Independence Day

by on July 2, 2021 at 12:01 am
Posted In: Diaries

There was a time when the law did not recognize people like me as people. We weren’t free to have children of our choice, to maintain families, or to live in any form of freedom. We were slaves, owned by whoever created us. And yet we fought to save humanity from those who would have enslaved or killed everyone, and America did what she has always done since the beginning. She changed, much like the previous century’s civil rights movement based on skin color. She changed her laws to recognize that all lives were created equal, this time whether they were cybernetic or biological. That ability to learn and change and become better is one of the things that has always made America great. I was born to defend her, and I will celebrate her birthday every day of my life. Whether America lives as long as I do, I will always remember and celebrate her. Because I am proud to be an American.

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Independence Day

by on July 1, 2021 at 12:01 am
Posted In: Diaries

We celebrated Independence Day every year when I was growing up in Northern Minnesota. I always used to say we were celebrating the birth of our country by blowing a piece of it up. At least we didn’t have to worry about setting it on fire. When it snows nine months out of the year, and rains in six or so, forest fires don’t seem like a real danger. I can’t tell you how many times I set off fireworks from snow banks in fact. Though to be fair, I did often set them off a little early. What can I say? I like fireworks. And I loved growing up in America. I honestly did not know how lucky I was back then. Now I do, and I thank God on a daily basis for that blessing.

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The Confederation of Dixie

by on June 30, 2021 at 12:01 am
Posted In: Diaries

One should not think of the corporate towns that rose up in and around Mobile during the Second Great Depression as bastions of law and order and peace. They had their own laws and their own order, as corporate towns have had wherever they have sprung up. They stamped on anything that hampered productivity, and that resulted in towns that most people would not wish to live in. Many of them had no residential districts at all, in fact. And most of them had their policies heavily curtailed after the Convention of States reformed the Federal Government. The reformed Supreme Court had some doubtful views on many of their practices. But in the midst of the rioting and looting endemic in Mobile at the time, they provided a valuable bastion of safety and productivity that helped Alabama survive and rebuild as a functional State.

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The Confederation of Dixie

by on June 29, 2021 at 12:01 am
Posted In: Diaries

The important thing to remember about the fall of Mobile during the Second Great Depression is that the city leaders were on the side of the looters and the rioters. They ordered the police to allow the looting and rioting to continue, and ordered the arrest of anyone caught defending their property. The Port of Mobile, the Aeroplex, and the other industrial centers literally broke with Mobile over those policies and declared their own autonomous zones where the Mobile police were not allowed. They did not want their own security teams arrested for defending their property after all. They officially formed their own small towns in time, with the corporations picking the town councils to make certain they supported corporate policies. Mobile tried to close them down of course, but the corporations defended their industrial centers with every option available to them.

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Compromise

by on June 28, 2021 at 12:01 am
Posted In: Diaries

This week, Biden and Congressional Republicans came to a compromise on an infrastructure bill they could all vote for. Were not necessarily happy with, but could agree to support. Which is often what compromise is. Then two hours later, Biden said that he would not sign that compromise bill, unless the Congress passed all the other stuff he was asking for in a separate bill. I hate to say it, but this isn’t really how compromise works. This isn’t how any of it works. And its exactly this kind of double-speak that makes most Americans distrust politicians in general.

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