It’s a modest, middle-of-the-road sports car. In its heyday, a hot commodity for the middle class. In its heyday, a fun drive, owing to 50/50 weight distribution and impressive drag coefficient. In its heyday, a fun ride on city streets, county roads and interstate highways, night or day. Well, the fun is basically over. Stuck at a red light at midnight, it’s no fun when a Yukon Denali camps two feet off your back bumper, headlights blazing away, arousing images of a cremation oven. Or when an Expedition presumes that 45 mph in a 45 mph zone isn’t fast enough and decides to encourage you by filling up your rear view mirror with its massive grille. They’re everywhere — Suburban, Tundra, F-150, Escalade, Sequoia, Silverado, Ram, Navigator. You’re a 175 pound scat back surrounded everyday by 240 pound linebackers and 280 pound defensive ends. Basically, you’re dog meat. In your heyday, you had a sweet ride, hearing the special thrum of the rotary,  with thoughts of a twisting open road and clear vistas. Now the only sound you hear is your own strident voice as you routinely hurl the most profanity laced invective this side of the nearest golf course. You know it’s juvenile to curse people you don’t know simply because they enjoy owning and driving giant wheels. But you curse anyway. You curse because too many of them are bullies, like some big kids on the playground who pick on small fry. You curse because you feel like it. And as you let go with an especially rich tirade, a strange thought inches its way between your eloquently delivered G, F, D, S, B and C words, used singly and in rich combinations. How would you feel if you knew your every spoken word were recorded and transcribed onto pages that comprise your Book of Life? Most likely, you’d be a little put out. How put out? Somewhere between horrified and terrified should cover it. Nobody wants to read thousands of his ill-conceived, thoughtless, impatient, angry, bitter, judgmental and stupid utterances. Nobody, that is, except politicians and other celebs whose self image is so exalted, they’re happy to sound off and spout off just to revel in the attention. In fairness, except for Trump, their statements aren’t spontaneous but are just as rehearsed as a stand-up comic who gives three shows a night. Few audiences will ever hear Obama make an unprompted statement. Known for her addictive use of F-Bombs behind the scenes, Hillary offers her adoring fans a practiced grin and practiced talking points. You have it on good authority that her Book of Life will be printed in two volumes — one entitled Queen of Lies. Bernie, on the other hand, doesn’t need talking points since he’s been saying the same things since 1965. You can’t listen to a Sanders delivery without thinking of Frank Costanza (Jerry Stiller)in his most animated Seinfeld performances. His Book will be more like a Manifesto. If Donald were an ordinary Joe, his verbal command would exclude him from getting any job that requires lingual abilities. Billionaires are universally judged by a different standard. He will therefore love his Book no matter what it says he said. But Ted Cruz cares deeply about what he says since he expects one day to deliver his Book of Life in person and read and rejoice in it forever; and given his legal expertise and evangelistic fervor, he very likely, from time to time, will want to have editing privileges. The son of a Postman has accomplished so much, has worked so hard to do the right thing, has reached out so sincerely in a spirit of non partisanship and unification, that his Book might be mistaken for The Little Engine That Could. Meanwhile, nobody on Earth is recording the words of the rank and file. Their words are lost, day by day by day. However, if your Book Of LIfe  happens to exist in the spiritual realm, in another dimension, you must, at any cost, remain mortal well beyond your mortal expectations. You need more  time to write many new chapters, better chapters, more worthy chapters. You must balance the scales. At the very least, you must try. You never know who might read it.

Imagine, if you will, that you’re a modern Rip Van Winkle. You wake up in 2016 after having been asleep for 60 years. As far as you know, life is still where it was when you took a snooze. World War II is history. Elvis is the rage. Norma Jean Mortenson becomes Marilyn Monroe. Eisenhower authorizes “In God We Trust” as the U.S. National Motto. Boxing champ Rocky Marciano retires undefeated. West Germany bans the Communist Party. Don Larsen throws the only perfect game in World Series history. France and England bomb Egypt to force re-opening of the Suez Canal. And Brown v. Board of Education desegregates public education. Fair enough. Business as usual. You pick up a newspaper to catch the latest and see a guest column by a well-known CEO of an internationally relevant corporation. He writes:

 . . . N.C.(HB2) enacted last week bans all local non-discrimination ordinances with protections for people based on sexual orientation and gender identity . . . The law overturns an ordinance that the city of Charlotte enacted known as the ‘bathroom bill’ . . . I am appalled by the law and bewildered as to why elected state officials would take an enormous step backward . . . Many of our tenants and buyers have expressed outrage . . . and prominent businesses . . . including Pepsi, American Airlines, Facebook, Dow Chemical, Paypal, Lowe’s Home Improvement . . . and Bank of America, (seek) to repeal the law. . .  (At our Company). . . commitment to excellence . . . is to treat all people with dignity and to act with integrity. Inclusiveness is a core value of our organization. We celebrate diversity and view it as a strength and unequivocally denounce any form of discrimination.

Too bad you’re not Rip because you’re not dreaming. Let’s see if you have it right. This guy, his organization and all of these world-class companies want to celebrate diversity by forcing my wife, my daughter and your grandchildren to share toilet facilities with genetically equipped males, either dressed like women or not, because these males consider themselves to be female oriented. My, how magnanimous. You must assume, therefore, that he suggests we should applaud the idea of testosterone laden Lesbians having access to and relieving themselves in Men’s Rooms. Surely, you must have it wrong. Better read N.C.(HB2). Regardless, you think Mr. “appalled and bewildered” should re-examine his lofty corporate “code”  to “treat all people with dignity and to act with integrity.” Seriously? All people? No, he really means “some people.” He means you should forsake the silent majority for the militant minority. He has not the slightest intention of treating all people with respect. His intention, and the intention of other prominent companies, is to pander to an LGBT community that represents influential customers, suppliers, workers, buyers — and revenue. In effect, he had to write his editorial or risk the ever present threat of boycott — as well as his lucrative livelihood. In fairness, however, you think the private sector should be free to adopt its own bathroom rules. If private businesses want Unisex toilet facilities, let them benefit or suffer the fallout with their employees and customers alike. But public facilities — Federal, State or Local — paid for by taxpayers, should be governed by the People whose voice is routinely ignored. Of all places, the bathroom is personal space. This is one subject that shouldn’t be left to politicians or special interests. Show some common sense. Give the people a referendum. Yes, it’s a waste of time. A waste of money. You and everyone else already knows the outcome.

With a modicum of history education, you learned that most of the world’s people, those you criticized for being mindless sheep, allowed themselves to suffer under dictatorships. Well, get busy eating your presumptuous and insolent opinions, because now you know how and why that happens. In this, a free society, witness the gibberish that emanates from the mendacious mouth of an individual who could very well slam and nail shut the open American coffin. Hillary Clinton said the United States should not adopt a policy that calls for surveillance of Muslim neighborhoods because it is “not only offensive, it’s too dangerous.” She wants all of us, including the Muslim communities, to work together to solve the terrorist threat. ” . . . we want everybody to feel together on our common defense against terrorism.” Targeting these communities for special attention, she suggests, would be an affront to them and an invasion of their protected civil rights. Besides, militant action on our part would only incite them to commit more violence. Time out while you lose a boiled egg and assorted fruits. You are stupefied that this foul-mouthed old lady can muster one vote, let alone millions; and that you must be forced to share the planet with her adoring imbeciles. This is a woman whose incompetence and callous disregard allowed four Americans to die a needless death at Benghazi. This is a woman who broke sensitive cyber security laws, putting American lives and national security at grave risk. This is a woman who, as Secretary of State and with the approval of her Muslim sympathizer boss, implemented a foreign policy that gave rise to ISIS and the convulsion of the Middle East. This is a woman who has not constructed one accomplishment as a private citizen or as a pubic leech, and who served as the enforcer to silence her sleaze husband’s accusers. This is a woman who stole White House furnishings and may own more murdered friends and associates than the late John Gotti. Yet, incomprehensibly, this woman says she’s qualified to be Commander in Chief of the U.S. Military. Let that sink in. If this duplicitous dragon ever stands in front of God and the American people to recite the Oath of Office, you have two words for every man and woman in uniform. Stand down. How many lies, how much deceit and how much failure will the people stomach before you say, “No more?” You would prefer to believe her reaction to Brussels was a case of simple stupidity. Not the case. She personally has been part of crime activities long enough to know that U.S. Law Enforcement always targets people where they hide. They could be Italian, Greek, Irish, African, Cajun, Puerto Rican or God forbid, Muslim. Surveillance and undercover activities are the cornerstones of crime prevention — essential tactics that save lives. Dirty Harry didn’t patrol the stunning vistas of Sea Cliff. Likewise, something tells you that Woodley Park, Georgetown or Park Avenue aren’t the ripest hunting grounds for Muslim terrorists. Something tells you that peaceful Muslims would certainly welcome a law enforcement presence in their neighborhoods. Wouldn’t they? Wouldn’t they? Well? Talk to a room of 5th graders, and they will agree that terrorists are indistinguishable among their general Islamic population, free to plot their next atrocity in the name of Allah. Hillary knows the drill all too well. By now an expert at risking other people’s lives, she is more than willing to speculate on further innocent life than hazard her political standing with her party and her base. Predictably, right on cue, she attacks Cruz and Trump for “treating American Muslims like criminals . . .” We can’t trust this world to trigger happy hawks like them. No, we must have a strong leader, a steady hand, an able Commander in Chief. Hillary Clinton has hung out in Washington DC for 24 years. You offer one question: Is America a better, stronger and safer place for her having been there? You know of many people who would like to answer that question, but they’re dead now.