Friday, November 28, 2008

Grass Eaters

Yeah, yeah, it's 4:00 a.m. and I'm surfing the intertubes. Damn dog woke me, barking his silly ass off. I threw his butt out in the back yard, and wide-assed awake, I made coffee.

And started surfing.

Turns out, there's a new definition for people that ain't like me. Grass Eaters.
If your first reaction to a law being horrifyingly broken is “we gotta make more laws”, you might be a grass-eater. If you believe in angels — or the Just World hypothesis — you’re probably a grass-eater. Both of these delusions indicate a desire to give up responsibility (and, therefore, freedom) to a faceless “higher” power. Grass-eaters are perfectly happy to give up liberty for a little safety — even if the only safety they get is from the consequences of their actions.
I've known people like that. So have you. Frankly, they piss me off.

Some might call them "sheeple". Jeff Cooper might call them "hoplophobe", but you don't have to be afraid of guns to be a Grass Eater. You just have to exhibit the herd mentality. Mostly, calling for new laws.

At this stage of our development as a culture, I'm not sure why we need legislatures except to approve the budget. There is certainly no pressing need for new laws. The ten that Moses gave us from the mountain covers the frailty of the human condition. You can write all ten of them on one sheet of paper. You would think, after two hundred years of Congress and State legislatures, we'd have all the laws we need. Yet, we keep sending legislators to the capitol so they can legislate. It's madness, sheer madness.

So, my question to the various legislatures: You've been meeting now for lo, these hundred years and yet haven't passed all the laws we need? Are you incompetent? Or merely on the Government Dole? If I had been doing a job continuously for a hundred years and hadn't made progress at it; hadn't demonstrably shown that I was capable of finishing the job, then the people who hired me would insist that I was incompetent. Yet the legislature continues to meet, year after year without any sign of completion. Indeed, they intend to meet next year because the job isn't finished.

It's either incompetence or theft.

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

The only disagreement I have is with belief in Angels. I have a personal Guardian Angel. I've never seen him, her or it, but I have heard still small voices, usually in the night, telling me not to do something. Usually the something I was contemplating would have had either disastrous or hurtful consequences. Also my Angel has protected me from serious accidents and malevolent people. This has happened often enough that it cannot be attributed to accident or coincidence. The source of my belief is analagous to the philosophy that "Twice could be coincidence, three times is enemy action." Except that in my experience it's freindly action.

Gerry N.

Pawpaw said...

I believe in Angels, too, Gerry. I had to use that line in the quote, and he qualifies it with a "probably"

Anonymous said...

Touche'! A succint and excellent blog entry.

Old NFO said...

Well said! IF naothing else, you make an excellent argument for term limits also... If they couldn't serve term after term, maybe they would actually be productive in getting rid of the outdated laws!

Anonymous said...

I believe that EVERY law on the books should come up for a renewal vote on the 25th anniversary of its implimentation. If a majority of the new generation of voters ok its renewal, it stays on the books for at least another 25 years. If a majority dics it, it's off the books the very next day.

be603 said...

PP,
Been up a more than a few times in the wee hours lately me self. It's always something, snore loud enough to wake myself :-), aging prostrate, late evening caffiene, or something, but then the mind gets going...

Casting all your cares on him, for he careth for you, and the peace of God that passes all understanding shall guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.

least that's what I kept holding on to...

took me reading Ezekiel to get me to sleep one night. Ezekiel? How'd I wind up there?