one moribund relationship in 2004 and found myself with a vacant house minus some door pulls and other key items. Such it is with give-and-take. A few properly-written checks later I completely severed the exsanguinated relationship and began a full court press to redecorate the house. In a fashion that I, for once, wished.
First, I threw away an amazing amount of needless gurp. I will be the first to admit that my cabin is small; not more than 1,250 sq ft., though it has two bathrooms (one upstairs and one downstairs) and three bedrooms. The upstairs bedroom (not technically a bedroom since it contains no “closet”) is a loft overlooking the open bottom floor.
I repainted several rooms and purchased new applicances, a wondrous, rich leather loveseat and sofa from Breuners, a huge Toshiba 42″ HiDef TV, and had the exterior repainted in the fashion I’d not been “allowed” under the previous regime. Quite naturally, it looks great. I also spent $9,000 on a new Trex deck and, in 2005, spent $5,000 to have a massive 192′ pine removed from the property — its base had been damaged by lightning as I feared it would crack and fall in the coming winter.
In summary, my house is now precisely how I like it. Influenced and created and decorated by no one other than me. To me this means everything. I finally have control over my home and, by proxy, over my Life. Because, at work, I have No Control.
My home is now the Anchor I have sought in my fevered existence. Without this Anchor, a spot I can cleave to, Nothing Makes Sense. When I desire, I can retreat to my own personal Hidey-Hole, disappear down its shaft and pull the rock in after me. What I also discovered is that no one, besides me, has my taste in decoration. And I do have fabulous taste. This is not bragging; this is simply fact.
I tried to express the import of my feelings about this to the prior administration but they eventually turned a deaf ear. They are now on their own and God Bless their efforts. They are operating now within their own parameters and I am now on mine. To our mutual benefit.
And what has this to do with the current post?
Well, perhaps, a bit of reflection over the past year and back a few years to 2004, a turning point for me.
2006 will soon be gone. What do I envision for 2007?
Any prescient predictions on my part?
I’m thinking:
The GOP will continue to be dazed and confused; it will not much coalesce — it hasn’t the intelligence. The Dems will continue to fight each other, like the GOP. There will be no unified strata on either side of the aisle.
2007, however, will be THE year that Presidential Candidates MUST assemble their war chests, amass their troops, Fish or Cut Bait.
There are no real clear leaders on either side of the aisle just yet. But I might hazard this guess:
On the GOP side: Rudy Giuliani appears, to me, to be the most credible of candidates. Yes, he leans a tad Left on certain social issues. That’s fine with me. Considering the total of those who may represent the GOP, I’m finding I’ll back a Leader more than I will someone who weakly espouses something of the daily Talking Points. Yes, Giuliani will have a time explaining the issues with his wife and his affair; guess what? I’ll STILL take Giuliani because he IS a LEADER.
I suspect that, in 2007, Israel will have to make a massive military strike on either Syria or Iran. This will be backed my US military equipment but not by overt US action. Prior to this, Lebanon will be a source site of missiles into Israel which will be a predicating event for Israel’s action. Israel will NOT give up Gaza.
North Korea will continue with the sabre-rattling. Sensible Shoes will remember that NK still cannot produce glass without sugar candy imperfections. The Midget will be distracted by more and more internal strife and dissension — dealing with the lack of basics such as food, housing.
America will continue within Iraq. There will be a stronger and stronger push to completely abandon this country. Saudis will find themselves pushed physically up against the Sunni/Shiite wall — and it won’t be comfortable. Their power and comfort will still be the dollar-per-barrel charge they make. When the Shiites loom, they will cut loose with a deafening defense.
Iran will find itself more and more challenged from within. When the overall elections did not go completely towards Ahmadinnerjacket’s this year, that was a portent from Allah.
Europe will continue to be challenged by immigration. China will continue to rise boldly. The dollar will stabilize to a degree. At home, we may finally realize that our funding is finite. The Taxpayer may finally come to realize how inordinately He and She has been Fleeced.
This will continue to create dissension in the US ranks. We will be on the cusp of realizing how much and to what degree we ignore and sacrifice domestic issues for international issues.
In a Nutshell, there will be a greater push to make America more Isolationist.
I do not inherently disagree with this immediate policy.
We can start with the UN.
DO YOU HAVE PREDICTIONS FOR THE COMING YEAR, 2007?
BZ
I do wish you a Merry Christmas, Mr. Z!
There is one image that will not shake from my mind about Mr. Giuliani… that of him amidst the smoke, dust and chaos, doing what was necessary and putting the first face on *how* to face this world. He did not know what had happened to the rest of America, but something under his care will *not* fall while he is in charge. To hell and gone with ‘social issues’ which are used to divide the Nation into smaller pieces. Those can be hashed out as needs be… but we must *have* a Nation to do that. The time of America running from the World is now over.
Large oceans will not protect us.
A large military will not protect us.
More nuclear devices will not protect us.
The only ones that can protect us is us, We the People.
The last time America went isolationist when the world was in danger, we heard about this funny man in Germany and the Sudetenland. Japan had already been in China and fighting Russia for long years by then. We slept. We pulled the covers up and hoped for the best. The World would not touch America…
Now there is no excuse, no place to run to, no place to hide and only the American People can save themselves. We are, most likely, doomed and have been ever since the Republic started. But we are consumate experts in putting off that final doomsday just *one more day*.
That feeling that used to portend isolationism now cannot isolate America. The last time it was reminded of this, three tyrants fell across the world. This time the World will not be so lucky if we decide that ‘enough is enough’. Isolationism is anger at being disturbed in Our Liberty and this time there are those denying that Liberty has meaning both at home and overseas.
We cannot afford the Socialist Coma of Europe, nor the criminal capitalism of Russia or the lashing decay of Communism in China. Each of those types of systems have run their course and those ideas of the mid-19th century and 20th century have run out of steam. And yet a Nation of the 18th century can survive and flourish, but the death toll to get from here to there mounts day by day, not by ones and twos in Iraq or Afghanistan, but by the huge butcher’s bill that accrues if we run again.
We now have enemies that cannot and will not make Peace by design of how they fight and what they do. The Left has no solution, no value, nothing to put up to address that. Fear speaking of the enemy and you become enslaved by that fear. Yet that is what those to that edge of the spectrum do every day… those on the Right have lost all hold on what it means to have a Nation that stands *for* anything. Big Government from *both* sides is the death of Liberty and Freedom as life is dictated by Government.
We felt the shifting in the winds this summer… a shift that left both Parties and both *sides* becalmed. The Dream of Empire has awoken in the world once more and they cannot address it. Hegelian views are not those to confront an Empire… Empire must be opposed across the spectrum with *everything* and give it no room to gain strength and build.
Run this time and the first global war of this century will make the death toll to all of last century’s conflicts appear miniscule. America on the run will be ripe for the knife in the back… and then the Terrible Swift Sword of the Republic, in full flame, will drop sunlight in a thousand places and light them up with the final light of Liberty.
Those that want to do *nothing* now, that want to *run* now, that want to *hide* now are asking for that fate. By trying to avoid it, you doom yourself to it as that is the logic of Empire and of every Tyrant ever to walk the Earth.
And it all starts with Naming Names.
And hearing one ‘side’ of the spectrum squeal at the ‘unfairness’ of it. And the other side fall silent as they have no answer to those names, having created the situation we are stuck in. Then you have two sides that get you to the exact same end… squealing and silence, just the same.
The cold winter winds of Empire are starting to be heard in far off lands now brought close. Jack Frost is visiting the cozy red lumps of Communists and making them tremble. Those wanting a ‘real world approach’ shiver at the coldness and wonder if it is time to put the suntan lotion away. Those trying to get ‘economic stability’ suddenly realize their coins have gone icy cold and they stick to the fingers.
2007 the Year Empire Returned to Mankind.
And the Sons and Daughters of Liberty squabbled as the first flakes of snow drifted onto them.
Nothing in politics of the 20th century has stopped this from happening.
Welcome to the 21st century.
AJ: whew! All excellent points! You are particularly correct that far off distances and massive oceans shield us not, not when we have remarkably porous borders, ports and airspace.
If you listen to Left Wing talk radio, the thing I find quite disconcerting is that listeners and hosts primarily believe that terrorism and Islamism is no credible threat and that the Right is “making this an issue” in order to support their Corporate War Friends.
BZ
Mr. Z – The Left kept on telling everyone what a ‘small world it is’. Now they run hard from that very same belief.
It is small and it has reached out to strike, not once, but many times. It has struck at home to let us know that Empire is coming back and will not stand us. And there the Left go saying the size of the world will protect us.
You cannot have it both ways and the proof of the smallness was on Dec. 7, 1941. The next good reminder of that was on 9/11, although the strikes at Embassies ARE against Sovereign Territory of the US. That has been set in diplomatic circles for at least two Centuries if not longer.
The Left would now have us curl up and deny the world and want to sing happy songs, while the barbarians seeking Empire arise once more to start pulling civilization down. These enemies will not stop.
They are taking no quarter: submit or die.
The US put paid to such in previous generations all the way back to Thomas Jefferson… funny how so many on the Left laud him, and then will not stand up as HE DID to send troops to a far off land to protect the Nation and let others know that we will not submit to blackmail or extortion. If Jefferson could do that, then where does the Left get off in wanting to curl up and deny the world?
And Jackson sent the first US ship of any kind half-way around the world to deal with Pirates. Islamic Pirates. The first US ship to circumnavigate the globe was a War Ship sent by Jackson. We have been fighting Islam in one form or another since Jefferson. Jackson. T. Roosevelt. Those were men that had ideals, Jackson’s harsh but fair, Jefferson’s high but realistic, and Roosevelt’s optimistic and yet oriented to keeping the Nation safe.
Where does the Left of today get off running when the likes of those set the Nation to fight Islam? And the Islamic Moros in the Philippines took nearly a full decade to finally put down and end as a threat then. And the Moros of today restarting their killing still FEAR the name of Pershing. And respect that name.
I do not care if America is loved by the likes of terrorists. I want them to fear us enough so that they drop this fool notion of attacking us. If not, then the Roman way against those who opposed them also worked. As did the Varangians in Byzantium who unfurled the Raven Banner. As did Jefferson. Jackson. Teddy Roosevelt.
They wish to build an Empire on our bones.
I do not want to give them the least bit of breathing space to continue.
If you abhor fighting *now* then the holocaust to follow is your responsibility entire.
Fighting is never the *first* thing to do.
By making it the last you guarantee slavery before it.
I put it around #3.
Talk first, but that has been tried for decades with thousands dead.
We have been struck many times, and with talking nothing has been accomplished.
Now attacked, and so it is fight.
We did not start this war.
But we sure, as hell, will end it or die trying because it is the death of Liberty if we STOP.
You have a happy new year BZ!