Success – A Social Crime

October 13, 2011

Success has become taboo. Leadership has become unfair. Reason has become politically incorrect and money has become malevolent.

Monochromatic is the theme. Mute is the desire. Mundane is the mission and control is the goal.

Where do we live? America?

In a recent New York Times article James Atlas ridicules the “Super People.” The students who have worked hard and achieved much are taunted in his article like a bully in the schoolyard. According to Mr. Atlas, the “Super People” are only successful because of frustrated helicopter moms or because they stretch the truth on their applications. “Super People” are super weird. The “Super People” made great grades, excelled in sports, and/or music, and contributed to country and society with social service. Losers. Oh, and they only succeeded because their mother made them do it, or they were rich – the 1%.

Where do we live? America?

We are a country that was built on true grit, hard work and a desire to soar on eagle’s wings. Drunk on freedom and free from the chains of tyranny, immigrants were inspired to reach for the sky and seek success. They labored and toiled, passionately pursuing their dreams. Liberty was a gift from God. Talent was admired. Success was revered. Public service was not only a virtue but inherent.

Children from broken homes, poverty, and despair had the opportunity to reach and seek higher ground. Our history is literally filled with examples of young students who studied meticulously, read voraciously and worked many jobs at the same time. Exertion and perseverance were synonymous with American pride and dignity.

Candice Millard, brings to life a stunning example of such attributes in her biography of the often forgotten President, James A. Garfield. He was born in a log cabin and fatherless by the age of one. He worked many jobs to put himself through school. At preparatory school, he studied so diligently he was promoted from janitor to assistant professor. At age twenty-six, he later returned to be the school’s President and passed the Ohio bar in his free time. His adult life mirrored his youth with ardent service to his country and countrymen in combat, Congress and as President.

Other such over achiever kids were George Washington, John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln and Martin Luther King. Today, they would be considered “Super People.” Today, they would be muted and shamed for their desire to speak their thoughts, acknowledge their God, seek seemingly attainable goals and God-forbid, win. Today, they would be labeled Mama’s boys, demeaned as privileged, constrained as prejudiced or taunted as eggheads.

Yet, just imagine America without them. Without them, there would be no America.

Is the design of the liberal elite? No America?

We are dangerously on the brink.

James A. Garfield was taught by his mother to “walk with his shoulders squared and his head thrown back.” He was proud to be an American. America gave him the opportunity to achieve his destiny.

Today we teach our kids to hide their heads in the sand like ostriches.

Our children are taught to hold their head down in silence and shame. America is not exceptional. God is not good. Winning is self-indulgent. Succeeding in business is unfair. “Be the 99%.”

Is this America?

Janine Turner

Tune in and call into my radio show today, The Janine Turner Show, on the Janine Turner Network, to discuss this topic. 1-2pm Central. Details on my website

Howdy. I can not believe that it is Friday.  The beginning of the week felt as if it was moving like molasses and then, poof, it’s Friday. How are ya? I look forward to chatting with you on my show today. Be sure to call in! The number is on my home page. Congressman Barton is my guest today. We will be discussing the Keystone Pipeline, plus Janine du Jour – my thoughts on todays headlines. One opinion is about a school that denied a school assembly about the United States Constitution! Wow!

Joyfully,

Janine

Booze, Big Business and Prohibition

October 3, 2011

Keeping Americans inebriated was big business for the German beer makers, wineries and other distillers during the turn of the century. It was also big income for the Federal Government. The government received 70% of its federal income from the liquor tax. Keeping Americans drunk was big business for the federal government as well – until the 16^th amendment, income tax, diluted it.

It is hard for us to picture what life was like during the saloon days; days when brothels and barrooms lined the streets. Men laid strewn about the town or having journeyed home, administered abuses on the wives and children.  Insult upon injury occurred when the wives realized that their husband’s paychecks had been exhausted too.

Men were despondent. Women were helpless. Children were emotionally scarred for life.  Starting at age 15 the average man consumed 88 bottles of whiskey a year.

And it was more potent, having a much higher alcohol intent than those drinks consumed by our founding fathers.

“Alcohol was a sign of masculinity that robbed a man of his masculinity,” according to the PBS Special, “Prohibition,” by Ken Burns and Lynn Novick.  America had become a “Nation of Drunkards.”

I haven’t had a drink for 25 years and I have a familial familiarity with the cycle of sorrows alcohol reaps.  As a constitutionalist, I disagree with the 18^th amendment. As one who knows the insidiousness of alcohol, I see the virtues of the prohibition movement.

Something had to be done.

Enter American freedom, American freedom of speech. American true grit. American women. The journey of prohibition is the journey of a social justice that clashed with the rights of the people. Should not a lesson be learned here? The government does not have the right to tell American citizens what they should or should not eat, drink or buy.

Obamacare will not work but the awareness will lead, hopefully, to a better system of healthcare, free from government intrusion.

The 18^th amendment did not work. The movement did. After the 18^th amendment was appealed by the 21^st amendment, the lasting affects of the social justice were felt. The saloons and brothels were extinguished and awareness curbed abuses, to an extent. Things were better.

Lessons were learned with the 18^th and 21^st amendments. A social movement can have a positive impact. Invasive government, intruding into people’s private lives and their rights, does not work.  Should the government decide if you get to drink a beer or eat a Hostess Twinkie? Does the government get to decide if you get “approved” as a recipient of medicine – that you are a life worth saving?

Something had to be done to bring awareness to the crisis and frankly the best work was done, not by the amendment, but by the women’s movement. Like whirlwinds, they, who could not even vote, banded together to create a force with which to be reckoned.  Women set out to save their men and their children and as a result  - their country.

They were spat upon, doused with liquor and sent outside into the cold snow by men in the saloons. The women took it in stride – the abuses at home were probably no different. They marched, they lobbied, they prayed. Women like Francis Willard and Carry Nation, having watched loved ones succumb to booze, were stewards of their wounds.

The repeal of the 18^th amendment did not diminish their arduous, emotionally charged mission. Enlightenment shone upon the evils of alcohol.

Yet, the battle against booze is a highly personal one. Alcoholism is a disease. An amendment can no more cure a disease than Obamacare can ensure proper and fair healthcare to every American.

The battle rages on in our American culture. We live in a culture that laughs at people in “blackouts”  - thinking it’s funny that they don’t remember what they did the previous night. We accept a culture that permeates the television with images of laughter and “getting the sexy girl” when men have a drink in their hand.

They don’t show the rape, the drunken driver, the vomiting over the toilet, or the tears of wives, husbands and children. Why would they? It’s a business, after all. Why show the truth if the truth doesn’t sell.

The current crisis doesn’t end with alcohol. The next wave of cultural demise is prescription drugs. The, “it’s okay because my doctor prescribed them to me,” drugs. It’s not just Hollywood stars that are succumbing. It is the American populace and the future generations.

In America, another wave of addiction is upon us. We need more whirlwinds to change the course of the downward spiral of addiction. It may not be as bad as it was at the turn of the 20^th century but it is a dark abyss swallowing our nation’s future.

Janine Turner

In case you missed my Saturday night show on 570 AM KLIF, here is my interview with Andrew Langer.

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September 29, 2011

Entitlements: The Sacrificing of our Rights to Big Government

Our nation was borne upon a new set of ideas, a new set of principles, that man everywhere has an unconquerable desire to be the master of his own destiny. Hope has always been the great, unshakable virtue in our country. This hope became a reality during 1776 with the drafting of the Declaration of Independence by the Second Continental Congress backed by their constituents and by the leadership of George Washington who was already in the field.

From the pilgrims to the depression, through wars and uncertain times, hope has been offered by America. Hope  - set upon the foundation of firm principles. “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.”

Our Declaration of Independence goes on to talk about a government that had become destructive to these ends, which of course in the context of the Declaration of Independence was Great Britain.

I pause upon those words: whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive to these ends..”

Is this not what is happening today? Our government is so big and invasive that is has become destructive to, not only our rights to privacy, and the right to keep “the bread of our labor, but to our very survival.

Our Big Government is becoming “destructive to these ends.”

“Life, Liberty and the pursuits of Happiness”

The American people recognize this hence, the low approval ratings of government, which are at an all time low.

They are passing bills that they not understand and they are passing bills that the American people do not endorse. Not to mention, they are riddled in the mire of inadequacy in regard to dealing with the debt.

It’s as if the country is on fire and the American people are trying to put it out but Washington, D.C. just keeps adding kerosene to the flames.

It is truly out of control. The debt is rising each and every moment of each and every day as a group of 12 men are hidden in a room, out of sight of their constituencies and the guide of the Constitution, making mysteries. And our President is on the campaign trail, using our tax dollars, telling the American people that we should just spend more money.

This is truly horrifying. It would be a comedy, a satire – if it were not so tragic.

The long and short of it is: Big Government threatens our pursuits of, “Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of happiness.” With every government entitlement we accept, we endorse, we ignore and we do not fight, we lose our freedom.

I had a friend say to me once when I kept returning to a bad situation, “What’s the payoff?”

Are we willing to risk out liberties, our rights, our freedoms, our national security, our country, to Big Government?

We must ask ourselves if accepting “big daddy’s” money is worth playing by “big daddy’s rules.”

We must rekindle and recapture our sense of American dignity that is based on our God given rights. God gives our rights, not government.

If we acquiesce our rights to government, then we are in essence taking our God given birth rights and putting them into man’s hands. This is the sure path to tyranny. Men are not angels.

Tyranny is like the tentacles of an octopus. Think of its arms like entitlements. With every entitlement we accept, liberty will be squeezed from us until we are trapped in the tentacles of government, our freedoms forfeited.

Hope. We are a country built on hope. A hope that was garnered form an inner strength. Our forefathers looked not to government but to God and their inner strengths for hope. Calvin Coolidge wrote in his speech, ‘The Inspiration of the Declaration of Independence,” about the true grit and determination of our forefathers and foremothers:”

The American Revolution represented the informed and mature convictions of a great mass of independent, liberty loving, God-fearing people who knew their rights, and possessed the courage to maintain them.

We the people, must have the courage to maintain our independence and liberty.

I think we do. It begins with our conviction to break free from the chains that bind us: a government that has out grown the confines of its true intent and the United States Constitution.

America has always been the great hope of mankind, like the hand of a great comforter. Within her land is opportunity for optimism and a creed that inspires courage. Within these principles we find our hope and our convictions to correct the wrongs that are taking America toward the cliff of abyss.

The progressives, the liberals, have the sacred right to express themselves, but we must have the reason to combat it.

Janine Turner

Call into my show and share your thought with me info on my home page http://www.janineturner.com or blog here!

In case you missed my Saturday night show on 570 AM KLIF, here is my interview with Grover Norquist.

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