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The contents of the “Weekly Feature” page are provided to you for your entertainment, amusement, and perhaps information. Here you may find articles of interest, pictures, historical information on the Club, or whatever shuffles to the top of the pile on our desk. The only defined characteristic of this space is that we will make every effort to change/replace it around the middle of each week. Thank you for visiting, and please stop by again. Click on any photo to see it larger in a separate window.


How it Looks from Here

Traditionally, this is the time of the year when we get all the status reports from those who are charged with our oversight. You know, the President gives the State of the Union speech, the guv tells us how the State is doing, and closer to home, I’m sure most of our wives would be able to give a fairly objective report on our personal progress as human beings. Hell, they could probably even whip out some pie-charts and graphs to illustrate our recent “progress”. But even with all of this pertinent information at our disposal, I still feel like there is a narrow gap that could only filled by a truly local review. Since all of these other reports tend to view life from the standpoint of a certain domain, ie: State, National, etc., and most of my postings tend to be centered from the illusive town of Fergus, I guess we’ll just call this exercise “The State of the Corner” report.

Of course, as luck would have it, Fergus is pretty much dormant during this time of the year, so the report will pretty much consist of how the outside world looks from here. Historically, the first real public event of the season here is Groundhog’s Day, which, over the years, has ranged all the way from being a joyous outing in the good years to whiskey-fueled chaos in the bad years. In 2011, the hopeless rodent burrowed furiously, spending the entire cache of his winter-stored of energy, without ever breaking through the surface of the snow that held him captive. His time-honored predictions were thus entered as a no-show for this year.

Therefore, we are forced to look beyond the provincial confines to offer unsolicited opinions of the world beyond. Frankly, given what we see at first glance, our first instinct would be to beat a hasty retreat back into the rural seclusion that Fergus offers, place our backs to the wall, and make ready to defend what we have left.

The world seems a chaotic place. People marching in the streets, from Cairo, to Tripoli, to Wisconsin, etc, etc. Nobody’s happy. The turmoil in the Middle East makes the area even less stable at the moment, as they progress from bad government to no government at all. The situation in Libya is nothing less than volatile, with the potential for enormous human suffering before it ends. But even faced with that specter, I cannot hide a growing desire for isolationism. The problems, both present and looming, that we face in this Country should become the growing target for the ever-dwindling resources that we have left to deal with them. I don’t give a damn how many new I-Pads Steve Jobs introduces, unless they each come with a built-in “Reduce the deficit” app. I don’t think this country is struggling because we don’t have enough instant communication capability. I think it is in trouble because we have become so broadly dependent on 3rd world and emerging countries for everything that we use and consume. We sold them our technology, then our jobs, and now they are actively buying our future, in the form of all the debt that has been “outsourced”. I think it is in trouble because we have lost so much of our capability to manufacture. I think it is in trouble because too much of our economic stability is subject to the whims of the speculators in the financial investment community. I think it is in trouble because too much of our salt-of-the earth common sense background has been sacrificed on the altar of “political correctness”.

I think organized labor was a concept born of human need and human rights, but in some instances it may have outgrown its natural place in the food chain of the business world. After all, if the corporate entity they prevail over in some conflict ceases to exist, who is served or protected? In the public sector, if they prevail over the government in a conflict, who is the loser, since the government is “we the people”? Before you misinterpret my leanings on this subject, I am fully in favor of worker’s right to organize, but believe that both sides will ultimately have to deal with the same set of realities that impact the situation.

On a different note, at this writing, the Supreme Court has just ruled in favor of the church group that thinks it is their right to demonstrate at the funerals or burials of our soldiers lost in battle. Here’s one of those applications for that “common sense” philosophy I referenced earlier. Sometimes the “right” is just wrong. The court of public opinion would almost certainly rule about 95% in the opposite direction. The old guideline on the Free Speech issue always gave the caveat that you didn’t have the right to yell “Fire!” in a crowded theatre. I anticipate that this issue will begin to be handled in a more “local” manner. I am unable to understand how anyone would think this is a productive or appropriate means to practice their religion.

Since it is neither my nature, nor in my best interest, to contemplate serious issues at any greater length, we’ll close by noting how pleased we are that Charlie Sheen is still the president of his own fan club, doesn’t need any help, and that he seems to be doing well at this writing.


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