The bright and colorful autumns in southern Wisconsin are like the dead of winter in St. Louis-cold and brutal. I was living in Monroe, Wisconsin, the undisputed cheese capital of the world. Monroe, home to Swiss Colony, is less than an hour south of the state capital, Madison, and twenty minutes north of Freeport, Illinois.

I manned an investment office on the town square in Monroe, hawking mutual funds and bonds to anyone who would listen. I often set out in my 1972 light green Cadillac Coupe de Ville, tooling from village to village in the heart of America's dairy capital, finding prospective buyers for my goods.

In early December, 1980, I left Monroe the week after Jim Dandy had shown up for a concert in an off-white shack which served as a pub on the southern edge of town. The bar was a block away from a micro-brewery, ran by someone with a Norwegian name. I was heading due east on Highway 11 towards Brodhead, a village of about a thousand Scandinavian souls.

Surely someone in Brodhead would open up an account with me and buy some bonds. Maybe a big-time dairy farmer or a retired couple. Back in 1980, there were still a lot of folks who remembered the Great Depression.

I talked to one elderly lady about government-backed bonds. "I remember the Great Depression like it was yesterday." Fear and recollection shone in her light blue eyes.

"I  hope our country never goes through that again. The banks closed and most everybody I knew lost their life's savings. They couldn't get their money out of the banks." Her voice faded and she looked at her living room wall as if the Ghost of the Great Depression shone on it.

The retired school teacher turned down my offer of high-interest (18%) government-backed bonds, which were redeemed fully in 1984 by the corporation behind it. One elderly person after another displayed the fear of the depression years in Monroe.

On my way to Brodhead the radio blared "Sweet Home Alabama" and the colorful trees had turned butt-naked. The only greenery in the gentle rolling hills of America's cheese-land were the fir and pine trees, copiously scattered from hilltop to bottom.

The sky was ice cold blue, the wind was cutting, and the frosty air had penetrated my black overcoat. It was December 9, Lynnard Skynyrd stopped howling about Neil Young and the radio announcer broke in.

"John Lennon, former Beatle and solo recording artist was shot by an assassin last night at  his home in New York. The name of his killer, who has been arrested, is unknown. Funeral arrangments are pending."

I was shocked. I had worshipped the Beatles since I was ten. I remembered the first Beatles tune I had ever heard: I Want to Hold your Hand.

I wasn't astounded when the Fab Four broke up in 1970, all that togetherness and stuff. Lennon had The Voice and was considered the intellectual and the leader of the group. His solo career, save for Imagine, was not exceptional.

I never did like Yoko Ono. She couldn't sing and I believe she had a big role in the break-up of the Fab Four. One conspiracy that went around after the Beatles disbanded was that they had recorded hundreds, even thousands, of songs, storing them in some secret location. The tapes would provide fresh Beat-les tunes for decades to come. Imagine that.

Give Peace a Chance. John's Vietnam Protests. His drug usage. His Deportation Thing.

All over by the violence of a pistol.

The 1960's were over. Former president Jimmy Carter had returned to Georgia to grow peanuts. Or something. Ronald Reagan, the reckless cowboy from Hell, was at the helms, leading America through an eight-year journey into the throes of conservatism.

Disco was in. Punk came and went. The baby-boomers had entered the real world and the generation behind them was sticking safety pins in their cheeks, bashing their skulls into one another. Politics was turning around. Music was changing radically. Comedy was making a big comeback on TV and in the club scene.

Some of us longed for our 1960's childhood, with Twist and Shout and Green Acres. But in the 1980's, taxes would be cut, de-regulation of some industries would take place, civil rights would take a back seat, and the Soviet Union would begin its long-awaited demise.

John Lennon, the wacky genius behind the Beatles, was dead. So was our childhood innocence and the insane 60's.

Welcome to the 1980's. It was the most fun I ever had in a single decade.

A year before the Berlin Wall came down, I was traveling in a German tourist bus with my Bavarian girlfriend, Manuella, to visit Paris. The trip from Augsburg was long and she was asleep as I stared out the window at the passing villages, shrubbery, and hills.

The bus drove by one region that consisted of gently rolling hills, dwarfed trees, dried-up bushes, and brown grass. Moreover, the area reeked of death. Many men had lost their lives there. Yet, I had never before seen this blighted scenery.

I wanted to ask Manu-her name shortened-about the sight, but she was asleep. At the next rest stop, the passengers got out to stretch their legs and use the WC's. I then asked Manu if she was familiar with a desolate stretch of land so many kilometers back.

She said, "Yes. That is the sight of some of the biggest battles of World War One."

What told me that this was a plot of ground where many had lost their lives? Was it the screaming spirits of the dead? What informed me that battles had taken place in this netherworldly region? The fact that the mustard gas killed all animal and plant life there forever?

The Treaty of Versailles, which racked and ruined Germany, caused World War One to be the Unfinished War. The Nazis found a scapegoat for their failure: Jews. The infamous treaty and the German conquest for more land led to World War Two.

After WWII, the Cold War commenced. In 1991, the Soviet Union dissolved, the Berlin Wall having come down in 1989.

In 1991, with no announcement or trumpeting, the War on Terror started. Today's problems in the Middle East can be traced directly back to World War One, after which the region's borders were haphazardly drawn.

I climbed a mountain in southern Bavaria and saw a plaque commemorating the event of World War One. It read: We almost made it, brother. We almost had the world for ourselves.

As long as nations covet the ground and resources of other nations, there will certainly be wars. After the end of the War on Terror, there will be another major war. Maybe more than one.

Monroe, Wisconsin is a town caught in the past. People here still sing their four-part harmonies in groups known as Barbershoppers. Residents belong to organizations such as Toastmasters where every Tuesday evening they get together and practice the art of public speaking. Others belong to service clubs, such as the Rotarians, the Lions Club, and the Masons.

The northern plains were settled over a century ago by Scandinavian immigrants who came to the United States seeking the better life. They settled up north as the climate and lush greenery reminded them of Norway and Sweden. Most are agricultural workers, cheese processors, and brewery workers. Others work in warehouses, factories, or eating establishments. There are a lot of retired folk there.

On Sunday morning, close to the end of March, 1981, the Monroe Barbershoppers were scheduled to sing at the First Baptist Church in Monroe. They took their place in the front of the spacious church auditorium and sang their first hymn "Just a Closer Walk." The audience loved them.

The following day I would  be traveling to Janesville to visit a few prospective clients. The first thing on my list was a coffee break at the local diner. Half a mile from town the music cut out on the car radio and the announcer said:

 

We interupt this normally-scheduled broadcast to bring you

this news bulletin. There has been an attempted assassination on the

life of President Ronald Reagan today.  Around 2:30 eastern standard

time, an unknown assailant fired an undetermined number of 

 shots at the president as he was coming out of the Washington

Hilton. The president has been rushed to the George Washington 

University Hospital. The president's condition is yet unknown. We

  expect a news conferencefrom the White House any minute now.

 

Later would be heard the infamous "I'm in control" line by then-Secretary of State Alexander Haig as he stood straightening his wide bright-red tie. A bullet hit President Reagan about three inches from his heart.

Around 1840, an Indian chief was incensed at the American government. Something about a broken treaty. He pronounced a curse on every president elected every twenty years. Here's what happened. President William Henry Harrison, elected in 1840, died of pneumonia the following year.

President Abraham Lincoln, elected in 1860, was felled by an assassin's bullet, as was Presidents James Garfield (1880) and William McKinley (1900). Warren Harding (1920) and Franklin Roosevelt (1940) died in office due to health reasons. An assassin took the life of John Kennedy (1960).

Would the Indian curse claim the life of Ronald Reagan, elected in 1980? History proved otherwise. Reagan lived, prospered, and life in America went on. De-regulation of certain industries went into effect, interest rates came down, the Dow and the economy went into the stratosphere, all of the federal air traffic controllers were canned, the Berlin Wall came down, the Soviet Union imploded, and the Cold War ended. Not a bad eight years. 

It appears the ancient Indian curse had been broken by 1980.

As I peered up at the four fancy new jets screaming overhead, I heard someone, an adult, say, "The President's in one of them jets."

President John F. Kennedy had just finished speaking to employees of McDonnell Aircraft at Lambert Field earlier that afternoon. The occasion was a briefing on the Mercury and Gemini Space Programs.

It was September 12, 1962 and I was walking home from school with my older brother. He didn't appear to notice the four jets. I remember trying to guess which jet carried the president.

Most everyone liked the president except for my dad, who worked for McDonnell's at the time. He had heard the president's speech earlier. I asked him that night what he thought of the president, what he looked like and all. My dad said, "Kennedy looks a lot like Mickey Rooney."

I thought at the time that his answer was a big slam on the president. Mickey Rooney was a dwarf and an ugly one at that. If the president came this far to speak to St. Louisans, why would anyone diss him?

I hadn't heard about the Bay of Pigs fiasco when it happened. No one talked about it much. The Cuban missile crisis wasn't to happen for another month. The word 'Camelot' was associated with the president, his wife, Jackie, and their two kids.

The following year, President Kennedy would pressure the steel industry into reversing its price increases, a big controversy of its own. JFK also founded the Peace Corps, a much talked-about organization during the 1960's.

1962 was an era of tame rock n' roll music. By then, all the hell-raisers--Elvis, Buddy Holly, Carl Perkins, the Big Bopper, Richie Valens, Little Richard, Jerry Lee Lewis, among others--had faded from the music scene. What was left was limp rock. 1962 featured Chubby Checker, the Beach Boys, the Angels, the Shirelles, Shelley Fabares, among other dismal acts.

1962 television starred the Beverly Hillbillies, Have Gun Will Travel, 77 Sunset Strip, and Route 66.

Best sellers that year included Silent Spring by Rachel Carson and The Reivers by William Faulker.

During the early 60's new popular foods included instant mashed potatoes, brown rice, and life cereal.

1962 was the calm before the storm of 1963. 1963 would decimate the American psyche like no other event. 1963 was the year John F. Kennedy was assassinated.

1962 was a period of innocence, tranquility, ready adherence to society's laws and norms, and relative peace throughout the world.

In 1962, I saw one of the jets that carried John F. Kennedy from St. Louis to Washington.

I witnessed a slice of history come and go

Jim and I sat in his 1987 Ford F-350 pickup truck and passed a doobie back and forth. He'd done time for growing marijuana in the privacy of his home. In his own closet yet.

"Tom, it's easy to kick in a door. You take that one over there."

He pointed to the wooden, windowless back door of our living quarters. It was a two-story shack, ancient, with a crappy bathroom and a common kitchen on each floor, and a bedroom, which cost me $65 a week. A bargain for the down-and-out.

"If it has a deadbolt, you kick directly under the deadbolt. If it doesn't have a deadbolt, man, you kick it right in the middle. Comes right open."

Pretty fascinating conversation. But when you're stoned, you can concentrate a little better on some things. Like movies, music, and kicking in doors.

America had just declared a war on terror. Or something to that effect. The Cold War ended about a decade ago, so our government needed any excuse to pump up the military-industrial complex. The Muslims gave us that excuse. America never did like the Muslim religion anyway. Too much competition for Christianity.

The images on the television screen were played and replayed over and over again. Two big jets were flown into each tower of the World Trade Center.

Another was flown into the  Pentagon. The only television image shown of that was a scene of the Pentagon with smoke coming out the other side of the five-sided complex. I never saw the crashed jet itself on the TV screen.

Another jet ended up in a field somewhere in Pennsylvania. Maybe it's original destination had been the White House. That morning I had phoned my sister-in-law and warned her not to allow her son, a university student in Boston, not to fly back to the Midwest for the coming weekend.

She was crying, scared that the draft would return. She has two military-aged sons. My sister-in-law and I had been teenagers during the Vietnam War.

Funny how 19 crazy Arabs armed with box cutters could kill 3000 Americans and start a two-front war: one in Afghanistan and another in Iraq.

This war propelled the careers of conservative talk show hosts, especially those on the radio. The number one Reagan-conservative talking head was a tall fat guy from Missouri who smoked cigars and was stone-deaf. The number two was a Long Island Irish choirboy who looked like a chubby teenager.

National Public Radio, of course, came out against anything the president, a Neo-Con, did or said. When the liberals talked on NPR, you could hardly hear them. I always had to turn up the volume when I listened to NPR.

That's the current state of politics today.

The arts aren't much better. There are no poets coming out to replace TS Eliot, Robert Frost, William Carlos Williams, or Allen Ginsberg. The closest thing we got is a joke named Angelou Maya. Some of her stuff actually rhymes.

Jim went on. "Anyhow, I don't know who ratted on me, but the cops knew I was growing weed and they knew which closet I had it in. One night they knocked on my door. I opened it."

Jim should have been a mercenary in another life. In this life, he was a construction worker. His specific job was to climb onto a roof, position his hammer gun, and drive nails.

"Tom, they walked through my front door without me asking them in. Frickin'-A, man! It was my house. Anyway, I took the heel of my open palm and shoved it into the nose of the nearest cop."

He smiled for effect. "The guy grabbed his nose, which was bleeding all over, and said 'Hey!' I covered my head with my hands as the cops came at me all at once and said, 'Okay, guys! You got me!' "

Jim did some hard time as this was not his first offense. He had boxer's eyes, almost closed and still puffy.

I was reading a novel that week. It was written by Chuck Palahniuk called Lullaby. It was about a guy who was under some lady's thumb. The year before, I read Skinny Legs and All by Tom Robbins. Robbins actually believes in the original religion of mankind, the worship of the mother Goddess. Where are the novelists today who will replace Norman Mailer, Kurt Vonnegut, Jr., and George Orwell?

Jim needed some money to put down on a two-bedroom trailor in the south part of town. "Hey, man! Do you need a computer? I'll sell you mine. All it needs is some hard-drive stuff!"

"I'll look at it tomorrow, Jim, after I get off work."

Everybody has a computer today. Even guys in flophouses. My new job was hauling flooring and paint around all day delivering it to job sites. It's murder on the joints and all, but it pays the bills.

Jim's girlfriend, Iris is missing a lot of teeth and busts tables at a bus stop/cafe. "Tom, I like the fact that she does what I tell her."

"Admirable, Jim."

My ex-girlfriend, Maddie, was black and worked three days at a nursing home. The last time we made love in my car, she moaned someone else's name at the wrong moment.

I broke it off with the skinny nag after a month of haggling and buying her boxes of cigarettes and six-packs.

The state of politics today is boring. The politicians are as interesting as buzzing flies landing on a screen door in the middle of July. The most relevant writer today is Noam Chomsky, a linguist by trade, an anarchist by night. This senile old Jew almost had me believing his conspiracy theories and his head-in-the-clouds ideas about utopia.

Noam's theories and ideas fade into unreality upon reflection. He's been fighting for the ideas of no-government and for increased worker's unions for about fifty years. Meanwhile, government has burgeoned and labor unions have went the way of the dodo in the last fifty years.

Capitalism is okay as an economic system. It beats total submission to the state (Socialism, Communism, and Fascism), rule-by-gangs (Anarchy), and Theocracies (Iran). Our government has just enough checks and balances to keep the status quo and to make politics boring.

The biggest movements on the Far Left are the anti-war thing and gay marriage. I can understand being anti-war. I was a conscienscious objecter during the Vietnam War. But gay marriage?

Why would our government make it legal for two homosexuals to get hitched? When they get  tired of each other, they will divorce. There are better causes to get involved in. Homos make up only about 1 or 2% of the population so it's not a big deal. I say, put them all back in the closet: Rosie O'Donnell, Ellen DeGeneres, and Sir Ian McKellen and any others who have crept out of the woodwork.

I see drugs destroying a fair selection of its users, primarily young people. Kids are buying, selling, and using the stuff and they are paying big-time for it. Some are going to jail, others are losing their motivation, and still others are becoming violent.

One of my nephews, Zack, aged 18, smokes pot that is laced with formaldehyde. It's known as 'wet.' A few days ago he smashed his younger sister's head into the couch and split it open, like a watermelon. His mother, recently divorced and dating an unemployed bum, didn't call the police or throw him out. Her excuse: He's my Son!

Illegal drugs are not meant for anyone, young or old, black or white, rich or poor. Keep them illegal and out of our country.

Time for a little break from thinking and writing.

Tiger P**s? What's in it?" I asked Will, who was pouring bottles of soda and liquor into a big vat.

"All white sodas, like Sprite and Mountain Dew. Then you add a whole lot of white liquors, like gin and vodka. Just mix it all up and you got Tiger P**s." Corporal Sidney Will manned the weapons room. He was from Sacremento, California and had a ready smile. And he knew how to mix drinks.

"Sounds good. I'll have me some." As I sipped my first glass, I looked at the inside of the World War II bunkers we were partying in. It was rumored that none other than Adolph Hitler hid in these rooms at the end of the big war.

The entrance to the bunkers was a solid metal door in the side of a hill. If the door had been round, it would have reminded me of a hobbit's home. But it was typically rectangular.

The floors, walls, and ceilings were bare, cold, grey cement, each room joined by a doorless entrance. The bare rooms measured roughly 7 meters by 10 meters. Each room was crowded with partying soldiers this night, ready to kick back and celebrate good  times after a week of field duty.

I was stationed in southern Bavaria, a few kilometers from Landstuhl, where Hitler was imprisoned during the 1920's. Augsberg was a few kilometers the other direction. Our company was situated out in the middle of nowhere. So we created our own entertainment.

I was in the service during the calm before the storm. The eight-year war between Iran and Iraq had just ended. The U.S. ousting of Manuel Noriega, strongman of Panama, had not yet happened. The 1990 Gulf War was a couple of years away.

I drank so much Tiger P**s that I blanked out. I was still conscious though. Later on, several of us drove to a nearby pub and mixed with the locals. I was drunk enough to irk some of the German girls on the dance floor. To this day, I cannot remember what I did to tick them off that night.

The following year would see the dismantling of the Berlin Wall and the reunification of East and West Germany. The dissolution of the Soviet Union was just a hope and a dream that drunken night in Bavaria.

More than one soldier overdid it and threw up after the party. By mid-1990, everyone stationed there was sent to the Middle East to kick Saddam Hussein, our former 'ally,' out of Kuwait. Some of my friends and companions helped make history during the first Gulf War.

Soldiers are neither saints nor sinners. They are souls trying to find their path through this trip we call 'life.' Thank God for soldiers and vets who give their lives to safeguard our borders.

Harry Reid, Senate Majority Leader and Democrat from Nevada, stated recently that the war in Iraq "is lost." His presumptuousness and greed for more political power have ticked off a lot of good people, including Vice President Dick Cheney and many fine military men and women.

Cheney shot back that Reid has changed his mind on the war umpteen times and that his comment is politically motivated. A U.S. marine stationed in one of the red-hot danger zones of Iraq had a couple of expletive deletives for Harry. But he admitted that the military is pushing out both the insurgency and al-Qaeda. Plus, the marine admitted that our soldiers and the Iraqis are helping to rebuild the war-torn nation.

Speaking of al-Qaeda and their ilk, it is pretty well known that outside terrorist groups have a strong foothold in some regions in Iraq. These groups are well-funded by Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, and some of our other "friends."

Some military experts believe that if all foreign troops were to leave Iraq, there would not be an al-Qaeda takeover of Iraq's government like the Taliban did in Afghanistan ten years ago. However, it was recently reported that al-Qaeda and other terrorist groups are working with the Sunni insurgency in Iraq.

If our troops were to leave Iraq, maybe al-Qaeda wouldn't take over the nation's government. But they wouldn't need to. Al-Qaeda would likely set up more terrorist training camps and use Iraq as a base for more attacks against the U.S. and the rest of the Western world. Iran and Syria would aid and fund them as best they could.

In addition to funding from oil-rich nations, additional oil reserves are believed to lie in the Sunni underground region. With these financial sources, al-Qaeda would have access to untold billions. This money would likely be used to purchase sophisticated weaponry, weapons of mass destruction, and biological, radiological, chemical, and nuclear warheads and missiles.

Imagine a suitcase nuke delivered to New York by al-Qaeda. How many millions would perish? Picture a terrorist sending a missile into Hollywood with a biological head hooked up to it. Imagine the untold millions dead? How about a chemical bomb on the Loop in Chicago? And on and on.

If al-Qaeda can send four airplanes crashing into buildings, obliterating 3000 Americans, there is nothing at which they will stop. There is no limit to their evil, their recruits, or their money. And we thought the Nazis were a huge threat to world peace back in the day.

The only thing that will stop the terrorists is brute force. These animals still have their heads in the Dark Ages and they will never emerge from there. It is literally impossible to sit down and iron out our differences and come to terms of peace with with their insane and primitive world view. Their Koran forbids compromise. End of discussion.

We have no choice but to wipe the terrorists out. One by one.

There are many fronts to the war on terror. Multi-national troops have been deployed to Afghanistan and Iraq. Terrorists have toeholds in or have struck Pakistan, Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia, Australia, much of the Middle East, most of northern Africa, Somalia, Russia, China, Phillipines, Great Britain, Canada, Spain, and America, among other nations.

Many of these countries are potential targets for al-Qaeda. Our Congress should let President Bush and General Petraeus do what they can to win the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. If Harry Reid states that the war in Iraq is lost, he is on the side of the insurgency and al-Qaeda. If Nancy Pelosi wishes to withhold funds from the troops fighting the insurgency and the terrorists in Iraq, she is on the side of the Islamic Jihadsts. Neither of these haughty, power-hungry Democrats should remain in their jobs. Both must be forced to step down and let America win the war on the destructive terrorists.

America must unite in the War on Terror. Or America will fall.

 I describe myself as a liberal politically. However, I use the term not in the sense of the Democratic Party or in progressive modes or in left-wing stances. I am not a socialist, a social democrat nor am I an anarchist.

I use the term 'liberal' in the old-fashioned sense meaning free as from restraint or check; not strict or rigorous; open-minded; and not bound by authoritarianism or orthodoxy. I use liberal in the sense of claiming my freedoms and rights that my liberal government has given me and in the abundant choices that America's capitalist free-market economy offers to everyone.

In the early 1970's, the Democratic Party was highjacked by far-left extremists who wanted to incorporate socialist policies into our government. They also highjacked the term 'liberal' in their primary policy of enlarging government so that Uncle Sam may become everyone's 'all-in-all' and the object of worship for its citizens.

Today, 'liberal' is used by the Democrats to denote a policy of big government taking care of its citizens from the cradle to the grave. It also means higher taxes, more government regulation, a total welfare state, and an enlarlged power base for political leftist 'progressives.'

The left-wing Democrats control Congress today and they are itching for further control in the legislative branch. They also yearn to take charge of the executive branch in 2008 and will do anything illegal, immoral, or unethical to make President George W. Bush and his administration look bad.

The Democrats have been hammering Bush on the war in Iraq big-time since its inception in March 2003. This has went on in spite of the fact that the war in Iraq is a totally legal war in terms of the steps taken to start it.

That's right. It's a Legal War. First, the United Nations issued 17 resolutions against Saddam Hussein, the now-deceased evil dictator of Iraq. Saddam let his people starve and go without other necessities while he and his inner circle got fatter.

Second, Bush went to the UN Security Council to make his case for a preemptive strike against Iraq. Their vote was a GO.

Third, Bush asked for a vote on a preemptive strike against Iraq from Congress and they gave it. You'd think the Democrats were literally forced against their wishes to vote for war with Saddam's forces, But they weren't.

Just a couple of days ago, the Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, the Democrat from Utah, declared unequivocately that the war in Iraq 'is lost.' Imagine how great this sounds to the insurgency in Iraq and the outside terrorists, like al-Qaeda. His anti-American statement only encourages the enemies of the U.S.

Reid and Nancy Pelosi, the House Speaker and Democrat from California, acted together to send a bill to Mr. Bush stating that they would fund the troops in Iraq only if a date is set to allow our troops to exit.

Excuse me, but Congress never refused to fund the troops in Vietnam. We have one commander-in-chief, not 538. The president and his generals decide strategy in Iraq, not Congress.

If Reid and Pelosi cannot see this truth, it is because they are grinding their teeth to obtain more political power and to take it from the Republicans. Reid and Pelosi are too haughty to cooperate with the president and to finalize a bill which would adequately fund our troops in Iraq so they may have the equipment, uniforms, weapons, ammo, food, protection and other necessities that they need to fight and to win the war in Iraq. But they finally gave in to the president this week.

The Democrats' agenda is a social democracy in America. This is the same thing as a welfare state, which is the type of government that Sweden and Norway have. A social democracy is one step away from fascism. Think about it. Big government. Big Brother. I will take care of you. I will protect you from outside enemies. I will protect you from inside enemies. I will protect you from yourself.

BOOM! 1984.

The far-left socialists have highjacked the Democratic Party and the term 'liberal.' The Democratic Party trutly belongs to great politicians such as John F. Kennedy, Franklin Roosevelt, Harry S. Truman, Joe Lieberman, and Zell Miller.

True liberalism stands for freedom, individual liberty, a proper education, smaller government, no social classes, reason over passions, promotion of self rather than groups or organizations, freedom of expression, freedom of thought, and a constitution like the one written in 1776 by our forefathers.

Today's way-out leftists have moved away from the true meaning and concept of 'liberalism' and are heading for pure socialism, which is a step away from Communism and despotism.

The Democrats must be stopped. And this can be done by electing good politicians who believe in our Constitution. We as individuals can also do our parts to disseminate the truth and to let our elected officials know what we expect of them. We must write them, telephone them, and e-mail them.

Let's Rock and Roll, fellow citizens.