Today’s remarks may not fit town
folk, but I grew up a country kid so it makes
perfect sense to me. When I moved to the big city to
attend the University of Wyoming, my life changed in
a manner I did not think possible. Just like most
kids, Christmas Day was the center around which the
other 364 days revolved. However, during a long,
slow and painful drive home from college for
Thanksgiving, I had an epiphany with Thanksgiving
suddenly bumping Christmas from its number one
holiday slot. Spending three months walking on
pavement in Laramie made me so miss ranch life,
every afternoon I day-dreamed about going home for
Thanksgiving break. I mentioned the trip home being
slow and painful; slow due to President Carter’s
ridiculous 55 mph speed limit. Yes, President Nixon
introduced the double-nickel limit, but with a two
year sunset. President Carter made it permanent by
removing the sunset. The trip was painful due to the
luxurious driver seat in my 1973 Vega. If you are
ever diagnosed with terminal cancer and given six
weeks to live, spend your final month and half in
the front seat of a Vega because it will seem like
forever.
After rolling to a stop in the driveway, I squeezed
out from under the steering wheel and stretched the
kinks out of my lower back. By the grace of God, I
was raised a Wyoming cowboy and it felt so good to
finally be home. Winter had arrived earlier that
November because western capitalism was causing a
new ice age, or so claimed the collectivist
forefathers of today’s climate change alarmists. I
did not believe them then either. Winters were
either tough or open regardless the type of light
bulb in your barn; a fact escaping the indoctrinated
minds of those in academia. Did I mention it was
great to be home? The next morning I saddled up to
help Dad gather cow and calves trapped by snow
drifts in the brushy draws in the hills behind the
house and our horses struggled trying to lunge
through the deepest drifts. When we stopped to let
them blow we were enveloped in a mist of horse sweat
slowly rising through the dead calm air. Neither of
us said anything. We didn’t have to. This was just
another moment spent with my father I would carry
with me for the rest of my life. Many times during
my eight years of study in the imaginary world of
higher education I thought back to that moment in
the east pasture when the only thing disturbing the
stillness was the rhythmic breathing of our horses.
It’s great to have a safety valve; something to fall
back on when your world is discombobulating. Going
home to the ranch over Thanksgiving was mine and
this brings me to my point.
Our great American experiment in freedom has been
fatally wounded by collectivism, Marxism, statism,
progressivism, liberalism, or establishment
Republicanism; it does not matter which title you
pick because they are all the same. The popular
theme is to lay the blame for our demise at the feet
of President Obama, but he is merely the final
captain of a ship previously plotted to plunge into
the abyss. Obamacare, the death nail, was
masterfully launched and it will be implemented
regardless the wishes of the populace or elected
officials. One hundred million Americans losing
their health insurance is just the beginning of a
system designed to collapse the health care system
and force the unwashed masses to their knees and beg
the ruling class for help. I am sad because I so
admire America’s founders and all they created, but
I know once collapse occurs there is no going home.
If you still do not see what is happening you are
either complicit or a fool. Take your pick; there is
no third choice. I fear ours is the generation who
failed to guard the watchtower of liberty.
|