As you prepare to go to the polls, please keep in mind that a stark choice lies before America. Tomorrow is a critically important election, one in which we shall choose between evil and fecklessness.
One the one hand we have the party of death and sodomy, lechery and license, while on the other we have the party of milquetoastery. Given such a choice, who can fail to be roused to action?
Actually, I really am hoping for an electoral bloodbath for the Democrats because their peculiar kind of hubris does need a few more holes in it. I hope that after the election a man would be unable to swing a cat on the Senate floor, not that this is likely to occur, without hitting a Republican. I do hope this is the outcome, and am planning on voting accordingly. Join me, will you?
This is because I am long overdue for a change up in my exasperation. I am tired of the Death Star blowing up planets, and want a quiet return to the petty mendacity of yore.
If this is a wave election — which it looks like it might be — one possible new exasperation will come from the fact that John Boehner may no longer need the Tea Party fire eaters in order to get anything passed, and will be in a position to tell them to do what the Republican establishment has long yearned to be able to tell them to do, which is to pound sand.
If the wave were big enough, Congress would be within shouting distance of being able to over-ride presidential vetoes — not that there would be that many Republicans, but because a wave election might put the fear of God into some Democrats. The first order of business would of course be to repeal Obamacare — and our exasperation will come when we see the fecklessness, a word that cries out to be used at least twice in a post like this — of the Republicans.
And of course, let us never forget that Article III, Section 2 of the Constitution gives Congress the authority to set jurisdictional limits on the federal courts, including the Supreme Court. Wouldn’t it be dandy if Congress prohibited federal courts from saying anything whatever about same sex mirage? Or abortion?
Although there are some Republicans I admire, I have no illusions about the Republican establishment. They wouldn’t do such things because they don’t want to. I am not holding my breath, in other words.
At the same time, I will go to the polls cheerfully tomorrow, whistling an environmentalist tune, but making it plural. Save the planets.
As you prepare to go to the polls, please keep in mind that a stark choice lies before America. Oh come on, you say this every time. But even if the Rs win, they still have no idea how to govern. The more interesting question is where this saying “go and pound sand” came from? What is it supposed to mean? Has anyone ever actually pounded sand? For that matter what exactly is “fecklessness”? What is feck and how much of it are we supposed to have? Funny thing is that I’ve only ever heard both of these things used… Read more »
Rearranging the deck chairs.
The election which has my concern is the Washington State ballot tightening hub laws. Women with records should not have to choose between risk of prison for felon in possession of a firearm and a body bag.
Spell checkers are more trouble than they are worth. Gun laws hurt women with felomy records
Sure. Hey, come to think of it, most laws could potentially “hurt” women. Lets just have them apply only to men.
Matt, I’m tempted to say that I’ve come across both expressions many times in literature, so the implication of your comment is that conservative Internet writing is obviously more literate than the general run.
But I won’t. ;)
Matt, google is your friend, and it will show you examples of liberals using both phrases in their respective first pages of hits.
Oxford English Dictionary
feckless |ˈfɛkləs|
adjective
lacking initiative or strength of character; irresponsible: her feckless younger brother.
DERIVATIVES
fecklessly adverb,
fecklessness noun
ORIGIN late 16th cent.: from Scots and northern English dialect feck (from effeck, variant of effect) + -less.
Dictionary of American Regional English pound sand pound sand down a rathole 1 Fig: to do the simplest thing—usu used in phrr not to know (or have sense) enough to pound sand down a rathole and varr. chiefly west of Missip R, N Cent, Upstate NY 1912 DN 3.581 wIN, He wouldn’t know enough to pound sand in a rat-hole; so don’t get him.  1914 DN 4.79 ME, nNH, Sand in a rat-hole, don’t know enough to pound. . . Very stupid.  1923 DN 5.219 swMO, Don’t know enough to pound sand in a rat hole. . . Stupid. Also, Don’t… Read more »
I don’t know that this report is to be taken entirely seriously, but I just couldn’t resist adding it to this discussion:
http://nypost.com/2014/06/27/hillary-called-obama-a-joke-at-lunch-with-pals-book/
You almost lost me after that comment about swinging cats, which presents a horrifying image even if you do consider it unlikely to occur. Why does it always have to be all about cats? Try to put yourself in the shoes of those of us who love cats and imagine how traumatized and marginalized we must feel by such thoughtless comments. Surely if you cared, if you had any consideration at all, you would employ species neutral metaphors. As it is your wording, calculated or otherwise, represents yet another cruel blast in the Republican war on cats.
I grew up hearing feckless all the time, particularly as applied to me. Now I delight in calling my daughter and her boyfriend Feckless and Reckless.
I agree with John M. I had to tell Fluffy to put her paws over her eyes when the two of us were reading your post.
I quite enjoy cats, and have learned quite a bit (martially) from watching their skill.
Think of swinging a panther; swing really fast, and pity the crowd receiving the released cat.
I voted early last week. Straight Republican ticket. I used to think people who voted a straight ticket were morons, but finding a staunchly conservative Democrat is like looking for tiny grains of diamond in a sand dune. On a sunny day “everything glitters”. You are bound to be disappointed.
My biggest complaint with establishment Republicans is they have no spine. No established convictions. Wish there were more Ted Cruz’s in the Senate.
More than likely going to sit another one out. “If you choose not to decide, you still have made a choice.” -Geddy Lee of the band Rush.
Hillary has also called Obama “feckless”. In fact, before 2009 you hardly ever heard the word applied to politicians, with people opting for a more normal word like “incompetent” or “ineffective”, but then Republicans found “feckless” and applied it to Obama approximately ten million times, so much so that even poor Hillary can’t escape it. It really raises the question of how much feck Republicans want Obama to have. Shouldn’t “feckless” be a compliment? At least Doug here is using it more rationally, if not correctly. The Republicans seem to have plenty of feck, having stopped Obama from doing much… Read more »
Matt, that article quotes Hillary as saying “feckless,” that’s why I posted it. I was mostly joking, though, because it’s sort of a silly article and a ridiculous situation, if true. Okay, maybe it became fashionable as applied to Obama, and of course that’s attributable to the right. But it truly is a word that people with larger than average vocabularies have been using with some frequency for a lot longer than that. But no, we don’t want a feckless president, even if his fecklessness limits his damage, because feckless, like foolish, also has a moral component. Part of the… Read more »
I’m not trying to say that Republicans invented the term. I just find it interesting how these words get associated with some specific context. Will the next president after Obama be feckless, or something else? It isn’t just the right, remember when the Iraq War was a waste of “blood and treasure”? Always “blood and treasure”, never “lives and money”. I guess “feckless” has the advantage of “feck” sounding a lot like…well, this is a family site. Part of the idea of being feckless, as RFB’s cite of the definition shows, is not knowing the right way to go; it’s… Read more »
Matt, did you notice that “fecklessness” refers to the Republicans in this post?
Yes, which is why I wrote the following above:
Doug, your eternal optimism gladdens my heart. I truly hope someday your “bloodbath for the Democrats” finally comes to fruition.
But I think the Republicans ever amending the Judiciary Act of 1789 is about as likely as my finding a winged Pegasus in my driveway tomorrow morning. Of course, given your beliefs on dominion taking with regard to genetic modification, I suppose anything is possible. ;)
Pastor Wilson,
Would you please respond to this blog post as only you can?
http://www.patheos.com/blogs/theologyintheraw/2014/11/jesus-in-the-public-square/
Thanks for considering,
Joseph