Dear LPKS,

Okay, the mid-term election is over, and we didn’t get the results we hoped and worked for.  I admit to being profoundly disappointed, and sometimes I wonder why we do what we do.

God knows it’s not expedient.  God knows it’s not popular.  God knows it’s right.

And that’s it, isn’t it?  Every one of us knows, as surely as we breathe, that assuring liberty and expecting responsibility is the only acceptable way to govern.  And we suspect that we are the only line resisting the slide into tyranny.

So this is my love letter, and my note of thanks, to all of you.

To the candidates, those who put their names on the ballot, who stood up there visible and vulnerable, who held the banner for all to see:  thank you.

To the candidates’ families, those who stood beside them and who welcomed them home at night, who urged them to bed at two in the morning even as they kept answering emails and planning strategies, who saw the anger and the frustration and, probably, the tears that the rest of us will never know about:  thank you.

To those who booked speaking engagements and produced radio ads and researched ad placements and deposited donations and filed financial reports and gave advice about wording for ads:  thank you.

To those who donated money in any amount:  thank you.

To those who walked or drove or rode in the parades throwing candy and handing out flyers, to those who stood on the corner of 10^th and Topeka Blvd. waving campaign signs and cheering for anyone who honked in agreement:  thank you.

To those who planned the watch party and brought food to the party, those who came to the party and were determined to be cheerful even when the returns were disappointing, to those who were not cheerful at all but came to the party anyway:  thank you.

To those who voted for freedom:  thank you.

There is no group of people I am more proud to call my friends.

I’ll see you all back here again in a couple of years, okay?

Love,

Sharon

Posted by Sharon under Libertarianism | No Comments »

Look in the Yellow Pages.  If there are two or more local businesses performing any given service, it is not a governmental function.

Posted by Sharon under Libertarianism | No Comments »

Okay, I admit that I click on and read the “What Do Men Want?” and “How to Make Your Sex Life Better After Age 50″ and “What Do Men Like Most About Women?” articles that pop up on MSN.  Most of the information is pretty banal.  (Men like the way you smell fresh out of the shower.  After menopause women have less vaginal lubrication than before.  Your partner is not a mindreader; you have to ask for what you want.)  I guess I keep hoping I’ll find something magic that I didn’t know before.  That way, if someone interesting actually comes along, I’ll be READY!

My point here, however, is that, with all that information available, how can anyone possibly have an excuse not be a great lover?  There should be no inept sexual partners out there, ever, anywhere.

Posted by Sharon under Laughter | No Comments »

When you expect the government to do everything you want for you, you end up with a government that thinks it can do anything it wants to you.

Posted by Sharon under Libertarianism | No Comments »

Posted by Sharon under Libertarianism | No Comments »

I learned something this morning.

Our church choir is tiny — four women.  We have a soprano, an alto, a tenor, and a tenor/baritone (me). 

I have some small talent as a singer, no training, and even less confidence.  My main contribution is to be able to hit a B below low C and to add some volume to the song.  I do fine in a group if someone will teach me my part, since I can’t sight read music.

Today was Kick-Off Sunday, and the choir served only to lead an old favorite, “Down by the Riverside,” with the congregation singing along.  Typically, we wear robes and hold a music folder, but this was very informal, so we decided to just wear our regular clothes.  And we knew the song so well that two of us decided not to even bring our music folders up there with us.

And thus it was that I found myself standing in front of the congregation, singing, with no robe, no folder, no barrier, no shield, between me and all those people.  Suddenly I didn’t know what to do with my hands, I didn’t know where to look, I couldn’t even decide whether I was supposed to smile.

I have an uncomfortable premonition that this may trigger those naked-in-public dreams.

Posted by Sharon under Observations | No Comments »

From The Kiplinger Letter dated September 3, 2010:

Keep your eyes on regulators, not lawmakers.

Rulemakers will be the real agents of change over the next two years of the Obama administration.

Congress and Obama won’t agree on much….

That gives more power to rulewriters.

And they’re ready to use it, in spades.  Obama’s lieutenants will move in a host of areas to implement his priorities.  Congress can’t stop them, and lobbyists will have influence only on the margins.

Chilling.

Posted by Sharon under Libertarianism | No Comments »

Yesterday I made a trip to the bookstore, then headed for their coffee shop to sit and read for a while.

One of my purchases was a collection of short essays, and I wanted to check the copyright date on one of them.  At the bottom of the page with all that sort of information is this:

The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of American

 National Standard for Information Sciences — Permanence of Paper for Printed

 Library Materials, ANSI Z329.48-1984.

The Libertarian in me balked, and I was going to come home and rant loundly herein.  But a cursory check indicates that the ANSI is a member organization that “coordinates the development of U.S. voluntary national standards in both the private and public sectors.” 

Oh. Okay.

Now I am just left to marvel that there are people, somewhere, who are paid to spend time being concerned with the Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials.

Posted by Sharon under Libertarianism | No Comments »

There is a lovely new building here in town where I attend a committee meeting once a month.  All the facilities are first rate, including the ladies’ room.

The dividers and doors of the stalls in the ladies’ room are shiny black metal, inside and out.  Which means that anyone in there has a full frontal view of herself sitting on the toilet.

I would prefer they had spared me that.

Posted by Sharon under Laughter | No Comments »

When I was growing up, we had what I think of as about four levels of dress.

There were shorts, jeans, and casual shirts which were reserved for play.  Then there were school clothes; we did not wear shorts or jeans to school, and when we got home we changed our clothes before we went out to play.  Then there were dressy clothes, sometimes called church clothes.  They served not only for church but for almost any event dressier than school.  By the time I got to college, I had added party clothes. 

Nowadays people seem to have more clothes, but they have fewer levels of clothes. 

People come to church, as a friend put it, in the same clothes they wear to the grocery store.  The children lighting the candles have bare legs and flip-flops hanging out below their acolyte robes. 

Jeans and t-shirts are the norm at our office.  And at the company Christmas party, which is supposed to be a dressy affair, I have seen folks in jeans and sweatshirts.

I have no idea what to make of it all.

Posted by Sharon under Observations | No Comments »