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Friday, March 29, 2024 - 04:25 AM

INDEPENDENT CONSERVATIVE VOICE OF UPSTATE SOUTH CAROLINA

First Published in 1994

INDEPENDENT CONSERVATIVE VOICE OF
UPSTATE SOUTH CAROLINA

Our hands may be wrinkled, but our spirits are still resolute.
Our hands may be wrinkled, but our spirits are still resolute.

We’ve all heard that sage observation that “getting old isn’t for the faint of heart, or for wimps”.  At the age of 83, I can verify the truth of that wisdom, as the “aches and pains” of the years constantly do battle with me.  Each week I seem to discover new joints that I never knew I had, and getting “started” in the morning is becoming  a painful challenge.  Younger folks sometimes question the abilities of “experienced” seniors, but are themselves often in a mental fog when we relate historical events that are perfectly clear to us, even though they may have occurred decades previously.  (True history is a “foreign concept” to many of our younger citizens, sadly.)

Far too many “older” people try to “stay out of the way” of these younger generations but truth to tell, it’s those “youngsters” who need to either stay clear of us or give us the respect we deserve, and hopefully EARNED, and learn from US.  A while back a fraternity brother sent me an e-mail that I’d like to share with you, for it relates much of what we “experienced citizens” have accomplished in our lives.  Clifford L. Moffett wrote it.  Here are his wise thoughts:

“The typical U.S. household headed by a person age 65 or older has a net worth 47 times greater than a household headed by someone under 35….  They like to refer to us as “senior citizens”, old fogies, geezers, and in some cases dinosaurs.  Some of us are “Baby Boomers” getting ready to retire.  Others have been retired for some time.  We walk a little slower these days and our eyes and hearing are not what they once were.  We worked hard, raised our children, worshiped our God, and have grown old together.

“Yes, we are the ones some refer to as being “over the hill”, and that’s probably true.  But before writing us off completely, there are a few things that need to be taken into consideration:  In school we studied English, history, math, and science, which enabled us to lead America into the technological age. Most of us remember what outhouses were, many of us with firsthand experience.  We remember the days of telephone party lines, 25-cent gas, and milk and ice being delivered to our homes.  For those of you who don’t know what an “icebox” is, today they’re electric and called refrigerators.  A few even remember when cars were started with a hand crank….

“We’re probably considered old fashioned and outdated by many.  But there are a few things you need to remember before completely writing us off.  WE won WW11, FOUGHT in Korea and Viet Nam.  WE can quote the Pledge of Allegiance, and WE know where to place our hand while doing so.  WE wore the uniform of our country with pride and lost many friends on the battlefield.  WE DIDN’T fight for the “Socialist States of America”; WE fought for “The Land of the Free and the Home of the Brave.”  WE wore different uniforms but carried the same flag.

“WE know the words to ‘The Star Spangled Banner,”, “America”, and “America the Beautiful” by heart, and you may even see some tears running down our cheeks as we sing them.  WE have lived what many of you have only read about in history books (if you can read them), and we feel no obligation to apologize to anyone for America.

“Yes, we’re old and slow these days but…we have at least one good fight left in us.  WE have loved this country, fought for it, and died for it, and now WE are going to save it.  It’s our country and nobody is going to take it away from us!  WE took oaths to defend America against all enemies, foreign AND domestic, and that’s an oath we plan to keep.  There are those who want to destroy this land we love but, like our Founders, there is no way WE are going to remain silent.

“It was mostly the young people of this nation who elected Obama and the Democrats….  You fell for (his) “Hope & Change” which…was nothing but “Hype & Lies”.  You youngsters have tasted socialism and seen evil face to face, and some of you have found you don’t like it after all.  You make a lot of noise, but most of you are all too interested in your careers or climbing the social ladder to be involved in such mundane things as patriotism and voting.  Many of those who fell for the “Great Lie” in 2008 and 2012 are now having buyer’s remorse.  With all the education we gave you, you didn’t have sense enough to see through the lies and instead drank the “Kool-Aid”.  Now you’re paying the price and complaining about it; no jobs, lost homes, higher taxes, and less freedom.  (Thankfully, President Trump, in 2020, before the purposely induced Chinese Covid-19 pandemic, improved things greatly as he struggled, with difficulty and resistance mostly from despicable Democrats and RINO phonies, to undo much of the horrible economy and socialist claptrap that Comrade President Obama and Comrade Vice-President Sleazy Joe Biden and their America-despising administration foisted on the country during their eight-year fiasco!)

“This is what you voted for and this is what you got.  We entrusted you with The Torch of Liberty, and you traded it for a paycheck and a fancy house.  Well, don’t worry, youngsters.  The “Grey-Haired Brigade” is here, and in (2020) we’re going to take back our nation.  We may drive a bit slower than you…, but we get where we’re going, and in (2020) we’re going to the polls by the millions.

“This land doesn’t belong to (politicians and demagogues).  It belongs to “WE THE PEOPLE”, and ‘we the people’ plan to reclaim our land and our freedom.  We hope this time you will do a better job of preserving it…(for) your grandchildren.  So the next time you have the chance to say The Pledge of Allegiance stand up, put your hand over your heart, honor our country, and THANK GOD for the ‘old geezers’ of The Grey Haired Brigade.”

As an “old geezer” myself, I can only say “amen” to Mr. Moffett’s sentiments.  When I was a youth and a young man, Mr. Moffett’s world WAS my world---and probably the world of many of you.  I’ve asked myself countless times---and I’ll bet you have too--- “What happened to that world of our youth?”  It’s patently obvious that the U.S. of 2020 is NOT the country most of us grew up in and came to love. Few in my youth wanted to change our national anthem from “The Star Spangled Banner” to something else, or as some propose today, to some disgusting pro-socialist, pro-Black Lives Matter, noise.  I tell my children and grandchildren that it was a different world when I was young, and they look at me with clouded eyes—as through a “glass darkly”, and they don’t understand how different (and much better) things were in the 1930’s and 40’s  and 50’s when I was young, despite economic uncertainties and a world war.

Then they ask me WHY I and people from my generation let that “better world” of our youth slip away from us, rather than passing it on to them.  I squirm uncomfortably at their queries and innocent accusations and ponder an acceptable answer to their questions.  But I can’t formulate any reasonable responses, and can only come up with EXCUSES, which I’m ashamed to give to them—and to you.  All I can tell them is ‘I don’t know what happened’ to that better world, and turn my head away in shame, because I haven’t told them the truth, because I don’t want them to see my tears of remorse, because I don’t know how to ask them to forgive me—to forgive US who came right after “The Greatest Generation”. 

You see-- I DO know what happened to the halcyon world of my youth.  I’m ashamed to admit that I gave it away through carelessness and indifference to the liars, to the schemers, to the verminous politicians, to the proponents of that “progressive (socialist) new world order” that didn’t recognize such saccharin sentiments as patriotism, love of heritage and true history, love of family ties, love of God, and keeping one’s word.  So did you.  May God (and our descendants) forgive us for what we did---and even more importantly--for what we DIDN’T do!

But we have a chance to preserve at least some vestiges of Constitutional liberty that are fading rapidly in our nation.  We can vote FOR President Donald Trump and the Republican Party candidates on November 3rd, EVEN if we consider this ‘the lesser of two evils’We can refuse to vote for ANY candidates of the anti-American, anti-freedom, pro-socialist Democrat Party—the party I now call The Klan of New Bolsheviks.  Sadly, even the Republican Party has willingly participated over the past 150 or so years in the slow but certain destruction of the form of government so brilliantly formulated for us by our Founding Generation.  Republicans have proven over the decades that they love to grow government and squander taxpayer money almost as much as the Democrats, and they’ve done so over most of the years they’ve been in power, albeit at a slower pace.  But the destruction of our free enterprise, Constitutional Republic is what the present-day TREASONOUS Democrats brazenly tell us they are going to try to accomplish if the American people are foolish, and stupid, enough to vote them into positions of power on November 3rd, 2020, for this has been the reason for the “forked tongue” existence of the Democrat Party ever since it coalesced into its present form in the 1820’s.  It’s a historical fact that the Democrat Party since its beginning has HATED our Constitutional Republic and the restrictions against unbridled government growth written into our venerable Constitution that BOTH parties, but especially the Democrat Party, have increasingly ignored for decades!  You who are dyed-in-the-wool Democrats, or you who believe that we have a genuine “two-party” political system, can disagree with me until the cows come home, but you who are politically savvy and historically honest with yourselves know that I speak the truth! 

Many of our original Founders detested the idea of political parties.  George Washington did, and so did others.  So do I, and many of you, I’m certain.  Un-American political parties like the Democrat Party, and the phony “Neo-Con” Republicans, shred away loyalty to and support of our Constitutional form of government—to the long-term well being of America—and instead ignite the petty and hot-headed party passions of class divisions, racial animosity, lust for power, endless foreign wars, and the accumulations of ill-earned gains and the domination of one group over another.  We see ALL these things in the U.S. today, and especially in this virulent, violent, and hate-filled election season of 2020.  The decisions we all make on November 3rd will likely shape the future of freedom in America for generations to come, and even whether or not freedom, AND our Constitutional Republic, will survive.  I know what decisions I’ll make.  I hope you know what decisions YOU will make.

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WHLambBioMug2

A native of Cleveland, Ohio, W. H. (Bill) Lamb is a graduate of Cleveland State University (Ohio); being graduated in 1960, he moved to South Carolina in 1964.  For many years he was an Industrial engineer, Chief Industrial engineer, and plant manager in the steel, electronics, and apparel industries in Ohio, South Carolina, and Alabama.  In his younger days, he was an avid hiker in the Southern mountains, a target shooter, and is still an avid student of both American history and ancient Egyptian history.

He is an avid and long-time writer, concentrating on political and cultural issues of concern to America's Christian Patriot community.  He was published in the Lancaster, S.C. "News" during the mid-to-late 1960's, and has been a Local Columnist published in the Greenville, SC The Times Examiner since 1999.  The late and great Christian Patriot, Col. Bobby Dill, was his first Editor. During those years he has had several hundred articles published in The Times Examiner, which he always refers to as "a great journal of truth"!  

He has had one book published, a 120-page novel set in our future, titled "The History of Our Future", and two unpublished  750-page sequels "Waiting in the Wings" to be published "someday".  Bill has been married to Barbara for 65 years, has two adult  (and aging) kids,  five grandkids, six great-grandkids, and a "feisty and opinionated" 80 lb. Pit Lab named Hayley, who admittedly runs the entire house.

A very long-time member, with Barbara, of The patriotic John Birch Society, he believes that it is the duty of ALL Christians to also be dedicated patriots and do everything possible to both resist the evil of collectivism that is smothering Western Civilization and to do his best to educate and motivate his fellow Americans in the preservation of our unique Constitutional Republic, and most importantly, to share the love of his Savior with others.