In the Year of Bottomless Bailouts, I am most grateful this Thanksgiving for Americans who refuse to abandon thrift, personal responsibility and self-reliance. When the moochers and entitlement-mongers drive you mad, remember that our nation still serves as home to millions of citizens who do for themselves. Like our Founding Fathers, they are God-fearing people — the ones elitist pundits ridicule as "oogedy-boogedy" — who will never put their faith in the Cult of You Owe Me.
They are people like my reader Jen, who runs a family farm called the Double Nickel in New Mexico. Tired of all the handwringing, "in times like these" rationalizations for unprecedented federal intervention in the financial markets to rescue beleaguered businesses and homeowners, Jen wrote me a letter this week about her own plight and triumph over adversity:
"I am writing to you to share my story of how one can survive hard times and land solidly on one's feet. … So here goes: My husband had an auto accident on Jan. 1, 2005, and our lives and finances changed dramatically. Our income was cut in half, as he has permanent injuries and went from being a field officer to a desk job in a less fast-paced career."
Instead of staying in a home they couldn't afford and waiting for a mortgage rescue from the savior Barack Obama, Jen, her husband and their four children moved to New Mexico because of the much lower cost of living and college tuition expenses. One of her sons is now a soldier — the third generation in her family to serve, including Jen's father, who was killed in Vietnam. The other kids are home-schooled students (among a growing population of home-schooled kids, whom "The View's" condescending co-host Joy Behar recently derided on the show as being "demented"). Jen continues:
"We sold our lovely home, bought a rundown, fixer-up place and converted it into a farm that could provide garden vegetables to can and an area to have some animals to provide eggs, chickens, ducks, turkey, geese, sheep and goats.
… Freecycle and Craigslist turned out to be wonderful assets, as most of our animals came for free or for barter — and the children and I mucked out stalls on a ranch for sheep."
Yes, they raise turkeys and other animals, and sell them for profit. This enterprise makes them, in the eyes of The New York Times editorial board, which recently decried Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin's visit to a turkey farm, "executioners." That's language the Times would never think of using to describe, say, the Weather Underground terrorists who targeted police officers in cold blood. But poultry farmers? Brand 'em with an "M" for murderers.
But I digress.
Instead of awaiting the next stimulus check from the Borrow-Spend-Repeat-Panic politicians in Washington, Jen explains how the family has cut costs:
"I learned how to make my own shampoo, toothpaste, soaps, cloth napkins, dish scrubbies, potholders, skirts (mend all clothes) and most meals from scratch. We heat our home exclusively with wood, and I am currently growing a winter garden. The spring garden will be in containers by the last week of December to prepare for spring planting. I do not see this as a downfall or a tragedy. For those worried about holiday spending: I spent only $100 for a family of six last Christmas, and most of that [on] underwear, socks and the meal."
And she adamantly rejects the victim card:
"This accident has been a blessing for my family. The pain that my husband has daily is not the blessing, but that he is alive and able to continue to watch his children grow into adulthood.
"It also has been wonderful to know that we live in a nation that affords us the opportunity to reinvent ourselves from suburbanites to a country-dwelling farm family. I am ashamed to see the American spirit that made our nation so great now turned into nothing."
Thanks to self-reliant Americans like Jen, that spirit lives. In times like these, they are our greatest blessing.
Michelle Malkin is author of "Unhinged: Exposing Liberals Gone Wild." Her e-mail address is malkinblog@gmail.com.
COPYRIGHT 2008 CREATORS SYNDICATE, INC.
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4 Comments | Post Comment
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Ma'am; this isn't the year of bottomless bailouts, but the year of brainless idiots... More specifically; the year when being brainless caught up with all the idiots... Read a book... Read history, or read economy, or read a recepe... There is only so many ways you can divide a pie, and there is only so many ways you can divide an economy... Look at divided societies and what happened to them once divided into rich and poor... I built America, Union... All my pension was probably invested with people who would never invest in union... That is the way the economy goes, invest with exploiters who invest in exploitation and hope every thing does not go to hell... Sorry to tell you little lady, but your system does not work, and now it is going to hurt a lot of people, and you better hope you don't have to be poor among the poor, and have to hide your look of disdain at the pain of those of Joes who feel entitled...Don't let on that you cheered on those who ran them down like a deer in the road... Better use the last of your cash to buy a warm bath and a razor blade than act all classy with the newly poor... They'll gut you with a rusty blade for all the dues you never paid.... No matter how hard you have worked for their wealth there are far many more working hard for want and poverty who have some claim on the common wealth... Don't get in their way when they're having their say, and don't get in their way when they're getting paid, don't look them in the eye...You don't want to be recognized for all your lies..Pray they don't know your name....Thanks...Sweeney
Comment: #1
Posted by: James A, Sweeney
Thu Nov 27, 2008 9:39 PM
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I read but I'm confused, WTF is a "recepe"? Don't believe I ever read one of those. At least not in English. The pie mentioned in post #1 does not need be divided at all, at least not IMHO! Not MY pie! I'll cling to my Bible and I'll cling to my gun, a bullet to the head for those who steal then run! Don't get in my sight you leaches of all, for lifting you up has been my down-fall! It is said Bad things happen to good people, that shall be proven true. It is about to get very bumpy.
Thank you Michelle for an excellent article. You rock "little lady" always have, always will! Very well said. I love America, she needs me more now than ever, I swore I would defend her and I certainly will not leave her!
Comment: #2
Posted by: bill s
Fri Nov 28, 2008 1:24 PM
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You are one of the best defender of the American way. Please continue to tell it like it is. There is so much BS that appears and yours is a refreshing voice. We as a nation will be in for a bad time with this new administration. Oh well, blame President Bush for all the ills of the country, but why stop there, also the world.
Comment: #3
Posted by: James Balitsos
Fri Nov 28, 2008 5:29 PM
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Re: bill s; Sorry Bill, ...Recipe, a typo... All systems are closed... Just like a pie, if the top one half of one percent has the same income as the bottom 50%; that does not leave much for you or me... So, by all means, kill for what you have so little of ... Why should you share what you have not when others will not share what they have??? Aristotle said that the line between vice and virtue divides all of mankind... Well if mankind is one single thing it cannot be two separate things divided by a single line... And the same thing is true of America... If we are letting our conception of property and property rights divide us as we did before the Civil War, then we are weakened... The rich can continue to feed on the poor, but when they are used up, what is to stop them from considering you as poor, and feed on you??? Lincoln made this same argument in regard to slavery, that if you can enslave a man who is black what is the protection for one who is brown??? Better protect all the people than to give any group the privilage of feeding on some, and denying that group their rights, to justify the feast... Certainly you have your best interest in your view... You think if you kill to protect your property you are well within your rights... Ask that God of yours first, how to restore life, because society has the power to make people whole who have lost their goods, but no one can restore life... So, consider that your rights may lie in defending your life and such wealth as is essential to your survival, but not in protecting all manor of property... Property is, after all, a form of relationship... It is the society that tells what property rights they will support, and this has changed very often in history, with chattel slavery being only a late example.. The property rights you propose to guard with a gun, a rich man guards with a law of his own design, and his wealth is a greater danger to your rights than is the rabble, because so soon as a man is made more by owning more, unequal by his possessions, having more rights because he has more property, he is suddenly more powerful than all who own less, so the trend is like that in our own country, of many small holders, peasant farmers run out of work, and off the land by the very power they might have used to injure some one holding less property...But, mankind has went through this before... Six men owned all of Maurtania under Roman authority, that was a huge piece of fertile land that would have better served Rome parcelled out to small farmers... What defense could those large land holders offer Rome when it fell??? For the poor, one form of slavery is like another...So why allow your society to be divided between rich and poor, when the rich have no support to offer society and the rich refuse to support society??? Better to keep all with enough, and your society whole, united before all enemies...Thanks...Sweeney
Comment: #4
Posted by: James A, Sweeney
Sat Nov 29, 2008 12:04 PM
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