Lots of Snow

Over the weekend the forecasters were calling for lots of snow... and they were right. We got nothing more than a dusting last night, but over the course of the morning we have accumulated 4+ inches. And the roads are not cleared yet! I just had to go to the Warehouse and boy was that an adventure. I was able to make it down with little trouble (crawling along EXTREMELY slow through the drifts), but coming up was nearly impossible. I am glad I made it. Coming up the side of the hill from the Warehouse there is one last big hump before it levels out, and while it was difficult coming up the majority of the hill, that hump was awful. I came to everything but a complete stop and just crawled with wheels spinning up that last 20 feet. Three cheers for maybe the first decent snow we've had this season and nobody bothering to clear the roads :-).

A Healthy Fear

Clint Eastwood is a great filmmaker and I have always enjoyed his movies. One of his most common themes is the corruption of government systems. I have to admit, many times I have watched his movies and then afterwords sat back and made excuses for the government programs or authorities that he just tore apart. In "The Outlaw Josey Wales" he exposed many of the injustices wrought on the South following the Civil War. In "Unforgiven" we saw the dangers of local law enforcement working for their own personal gain rather than for the people. In "Absolute Power" we saw how officials as high as the President can be seduced by their power into doing the unthinkable. The Franklin D. Roosevelt administration is labmasted in "Flags of Our Fathers" for their incredible propaganda program. We know that power corrups and absolute power corrupts absolutely, and the older I get the more afraid I become of our government. I know that my mind is expanding because I am constantly questioning my beliefs and sometimes changing my opinions as I find truth. Well, while I in the past have made excuses for our big government, I am now seeing the importance of people like Clint Eastwood pointing out the extreme dangers posed by giving them so much power. We have seen the myth built up and propagated that the government is a good thing, something that is working for you to fix the problems in your life and make your life and standard of living better. Well, that is wrong. Our founding fathers knew that the government is something to be feared and that is why they made such a confining Constitution. Though even that has not been enough to hold our federal government in check. We need to have a healthy fear of giving President Bush all the power of the Patriot Act (a terrible name by the way, pure propaganda), we need a fear of our government's powerful propanganda network and the IRS. We need to watch everything they do to make sure they do not keep growing and taking away our liberties. We need to watch movies like these done by Clint Eastwood and not make excuses for our government, but instead watch them and learn that we need to fear our government and fight with everything we have to keep it from getting bigger and more intrusive. We need to fear this new administration trying to take away our gun rights, control our personal healthcare, second-guess our parenting methods and go so far as to mount satellite tracking devices on our cars.

Good job for Clint Eastwood and Ron Howard and all those willing to show the true dangers of giving too much power to the government.