Welcome to DU, fairwitness42!

Okay. Point taken. "Dilemma" is a good word for it.

It appears I stand on the other side of the argument than where you stand. With all due respect, I think the Second Amendment badly needs revising and updating. Too many guns means too much unnecessary bloodshed and death. I lost a couple of friends to guns. These were people who lived up in the mountains, up "in the sticks" on a family ranch, where everybody for miles around had guns, and they did, too. Grew up with them. Hunted, practiced, learned all the proper handling and cleaning and keeping and storing - AND safety. All their lives. It was a family thing. It was a neighborhood thing. It was a region-wide thing. Knew it backwards and forwards. Lived with it. Learned it at their mama's knee. They knew this stuff. They KNEW ALL ABOUT THIS STUFF.

And then, there came one horrible day. They were home, just hanging out, and they got into an argument. It became extremely heated. And she in a knee-jerk emotional response, grabbed the nearest gun and blew him away. Then, with her mother, elsewhere in the house, hearing the gunshot, and frantically crying and screaming her name while searching desperately through the house for her, my friend went behind a door and turned the gun on herself, and blew herself away, too.

All it takes is ONE argument.

I'm sorry. That just kinda shut my ears and closed my mind to all protestations about the right to bear arms. FINISHED. DONE. I don't understand any of that ANY LONGER. And I don't want to. And I don't have to. Not anymore.

John Bolton! What a total fuckwad.

However, it wouldn't have been his ridiculous mustache that I would (or DO) find so off-putting. It would be his constant throbbing hard-on for war. Probably the only way he can get hard, anymore. He wanted war like an infant wants its mother's breastmilk.

He was a signatory of the highly notorious and war-mongering cabal PNAC - Project for a New American Century. This den of evil started pushing then-President Bill Clinton to go to war in Iraq. They were unsuccessful. But they did get their way after bush/cheney stole the election in 2000. And a bunch of 'em turned up in that foul scrum of White House counselors and other officials.

This group was a piece-o-work. Chaired by Mr. Perpetually-WRONG himself, Bill Kristol. Other nasty war-mongering weasels whose names you might find familiar, from their infestations of several CON administrations from ronald reagan onward, included dick cheney, Elliott Abrams, Scooter Libby, Paul Wolfowitz, Donald Rumsfeld, THREE Kagans (Donald, Frederick, & Robert), Jeane Kirkpatrick, Ken Adelman, retired General Barry McCaffery (TV talking head), Michael O'Hanlon (!!!!?!?!?!?! - who, being from the liberal-leaning Brookings Institution, should have known better), Richard Allen, Gary Bauer, Bill "national scold" Bennett, Charles Krauthammer (Pox Noise columnist/talking head), Stephen Cambone, Steve Forbes (!), John Lehman, Frank Gaffney, Ed Meese (reagan's oft-investigated Attorney General who's other claim to fame was his ridiculous pornography report), Richard Perle, John McCain (!?!), Dan Quayle (THE infamous Mr. "Potatoe" Head, himself), Robert Zoellick, Norm Podhoretz, Randy Scheunemann (watch out for this guy. He keeps turning up again and again. He was the guy who tried to "coach" Sarah Palin for her VP debate with Joe Biden and finally went away shaking his head in dismay, William Schneider (another columnist/talking head), Malcolm Wallop, Vin Weber, and James Woolsey. AND "jeb!" bush. Yep. He's on there, too.

These were true chicken-hawks. A whole insidious, scheming, conniving, card-carrying coven of them. In every sense of the word. NEVER served in the military. NEVER wore their country's uniform. NEVER saw combat. NEVER got their hands dirty. NEVER had any skin in the game. NEVER went to war (except, for some of them, from the comfort and safety of the White House Situation Room). NEVER put their asses on the line. NEVER shed a drop of blood for their country. They just wanted everybody else to have to do that, while they stayed home where it was safe and sheltered and comfy. One exception: Rumsfeld, of all people. He actually did serve. But lucky for him, he served between conflicts. After the Korean War. So, yeah, he did wear his country's uniform. But he, too, never had to put himself in harm's way.

I must admit, the first time I scanned this list, I was shocked to see Michael O'Hanlon's name on it. What the fuck was HE doing, lying down in the same bed with those human vermin? For awhile, early in the bush/cheney regime, he was just about the ONLY voice any hapless purported "news" network seemed able to find to voice any opposition to that criminal squatters' White House. For awhile, back then, the Brookings Institution was the ONLY think tank or corresponding organization on the left, to even try to counter the metastasizing onslaught of CONservative groupings like the Heritage Foundation, the Hoover Institute, the Cato Institute, and the American Enterprise Institute (which was the spawning ground, home, and haven of the PNAC). Even back then, there were at least these FOUR on the side of the bad guys, compared to only ONE, Brookings, on our side, and it was pretty damn flimsy at that.

http://www.publiceye.org/pnac_chart/pnac.html

Welcome to DU, Denverchick.

It's been a pretty sucky year, all told. Really going out with a bang, too.

Just as long as it goes OUT.

Unfortunately, in any other year, I'd be looking forward to closing the book on the old year and the fresh, optimistic start (or restart) that a new year ordinarily brings, psychologically. But when I think about what 2017 has, laying out ahead, it makes me want to crawl into bed and pull the covers up over my head.

Welcome to DU, Doitnow!

Good one! That sounds like a pretty reasonable assumption, considering the multitudes of cockeyed mindsets we have to deal with anymore.

My sympathy to you and your wife, MM.

This year is going down bad, sad, and bitter. I've never seen anything like this. The election and surreal aftermath, and all the tragedies in the news. SHEESH...

I'm worn out. I feel as though the last two months of this year almost literally stepped on me and flattened me to the floor. The really galling thing is - ordinarily I'd be looking forward to closing the book on a year like this, and starting fresh with a new year. But the new year this time brings us the biggest disaster to hit this country (hell, this whole planet) since the last Ice Age. I'm still stuck on "if we have nukes, why can't we use them?" and of course our favorite - "grab 'em by the pussy." I'm literally still stuck on those two comments. I'm still totally flabbergasted that a candidate not only would remain viable after uttering such shit, but would actually win the election.

So unbelievably foul. Vile, vulgar, foul, and fucked.

I wish that at least you both could have the solace of knowing a new year is starting, and new beginnings and new energy and new hope and a turning of the page to start up again. There's comfort in that. I guess maybe you have to make it up this time. You're not alone. Seems like anguish is just about everywhere one turns.

My best friend has a mantra: "This is temporary." I've been borrowing it a lot lately. Sometimes it can help.

Welcome to DU, orangecrush!

Yeah, after 8 years of dubya... Holy Cannoli!

Like night and day, the difference! It was as though a sober adult had entered the room and cleared out the reckless drunken, brain-rotted arrested-development case. And now, after eight years of the well-informed, cool-calm-collected thoughtful grown-up - here goes another reckless arrested-development case, only this one isn't a dry drunk. He's a predatory, opportunistic, lying, sociopathic narcissist.

Never imagined the day when I'd expect to see people talking about how trump makes them miss dubya. But somehow, I'm thinking the Mango Mussolini is gonna get us there.

Grabbing this for my quotes file, sarcasmo.

..

Aww... that dear sweet woman.

She was such an "America's Sweetheart" type. Just really dear.

Carrie's death probably sent her into a tailspin.

Understandable as can be.

NO parent wants to outlive a child. NOBODY wants to bury one of their children.

Hope they find each other on the other side. Maybe they already have.

Aw, damn. Sorry to hear this.

Lost another one.