U.S. is #1 for all the wrong things

For the record, DEMs and liberals do NOT want open borders. Immigration reform? Yes. Security? Yes. Walls? Fences? Where needed? If effective, sure. 21st century solutions? Duh. Of course. Anyone heard of lasers, drone cameras, motion detectors? How about we install those damn motion detecting flood lights people install on their houses? Install some of those camera doorbells. How about turning the problem into a solution?

Mass numbers of people want to come here to work and support their families. They are willing to do literally anything, just like immigrants of the past. Just like unemployed men and women of the Great Depression. Many even want to serve in the armed forces. You’re telling me we can’t figure this out? Of course we could if many of our leaders really cared. But their compassion doesn’t extend beyond their noses and their bank accounts and their desperate clinging to power.

The country that has done so many great things, solved so many difficult problems, defeated so many foes, can’t figure this out?

Make America a great problem-solving innovative nation again.

Right now we’re skilled at blaming, complaining, lying, demonizing, oppressing, suppressing, glorifying, deifying, worshipping, brainwashing, dividing, manipulating, stealing, scapegoating, propagandizing, gaslighting, incarcerating ....

These are not the pillars of greatness. These are not the wheels of advancement. These are not catalysts for opportunity. These are the ingredients of disgrace, desperation and decline.

Wrestling With Racism

By Tom Hagy 

Preparing for the usual humiliation of the naked weigh-in at a wrestling tournament in 1974, the 250-pound referee would not let me on the scale until I cut my hair. I told him I’d like to see if I managed to get down to 132 lbs before I hacked at my wig with a pair of dull gunked-up tape scissors. He refused. I asked again. Again he refused. 

Keep in mind. I’d spent a week eating nothing, spitting, inducing vomiting, sitting in trash bags in a steam room and practicing with a teammate who didn’t shower because he thought his stink gave him an edge over his hygienic competitors. He wasn’t wrong.  

Your long-haired blogger at 17. 

Also keep in mind, I am debating nude with a moose. The moose was in a striped shirt. The moose was being what would later be called a “dick.” A dozen or so people, teammates and coaches, looked on, probably bored or thinking about their next meal or warm robes, since it wasn’t like I was an olympic hopeful. I wrestled for the hell of it. Killing time until someone noticed my drumming talents and made me a millionaire. 

I now regret telling the ref to fuck himself, I really do, but in my defense I was what later would be diagnosed as “hangry.”   

Now. As a father of a daughter who worked very hard to grow dreadlocks I can appreciate not wanting to cut them. But I also know the strict rules of collegiate wrestling. (The photo of me at 17 displays rule-breaking hair. I had just narrowly defeated a black wrestler whose hair was regulation and whose skills were only marginally worse than my own. Afterwards we shared a couple oranges and wrestling banter, then we went on to evade any collegiate wrestling scholarships.)

In the case of New Jersey wrestler Andrew Johnson, the worst crime against him was naming him Andrew Johnson. Thanks, mom. Was Richard Nixon not available? 

Beyond that the story has to be the dumbest yet to somehow rise to one of a civil rights violation allegation in recent memory. First, his dreads were short. By my eye short enough to wrestle. Second, he could have worn a hair cover. Third, if hair is too long any ref will ask anyone to cut it or, apparently, wear a hair-containing cover. (I guess these were not available in 1974, but I’m sure a bathing cap would have given me an edge. One with ducks and daisies.) Fourth, they chopped away at his dreads like they were poisonous weeds. Fifth, white kids have dreads. Sixth, you may refuse to wrestle. It’s no picnic anyway. Seventh, it is very possible the ref was a jackass or even a racist. He might even be a drummer. But none of those things was on display here. 

This was not a hate crime. This was not racism. 

The ref should have done his job sooner. The kid should have worn the hair covering. The coach should have made the kid trim the locks or put on the damn hair cover. The parents should have encouraged the hair cover for safety reasons. The press should have yawned. The governor should have said WTF are you bothering me with this shit for. 

This is not was not the subject of MLK’s dream. This wasn’t Selma. This was stupidity on everyone’s part. We have enough actual racism that does actual harm to waste energy on something so ... well, nothing.