PrintDecember 30, 2009
On the Obama River and Headed for the Falls
Did you ever imagine what it might be like to go over Niagara Falls in a barrel? How about going over the Obama Falls?
Life has many warning markers. Some of these markers represent points of no return: where one must make a commitment so forceful that there is no turning back. The phrase "point of no return" is a poignant characterization of what is taking place politically and economically in our country today.
President Obama and his Democrat Congress are presently attempting to do away with our free-market system and the personal liberties we enjoy. Via a head-spinning series of sweeping changes and fast-paced "emergency" bills, they are doing everything they can to get us beyond the irrevocable point of political and financial no return.
In case anyone has missed it, allow me to point out the obvious. President Obama and the Democrats are taking over the banks and the auto industry. They are one step closer to government-run health care. In their sights is cap-and-trade taxing and amnesty resulting in citizenship for those here illegally. Not too far down the road will be the elimination of conservative talk radio. We have a trillion-dollar deficit balloon that is expanding and ready to burst. Our enemies abroad grow stronger and ever bolder.
Some days I feel as though the die is cast and our nation has passed the point of no return. There I am, in a barrel on the mighty Obama River, headed for the Obama Falls, with its jagged rocks awaiting me below. Of course, it's not just me, but all of us.
If this is our destiny, I think we should know that we are not the first to go over a waterfall in a barrel. There have been others. Some even survived the treacherous experience. From those exalted trailblazers, regardless of whether they lived or perished, I take inspiration.
So how did they who went before us prepare themselves? Here is what some did before going over Niagara Falls:
- Annie Edson Taylor went over Niagara Falls in a barrel in 1901. Her preparation was a padded mattress.
- Bobby Leach went over Niagara Falls in a barrel in 1911. His barrel was made of steel.
- Charles Stephens went over Niagara Falls in a barrel in 1920. He tied himself to an anvil. (He, by the way, did not survive.)
- Steven Trotter went over Niagara Falls in a barrel on two different occasions. In 1985, he wrapped his barrel with inner tubes. He also did it in 1995. This time, he packed lady-friend Lori Martin.
So what should we do to make ready our personal barrels so that we might survive if and when we go over the great Obama Falls? Here are some of the suggestions I have been hearing:
- obtain a medical degree so you can practice medicine on yourself
- stock up on a lifetime's worth of nonperishable foods
- build a bomb shelter
- learn to blame Israel for all the problems of the world
- purchase a handgun and learn how to use it
- buy gold
- take your money out of your bank account and bury it
- learn to speak Spanish
- take your money out of the stock market and hide it
- sew your jewels into your clothing
- diversify, diversify, diversify
- leave the country before it is too late
- get a Swiss bank account
- join the ACORN team
- convert to Wahhabi Islam
It seems to me that we who love this great nation have but two choices. We can give up and try to protect our own personal barrels, or we can hope we have not yet reached the much-feared point of no return on the Obama River and fight for the principles that our Founding Fathers laid out.
If we have not yet reached the point of no return -- and I believe we have not -- then even slowing down health care "reform" legislation (or other bankrupting entitlement foods on the liberal plate) can be a victory in that we have bought time. And time, as they say, is of the essence as we close in upon 2010 and the next round of elections.
Too often, I hear conservatives ask, "How can we stop what seems inevitable?" Now, I could respond to this question with a number of inspirational clichés. I could say, "It ain't over till the fat lady sings"; "[We] have not yet begun to fight"; or "You cannot love a thing without wanting to fight for it."
Instead, the best advice I can give is, "Pray as if everything depends on God. Work as if everything depends on you."
