Returning to the Fold of Nature vs. Nurture

 "You can't go home" is common.  Vaguely I understood what it meant.  In my adult life I have been most successful living away from home.  This meant living in a city different than my parents.  I never openly disparaged Fayetteville.  She provided a rich solid environment for my social and musical education.  It was not easy, and my two years at Washington Drive Junior High School were spent in fear.  I used Fayetteville and the comfort of my parents' stability as respite in needed situations.  I came home more than once.  Often I would realize I needed greener pastures.  It would be helpful to explain this phrase, "You can't go home."  Anyone?  Bueller?  Shall we guess?  Without beating this dead horse, most of us know why.  The best reason may be children spend a lot of time trying to escape their homes.  Many movies have been made about "locals, " and for some reason it usually involves a beach.  It may be your hometown doesn't offer employment.  More importantly your hometown may be small, sheltered, and base not offering you the cultural or social opportunities you seek.  Fayetteville, North Carolina is this; it is common knowledge.  Most kids that move away do not return.  While I speak about Fayettenam in jest and with levity, I have pleasant memories.  I made the best of it.  Quickly I discovered that a partner or mate of the opposite sex was good.  America has lost touch with this notion.  Our population has been pitted against each other in many ways.  Without disparaging the LGBT movement, I feel they are responsible for this gender war.  It vitally is important to me that today's children be exposed to unbiased sexuality.  We have lost this also.  Parents are molding their children with premeditation, and it may be that heterosexual behavior and its implications are too challenging for the LGBT community.  (No pain, no gain.)  The basic "War of the Sexes" or natural push and pull of gender are crucial for human development.  Without it human beings are deprived of essential tools to traverse life.  In the film "Soylent Green" or was it "A Clockwork Orange," mention is made of seeking to abolish the human orgasm.  Without it humans would be more compliant with no desire for personal gratification.  God gave us gender and sexuality for a reason, and anyone who has experienced healthy sex understands this.  This physical, emotional, human bond helps us survive a brutal often cruel world.  What does any of this have to do with cumming home?  Only now am I discovering this.  You are your parents' children, and when you are home this is what you are.  It is a necessary relationship.  If and when you return home as an adult, those who do know you know you as your parent's child.  This is not liberating.  While it could be helpful finding employment or for social support, to be happy one has to be an individual.  That means not being defined by your parents or society.  If you return to your childhood home as an adult, you must start over.  How many times in life can we begin anew?  I have done it  moving to different places.  Each time I embarked on a new geographical journey, I reaped the benefit.  Returning to my childhood home as an older adult is challenging.  It is because we are winding down in our lives, not ramping up.  The energy does not exist to recreate yourself again.  What I have found without being egocentric, is that the person into which I have grown has outgrown this community.  As a product of diverse, often international places, my values have grown.  My knowledge, talent, and skill have become competitive to the local community.  It is likely your community does not understand you.  This feels oppressive.  In our current political environment we are being brainwashed into fighting what is not just like us.  In Fayetteville it is LGBT.  There are so many clicks of people, and they seem to revel in their separatism.  Solidarity is not an overt quality of Fayetteville, North Carolina.  The times I relocated to continue my education, I was met with open arms and a more challenging artistic pallet.  Nature vs. Nurture is this predicament.  Can your inner self continue to evolve and define itself in the midst of a colloquial agenda?  "No man is an island entire of himself."  I am realizing it is a near impossibility.  Trying to play jazz in a community that does not understand jazz music?  Playing gospel or praise music in a community that is conservative, staid, and segregated?  Trying to find heterosexual companionship in a community that favors LGBT behavior?  Let's add insult to injury.  Since Covid 19 Fayetteville has become survival.  Gentrification is imminent and poor areas are being developed, but traditional middle class areas have succumbed to degenerate behavior, poverty, and crime.  Murder is common.  Drug use has driven this statistic.  Try reinventing yourself to an audience of junkies and indigent homeless people.  It would seem Jesus is speaking.  I ask myself not to discriminate against those less fortunate, but finding common ground is difficult.  Fayetteville has become a sacrificial lamb.  The influence of Ground Forces Command and an Apache helicopter range are brutal.  The glamor of Pentagon money is gone.  I returned from the sea to help look after my aging parents.  Families deal with parental aging differently.  Assuming offspring have their own families, it is likely parents remain in their own homes or move to assisted living.  Having an adult child return home is challenging.  While I was living with my mother, an agreement emerged.  Consequently and without my asking, she bequeathed our home to me.  After her death in November of 2024, the shit hit the fan.  Everything in Fayetteville changed.  Her death had a sizeable influence on Fayetteville.  A stable and respected figure now was gone, like many others in her influential generation.  The foundations of our community began to move.  My friend calls this progress, but I am not sure that is appropriate.  What are these changes that seemed to come in one fell swoop?  Gentrification all ready had begun in Fayettenam, but the opposite also emerged.  The shopping center nearest our neighborhood fell victim to the pandemic.   Both the workers and patrons of local stores began to exhibit stress fractures physically and mentally.   It became more difficult to find healthy competent workers, and the clientele of the stores changed.  What once was a middle class shopping center became overrun with poor, drug addicted, indigent vagrants.  The products in the grocery store changed, and often the shelves are empty.  The employees work diligently, but the shoppers no longer are blue or white collar workers.  They are strung out looking for the bathroom in which to get high, or trying to steal.  Shoplifting has escalated, and the employees police the front of the store.  Is this our new experience shopping in America, or has our local strip mall morphed into the ghetto?  There is a word for this, and it is the same thing that happened in Detroit.  There has to be a local economic stimulus.  Napster and Steve Jobs annihilated the music industry.  In Nashville you have to pay to play.  What kind of absurdity is this?  The value of music has been lessened, because of its availability for free on the web.  I can't say digital distribution isn't convenient and rewarding.  It is immediate gratification, but the traditional process of creating and performing music has been undermined.  Bands plays to a track.  Our local economic stimulus is vape and drugs.  They may be illegal, but they are bought and sold like over-the-counter medications.  No one bats an eye, and you can get whatever you want.  The one thing that everyone used to pay for was the opportunity to "hook up."  Since the decimation of "Back Page," how are people getting together?  It is not by looking at a phone in the palm of your hand.  Sex always has sold, and the LGBT community has sealed the coffin on much of heterosexuality.  While our current President is unorthodox and is doing illegal and unconstitutional things, his irreverence to authority and tradition has its merits.  Boinking underage girls on an island is not a wise decision for anyone, and to see leaders falling from grace because of their libidos is insane.  America is so far behind the rest of the world culturally, it is no wonder our democracy is about to fail. 

Cotton PIckin' Values

 "How have we become fascist?"  It is amazing how susceptible humans are to temptation; it is not coincidental.  Almost everything around us is addictive in some way, because the traditional tenants of human interaction and fulfillment are absent.  The exploitation of the internet is responsible for much of this.  I have been watching Ken Burns' documentary about Congress, and it is telling.  Congress is problematic.  In a broad sense Congress has regressed 125 years to being mob bosses.  This era was known as the "Millionaire's Club," and our elected politicians were the richest and most powerful people in America.  Trusts were powerful, and inherited money accrued more wealth and power over time.  A "Progressive" contingency fought back and eventually won power, but it tested the fundamentals of democracy.  It happened in the streets by presence and with vocalization.  There was no internet.  With the shift of the American economy to technology and the internet, we, as a people, have lost touch with this responsibility.  If a free American market is to survive, then this turn toward automation, AI, and the replacing of live workers is not wise.  What does it say about America, once was a democracy?  Corporations are downsizing firing live human bodies and replacing them with software reliant upon wireless telecommunications. The resultant profits are absorbed back to the most wealthy.  We are becoming a Third World nation or "Banana Republic."  We, the people, no longer are in control or actively participation in governance.  Congress has failed to lead the country for the good of all.  No one can deny this change.  Internet commerce is key, but it was the Covid pandemic that has steered us down the wrong path.  To this day we do not know the real origins of Covid 19.  If we rely upon traditional means of enlightenment, the interview with Dr. Robert Redfield is helpful.  Why should we not trust him?  Former Vice President Dick Cheney appointed Dr. Anthony Fauci head of "The National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases." NIAID became America's biodefense program.  Other departments, agencies, and centers, including the military, were relinquished of this responsibility.  Fauci was given billions of dollars in funding and had a direct political liaison from Scooter Libby giving Fauci complete control.  He receive the highest salary in the federal government and an open line of communication with then President, George W. Bush.  He held this highest paying position until 2022.  Dr. Redfield recently conceded Covid 19 was a highly engineered virus not capable of natural evolution.  HIAID was responsible for the creation of Covid 19 with the help of the Wuhan Lab in China, Fort Detrick in Maryland, and labs at UNC-Chapel Hill.  (my alma mater)  This is disturbing information.  It is probable this highly infectious and often deadly engineered pathogen inadvertently escaped the lab in Wuhan, killed its makers, and made its way to the United States on a cruise ship.  As the passengers disembarked, they were collapsing to the ground.  Because America, through her reaction to 9/11 and as evidenced through her erroneous decimation of Iraq, was responsible for sanctioning this kind of biological/chemical weapon, it stands to reason we have it now.  Dr. Anthony Fauci has disappeared from the public eye.  In retrospect we have discovered America's response to Covid 19 largely was misguided, ineffective, and dictated by those bearing the burden of responsibility for killing hundreds of thousands of innocent people.  Only now and extremely slowly is America renewing faith in her own honesty and people.  The evil of Covid has begun to subside, but a second Trump presidency has muddied the water of a complete revival of truly American ideals.  I agree with some of the things President Trump is doing.  If we pay our troops only to train, and we are not engaged in war with boots on the ground, why not send them to curtail illegal immigration?  Transgender ideology clouds the efficiency of the military.  I did not have faith in the Secretary of Defense nor the Chairman of the Joints Chief of Staff.  They were figureheads.  Inasmuch as people personally do not like Pete Hegseth because of his media past, an Ivy League educated military veteran is a better choice to lead active duty troops.  Knowing that America has the capability to use Covid 19 in the future, whether we choose to or not, demands active democratic leadership.  We cannot allow this to happen.  In a narrow view the Covid pandemic was similar to the Holocaust.  It just was cloaked in anonymity.  Its purveyors have disappeared like Nazi officers.  There is no telling where they may emerge. 

The American Crusade

 I worked as a professional pianist in the cruise industry for a decade.  My compatriots thought this "work" a paid vacation.  There are perks.  You travel and see foreign places which is enough to validate the job.  Compared to America now, it is appealing.  There is a blatant irony.  Becoming a caregiver for my mother, which was essential for our family, I made this unusual and possibly unseemly situation work for us.  My mother, a teacher, was no pushover.  She was a hard ass, and   cohabiting with her I learned as an adult it stemmed from being an educator in the North Carolina public schools.  When she returned to the profession after having children, she was at the predominantly black high school in Fayetteville.  She caught the bus home from school, and often she was crying.  This uncultured, low-income, prejudiced black student body did not welcome whitey.  She developed a tough skin, and it was not a stretch.  She grew up poor on a Shelby diary farm picking cotton in the fields during the Great Depression.  I always will remember one of her chores was cleaning the glass chimneys on kerosene lamps.  They did not have electricity, and it is interesting that people can be without it.  Perhaps the values then were more tangible and beneficial to the human experience.  Our values now in America because of the internet are detrimental.  America is slow to notice, because those making money participate in ruthless, immoral, and criminal behavior.  One that springs to mind is companies that benefit from detaining seeming immigrants.  Can there be such a thing, companies or corporations that profit as private pawns of the government?  A loud guffaw escapes from my coughing lungs.  This is America.  We have become a nation that the government subsidizes almost everyone, whatever political ideology that is.  I believe there still is an open market system, but the odds are so stacked against a newcomer it takes more than a village to reap the benefits.  Perhaps the last one to do such a thing was NWA, Niggers With Attitude.  A small group of rappers, musicians, and artists harnessed the rebellion of American youth.  This became Hip Hop.  Popular culture has preened successful business before, and it is one of America's great offerings.  It possibly is the American Dream.  That has faded, and the evil seeds of other governments have crept in.  While most populists won't acknowledge it, I feel our current "Conditions of America" are nothing more than the fight against Communism.  The Cold War ended, the Berlin Wall fell, and the Soviet Union disbanded during the Reagan Presidency.  Ronald Reagan was a pawn, a hired actor to play the part of the American president.  I do not like for what he stood.  Contrarily I have positive feelings and recollections of his time in the White House.  America was at her creative and artistic peak.  It was the age of MTV, blockbuster movies, prime time television, and American popular music.  The substance of the precedent music was more relevant because of civil rights and Viet Nam, but a more beautiful era cannot be found in American history.  Look at any notable film from this time and you will see and hear unfettered, unabashed, artistic beauty.  Today this kind of beauty does not exist.  We are damaged, so  we mock society like we have no control.  Democracy has failed either because it has been hijacked by subversive parties like Donald Trump, or because we have lost sight of our own constitutionally awarded power to govern.  Congress has regressed to its worst form in recent history.  Because of the absence of God, our country has regressed to the brink of fascism.  It is difficult to discern our own responsibility.  If the meek are to inherit the earth, then do we just lie down?  America is not this.  If we look we will find the "Good Fight," the kind of moral crusades that eventually pay off.  Today moral behavior is punished. 

Driving the Herd

 It's the small things that matter.  At the ripe age of 62, I reinforce to myself that adolescent love is not an option.  There is zero chance that another human being will ever consider me a love interest.  There are several reasons, and these reasons are reasonable.  We get old.  Our bodies go through a transformation, and we turn into different people.  I may be the same inside, but the stark changes and challenges to our bodies are inescapable.  It is more wise to understand from a younger person's vantage point.  You are a fat old man.  Without being both sexist and discriminatory, I can say without a doubt that women are not attracted to the inner man.  They are not attracted to your intellect, your wit, your humor, or your talent.  These can contribute to the overall package, but when it comes to love or lust animal desire driven by a visual image is what stirs women.  Women are not interested in fat men.  They require the beef.  It is the way you look to which women are attracted.  The gym should be your friend, because if you are looking for love a geometrically balanced physique is your ticket.  In my experience the only thing that can counteract this primal urge of Freud's ID is money.  If you have money, and you are willing to spend it on women they will manipulate you.  It seems to be what they do, at least around here.  Before they will consent to let you express a carnal thought about them, they will require a life long commitment of financial support.  They want your house, your car, and your money.  The sex will disappear quickly, and if you resign yourself to marry a man-eater, you will be stuck in a loveless marriage with no physical release.  It is not worth it.  It is best to move on, and the world outside  America understands this.  More intelligent countries would not let their political leaders by toppled by simple infidelity.  Everyone needs love and sex, but to make it paramount in life is ridiculous.  In most European countries you visit legal houses of ill repute and purchase what you need.  It is a mature and satisfying experience, because the parties involved are mature enough not to trip on love.  America uses sex and love for control and monetary success, and the strip club is the perfect metaphor.  Why would any man choose to spend hundreds of dollars in a strip club, when in any other country simply you purchase exactly what you want and need.  It is a callous, shallow, unfulfilling exploitation of human desire.  Trying to earn the affection of someone is a complete waste of time.  You fare better ignoring them.  Better yet your hold them in contempt and build self esteem by excelling in the other areas of American life.  Otherwise you will sit around crying in your own beer lonely and forlorn.  Recent circumstances in human existence make this more difficult.  We were assaulted by a deadly virus that wreaked havoc on the human race.  Not since the Black Plague have we seen a more disruptive pathogen.  Multiple infections and organ failures.  Covid was devastating and the world has not recovered.  Human health is the most challenged in our own lifetimes.  It would seem there is a tangible force trying to thin out the human race.  We must fight for our existence, and it is a huge challenge.  When we rise each day we confront an unbalanced playing field.  Things have become stacked against us.  Almost everything is more difficult than it once was.  Perhaps Covid caused this, a weakening of the world's food supply.  In my point of view a shift away from humanity is the answer.  The digital age or our new reliance upon streaming digital images and information has undermined human accomplishment.  The things that a human can do no longer are important.  The economy has shifted to this technology driven dynamic, but average humans have little to contribute.  We cannot build and launch satellites and rockets.  We cannot build weapons.  We cannot form networks of wireless information.  While digital visual imaging is becoming more accessible to the common man via AI and smart phones, these concepts are icing.  The substance of art representing the human condition largely is absent, because we have forgotten how to achieve it.  You can't use AI.  The human element is what is necessary to achieve art, and the process is as old as this earth.  Humanity has been reduced to a herd of cattle.

The Midnight Special

As I listen to Leadbelly sing the "Midnight Special," I realize that song writing once was a valued commodity in America.  Songs were the voice of the people, and the styles varied according to the cultures they represented.  This is what makes the history of American popular music interesting and complex.  Harry Belafonte sings "Midnight Special."  It was a hit album for him, and interestingly the songs on it represented the pirating of Roots Music in America.  The chord progressions of the songs he sings are exact replicas of traditional Old Timey, Gospel, and Country songs in the public domain.  Good composers borrow, great composers steal!  Imitation is the highest form of flattery!  As you listen to Harry Belafonte sing, you are singing along with him; you all ready know the melodies from having heard and sung them in your youth.  It was the era of Stephen Foster and his song "Old Folks at Home."  The Black Church had a strong influence on American popular songs, and that has continued through the decades.  Khruanbin's guitarist and drummer played at Beyonce's church in Houston, Texas.  The Black Church has been a cornerstone of American music.  Black influences on American popular music are syncopation, improvisation, and The Blues.  Pundits suggest the The Blues spawned in the American South during and after slavery are the sole source of this emotionally moving music.  If suffering and sorrow are the overt traits expressed in The Blues, then everyone will understand all cultures throughout time have faced equal adversity.  It is not just enslaved and trafficked African-Americans.  Scot-Irish, German, Italian, and Jewish cultures all are infused with The Blues.  The Ballads in particular of the Appalachians not only express hardship, but impart wisdom to their offspring.  Any music in minor mode going back to Gregorian Chant expressed piety and sorrow at the crucifying of Jesus.  Sadness and hardship are nothing new, but perhaps the prospect of riches in the Wild West of America usurped these trials and tribulations.  All cultures have vehicles to express grief and sadness, and they are important.  One listen to aria and recitative by George Frederick Handel, and you will hear bereavement personified.  What America did do was exploit The Blues, and that is okay.  The vehicle of The Blues, its chord progression in varied forms, was a worthy foundation for the creation of American Rock 'n' Roll.  Early Rock 'n' Roll was race music or Rhythm and Blues, and largely its chord progressions were from The Blues.  This feeling of The Blues is what is appealing, and always it does not have to be lamenting.  Quickly Buddy Holly, Jerry Lee Lewis, Bill Haley, Chuck Berry, and many others discovered you could superimpose overt sexuality onto the vehicle of The Blues.  The tempos went up, and energy, vitality, and physical showmanship became paramount.  I concur.  If you want to end a party early, have the band play, "Ain't No Sunshine When She's Gone."  With no disrespect to Bill Withers, that song will depress anyone.  Baby's love it.  It is common to exploit the poor and down and out.  "Them that's got shall get.  Them that not shall lose."  

King to King Level Zero

Often when one speaks the truth or does a good deed, they are punished by the masses.  When I am compelled to write about life, it is because a force greater than me insists upon it.  Whether this is called conscience, soul, or God I don't question.  When I compose music I listen.  I have discovered in the throes of survival often there is nothing to which to listen.  That which we do have to listen is manipulative, inciting, or antagonistic.  I feel this way about television commercials.  In their inception like many things, advertising sought to be honest, clever, and entertaining.  As a nation and culture America has moved backwards.  Solidarity which is needed to bind a nation together has been replaced with tribalism.  Because  we cannot get along as adults, we seek to manipulative each other.  The Capitalist socioeconomic construct is not helpful, because it pits us against ourselves for monetary survival.  I would not say I am a Democratic Socialist, but Capitalism has succumbed to corporate corruption in such a way that the American people's system of governance has been discarded.  The essence of the United States Constitution is being mocked by our elected leaders.  I cannot remember in my lifetime such an event.  Usually we elect and believe in our leaders, because our lives and livelihoods are dependent upon them.  When they turn against us, it is nothing more than treason.  When the entire government turns treasonous, who is left to charge and prosecute them?  America's judicial system now is tasked with policing our elected leaders as well as corporate and civilian criminals.  The precedent was set in 2000 with Bush vs. Gore, when the Supreme Court ultimately decided who became President.  It was a low point in American history, and it is upon what Donald Trump has trusted his dictatorial ambitions.  The fight for the survival of American democracy now is in the courts, but are they strong enough to save us?  Again I will ask the question, "What body is responsible for charging and prosecuting a criminal government?"  If the entire government and its civil branch are under the control of the President, who is immune from prosecution, who will police them.  Will the police step up and accept this responsibility?  This did not fare well at the Capital on January 6, 2021.  The Capital Police are under control of the President, and he purposely held them back from the attack on Congress, so they could not confirm what the Electoral College decided.  America has re-elected a criminal President, so it should be no surprise when he turns against the people.  A spiritual catalyst is needed in and by America, because a greater force is needed to defeat evil.  We it would seem are not capable.  When I compose I listen.  Although I understand theoretically how and what I am composing, I must listen.  Later in life I have come to understand more often there is nothing to which to listen.  This is true of mundane American life.  Film, television, radio, and the American music industry once provided this sonic stimulation for our souls.  Covid drove a stake through most truly American virtues.  The things that have made America great, such as the commercial arts, have been hobbled by the smart phone.  Our entire culture has been hobbled by the smart phone.  Seeing or hearing artistic endeavors rife with emotion and spirituality now make me weep.  This has become so foreign to America, we have dated ourselves.  What is being offered as our future is conquest.  America has not asked for or chosen leaders whose task is to change the charter of our country.  In good faith we have elected leaders to follow the  United States Constitution.  Unfortunately the precedent was set with the Supreme Court's selection of George W. Bush.  His Vice President, Dick Cheney, pushed the boundaries of the authority of his office ascribing new power to the Supreme Court.  Two decades later Donald Trump is continuing this pattern further separating the American people from self-governance.  His administration has begun moving backwards towards the monarchy against which America fought and was founded.  "We don't want no King." 

Wearing a Tin Foil Hat

Purposely I have chosen NOT to blog about our current political strife.  The ramifications of the President's ill actions in tandem with an American oligarch will reap the repercussions of the people.  It is the people who must demand justice and take back their Constitutional right to self-govern.  This right has been hijacked under our noses, but it is no different than other nations.  The pattern is well understood, and this is Donald Trump's life's work.  Is it possible for one man to accomplish such a goal, the deconstruction of the democracy of what once was the world's superpower?  I don't think so.  There are so many losing their jobs, how can any of Trump's words be taken seriously.  This is why I have chosen NOT to blog about it.  It does not merit my attention except there is treason, a high crime.  The jury will be the millions of Americans who may be cast onto the street, and the tables of January 6 may turn.  The revolution may be original Americans, with a well-armed militia, decide not.  What is more concerning to me is that a malady unlike Covid, a nebulous and invisible nemesis is causing serious harm to specific individuals in the public forum.  A covert, seemingly invisible, nonlethal weapon has debilitated thousands of civil servants, diplomats, and others.  The intelligence agencies and the medical establishment can't find a cause.  That is because the cause is the intelligence agencies.  We could be so gullible to elect Donald Trump again and to believe his accomplice is using his 30,000 low earth orbit satellites only for internet service.  IRS or Intelligence, Reconnaissance, and Surveillance is the new cornerstone of the United States military.  Thank Bill Clinton and Dr. Ross McNutt.  President Clinton auctioned off dangerous microwave portions of the electromagnetic spectrum which did balance the budget.  Also it created America's newest economy.  We have yet to transition away from it, although it is warming the earth and causing physical harm to everything.  Millimeter waves are not our friend, and while corporate America once had oversight and federal agencies provided protection, they now have been stripped like the millions of jobs held by civil servants.  It is the Wild West, and it is happening before our very eyes.  Microwave use is off the hook.  It erroneously has become the core of human existence, and it is not necessary.  Wires are better.  It was too easy for microwave surveillance to become a nonlethal weapon.  Probably it happened by accident like Covid.  Beam microwaves at Russian government offices for long enough, and the ill effects on humans will make themselves known.  the same is true for the Apache helicopter.  It is a metaphor of the Cold War.  It is braggadocio.  It says, "Look how powerful we are!"  With all of the armaments that can be fashioned to a Sikorsky helicopter from the l970's, we don't need to fire a single round.  The radiation coming from this attack helicopter's onboard targeting and acquisition systems are enough to humble any human being.  The same is true for what is under the radome in the front of every aircraft flying.  Carbon emissions are problematic, but radiation from the upper frequency microwaves are baking our brains.  All of the symptoms of the Havana Syndrome are those of electromagnetic radiation.  When the CIA or FBI are surveilling a person of interest, they discover that with their gathered intel also the person begins to suffer from unknown maladies slowing their activity.  Effectively these individuals can be accosted invisibly without effecting those around them.  A highly steerable wave of microwave energy has become the modern nonlethal weapon, and we don't know it. 

Where is Steve Bannon?

 When asked what the Trump Administration's number one priority would be if again they came into power, Steve Bannon's response was, "To go after the Deep State."  Upon hearing this term for the first time from a childhood friend, I was perplexed.  It elicited images of a long gone era of Jim Crow segregation, the Cold War, espionage, and Fascism.  Little did I know it was the Civil Service.  Fayetteville, North Carolina is no stranger to the Civil Service.  There are hundreds if not thousands of workers gainfully employed at what was  Fort Bragg.  Although like most Americans I am aware of the heinous atrocities of the Confederacy against freed slaves and their offspring before, during, and after the Civil War, my sentiment is keeping abreast of one's past, no matter how grievous, is important.  If we sweep criminal behavior under the rug, like the actions of Donald Trump and the Republican Party, we shall forget.  This is the plan.  All ready this has begun to happen in America.  Not only are American's not being educated properly, we are being "gaslighted" into believing falsehoods.  Keeping Fort Bragg named Fort Bragg is a good idea to me, because the name retains memories of the post's history.  Championing the Confederacy, like some modern Southerners do, is not prudent.  Racial discrimination and White Supremacy are evil concepts.  It must be difficult for most to understand such small-minded behavior.  We must.  Donald Trump got re-elected.  White Supremacy and discrimination of all kinds have been a covert trait of America since her inception.  Like many historical precepts America has done her best to navigate the minefield of slavery.  Whether Trump was a catalyst for this new, misguided, and mostly ignorant tribal warring, reparations a century and a half later are not the answer.  America was doing well until now.  Most of us know that immigrants seeking a better life often will do work Americans frown upon, but watching America's core get decimated and replaced with non vetted illegal immigrants is problematic.  It seems like every conceivable attack on mainstream Americans becomes a priority.  All war is simple genocide of the pure blood of a nation.  That includes the Civil War and Viet Nam.  Watching pure blooded, wholesome, hard working Americans dies fruitlessly has become commonplace to the point that there is no America.  We are scattered bands of mutts easily controlled and manipulated.  Well educated, intelligent, thinking individuals who can see through corruption, imperialism, and Fascism almost are extinct.  It would seem a present day "Lord of the Flies" has transpired.  The tenants which built democracy including opportunity, public education, and justice have been replaced with nepotism, greed, and quest for power.  One only has to look to the White House, again, to see.  Using America's military to enforce immigration laws is not that far fetched, but it is risky.  For soldiers to embrace helpless civilians as the enemy, American or not, is wrong.  As history has proven it is far too easy to make this mistake.  An overzealous dictator usually is at the helm.  Eventually it will be the military against the populace, and this is why our Founding Fathers penned the Second Amendment.  While assault weapons are not a good choice for home use, they are being made available for this reason.  North Carolina Senate President Pro Tempore, Phil Berger, feels every adult over the age of eighteen should be able to carry a concealed weapon.  Only can we ask why?  Misguided millennials who lack crucial life experiences and wisdom should not be carrying concealed weapons.  In North Carolina anyone can walk into a gun store and buy a hand gun with no permit.  It is the wrong approach to a civilization, and only can we think that the entangling tentacles of Southern fascism bred in the Era of Jim Crow are strangling our common sense.  War, oppression, and the pursuit of power are not the pinnacles of human existence.  Art, romance, and creativity, or the Liberal Arts are a more prudent model of life.  These disciplines glorify, inspire, and empower the human heart, soul, and intellect.  We have lost them.