I spent Friday and Saturday in Ireland.
Okay, this Ireland is a small community in the middle of West Virginia. For 44 years they have put on the Irish Spring Festival, centered around the Community Building (formerly a 2-room school) and the Methodist Church. Activities for all ages include square dancing, basketball, kite flying, bingo, costume contest, a parade, gospel sing, 5k Walk/run, and Road Bowling. Plenty food and homemade crafts.
These country folks, including several of my relatives, know how to have a good time while serving the community. They select a King and Queen (three candidates for each). The process raises money to maintain the community building and upgrade the kitchen. The candidates who attract the most money, a penny a vote, are the winners. (Not much different than most of our elections.) With inflation, and a shortage of pennies, next year it will cost a dollar per vote.
Road bowling may be a new term for you. The ball is about the size of a tennis ball, but quite heavy. The sport is conducted on a country road. The ball is tossed, somewhat like a regular bowling ball, and the farther it rolls without careening off the road, the better. Each successive toss is from where the ball stopped rolling. The course is about 3 miles, up and down hills and around curves, and the team that gets to the end with the fewest throws is the winner.
The Festival continues until March 20. At 10:46 a.m., to mark the official start of Spring, a spirited group will climb to the top of a steep hill where a huge rock has been christened the “Blarney stone.” Whether anyone kisses the Blarney stone may depend on evidence of any birds recently perched thereon.
Meanwhile in Washington, the Senate is locked in an argument over funding the Dept. of Homeland Security (DHS). Republicans want to fund the whole department while Democrats have shut down payments to the workers with TSA, the Secret Service, FEMA, and the National Guard because they want to get rid of one part of DHS: ICE.
Suppose Congress treated the Department of Agriculture the same way. Republicans might favor passing the 20 percent of the budget that supports farmers and reject the 80 percent that is mostly for SNAP (food stamps). And Democrats would be the opposite. So far, they have had enough common horse sense to fund USDA as a whole. (The delay in passing the “Farm Bill” is an issue for later.)
Back to the argument over DHS and ICE. A simple question will tell you where your Senator stands. Ask, “Do you favor deporting people who are here illegally, especially those who have committed other crimes?”
Did you know this? ICE is funded for the next 3 years! There’s nothing Congress can do to eliminate the ICE budget. So, to get even with ICE employees (who are executing a law passed by Congress), Democrat Senators are essentially forcing employees in TSA, FEMA, and other DHS agencies to work without getting a timely paycheck. Somehow, they think this action will attract votes from citizens who are asked to go to the airport 3 or 4 hours early to get through TSA.
The war in Iran continues. The armed forces of Israel and the U.S. have wiped out Iran’s Navy and Air Force. Political and military leadership in Iran has been decimated. (The current Supreme Leader is represented by a cardboard cutout.) Yet, Iran still has missiles, cluster bombs, drones, and small swift boats which are causing havoc across the Middle East and blocking the Strait of Hormuz.
Again, there is disagreement in Congress. Many Democrats say we should stop the war immediately. Yet, a few years ago the same Senators were strongly in favor of stopping Iran from having nuclear bombs and being run by radical Islamists. Now that a President has actually taken action toward those goals for the first time in 47 years, they object.
Historic quotes by Will Rogers:
“This country has gotten where it is in spite of politics, not by the aid of it. That we have carried as much political bunk as we have and still survived shows we are a super nation.” DT #1948, Nov. 1, 1932
“They [Congress] wouldn’t be so serious and particular if they only had to vote on what they thought was good for the majority of the people of the U. S. That would be a cinch… They first must consider is, or was, it introduced by a member of the opposite Political Party. If it is, why then something is wrong with it from the start, for everything the opposite side does has a catch in it.” WA #78, June 8, 1924