accomplished
haikujaguar and has been co-sponsored by her and ellenmillion. You-two have reprint rights for it, so you can echo it on your blogs if you wish. Other folks wishing to share it may link to it here. Working together, we can accomplish great things! Thanks to everyone for your support and feedback.Which Is Stronger
Which is stronger,
liberal or conservative?
Who is better,
the bold hunter or the patient farmer?
Shall we pursue happiness, liberty, and life
at the expense of husbandry, caution, and law?
Shall we fight for honor, security, and peace
at the expense of honesty, freedom, and grace?
Which is stronger,
the day or the night?
Without both, there would be no cycle,
no living dance of light and dark.
To be liberal is to be an explorer.
We are the ones who hunt the wild ideas
along the frontiers of philosophy and civics,
who come up with new solutions to old problems.
Where would we be without
our beacons, our lighthouses, our anchors?
We would be lost in the wilderness
without someone to show the way home.
Which is stronger,
the heat or the cold?
Neither the star nor the void bear life,
only the Earth balanced between them.
To be conservative is to be a keeper.
We are the ones who stay and maintain
all that our ancestors have gathered in,
who teach the traditions that define us all.
Where would we be without
our traders, our muses, our legends?
We would be stuck in the mud
without someone to bring new traditions to try.
Which is stronger,
the warp or the weft?
Without both, there is no fabric,
only fragile threads.
It is our differences as well as our similarities
that make us cleave together instead of apart:
two north magnets will never meet in the middle,
and a flag of one color is only cloth.
It is the divergence of our worldviews
that gives greatness to our vision:
parallax reveals the position of the guiding star,
and stereopsis gives depth to perception.
That which is stronger
is that which is balanced,
which is blended,
which is complete.
November 7 2008, 16:34:48 UTC 12 years ago
Thank you!
November 7 2008, 18:52:19 UTC 12 years ago
Re: Thank you!
April 28 2010, 20:25:57 UTC 11 years ago
I don't want to condemn you, but I can no longer stay silent. I have to say this:
Hypocrite.
Thoughts
April 28 2010, 20:37:31 UTC 11 years ago
I am not comfortable with some things the "tea party" movement is doing, and I disagree with many of their beliefs and goals. I have a right to express those opinions. Some tea party members have made death threats against elected officials, or racial slurs, or other things I find objectionable. I dislike racism. I dislike the principle, "Every man for himself, and devil take the hindmost." So I'm often in conflict with people who promote those ideas. They can rant and scream at their rallies if they wish. Conversely, I can aim to make my blog a reasonably civil place, where I can promote ideas that I consider desirable.
If you can't be polite on this blog, then please don't post here. Name-calling is not acceptable here. A hostile environment makes other audience members uncomfortable; I've had several people express unhappiness with the rising level of tension in some comments. If you prefer a different mode of discourse, the internet is full of alternatives.