Liberty Maven

Why is it, I’ve often wondered, that when I tell people at parties that I’m a high school English teacher, even adding, since June, that I’m retired, I note a brief wave of anxiety cross their faces? You’d think people would be delighted to have the opportunity to talk to someone who really knows which predicate nominative to use after a copulative verb. But something dawned on me yesterday, during a silence after I’d said, “This is he” to someone who’d asked for me on the phone. Had I really just burdened some poor sod with the equivalent of “This is he whom you’ve called”? Far from erudite, it sounds like Lily Tomlin’s operator asking, “Is this the party to whom I’m speaking?”

It got worse later in the day when I was reading an article about California Governor Schwarzenegger’s attempts to find the state ways to save money. The Governor was quoted as saying, “We literally have to take the ladder from the tree and shake the whole tree.” My response: “Really, you’re going to literally shake a tree?” Wouldn’t a normal person have wondered how we could balance the books without impacting the needy? Is it really necessary to put Arnold back in the 8th grade for a lesson on the difference between metaphorical and literal?

Here’s the horror of it: “Yes,” I think, “he should be taught the difference.” No kidding, a little creature within me believes someone should advise Arnold about his violations of figurative speech. “That settles it!” you say, “English teachers are like cops who give you a ticket for being the third car in the intersection to turn left while five people just ran a red light with impunity. They’re like robots turned loose on society to keep anyone from saying, ‘She went to the mall with my friend and I.’”

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by Clyde James Aragon

As the difference between Republicans and Democrats intensifies, as their arguments become shriller, as the national deficit approaches critical mass, it’s obvious we’ve reached the point where conservatives and liberals simply can’t live together. We bicker endlessly over taxation, government control, school prayer, and the Second Amendment. We don’t even speak the same language these days. For instance:

Liberal: The land belongs to the people, man. It’s social justice that allows us to walk freely upon the earth.

Conservative: Get off my lawn, damnit!

However, rather than partition America and try to divide its property evenly, there is one way we could still coexist. That is, create separate national corporate entities and activities apart from each other which would meet the wants and needs of each group. We would have separate sales buildings and work and play areas all well-lit and properly demarcated so that no one would accidentally enter and be offended by what he or she saw. Here’s what we would find in a new America:

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A Wisconsin road sign pointing travelers onto Business Highway 51 in Rothschild and Schofield bears an incorrect spelling for every word except exit. The photo says it all:

Once or twice a year I make the mistake of deluding myself into thinking that it would be a good idea to pick up something “cheap” from Walmart.  Usually it ends up turning out to be anywhere from simply a poor experience to a full-blown fiasco, usually due to inept employees or incompetent customer service.

Recently, I happened to be in need of a spare propane tank for my outdoor barbecue grill.  Someone suggested to me that I could pick up one cheaply at Walmart.  So the other day I went in and found a shiny new 15 lb. tank on the shelf for $35 (which I didn’t think was particularly cheap, but that’s not the point of this article).

Then I checked out the prices for propane.  It said $17.42 to exchange my empty tank for a new one, or $43.92 to fill my empty tank.  I couldn’t find anyone nearby to help me get it filled, and I was in a hurry, so I put it in my cart, wheeled toward the register, paid for the empty tank, and left.

Today, I went back to get it filled, and in talking to a Walmart employee I learned that the $43.92 actually included the cost of the tank, and in fact they will not fill an empty tank I bring in.

So if I exchanged my brand new, empty, tank for a full, used one it would cost me another $17.42 for a total cost of $52.42, which is $8.50 more than if I just buy a full tank out of their stock.  So I decided to do that, and simply get a refund for my new, unused tank.

So I stashed the full tank in my car, retrieved the new one that had been rolling around in my trunk for the past couple of days, and headed back to the store.  As I approached the store, tank and receipt in hand, I noticed signs on the front door stating “No propane tanks inside store! — Federal Law“.  Well common sense, of course, dictates that since my tank had never been used and has no propane inside, the sign does not apply to my case.  Besides, there are several more such empty propane tanks, identical to the one I was holding, sitting on the shelf inside the store.  In the back of my mind it registered that common sense rarely applies to Walmart employees or Federal law, but I was determined to get my refund.

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Thirteen year old Jack Theisen in Madison, WI had to make a quick decision when he spotted two men casing his home:

Madison (WKOW) — 13 year old Jack Theisen had to make a quick decision when two would-be robbers were in the process of coming through an unlocked, basement door, and Theisen was home alone.

Theisen grabbed his Red Ryder model BB gun and shot the first invader in the shoulder, scaring off both men.

“He’s resilient,”  Jack Theisen’s father, Mike Theisen told 27 News.

Mike Theisen said his son, an eighth grade student at St. James Catholic School, has taken a hunter safety course and is proficient and safe with guns.

Theisen said his son spotted the two men as they cased the front of the house on Sherman Avenue, perhaps believing the house was empty since most of the lights were out around 8 p.m. Oct. 9.   Theisen said Jack Theisen then watched the men make their way to the home’s side entrance.

While the Political Correct agenda would be to counsel the boy to never point a gun at someone and to “run away” from all threats, I commend this young man for using his wits (along with his toy gun) to protect his home.  As beautifully explained in A Nation of Cowards by Jeffrey R. Snyder, to protect one’s property and family is to protect one’s dignity:

Crime is not only a complete disavowal of the social contract, but also a commandeering of the victim’s person and liberty. If the individual’s dignity lies in the fact that he is a moral agent engaging in actions of his own will, in free exchange with others, then crime always violates the victim’s dignity. It is, in fact, an act of enslavement. Your wallet, your purse, or your car may not be worth your life, but your dignity is; and if it is not worth fighting for, it can hardly be said to exist.

Personally, I would be proud to have a son like Jack.

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Today we are beginning a new escape at Liberty Maven. From time to time we will post a few news stories that may or may not be related to “liberty” and the normal subject matter of our little corner of the web.

Some people crack open the Sunday paper and immediately turn to the comics section to seek laughter. With bailouts piling up, the demise of capitalism, and widespread panic and fear of what tomorrow will bring, sometimes it is just nice to escape a bit and laugh or marvel at the world.

With that in mind here are some odd news stories that struck us as interesting, disgusting, or just plain funny.

• INTERESTING->One Man fills out 72 voter registration forms: CLEVELAND - A man at the center of a voter-registration scandal told The Post yesterday he was given cash and cigarettes by aggressive ACORN activists in exchange for registering an astonishing 72 times, in apparent violation of Ohio laws.
• DISGUSTING->National Debt Clock adds a digit to accommodate growing deficit: NEW YORK — In these uncertain financial times, one thing remains certain — the ever-expanding national debt. But it’s growing at such an accelerated rate, the clock that has kept track of the deficit since 1989 has had to add a digit.
• FUNNY->Man Accuses Doctor of Stapling Buttocks Closed: Maryland - Arguments began Monday in a federal lawsuit alleging that a Maryland doctor stapled a man’s rectum shut during an operation, rendering him unable to move his bowels for 17 days, the Baltimore Examiner reported.
• FUNNY->Woman kept prisoner by her own husband for 50 years: Italy - A woman in Italy was kept a prisoner in her own home by her husband for 50 years, police have revealed. The wife was only allowed out of the house when accompanied by him, and was not allowed to speak with anyone else.
• DISGUSTING (not because I’m against gays, but because this is just more “groupism”)->Special High School for gays, lesbians, and transgendered: Chicago - The head of Chicago’s school system has proposed the creation of a ‘gay-friendly’ high school to counter the high bullying, depression and drop-out rates among homosexual pupils.

That’s all for this week. Now back to our normally scheduled programming.