Moonhowlings

Guest Contributor: Annabel Park

Disclaimer: All guest posts are the opinion of the poster and do not necessarily represent the views of moonhowlings.net administration. M-H

Fri, 08/27/2010 – 11:14am — AnnabelPark
I have been asked many times in recent days, “What do you think about Glenn Beck?” I haven’t commented because I haven’t been focused on him enough to really know. But since his rally at the Lincoln Memorial this weekend is distracting so many Americans who could put their time to much better use, here is my take:

I wrote the following in Wednesday’s Facebook post, without mentioning Mr. Beck but with him partially in mind:

Before we call someone a racist, we should ask ourselves: are we moved to call someone a racist because we feel compassion for the victim or because we feel hatred toward the perpetrator? What if, instead of being divided against each other over race, we stood together against those who perpetuate economic injustice against us all? Imagine how the world would change.

Martin Luther King’s march was called the “March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom.” While so many of us are immensely distracted by Mr. Beck and other wedge issues of the day, Rome burns. If we continue to follow Pied Pipers who want to see our country fight itself rather than come together to solve our problems, what problems can we expect to solve? We are headed for a deep economic depression if We the People fail to show our leaders that we want solutions not distractions. To do that we must lead by example.

In short: Glenn Beck’s rally is a corporate-sponsored ragtime show. An unfortunate distraction in tough times when we should be pulling together.

Read more…

Colonel Morris Davis published some of his thoughts on being an American and and what it takes to nourish our country:

My father was a 100 percent disabled veteran of World War II. He left home a healthy man in the prime of life and returned seriously disabled by a broken back during a training accident. My earliest memories are of him going to the Bowman-Gray Hospital at Wake Forest University for multiple surgeries, spending weeks at home in bed in a full-body plaster cast, his back and leg braces and crutches, and the hand-controls that let him drive without using the gas or brake pedals. Like many of his generation – and like many of the men and women I see now at Walter Reed Army Medical Center – there was never a word of bitterness over what he lost, only pride in his country and a bond with others who served in defense of democracy.

Robert Hutchins, former Dean of the Yale Law School and Chancellor of the University of Chicago, said “The death of democracy is not likely to be an assassination from ambush. It will be a slow extinction from apathy, indifference, and undernourishment.”

I believe that living in a democracy is a privilege, not a right, and each citizen has a duty to do his or her part to ensure the privilege isn’t lost to future generations. That was a lesson I learned from my father at an early age. I joined the Air Force a few months after he died and served for 25 years, in part because of his example.

Volunteers for military service aren’t apathetic or indifferent about democracy. They pledge to support and defend the Constitution, and many make the ultimate sacrifice; I saw proof every morning when I drove by the white stone markers aligned in rows at Arlington National Cemetery on my way to work. We owe them a duty to do more than just passively surrender to the challenges we face; we have an obligation to participate in working towards solutions.

It says something when we cast nearly as many votes to select the next American Idol as we do to select the next American president, when more can name the “Plus Eight” that belong to Jon and Kate than the eight members of the Supreme Court remaining when Justice John Paul Stevens (Navy veteran) retires, and when Tiger Woods wrecking his marriage and his SUV is the lead story on the national news. Too many of us are too absorbed with the superficial world of celebrities and the schadenfreude of their calamitous lives.

The most basic duty of citizenship is participation, something Americans do less than citizens of most other countries. Almost all eligible voters in Australia – about 95 percent – cast ballots in national elections; typically a little more than half of eligible voters in the U.S. do the same. That’s a sad fact. There is no excuse for being uninformed on issues and there is no excuse for not voting. In my view, you forfeit the right to pontificate if you’re too lazy to participate.

I’m involved in the Coffee Party, a group that promotes civil discussion about issues and greater public participation in the political process. I don’t believe any political party or any group along the ideological spectrum has a monopoly on good ideas, and I believe we should be able to discuss issues and ideas without hurling insults and threats. We seem to lose sight of the fact that we’re all in this together.

We have the power and the ability to prove Hutchins wrong and to advance the ideal the Founding Fathers envisioned – continuing to perfect the union, doing justice, insuring domestic tranquility, providing for the common defense, promoting the general welfare, and passing these privileges along to those that follow – if we just have the will.

Colonel Davis seems to have great hope for America. Will the ideals envisioned by Colonel Davis win in the end or will apathy indifference and a slow extinction become our fate?

Sunday’s News and Messenger had a great article on the Coffee Party entitled Still Brewing.  It featured Bob Settle, Bill Golden and Al Alborn  all sitting outside a Woodbridge Starbucks drinking coffee and explaining   the Coffee Party.  The men spoke  a little about their politics, which were surprisingly centrist and conservative. 

Jonathan Hunley, reporter for the News and Messenger,   apparently wanted to give Corey Stewart, the chairman of the Board of Supervisors,  a chance to clean up his act. He had been unflattering to the Coffee Party the previous week at their kick off meeting.   It didn’t work.  Stewart once again shot himself in the foot.  Poor Corey is running out of feet real quickly:

Prince William Board of County Supervisors Chairman Corey A. Stewart isn’t buying that, however.

He said that if everyone in the Coffee Party was a “middle-of-the-road veteran” such as Alborn, he might have more respect for the group.

But Stewart said Byler and Park are just “ultra-left attention-seekers” who “despise” him and Supervisor John T. Stirrup Jr., who led the county’s crackdown on illegal immigration.

“This is just an ultra-left fringe group,” the Republican said.

Corey, Corey, Corey!  This kind of talk has no political capital.  The Coffee Party isn’t about you or John Stirrup.  The Coffee Party isn’t about Annabel Park or Eric Byler.  The Coffee Party isn’t about the 3 men who were interviewed for the story. 

I find it frightening that the only people Stewart seems to have respect for are ‘middle-of-the-road veterans’.  Does that mean that everyone else is an ultra-left attention seeker, a fruitcake, a nut, or crap? (his descriptors, not mine)

A review of the article will be forthcoming.  Chairman Stewart’s words, meanwhile, deserve to be handled separately.

Why does the Chairman continue to shoot himself in the foot making derogatory remarks about his constituents?  There are a bunch of people out there who see themselves as Coffee Party People.   They do not deserve to be called names, especially by the county Chairman.  This behavior sets a bad precedence.  Do we assume Mr. Stewart is a member of the Tea Party and sees the Coffee Party as competition or do we just assume he doesn’t want to be re-elected?  I can’t vote for anyone who gratuitously calls strangers names, not even knowing who they are.  

Mr. Stewart ought to find out who the people are and go shake their hand.  These are the people who want to be part of shaping their government.  Aren’t those  people the folks  we used to call a PATRIOTS?  What happened to that term?

Nuts?

Corey thought he was only insulting Annabel, Eric, and I am sure, he was thinking of me also in his kind words (major sarcasm)when he called Coffee Party participants “fruit cakes” and “nuts”.  What he did not realize was that  many of the attendees were military vets.  One of whom holds the rank of Colonel.  Colonel Morris Davis served in the Air Force for 25 years.  He resigned after being appointed Chief Prosecutor at Gitmo due to his insistence the trials be fair and spoke out strongly against torture as he felt it compromised the integrity of the prosecutors.

Corey Stewart’s Nuts Are Out

Last Saturday, I attended a Coffee Party Day event at the town hall in Haymarket, Virginia. The Coffee Party is a new group that encourages civil discourse on public policy issue. About 30 people attended the event and, based on a show of hands, at least a third of the attendees were military Veterans. I’d estimate the median age of those in attendance was over 50 years of age. The common theme was there are a lot of problems facing the nation and screaming at each other is not going to solve them.

The Honorable Corey A. Stewart … my representative.

Corey Stewart is the Chairman of the Prince William County Board of Supervisors. On the official county website, he is listed as “The Honorable Corey A. Stewart” and supposedly he represents me and all of the other citizens of the county, including those of us that met at the Haymarket town hall last Saturday. Here is what he said in an interview with a reporter from the Gainesville Times:

“The Coffee Partiers are a bunch of fruitcakes; yeah, they’re a bunch of nuts. If they’re going to be a coffee party, they’ll be a hazelnut party.” Stewart elaborated, saying the Coffee Party is “just a phase; it’ll disappear.” He derided one of the co-founders saying, “does (he) have a job?” Stewart described the Tea Partiers as patriots “concerned about the direction of the country and about the vast amount of spending that happening.” He called the Tea Party a “legitimate movement” while saying the Coffee Party is “just a load of crap.”

So, my representative, The Honorable Corey A. Stewart, considers me and the other Vets who were there on Saturday fruitcakes, nuts, and a load of crap while he believes the Tea Party group are “patriots.” It seems that a lot of people like The Honorable Corey A. Stewart, Newt Gringich, Karl Rove, Rush Limbaugh, and Glenn Beck, among others, like to use the word patriot to describe themselves and those who agree with their ideology, while none of them ever felt the urge to put on the uniform and defend the constitutional right to belittle others by calling them fruitcakes, nuts, and crap. Apparently he, like former VP Cheney, had more important things to do than serve in the military. To him and the others; you’re welcome.

UPDATE:  Title changed to appear less leading.

By now, everyone knows about the Coffee Party.  There were meet-ups all over the United States last Saturday.  People got together to discuss the direction they wanted their local, state and national governments to go. 

A reporter with the Gainesville Times,   Dan Roem, covered the meet-up out in Haymarket last Saturday.  He reported that our BOCS chairman had the following to say about his constituents who gathered to discuss a more productive government:

Despite its call for civility in political discourse, not everyone is buying into the movement, particularly Stewart.

“The Coffee Partiers are a bunch of fruitcakes,” Stewart told the Times on Sunday. “Yeah, they’re a bunch of nuts. If they’re going to be a coffee party, they’ll be a hazelnut party.”

Stewart elaborated, saying the Coffee Party is “just a phase; it’ll disappear.”

He derided Byler, whose 2007 films portrayed Stewart as being a right-wing ideologue, asking at one point, “Does (Byler) have a job?”

Byler said he does not have a full-time job but has earned income from college speaking engagements during the last couple years after striking it rich in Los Angeles making romantic dramas from 2002 to 2006.

Stewart described the Tea Partiers as patriots “concerned about the direction of the country and about the vast amount of spending that happening.” He called the Tea Party a “legitimate movement” while saying the Coffee Party is “just a load of crap.”

When asked to respond to the inevitable accusation that his comments are the type of discourse Coffee Party participants are fighting against, Stewart replied, “It’s more important to be honest than polite.”

Corey must be looking for this year’s scare tactic so he can get elected. More ‘honest than polite?’ Not really. Some people would say or do anything to get elected, or re-elected.

Nothing else needs to be said. Corey has said it all. Is he speaking for the entire BOCS?

REMINDER

The Prince William County, VA Coffee Party will hold its kick-off meeting on National Coffee Party Day, March 13^th, 2010, from 10:00 to 11:00 A.M.  The kick-off meeting will be held at the Haymarket Town Hall.  The address is:

15000 Washington Street

Haymarket, VA 20169-2975

(703) 754-4816

To register for this event, please go to the Prince William County Coffee Party facebook page or www.coffeepartyusa.com    For more information about the lovely town of Haymarket, please visit www.townofhaymarket.org.

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The criticism about volunteering for Candidate Obama and Senator Webb seems rather bogus to me. What person in any grassroots movement hasn’t been involved with other campaigns. I would expect most people from the ‘other hot beverage’ group worked for their candidate. Just recently, in fact, some TPP in Massachusetts claimed credit for sending Senator Scott Brown to Washington.

I don’t see how nearly 100,000 people on face book can be considered a top down movement. It sounds to me like people are finding their regional niche and going for it. Hopefully out of all of this, people in various locations will meet other people who are willing to run for local office. Throwing the bums out starts at home.

Good for those who are making their voices heard. The political parties need to listen carefully to the constituents. Meanwhile, Annabel, you sounded great! Keep up the good work.