July 28, 2013

"Over the Mountains Of the Moon, Down the Valley of the Shadow"

In my email this morning, a photo and a note from Chuck Ellington:

harrisonwhiteakerswestern.jpg

"A sign of times gone by.East of Harrison, Nebraska on Highway 20. A lonely road, even in midsummer vacation season on a Saturday.

"A sign of rugged individualism, not government subsidies. I bet the owner was never asked how many minorities he had hired.

"I doubt he had to file an environmental impact statement when he built either."

Of course in these days that's just enough information to go to the [Google] map and check out the territory. Just enter "Harrison, Nebraska," drop down into street view and take a trip out of town on Highway 20. Keep going, keep going..... it takes a while..... keep going..... there's a smudge on rise in the distance.... keep going..... don't zoom out or you'll have to go back into town and repeat it all... keep going.... and.... there on the left....

harrison_driveby.jpg

Yup, like some many things out on the vast land sea of America, still there and still haunting. There was a time when the government left you alone. There may be such a time again. I dread what comes in between, the interregnum, but I no longer fear it.

"I see from my house by the side of the road
By the side of the highway of life,
The men who press with the ardor of hope,
The men who are faint with the strife,
But I turn not away from their smiles and tears,
Both parts of an infinite plan-
Let me live in a house by the side of the road
And be a friend to man."

      --Sam Walter Foss (1858-1911)

Posted by gerardvanderleun at July 28, 2013 9:22 AM
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"It is impossible to speak in such a way that you cannot be misunderstood." -- Karl Popper N.B.: Comments are moderated and may not appear immediately. Comments that exceed the obscenity or stupidity limits will be either edited or expunged.

It took a horrific war to achieve the fundamental transformation of this Republic into its present - unstable - upside-down state.

It took almost one million dead Americans, during and after that war, to elevate the federal government to a position of presumed, absolute rule over an empire, comprised of the individual, formerly sovereign States of America.

It took an imperious President - possessed of a level of narcissism and lawlessness not seen before or since - to impose the ongoing threat of military (and, now, paramilitary) force toward the ends of subordinating the citizens and State legislatures of this nation to the unaccountable will of an unelected oligarchy in D.C. Their gift to this formerly prosperous nation has been the shoveling of bottomless pits of Taxpayer funds into bottomless entitlement programs administered by bottomless bureaucracies, producing a bottomless, unsustainable hole of debt.

So as to what's in between? Well - thanks to blind acceptance of a faux history written by the victors - we have stupidly deified the one individual who is most responsible for this fundamental transformation from Republic to empire. In doing so, we have completely airbrushed that transformation from our civic consciousness. Without the knowledge of how things went so wrong, it's likely we'll have to stumble through the all same horror again, in order to back out the overreach, deceit and usurpation that has been swallowing this Republic since 1861... assuming that's even possible.

Can a nation declare independence from itself? We may find out.

Posted by: AGoyAndHisBLog at July 28, 2013 11:07 AM

Interregnum.

Yes. That fits.

Plus a population with an overt hostility to the scam of Socialism in all its forms.

The Road to Serfdom starts with Free Food, Free Heathcare, Free jobs paid for by stealing it from other citizens and ends with ALL people dependent on the government for Food, Healthcare & Jobs.

Please enjoy your stay at the nationwide Plantation, compliments of the Democrats and their Socialist Handlers. If you don't enjoy your stay, there are plenty of rooms at the local Fema Camp where you can enjoy its Hot Showers and Tanning Booths for the rest of your (very) short lives.

Posted by: Cond0011 at July 28, 2013 11:44 AM

Growing up, I lived on a farm in PA surrounded by mountains and couldn't wait to leave.
Now, I live on the "plains". It is ironic.
But, I know I have the knowledge that we as a people can do "it" all again.
It is sad that we have thrown our heritage away and have to salvage and rebuild.
Driving the "plains" and seeing the isolated ranches and farms, I always marvel at the endurance and faith of the pioneers and know we were once free.

Posted by: elr at July 28, 2013 6:19 PM

Is this true Van der Leun ?

commenter Jewel: " but Vanderleun channels the very devil so well the little hairs on my neck went all agley" ( Or do we simply all want a return to traditions? We would have to find a Latin Mass.)

Or is it : "It is impossible to speak in such a way that you cannot be misunderstood."

Posted by: Grace at July 28, 2013 6:53 PM

Wisdom abounds in the post and responses. One proof resides in the Google view screen-capture. Look closely at the road. Do you see it? Way out in the middle of nowhere, taxpayers paid a bundle to have highway rumble strips installed. Government just mindlessly standardizes, spends and controls, never once pausing to ask if something is needed.

Posted by: Tom at July 29, 2013 9:15 AM

I am very familiar with that part of the country. The secret is that many of the real treasures lie off the paved roads in country that can best be described as "lonely".

There is Ft. Robinson to the east- a frontier era cavalry post.

To its north lies the Hudson Meng bone bed a ten thousand year old bison kill site.

A few mile further north brings one to Toadstool Park where 30 million year old tortoise shells weather out of the marl.

To the west of Toadstool lies the site of the War Bonnet Creek Fight where Buffalo Bill Cody "made his bones" killing and scalping a Cheyenne warrior in a one on one fight.

The action also resulted in the cavalry riding to the rescue of a wagon train, an archetype that Hollywood used ad nauseam for the next century.

Mere yards from the Buffalo Bill monument stands a Catholic Chapel and its 19th century graveyard. It stands in alone in the middle of nowhere, still lovingly maintained by the local diocese.

To its north lies the 30s era ghost town of Ardmore. It was once important enough to be a whistle stop for Calvin Coolidge's campaign. It lies abandoned now, like Detroit but a lot friendlier.

There are countless other sites in this American backwater that require only a high clearance vehicle and a dry dirt road to access,

Posted by: stuart at July 29, 2013 12:28 PM