A Cold Wind With a Warm Heart

(Click on pictures to enlarge)
It was cold and the wind blowing off Hart Lake gusting onto Veteran's Park made it a bitter cold. A group of Oceana citizens braved the elements and marched from the Courthouse "carrying flags and carrying signs which mostly said hooray for our side." (Forgive me Bob Dylan).


Those citizens of course were members or friends of the Oceana Tea Party and they brought warmth to each other’s hearts in this March and this Rally. They braved the elements to show their strength of resolve in their beliefs in American exceptionalism. The speakers reminded us all that America and it's free people are what made America the envy of the world. It is simply up to us to keep it so.













We had some bright spots. Rebecca Wentzloff made a banner for us. Not just any banner either. This was a handmade quilt. A lot of work and love went into that, I should keep that in mind. I wish we had a better picture of it but this will have to do. We will proudly have this banner at our meetings to come.

BTW LOL Our next meeting is May 4th at the Golden Township Hall 5527 Fox Rd. Mears. 7pm.

At the Rally I gave a few words then Andrew Sebolt talked of Honor and other virtues which need to be behind all we do as a country. Larry Loree our guest speaker and Vietnam Veteran brought Honor front and center in his speech. As a Vietnam vet he knew well what honor meant and how without it men and women fail to do courageous things. His talk reminded us that courageous things need yet to be done.

State Representative Jon Bumstead ended the speach making part of the program. Mr. Bumstead tied it all together by speaking of citizen involvement and how that effort needs to be made and will help hasten change.







By then we were all freezing and ready to take off but we hung around for the last part of the event. Just as in the old tales, we threw a box of Tea into the lake. To keep the over zealous EPA off our backs, we tied a rope to it and the Box was empty. Oh well the life we live in.






Then we all skedaddled for the warmth and fellowship and gooe eats at Hart Pizza just across the Lake.





All told everyone seemed pleased with the results. Lots of things were talked of over Pizza such as Windmills, Booths in the County Fair, floats in the Asparagus Parade, Debbie Stabenow and some possible opponents to dethrone her like Peter Konetchy or Rob Steele. Pete we learned has bowed out.

Life goes on. But I was reminded by this day that life is indeed what we chose to make it.

And I was warmed.

Regards, Live Dangerously Be A Conservative

Big Fun in Lansing

Five of us from the Oceana Tea Party carpooled yesterday to the "Keep Them Honest"/Tea Party Rally in Lansing. We had a great time and were energized for our Tax Day Tea Party Rally in Hart later today.(4:30 Fri. at Court House then a march to Veterns Park).

Luckily Senator Goeff Hansen and Representative Jon Bumstead were also getting out of session and were able to give us a guided tour of the Senate and House Chambers, before the rally started. Representative Holly Hughes from Muskegon's 91st district made an appearance also.




The speakers were all good. Ruth Johnson, Bill Schuete, Rev.Yulie, Herman Cain, Dick Morris, Kyle Olson, and Scott Haggerstrom. As far as I know, Herman Cain broke the news that he was forming an exploratory committee for his candidacy for the President of the US.









After the rally look who we saw walking down the street. As I was a "Ruth Captain" and Andy Sebolt who was with me was the Secretary of States "Secret Shopper"
We had a nice chat. Barb VanderVeen, Ruth's assistant was with her. It was nice to see Barb again.



This is a pic of a Mother and Daughter and their signs. I doesn't get any better than this.


Not to forget, below is a pic from our last Tues. Cozy Conservative Corner weekly breakfast we have every week Tuesday at 8am at LaFiesta in Hart.


Finally I took this at my old haunt in Muskegon. Morning Bear (sitting down)along with some others has started getting the raised garden beds ready for planting at our Community Garden.

Some things and people I do miss in Muskegon.
But then again I'm happy visiting. LOL



Regards, Live Dangerously Be A Conservative

Mother Nature

What a Difference a Day makes.



Mother Nature proved she was in charge the last couple of weeks. I had been marking the disappearance of the Ice/snow cover every morning as I woke up. Finally Sunday morning the basic cover was gone. Just a few spots remained in the heavily shaded places.

I sat at my console and as I did my daily computer stuff, all of a sudden out of my window I noticed some light snow. Within 5 minutes there was a heavy snow and 10 minutes after that it was nearly a “white out”. I must say sitting in my lazy boy it was a beautiful “white out”. The flakes were huge and I noticed the trees were all getting covered. Within an hour we had at least 2 inches on everything.

The pics below show how in my neck of the woods Mother Nature can take a beautiful spring day without snow cover and send us straight back to the dead of winter within an hour’s time.





Let us not forget a week and a half earlier Mother Nature laid a one inch coating of ice then more snow on what was previously a snow free land. The Ice as you remember was on everything including the roads.

After the pics above Mother Nature must have thought better of her belated April Fools joke and rose up in her might and gave us a 40 degree night through which she blew up a terrifying nonstop, continuous spate of lighting and thunder. I had never heard such nonstop thunder. I guess in Mother Nature’s defense she needed that cacophony of light and sound to unleash the torrential downpour and later the steady rain that eventually negated her previous snowy tantrum.

As I drove to Hart this morning for the 22nd meeting of the Cozy Conservative Corner, I was happy to see the snow was gone, the sun pop back out and the nicer face of Mother Nature revealed. It looked and felt terrific.



At our Conservative breakfast at LaFiesta Greg Van Woerkom representing Congressman Huizenga was there along with the regular crew. However I did miss Al Doctor and Barb V; she rescheduled for May 3rd.

After the breakfast Andy Sebolt and I picked up some extra chairs he had for our Oceana Tea Party meeting coming up Wed. night 7pm. Last night State Representative Jon Bumstead called and confirmed that he would come and speak at this our 2nd Tea Party meeting. I was happy; the other Tea Party folk who were at the breakfast thought it was good news too.

Andy then introduced me around at the Pink Elephant restaurant just up the street from LaFiesta where some Republicans gather. Earlier Juanita Pierman, at the Conservative breakfast told us of an organizational meeting talking place later today in Shelby at the Brown Bear to set up a fundraiser for Goeff Hansen’s son Collin’s son’s education. I plan on going.

Then as Andy and I settled into the Pink Elephant, in walked Goeff and his wife Tammy. Geoff asked if I wanted to ride along to a Right to Life event in Ludington with him as Tammy just wasn’t up to it. I said sure so after I’m done blogging, I’m off to Hart to get some copies made for our Tea Party meeting then to the Shelby meeting and then to Goeff’s.

It is easy to get involved if you just make the effort and are willing to do things on other people’s terms and not always yours. All it takes is asking “What can I do?” I’ll try to blog some more later and for sure after the Tea Party meeting.

One good thing today also that came about happened as I visited the County Clerk Rebecca Griffin about whether or not the County had anything I needed to comply with if our Tea Party decided to have a Tax Day Tea Party Rally in downtown Hart on the 15th. She said that would be covered under the City rules. The good thing here was that I was able to meet the Vice President of the Municipal Township Association for Oceana County. The good in this was I was given a chance to explain what the Tea Party was and the reasons I was making all the effort. They both seemed sympathetic.

Well all for now.
Regards, Live Dangerously Be A Conservative

Catching Up

New Beginnings

With winter losing its grip on my new home, I am getting more time to get into my community. Before our last ice storm and the ground snow was mostly gone I walked my property and met another neighbor. A nice young couple with a very young child living my idea of the American dream. I actually found I owned more land than I thought.

On the political side of things, our Cozy Conservative Corner is running well and has a core of five people who show up regularly every Tuesday 8am at LaFiesta in downtown Hart at the light. BTW all are welcome to our breakfast. At our last one we had a visitor from Muskegon who was one of the originals at our group there. He had a motion to file at the Court House in Hart and he read my Cozy Conservative Corner email and came for breakfast. If you want to get on the email list let me know at glhotdogs513@gmail.com.

After the breakfast some of us went to the Hesperia where Andy brought us up to speed on how facebook works.


I recently talked with Rob Lemille who was one of the 4 people who came to the first CCCorner in Hart. He said he would be coming home from Florida and he will be attending our Cozy Conservative Corners at LaFiesta in Hart plus hopefully he will be home in time for our 2nd Oceana Tea Party. Let me now catch you up on our First one.

March 23rd we held our first Oceana Tea Party meeting at the Golden Township Hall at 7pm. The weather was truly awful and a lot of organizations cancelled out. We didn’t and still twelve people showed up including a reporter from the Oceana Herald Journal. After the meeting he said that he was going to write a story and would put the date of our next meeting in it. Good news for us, we need all the free publicity we can get.

I was impressed with the people that came. There obviously is enough interest in a Conservative message to justify a Tea Party in Oceana County. We did little advertising and had short notice – I was happy with the turnout.

At the meeting we sketched out the idea of the Tea Party and what we thought it could do. Our mission statement was passed around. It was a casual and friendly meeting. We also set the date for our next meeting for April 6th, and Tom just confirmed that we can use the same location. The meeting room holds only 40-50, but Tom also got the ok that we could use the gym if we had more than that. Our only problem would be chairs. I any one has access to a bunch of chairs let me know. I would like to have an extra 50 or so just in case. I remember the very first Tea Party meeting in Manistee and they had over 130 and had to turn people away. Call me Bob Carr at 231-728-3455. I placed an ad with the Journal to run on the 31st March. Tom paid for the last ad I’ll pay for this one.

Also at the meeting we decided that at the next meeting we would elect the leadership. We already have people who volunteered for Chair, Vice Chair, Secretary and Treasurer. All will be welcome to run.

Our next meeting will have some reports from Township meetings. Andy said he’d report from Elbridge and about their wind turbine ordinance. I went to my first Newfield Township meeting and will report on that as well. Along those lines I and Tom plan on going to the County meeting and will talk about that. Below is the link to the Oceana County website.
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http://www.oceana.mi.us/
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I picked up the remaining County Directories that list all the contact info and meeting times for all the county and township meetings plus a world of other info. The County Clerk Rebecca Griffin let me have them for free as they are last year’s and out of date. There were about 15 which I’ll hand out at the meeting. The new ones are coming out within a month and I put an order in for either 50 or 100 depending on the cost. The old cost was $1 but now the counties cost is $1.60. I can only afford to buy a limited amount and will give them out mainly to people who lack computers.

Andy also will be presenting the idea of getting some people to car pool to Lansing for a “Keeping Them Honest Rally” being put on by AFP (Americans For Prosperity) and a bunch of Tea Party Groups April 14th.

-----link------
http://www.eventbrite.com/event/1296924135/efblike
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I’m going, The speaker list is impressive with Dick Morris leading the list with a lot of state wide dignitaries including Ruth Johnson, Bill Shuette , Bob Young and many more. Also please note in the link that the candidates hoping to replace Debbie Stabenow will be there also including Pete Hoekstra among others, I didn’t see Terri Lynn Land’s name, and hopefully she will be there as well. This will be an all day affair.

A lot of Tea Party groups are helping to put this on so I’ll enjoy seeing some old friends. This is on the 14th and I would like to bring up at the meeting the idea of Oceana having a Tea Party Rally in Hart the next day, the 15th. I’m sure I could get a speaker or two if we decide we want to have one. By the way when I placed the ad, the reporter who covered our last meeting was there and said that the Journal would cover it if we had it. So let’s get busy and figure this out. This could be a great chance to recruit new members and let people know the Tea Party at least in Oceana County is alive and well and growing.

We would need a few things to make this work.
Advertising
Guest Speakers
Sound system
Venue or Place hopefully with covered stage or platform.
An OK to do it.
And most important, volunteers to help make it happen; to man a sign in table and give out our flyers and information etc., also to invite all their friends to the rally.

Below is a pic of one we had in Muskegon. There we marched down the street to the park.


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All that aside, I had a great time at the Newfield Township meeting and when I asked if there was anything I could volunteer for I was warmly welcomed. The treasurer Tammy wanted me to become the alternate to sit on the Property Review Board. I talked with her today and the idea seems to be a good fit for me. I’ll meet with her later and get some info to study to make sure I’m capable then I’ll sign up. I also asked if I could become a poll worker and they were agreeable but I think the slots are filled but they wanted me to “tag along” to get broken into the job so I could fill any vacancies as they arise.

I was impressed with the openness of the meeting, all the leaders were accessible also there was a group of around 14 people in the audience which seemed like a large group for a township meeting and later when I talked with the Tammy the Treasurer she said that the audience was larger than normal.

I would suggest for anyone interested in watching your government at the local work to attend your township meeting.

That’s all for now,
Regards, Live Dangerously Be a Conservative

Census Figures In -- Oceana's 1st Tea Party

First to the Census and Reapportionment

The 2010 Census figures are now in at the Mi. Secretary of State website

-----link-----
http://www.michigan.gov/cgi/0,1607,7-158-54534-252541--,00.html
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These figures are what determines the political district lines throughout the state.

Reapportionment at all levels is gearing up for the battles to come.

First, Mi has lost population overall as you can see by the link above we in Michigan will lose one seat and voice in the US House of Representatives.

Our Michigan State House and Senate district lines will be redrawn.

So will our County Commission lines. The County lines are what I'm interested in. Here is the set up.

1. Each county in the state forms a five person reapportionment committee made up of the County Treasurer, Clerk, and Prosecuting Attorney; along with the County Chairs of each of the political parties. This has been done.

2. Depending upon the County Committees, there may be some “informational” public meetings to get input from the public on how the people feel the lines should be drawn.

3. Once the Census figures come out then a complicated set of timelines is started. What they boil down to is setting a time limit to study the figures and come up with a plan. BTW, anyone can submit a plan, not just the members, however the members are the ones that decide.

4. All of this information should be made public with ample time for the public to look at the information and submit a plan.
Here is my information on this.

I went to a public meeting in Ravenna of the Muskegon County Reapportionment Board, this was one of many previously held across the county. A resident of Ravenna labored long and hard to make that meeting happen. She wanted to make sure that the more rural areas of the County would be at least heard. This is what I learned from that meeting.

1. Though it hasn’t been decided my guess is that Muskegon County will lower the number of Commissioners by 4 from 11 to 7. There happens to currently only be 4 Republican Commissioners. Of the Reapportionment Board, 4 of the 5 are Democrats. You do the math.

2. About the mechanics I learned the following;

a.The number of districts is variable from 5 – 25 (it may be 5-23) ; regardless of the population of the County.
b.The one man one vote proviso only demands that the districts are roughly equal. Kay Punter said the exact figures as far as deviation from the average t was roughly 5% either way or 10% total. Example if the county has a population of 20,000 and they want 5 commissioners their districts will each have 4,000 plus or minus 200 (5% of 4,000).

The main thing I understand is that the more representatives there are for let us say a County of 20,000 the more weight my voice will carry. Example if there are 5 commissioners I am one voice of 4,000 for my commissioner to hear. If there are 10 commissioners for the same 20,000 then I am one voice of 2,000 for my commissioner to hear. My voice would be twice as loud. The latter was seems the best way for me or anyone’s voice to be heard.

I just found out that the Oceana Reapportionment Board will meet March 31st Thurs. 2pm at the county bldg in Hart.

Overall it seems people are moving out of the cities to the more rural areas. My conclusions from briefly looking at the figures is that they are not moving to be away from the amenities as much as they are moving to get away from the "Big Government" mentality of their elected officials. They seem to be moving from the cities to the subburbs that still have the amenieties like TV and highspeed internet, large supermarkets and seem willing to give some of each for larger yards and smaller government. This seems to go across racial lines.

People in the "Primitive" areas lacking most amenities and miles from "civilization" are also losing population.

I hope this is a trend towards self "governance" which by the way is the title of a great short pithy and stimulating book by Scott Rasmussion. Time will tell.

Now some great news. Oceana County will be having its first Tea Party meeting 3/23/11 at the Golden Township hall. 5537 Fox Rd. Mears Mi.

-----google map-----
http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&source=s_q&hl=en&geocode=&q=5537+W+Fox+Rd,+Mears,+MI+49436&aq=0&sll=36.949892,-95.800781&sspn=17.311977,46.318359&ie=UTF8&hq=&hnear=5537+W+Fox+Rd,+Mears,+Michigan+49436&ll=43.685998,-86.405067&spn=0.015331,0.045233&z=14
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We couldn’t have picked a worse day weather wise (careful driving) – well just think of Washington crossing the Delaware river in the dead of winter and it won’t seem so bad.



This will be an organizational and get together meeting, I’m sure we will have another real soon to get officers etc elected and the show on the road.

If you are interested in doing something to change the mess we are in come on down

All are welcome