I want to note the closing of Patterson Hardware after 105 years of service to the people of Fillmore. Harvey Patterson and wife Emma always provided the kind of personal service rarely seen today. Throughout the 34-years of the Fillmore Gazette’s existence Harvey always supported the Gazette, and I believe he was the first local company to advertise in the paper; certainly, Harvey supported us continuously during those years. A final word of thanks to the entire Patterson family for a job well done.

I’m way over time and space due to appointments. I apologize to Kelly, being unable to respond this week. I do recommend Jonathan Turley’s new book The Indispensable Right, Free Speech in an Age of Rage.

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A word about the war. It may sound strange to mention “the war” because very little information is provided as one should expect of imminent global war. We do hear bits and pieces about the wars in Ukraine and Israel, but not with the urgency or fullness needed to secure our military readiness. We are unprepared. We are at the September 1938 Neville Chamberlain stage of pre-conflagration when he sought to appease Nazi Germany by signing the Munich Agreement with Hitler. It’s not hard to understand why Chamberlain, British Prime Minister at the time, would seek peace with Nazi Germany after having lost 880,000 British forces, 6% of the adult male population and 12.5% of those serving, in World War 1 – (only 20 years, 9 months, 21 days later). Appeasement was supposed to bring "Peace with Honour - Peace for Our Time" according to Chamberlain’s speech after Munich.

But weakness, as always, brought six years of WWII from 1939-1945, and the ascendency of the Communist Soviet Union and Communist China – with whom we are about to deal again, in WWIII. The big difference today is our foolish reluctance to prepare our industries for this war. The Democrat Party has seriously acerbated this weakness with novel Woke mandates such as President Biden’s 2021 Executive Order 14035, promoting Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Accessibility in the Federal Workforce (DEIA). This is a clarion call for incompetency, eagerly answered by flocks of faint-hearted applicants. Biden generals such as Gen. Charles Q. Brown, Jr., Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the nation's highest-ranking military officer, are ardent supporters of DEIA even though it has decimated recruitment, depleted the ranks, and caused massive disillusionment throughout our defense system. General incompetency brings to mind Mark Milley and his great adventure in the Afghanistan surrender to the Taliban, and China calls. Where are our Grants, Shermans, and Sheridans? Lastly, how can any reasonable person explain this? “Mystery Drones Swarmed a U.S. Military Base for 17 Days. The Pentagon is Stumped.” “U.S officials don’t know who is behind the drones that have flown unhindered over sensitive national-security sites - or how to stop them.” Didn’t this sort of thing happen with giant Chinese balloons a while ago? With laws like this: “Federal law prohibits the military from shooting down drones near military bases in the U.S. unless they pose an imminent threat.”
This is a problem no other country in the world would have trouble solving. The answer is clear and obvious – shoot the damn things down, determine ownership, and prosecute, militarily or publicly. I’ve given up trying to put the pieces of this damnable Woke political puzzle together for the purpose of understanding the decline of the Republic. 20 million illegals crossing our border is proof of its closure? Demanding an ID at the voting booth is racist? The product of abortion is not a human male or female with a unique eternal soul? A human is capable of changing their sex? There is no eternity? There is no God? Government should provide pornography for our children? Go figure. I’ve tried and failed.

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The truth or falsity of those Marion Apparitions I’ve spoken about perhaps too often is about to present itself, beginning this month. Events will speak for themselves. Watch North Korea.