“Unfortunately, what is thrown away is not only food and dispensable objects, but often human beings themselves, who are discarded as ‘unnecessary.’ For example, it is frightful even to think there are children, victims of abortion, who will never see the light of day; children being used as soldiers, abused and killed in armed conflicts; and children being bought and sold in that terrible form of modern slavery which is human trafficking, which is a crime against humanity.” Pope Francis, January 13, 2014

Good Tuesday morning as we rush our way towards the fall, at least, from a calendar point of view that fall status became official last week. It's September 29, 2015, and I'm here to tell you that I have enjoyed some of the nicer commutes with my window down. Okay. The Papal visit has ended. I do have a few observations. You are what? Not surprised? Well, you are correct. I can't remember anytime in my memory when the mainstream media became giddy over anything related to religion. Period. But, they did last week. Even NPR could hardly contain their glee. The Pope agrees with us. The Pope is for all our leftist ideals. Even though that is very much subject to interpretation it has been interesting to see our President and his cronies as they clearly attempted to gain as much political collateral as possible from this visit. The lady in Kentucky who refused to sign off on same sex marriage licenses was both persecuted and prosecuted in the press day after day. Relentlessly. Every mainstream national news source, 24 by 7. Here's what they failed to acknowledge. The Pope and this lady are in 100% agreement on the subject of same sex marriage. The Pope and the Church also stand in opposition to abortion. And, many other issues as well. Yet, we have the spectacle of the media calling well known democrat office holders as being devout Catholics although they openly support same sex unions and abortions on demand. Devout? I would think folks who are truly devout in their beliefs would be alarmed by this unbelievable designation. Who would have ever thought that Papal thoughts on climate change, immigration, and income equality could bring revival to our mainstream media. It has been something to behold folks. Something indeed!

The polling of the American people has been consistent. You cannot spin or wish it away. An overwhelming majority of our fellow citizens believe our nation has declined over the past eight years. The blame others strategy only works within a small circle of those who love the emperor's clothes, no matter what. People have no respect for those whose first knee jerk response to intransigent problems is to blame someone else. Eight years of blaming. Last week I thought I would throw up when I watched the White House press secretary go into great detail in describing President Obama as being so much like Pope Francis. No folks. It was not a parody sketch on Saturday Night Live. It was a full dialogue of attempting to portray the President as some type of iconic messiah. Shameful. If you ask me. We are talking about a President who blocked a 10 year old African American boy from his Twitter account because he was a conservative. We are talking about a President who has carried extravagance and lavishness to new heights in his use of his office. No wonder one of the main decision makers in giving the President the Nobel Peace Prize now says it was a mistake. Some of the polling I have seen puts this sense of loss in terms of our national pride and well being at 75%. Do the math. That's a lot of folks who are too stupid to know how great things are. And, oh yeah, unless I forget, they will likely deem these polls to be in one way or another a racist plot.

Last Thursday was national punctuation day. I missed giving a shout out to the tilde. That's the little separator mark you see so often in my blogs. The ~.  I would have mentioned it before but I didn't realize that it had a name. Now that I know what it is called it probably will not make any difference in how I use it. I didn't dare check the proper usage or even it's intended use. I do know that it actually has something to do with pronunciation but I like the looks of it, therefore, I no doubt will continue to use it as a break or separator in my blogs. This usage would alarm a lady who was once my secretary many years ago. She had previously been an English teacher and a professional proof reader. I hired her thinking she could help our entire department improve our communication skills. Everything went great until she tackled the writings of you know who. Can you imagine her looking at a long memo I had written? She soon learned there were exceptions to every stylistic rule in the book. I do believe she developed a twitch while she was in our employ. Believe me, I was very open to her red marks all over my drafts. That is, as long as she could handle the fact that more times than not I left it like it was. Because of being ornery? Not hardly. Because I wrote back then pretty much just like I do today. And, my writing actually did reflect me, myself, and I. There were times when I did make changes based on her recommendations. That would be a red letter day for her. Literally. You know. Red marks. At any rate our association didn't last all that long but I do appreciate her trying to help me and my staff to be better. Especially all she did for the staff. You do know I am kidding. I sure hope that twitch got better after she moved on. Take care, have a great day, and may God help us all is my prayer. Amen. ....More later.