Cleaning Supplies

When the time arrives for Spring Cleaning, an ample collection of the proper supplies is essential for completing the task. If we begin with the floors, we’ll need carpet cleaner and floor wax. Our political parallel is the candidates. In order for our clean sweep to be successful we must have capable, principled and informed candidates. While some of the conspiracy theories floating around the internet may have validity, they will not resonate with the electorate at large and may reduce our candidate’s status to a punch line for a political joke. For example, Dr. Ron Paul has solid reasoning and constitutional foundation for his positions yet the media and political class demean and marginalize him at every opportunity. Our candidates will lack Dr. Paul’s experience and savvy so they cannot afford the luxury of appearing “too far out there.”

Principles of constitutional government, individual liberty and property rights should be the cornerstone of every candidate’s campaign. Examples of egregious violations of each principle should be researched and saved into the mental arsenal for use in debates, speeches and general conversation. It should be noted that a candidate who runs on “cutting spending” cannot be fully trusted. Consider that we have a theoretical budget of $1000 of which we borrow $430. Cutting spending could mean that we spend $999 and borrow $429. The candidate must be committed to constitutional principles that are defined by the enumerated powers.

The walls and windows represent the structure between the floor and the roof. The volunteers who work with the candidates to achieve victory are the links between the candidate and good governing. Every solid congressional candidate should have a minimum of 125 dedicated workers to provide the manpower for a legitimate door-to-door campaign. Personal contact remains the best method for winning voters, and volunteers who represent the candidate are a powerful surrogate. The potential congressperson will need another group of volunteers for “bird-dogging’ appearance opportunities, scheduling, driving the candidate, answering phones and making calls, and all the various and sundry tasks that a well-oiled campaign requires. People, people, people are needed. If the Tea parties, Liberty groups, Patriot organizations and 912 projects cannot or will not supply the necessary personnel to conduct a credible campaign, then we may as well spit into the wind. We’ll continue to get the spineless big spenders we obviously deserve.

Each legislative campaign will require twenty five or more dedicated volunteers to handle the same type of activities that we anticipate for the congressional races. State Senate campaigns would require roughly 60-75 patriots working. It’s rather easy to note that a massive number of absolutely committed people will be needed to totally transform the political culture in D.C. and the state capitol. I am not convinced that most Tea Party-type organizations have the numbers, stomach or the will to do what has to be done. If they do not, convincing future candidates to engage in futile campaigns will become increasingly difficult. The moment is now. If the walls are unstable or dirty, the building cannot be cleaned.

The capstone or roof of our building and cleaning supplies is money. There are three basic components of any campaign: money, manpower and material…the three M’s. Obviously it takes money to purchase the material, and the material is vital for the volunteers (manpower) to disburse as they go door-to-door. Despite an all out face-to-face effort by the volunteers, the candidate’s message will have to be repeated and reinforced through mass media. Most of the media outlets will be hostile toward a constitutional candidate so paid media will be needed. So, mucho dinero will be necessary to assure that the effort receives the maximum exposure. Volunteers should initiate fundraising events for candidates because, please remember, most new candidates will NOT be independently wealthy or be experienced political fundraisers. In fact, most new principled candidates will be extremely hesitant to ask for support…financial or physical. The supporters have to take the initiative. If we allow politics to be practiced as it usually is, we’ll get the politics as usual.

People committed to constitutional government and personal freedom must move out of their comfort zones. Your commitment to liberty MUST exceed your reluctance and fear. Going to meetings, attending rallies and engaging in never-ending email threads will not save our republic. Hard-core feet-on-the-ground, knuckles on doors and dollars in the kitty may work. True belief and conviction migrates from the heart and mind to the whole body’s involvement. Hope is invaluable, but it is not enough in the political universe. Work…lots of it…is required. Just do it.

Comment:  cearlwriting@hotmail.com     or   www.littlestuff-minoosha.blogspot.com

...and the Outhouse.

Prior to our moving back to Ohio we lived in Rochester, Illinois. Rochester is a small village about 8 miles from the state capitol of Springfield. We lived in a new subdivision there and had wonderful neighbors who have become enduring friends. Rochester is a charming little village that has begun to enter a growth spurt as a bedroom community. Running through the village is an abandoned rail line that has been converted into a walking or bicycling path. The line begins in Springfield and is intended to run to Taylorville…some 20 miles away.

While we were living in Rochester, my wife became a member of the Rochester Women’s Club. Although a small group, they wanted to take their community service ideal very seriously. Through a series of fundraisers, the Rochester ladies had finally accumulated $10,000.00 which they were going to use for constructing a toilet facility and drinking fountain on the Springfield to Taylorville exercise trail. Their plan was to use the club’s funds for purchasing materials, and then to solicit volunteer labor from their husbands and other people in the community.

The ladies encountered government interference from the beginning. First, they had to establish the club as a non-profit 501C(3) in order to encourage tax-free contributions. The process took several weeks because the bureaucratic hurdles, vagueness and delays somewhat mystified the community-minded women. When they presented their idea to the village council, they were informed that they would need formal plans from an architect in order for the crapper project to move forward. Early estimates suggested that architectural fees would be in the neighborhood of $30,000.00…huh? For an outhouse? At this point had I been in charge, the project would either have been abandoned or a “porta-potty”, faucet and hose would have been provided to the runners, walkers and bikers.

But the determined ladies of Rochester would not be denied as they forged on to present the village of Rochester with an outhouse worthy of Central Illinois royalty. The construction and sanitation issues continued to accumulate, but they charged forward. The ladies were informed that any labor used to construct the magical receptacle had to be paid the prevailing wage. Huh? For an outhouse? No hubbies and neighbor guys, no volunteers from the town, they were not permitted to give of their time and their talents. There were federal, state, county and village laws, rules, regulations and ordinances to maneuver if the “trailside toilet” were to become a reality for the anorexic runners and obsessed bikers who used the path in their efforts to outrace mortality.

The committed effort to raise $10,000 for an outhouse and fountain on the trail had morphed into a $60,000 King of Crappers because of red tape and incessant government busy-body interventionism. The camaraderie that might have developed from having the volunteers work together for the community was never realized. The additional $50,000 that might have gone to other worthwhile community projects was lost. I’m not certain, but I suspect that a small group of wonderful ladies have lost some of their fervor for improving the village.

Over the years the high school football stadium has offered opportunities to nearly a thousand young players and many more cheerleaders and band members. Literally thousands of family members and fans have attended functions and games at the all-volunteer stadium. Once upon a time there were three small communities which merged together to form a new one and high school football proved to be a unique catalyst for forging a new identity. Meanwhile some seven hours to the west strangers running or riding through the Village of Rochester may stop to dump their bodily wastes and refresh their parched lips without ever knowing the hurdles that were encountered by the wonderful ladies of the Rochester Women’s Club.

Oh, you may be curious about where the additional $50 grand came from. The Village applied for a stimulus grant for the remaining balance, so non-runners or those who do not bike on the trail can help pay for the outhouse with their tax dollars. And….some shepherd in Wyoming, or a croupier in Vegas, perhaps a waiter in Orlando, a crossing guard in Boston and any number of taxpayers across the nation have contributed in some small way to the dripping and dumping by athletic Illini. This column was not written to ridicule Rochester or the ladies of the Women’s Club, but it does illustrate how far we have drifted. Over-burdensome regulations are offset by government grants…we pay doubly. 

The Stadium and the Outhouse illustrate why our nation is headed for the crapper.

Comment:  cearlwriting@hotmail.com    or   www.littlestuff-minoosha.blogspot.com

The Stadium....

As a child, I had the good fortune to be reared on a Seneca County, Ohio farm. During my elementary school years the district was comprised of our small village and the surrounding townships, but just prior to my entering junior high school, our little local school consolidated with two other small country districts to form a much larger new school district (I should note that the new school was and is still a “small” school). Our little village school had competed athletically with the others for years (perhaps decades), and there was considerable dating and intermarriage among the families of each of them, so the new culture was not much different from the old…just larger. There was some hangover from the historic rivalries as they newly-formed school board sought to find a location for building the new high school complex. The three older schools would continue as elementary and junior high facilities. 

Despite the lingering sense of loss by the old timers, many in the new district worked together to forge a new identity. Their small town, farm values would not allow them to indifferently stand by as the new community developed its own unique persona. As a youngster in the system, I was thrilled about the prospects for the new school. I was a football fan, and the original three schools did not play football…just basketball, track and baseball (pre Title IX). My mother’s brothers played at a nearby district, and I enjoyed the opportunity to attend my youngest uncle’s games. Also when I was eight years old, one my uncles took me to see my first Ohio State game at Ohio Stadium. It was sleeting, snowing and windy as we sat in “C” Deck (way up in the nose bleed section) and cheered for the Buckeyes as they battled Wisconsin. I was a football fan…and our new school was seriously considering adding football. They did add the sport, but I faced some difficulty as I attempted to get on the field. Our family was a farm family, and my Dad suspected that football would interfere with my chores at home.

We ganged up on my Dad. My uncles, my mother and I reasoned, pleaded, promised and begged so that I could put on the pads and follow my heart. The summer before my sophomore year Dad relented. He did more than merely give in because he took his truck and moved our new coach into the area. In the previous two years our school had not yet won while playing a JV schedule, but our new coach brought organization and optimism to the program and the district. We went 1-9 my sophomore year. Our first season with a varsity schedule. Bad? Certainly, but we won the first game in school history. Woo hoo. Our junior year we were 6-3-1 and shared a three-way tie for first place in the conference, and our senior year we finished at 7-2-1…good enough for 2^nd place. We NEVER played a home game because we did not have a stadium. Every Friday or Saturday game included a bus ride.

During the winter of my senior year, the school’s booster club announced that they were going to construct a football stadium. In today’s world we would tap the business community for big bucks to do it, but it didn’t work that way in the farm culture. Yes, they raised funds, but not very much. They raised enough to buy unassembled bleachers for home and visitors and lights to brighten the field. Then they began to work. Volunteers surveyed the field and set grades, and other volunteers moved the dirt and sowed the grass seed. A convoy of farm trucks drove to the manufacturing plant to pick up the stands to save shipping costs. Boosters used hammers, squares and donated lumber to construct a press box/coaches perch, concession stand and ticket booth. Farmers, merchants and factory workers assembled bleachers, erected the donated light poles, strung electrical wire, ran the plumbing and equipped the concession stand. The fall after my graduation was the inaugural season for the new stadium.

In the 47 years since the stadium was built, the wooden bleacher seats have been replaced by metal ones, the press box was improved and enlarged, the concession was made bigger, and a new work out locker-room facility has been added. The original bleacher structure still stands. In the past 47 years no one has been injured by collapsing bleachers, nor has anyone been electrocuted due to faulty wiring. The press has remained on top of the stadium, and no one has suffered from unsanitary food or conditions in the concession stand. And there have been some darn good football teams and players on that field. My dad was an instrumental force behind the community action for the stadium. He was inducted into the school’s Hall of Fame for his efforts to build the field. Unfortunately, he passed on before his recognition, but he was a tremendous example of what our people and our communities can do if government stays out of the way.

By the way although I never played on the new field, I did broadcast games from the press box, sat in the stands as my daughter was a statistician for the football team, and prowled the sidelines when my son played. Also I frequented the concession stand without encountering the scourge of ptomaine.

Tomorrow I will discuss the outhouse. The stadium and the outhouse illustrate our changing nation.

Comment:  cearlwriting@hotmail.com     or   www.littlestuff-minoosha.blogspot.com