Editorials
GET UP OFF YOUR KNEES WHILE YOU STILL CAN - By Hessie Harris
STICKS AND STONES - By Reardon Sullivan, P.E.
WHY SUPPORT OUR PRESIDENT - By Daniel P. Czelusniak
JULY 4, 2020 - CELEBRATION OF THE REPUBLIC - CAN WE KEEP IT? - By Bill Richbourg
GET UP OFF YOUR KNEES WHILE YOU STILL CAN
By Hessie Harris
In 2016, led by Colin Kaepernick, some NFL players started “taking the knee” when the National Anthem was played supposedly in protest of police brutality and racial inequality. When everyone else’s eyes were on the flag, theirs were not. Initially NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell opposed such actions.
However, in the wake of the alleged protests over George Floyd’s murder, and ensuing murder and mayhem by rioting mobs that has changed. Mr. Goodell, like others in Corporate America, has decided to bow down to Black Lives Matter and other anarchists. He has endorsed such protests by players.
Well, having got as much mileage out of that as they can, the next demand is going to be that all players take the knee. If they do not they will be branded as racist and probably ostracized and criticized. After that, it will be demanded that all attendees take the knee. That will be the moment of truth for the fans and football administration. It is one thing for the players to make a protest disrespectful of the flag and all it stands for, it is quite another to try to force it on others.
Of late, white people have been “taking the knee” in front of blacks in abject subjugation and submission in atonement and hoped for expiation due to their assumed guilt for crimes, real and imagined, which they did not commit and quite possibly never heard of.
For them to prostrate themselves that way also shows a lack of self-respect and a slave mindset. If one rejects that characterization, they should either google or go to Lincoln Park in Washington, DC and observe the statue of President Lincoln reading the Emancipation Proclamation in front of a slave, Archer Alexander, on his knee before him. Yes, the image is to show the slave in the process of being freed but he is frozen in time in that pose.
If whites continue such self-abasing, personally disparaging actions, the day will come when such groveling is no longer considered voluntary but mandatory. Their feeling of "wokeness" will become a nightmare.
As the Declaration of Independence states, “all [men] are created equal”, therefore Americans do not bow, kneel or otherwise prostrate themselves before others, even those considered to be of higher rank .
Yes, the Founding Fathers saw the incongruity of that view and slavery. To form the nation, they had to accept the “South’s peculiar institution”. But many knew that there would be a time of reckoning down the road.
Not bowing or kneeling is a top down philosophy. Protocol dictates that our leaders do not bow or kneel before other heads of state as they are considered to be of equal rank. When President Obama did bow to world leaders, during his tenure it was frowned upon. It suggested weakness on the part of the US instead of being on parity in strength.
Those considering kneeling to be a sign of respect, should remember the abducted Africans who became enslaved did not come to here taking the kneeling position. It was a badge of inferiority forced upon them both physically and mentally. It took over hundreds years and the bloodiest war in US history to bring an end to that practice. To paraphrase the baseball great, Yogi Berra, “This looks like déjà vu all over again”.
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Hessie Harris is Co-chair of the Black Republicans of Montgomery County, a member of the Potomac Republican Women’s Club, the Chevy Chase Republican Women’s Club and Help Save Maryland.
Sticks and stones….
By Reardon Sullivan, P.E.
When I was a kid there used to be a saying… “Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me.” Apparently, we need to update that saying…” Sticks and stones may break my bones, but flags and monuments offend me!”
I am astonished by the gleeful embrace of ignorance and virtue signaling by liberals and others where the destruction of property is justified simply because these historical symbols are viewed as offensive. Most of these protestors were not even alive when the subjects of these statues were around and they have little understanding of the complicated history of our great country. These uneducated mobs have destroyed statues of Grant, Steve Ray Vaughan, and Christopher Columbus.
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“Christopher Columbus died in 1506. If he is ruining your happiness in 2020, you should probably seek therapy”
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I am further astonished by the number of elected officials and media outlets that do not condemn, and moreover, often support the mob destruction of public property. The idea that these criminal acts of violence are being tolerated without repercussions should outrage us…whatever happened to the rule of law? If you do not like a public monument (which belongs to the public… not you) then petition the planning board or other government agency.
If we let this behavior go unchecked, where does it end? Who gets to judge what is offensive and what is not? 12 million legal immigrants traveled thousands of miles in filthy and dangerous conditions to arrive at Ellis Island seeking a better life. They gave up their names, identities and often left behind families to step onto American soil. Could we ever have imagined these weary travelers tearing down historic American symbols because they found them offensive?
The righteous and in-vogue opinion of an uneducated mob should not justify harming people or property. My right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness doesn’t end where left leaning rioters’ opinions and feelings begin.
The disingenuous post by the limousine liberals that blast history from behind a keyboard do nothing to help the county. Have they done a ride-a-long with the police? How about presentation to a planning board? Built a legacy or produced something positive like jobs, health care, education or even understanding?
These rioters need to take their 5th grade participation trophies and go home. They have no idea how to work for a goal, build something positive, beside a blog post? These rioters do not understand that there are police officers that will not come home tonight due to their actions. Men and women with families.
Our country will become a better place, when everyone realizes we are not enemies…we all have a vested interest in creating a healthier, safer and more prosperous planet. Ethnicity does not matter.
I am left wondering …who will be sweeping up the broken monument pieces come November? For the future of this country…I hope voters step up and get their brooms out. Let’s sweep up the mess and vote for life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Hopefully, it’s still in vogue.
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Reardon Sullivan is a member of the Montgomery County Republican Central Committee and has been a resident of Montgomery county since 1966. He is a black businessman and owner of a 40 person consulting firm in Rockville, Maryland.
Why Support Our President
By Daniel P. Czelusniak
I am often mystified by supporters of the President who lament he is his own worst enemy, and if he wasn’t so egotistical and defensive, or if his personality wasn’t so abrasive, he’d somehow escape the relentless attacks and barbs of the left, and appeal more to independent voters. They attribute negative media coverage of the President and his Administration as somehow unique and a figment of his character and the way he treats people.
Hello … the media doesn't just report negatively on our current President and Administration. They report negatively on all things associated with American patriotism, capitalism, individualism, and nationalism. For decades they have reported negatively on every Republican President. There is nothing new in the negative criticism of the President and everything American. If Mother Theresa herself was a Republican in the White House and believed in American values and ideals, she would be criticized and labeled unmercifully.
The days are long gone when unbiased examination of ideas and free expression of beliefs were a reality in America. Arguably, the co-opting of thought processes and open communication began nearly fifty years ago in the wake of The Weather Underground’s domestic terror campaign to overthrow our government. In the intervening years, after the failure of that campaign, the revolutionaries changed focus to a long-term strategy of covert indoctrination by seeding the halls of academia and journalism. It is no accident that today we have an educational system that increasingly teaches leftist ideology to the exclusion of dissenting thought, and a journalistic profession that embraces the role of political activism to the exclusion of unfiltered reporting. Yet despite the current state of education and journalism, the left has become even more frenetic in attempts to discredit anything the President does or says. Why?
The answer is simple. This President has unmasked their indoctrination strategy through his uncompromising fidelity to our Constitution and the values it represents. He’s forced into the open the true nature of leftist ideology. They now overtly display their radical agenda with vitriolic ardor. They can’t help themselves. He’s taken the fight to them rather than being apologetic or wary of the political consequences.
The President is a street fighter and isn't from the mold of a milk toast politician. He disrupts conventional thinking, regularly steps out of the box to get things done, and doesn't beat around the bush trying to placate and be diplomatic. He doesn't have time for platitudes and pandering like traditional politicians. He values results. He's exactly the man the American people elected and why they elected him - nothing more and nothing less.
Every great leader has a big ego and none have a normal personality. Their confidence, perseverance and determination are products of that ego. Their personality is what sets them apart as a leader. We had a long string of nice and personable, but ineffectual, leaders in the White House and it led us to a weak economy, high unemployment, stagnant incomes, declining manufacturing capability, weakened military strength, and global non-competitiveness.
President Trump corrected all of that in 3-1/2 years. Such a turnaround could not have been achieved being a touchy-feely, politically correct politician. Few could have withstood the criticism, treachery, deceit, and insults thrown at the President (and his family). He’s been maligned by the media, professional politicians, deep state operatives, and globalists, alike.
All manner of establishment people are threatened by the actions he is taking to rectify years of neglect and disenfranchisement of Americans across the spectrum of race, occupation, and economic standing. To think he would be getting rave reviews for his achievements if he were somehow more "normal" belies the reality of the political landscape in our country. He is breaking rice bowls, challenging institutional norms, rejecting globalism, prioritizing the needs of American citizens, and upholding American values and ideals. That puts him at odds with large segments of the population.
The President needs our unflagging support, notwithstanding his perceived flaws. Viewed through a different lens, those “flaws” are in fact strengths that force truth to the surface and cause surreptitious motives to be exposed to the light of day. He is fighting a peaceful coup attempt that could easily metastasize into a coup d’état ... something heretofore unfathomable in this country. It's a sign of how far to the left the country has moved. Now is not the time to waiver in support of our President if you believe in the survival of our Constitutional Republic.
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Daniel P. Czelusniak is a former Department of Defense Senior Executive.
July 4, 2020 Celebration of the Republic - Can We Keep It?
By Bill Richbourg
This article is dedicated to those Americans we call the Founding Fathers who created the framework for the first free Republic to actually survive as a nation in modern times. They wrote a new kind of Constitution that is now the oldest in existence and which has resulted in the greatest nation in history.
Consider, for example, that the United States represents approximately 5% of the world’s population but has created more wealth than all the rest of the world combined. During the past 200-plus years the United States has surpassed the rest of the world in extending the benefits of inventions and discoveries to the vast majority of its people in such fields as medicine, housing, education, energy, transportation, space, aircraft and agriculture. Americans have been responsible for more discoveries and inventions in science and elsewhere than any other nation on the planet.
Our young men and women have fought and died in wars throughout the world in defense of freedom, asking nothing for their efforts. The United States is always the first nation to provide relief and aid to other nations, sometimes even our enemies that suffer natural calamities. We have given more dollars and manpower in aid and relief than most of the world’s nations combined.
Yet, in spite of all that, we are the target of the hate and envy of the rest of the world. More worrisome, is that many of our own citizens are taught to despise this country as racist, sexist, colonialist and exploitative and appear to be dedicated to destroying it, while others are indifferent and apathetic and could care less about our rapidly deteriorating condition.
Earlier generations of Americans have made mistakes. No one denies that. However, we are humans, not angels, and humans are flawed. In the past we have been able to make appropriate course corrections and survive. However nothing is comparable to the current attack on the fundamental underpinnings of our Republic.
Today, there are organized elements among our citizens who are purposefully out to destroy the republic. Why? We can speculate that this is due to ignorance of our history, ignorance of our fundamental rule of law and ignorance of the basic governing principles of our constitutional republic. On top of that are mistaken beliefs that Americans are inherently racist and, although it has lifted millions out of poverty all over the world, that capitalism is inherently unfair! As Thomas Jefferson said, “If a nation expects to be ignorant and free, it expects what never was and never will be.”
Today we have organizations, such as Black Lives Matter, although professing leftist Marxist ideology, which are more popular among average Americans than the President of the US; more popular than Joe Biden, more popular than any major religion, the media, the Congress, Big Business, either political party, even the Pope. What is more discouraging is that we have political leaders, including law enforcement, caving to the BLM, reluctant, or afraid, to stand up for the rule of law and carry out their duties. The cowardice and compliance of our leaders confirms to these Marxist organizations that violence and brutality pay!
Now, these organizations are generally untouchable and a person can be punished or even fired for merely criticizing BLM. Yet what they stand for is wholly un-American! BLM wants to eliminate law enforcement, repeal all immigration laws, legalize sex workers, reallocate national farmland, and race-based reparations in the form of guaranteed annual income for all Blacks regardless of their origin. They openly plan to use violence to achieve their goals because apparently it works! They will use any pretext for violence because it intimidates cowardly local leadership and promotes their hatred of America and ultimately their hatred of civilized order itself. This is an assault by the forces of barbarism on a supine and fearful establishment that pretends to represent the authority of civilization.
This is not complicated. Ideologues will say that the problem is race relations, or capitalism, or police brutality, or global warming. But the real cause is far darker. It is the lust for power generated by a generation taught to despise their country as racist, sexist, colonialist, and exploitative and enriched by a meek and cowardly society that tolerates the violence and destruction of our cities.
Brave leaders can prevent these organizations from destroying our Republic and erasing our history. Recent events should be a serious warning that we have lost our way as a nation. Unless the people of this country take seriously the extreme danger lurking in senseless rioting, looting, and destruction of our history, we could end up in the graveyard of fallen nations. It is not too late to reverse this trend but we must start now!
After celebrating this July 4th holiday, we should take pride in the fact that America is still a bastion of freedom in the world but acknowledge that at this time in our history, our free society is particularly vulnerable. We have a responsibility and duty to find and support leaders that have the courage to stand up while there is still time.
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Bill Richbourg is a member of the Montgomery County Republican Central Committee