Who Are The Minnesota Lemmings?

Sorry to say, the Minnesota Lemmings are not a new sports franchise, at least not in the traditional sense. I’ll give you a hint though, by citing this definition

lemmings: (2.) a person who follows the will of others, especially in a mass movement, and heads straight into a situation or circumstance that is dangerous, stupid, or destructive.

These lemmings that eat up conspiracy theories are so blinded by lies, they don’t even see the cliff they’re about to plummet over.
www.dictionary.com/browse/lemmings>

Still can’t guess? “The Minnesota Lemmings” I speak of are the organized mobs of both local and imported, paid and unpaid, waves of humanity drawn to Minneapolis to either gawk, chant, carry signs, record videos, scream, taunt, push, kick, throw objects, physically threaten, and/or otherwise obstruct Federal Officers from doing their jobs in any and every way possible. Sadly, the majority of these mobs apparently truly believe what their Leaders have declared (i.e. that they are acting as the “Protectors of democracy, freedom, and human rights” on behalf of innocent migrants and citizens allegedly targeted to become slaves, deportees, prisoners, and for death by the big, bad Trump Administration. The fact that these mostly well-meaning followers do not see how they’ve been lied to and manipulated by the self-righteous politicians, media, activist groups, and those funding them is as tragic as as it is terrifying. And while it is nothing new for people to act as lemmings and sheep, more than ever before, with today’s technology, the consequences are quickly becoming within a hair’s breadth of catastrophic for of us.

Cartoon image of Lemmings jumping off a cliff.The German text translates to:
“Turn back!? Now that we’ve come this far!?!”

My goal is to COOL and not fan the flames of division, by providing context that has been sorely missing from most reports and opinion pieces elsewhere.

As a former die-heart liberal Democrat, I do not believe the current gulf between Americans is as wide as legacy Media, left-wing Politicians and Activists try to portray it. Most people, (regardless of their politics, skin-color, gender, religion, financial status, or ethnic background) simply want the ability to earn enough to keep themselves and their families adequately fed, physically safe, comfortably housed, free to express themselves as individuals, afforded the right to pursue whatever personal goals they have without artificial obstruction, to feel certain that they will be treated with the level of respect they’ve earned, and to know that they will be judged here on earth by an unbiased legal/judicial system that cannot be bought or manipulated by anyone. The Founders of our Country, an extremely diverse group of individuals, following years of research, practical observation and experience, debate, and experiment, devised a brilliantly planned framework for governing the USA that could guarantee the desired result for every Citizen, as long as each one of us steadfastly upheld our own responsibilities under that adopted Federal Constitution, including faithfully holding true to its’ underlying principles.

Amazingly, our Founder’s wisdom has held us together for 250 years. Together, we’ve witnessed periods of tremendous growth in population, territorial expansion, scientific and social progress, economic strength and world-wide influence. And while that path has faced tremendous challenges from both without and within, we have always managed to work through the difficulties and our differences, by subverting our personal egos to find a way to work together lest we risk destroying our common dream for “Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness”. So why has our future suddenly seem to have changed direction?

In my humble opinion, based on history and objective facts, it is our own very success in improving the quality of life for nearly every single person in our Country combined with a loss of focus on where those blessings came from and the gratefulness due, that has lead us to have entirely unreasonable expectations. We have failed increasingly over the generations to fully recognize the value of hard work, patience, self-sacrifice, and self-reliance that made the abundance we’ve enjoyed possible. And most of all, we have increasingly failed to recognize the vital importance of moral principles, personal integrity, and inter-personal ethics. The result is that we have made ourselves ripe as a nation for manipulation by the relatively small set of people (I call them “The Users”) who feed off of a large population willing to follow their lead, without much more than an overt firey appeal to their target’s immediate emotions and desires. The Users know just which buttons to push, while The Lemmings, thrill to partake in the rewards of having one’s endorphines surge each time their ire and rage gets activated and shared, thus having little interest into questioning their favored Leader’s ultimate intent.

The issues raised by the above are many and each deserves further examination and discussion, but for the purpose of this immediate post I’d like to bring it back specifically to what is happening in Minneapolis, Minnisota under the guise of “Righteous Protests” against the presence and operations of Federal ICE Agents. Essentially, ALL of the chaos, turmoil, fear and outrage being portrayed by the Leftist Leaders rests on the necessity of you buying into an “Us versus Them” mindset. They accomplish this by framing every word, every scene, with high energy and the sense of urgency, using absolutes in terms of oppressors and victims, using strident and shocking images and pushing predetermined conclusions. They do their best to leave no room for you to think, consider, question, or decide; wanting only for you to react in lockstep in the direction of their lead.

Over many years, Leftist Leaders have trained us to blindly accept who are the “Good Guys” and who are the “Bad Guys” based only upon the direction their fingers are pointed. The “Wealthy” are always to be considered “bad” – but only it’s not one of their own. Gun Owners are always evil – but only if it’s not one of their own. Laws are always oppressive and unfair – but only if they are enforced against themselves. Those who break the law should always be allowed to get away with it and even cheered – but only as long as they don’t harm (or vote against, God forbid!) one of The Users designated “Good Guys”. In essence, according to the Left, all ethics are “situational” and the law only applies to everyone but them. Yet despite that mindset, the fact is that ICE Agents are in Minnesota for the sole purpose of doing their legal duty of enforcing U.S. Federal Immigration Laws by taking into custody persons who are in this Country illegally (a felony) and whom have engaged in further criminal activity. The Agents have performed these exact same duties thousands of times in almost every single other state of our Union, without any significant notice or disruption, much less a single fatal incident. The only difference has been solely due to the total lack of cooperation by Minnesota’s Democratic Politicians, local police, and the surge of both local and out-of-state and mainly paid professional “Protesters” who have not only been welcomed by that state’s leaders, but actively encouraged to engage in violent action against Federal Law Enforcement. There is no honest way to deny this fact given the plethora of unedited recorded and documented evidence freely available for anyone with an open-mind to examine.

So what does this all mean?

The most important take-a-way is that if you truly care about people, about protecting human rights, about ensuring equal justice, about ensuring the freedom and liberty guaranteed under our Constitution, and about ensuring the continued existence of the United States of America as the one stable beacon of hope as it has been seen for two and a half centuries across the world, then it is time to:

  • Stop being a lemming.
  • Stop following the crowd.
  • Stop believing the Haters.
  • Stop believing anyone promising free tickets to paradise.
  • Stop expecting to get anything you’re unwilling to work for or to give to others.
  • Stop expecting to be safe from those you attack.
  • Stop expecting to be protected by those you treat with disdain and disrespect.
  • Stop expecting to get away scot-free for your own bad acts against those you have pre-judged and condemned.

Beyond that, I believe we can all benefit by re-reading and taking to heart the Ten Commandments, a non-denominational treatise universally respected, and which is at the very core of our Federal Constitution. I’ll leave for another day to discuss more about that latter document: how it was developed, what it means, why, how and by whom it is being actively threatened, and what we can do about it. Until then,

…Be True and May God Bless You!

I DID IT! (Learning To Take Pleasure In Small Accomplishments)

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Yup. I finally completed relocating all of my original clip art, icons & desktop wallpaper to different servers and updated all the affected posts on this blog. Now there will be no interruption in the accessibility of those files AND the loading time for viewing my blog should be much faster. While it was a big and tedious job involving a few hundred files and over a hundred posts, I suppose that my enthusiasm (as denoted by this post’s title) is a bit pathetic considering the fairly trivial nature of this accomplishment in the vast scheme of the universe, but if there is one thing I’ve learned in my life, it is the importance of finding as much pleasure in the little steps and small achievements as I would on reaching my most important goals. None of us can count on being as capable as we are today (to whatever degree that is), much less have any guarantee we’ll even be alive tomorrow. The odds I face are substantially lower than average, so I’ve spent a lot of time over the years (and especially over the last few months) trying to convince myself how important it is to be pleased with what I CAN do and be proud of myself for doing whatever I realistically COULD do towards reaching my ideals. That’s a tall order to ask of one who has always had high expectations and standards for herself.

Being my toughest critic has largely served me well during my first 57 years as it has motivated me to work as hard and as smart as I could to constantly improve my skills and my usefulness to others. While I certainly appreciate the complements and reliance on my ability to deliver bestowed on me by so many others, I’ve never been able to get away from the feeling that I should have done more and done it better (whatever “it” was). By some theories, such perfectionism is a good thing where it spurs one on to grow and become the best they can be as a person and to reach the pinnacle of their abilities. The downside arises when you’re too slow (or fail altogether) to recognize when you’ve already reached the limits of your abilities, whether due to limitations within you or due to external factors outside of your control. The problems such lack of recognition poses includes the inability to enjoy or take pride in whatever you have accomplished, the stress and frustration of continuing to strive for a goal that, through no fault of your own, will always be out of your reach; and the loss of opportunity to ever feel completely at peace that comes from knowing you did your best. I actually didn’t realize I had this problem until very recently because I had always considered myself to have a fairly well-balanced ego; but what happened was a resistance to recognizing that my seemingly infinite ability to find ways to overcome adversity (both internal and external) is in fact, not so limitless.

While I have surprised (pleasantly) my physicians by having beaten the odds of surviving much longer than expected given all the complications of dealing with the lethal combination of multiple serious, life-threatening diseases and conditions, I have hardly come through this all unscathed. I thought that by having a positive attitude and stubbornly telling myself that I “refuse to die” that I could not only cheat death but somehow avoid the physical and emotional suffering that’s associated with those diseases and conditions as well. In the past, that attitude has made a huge and positive difference in my life in overcoming many physical disabilities and tremendous external adversity. For instance, as a result of having served as a “guinea pig” to early experimentation with brainwave biofeedback forty years ago, I learned to be able to control my brain and body to the extent that I could prevent or stop my epileptic seizures from developing past the “aura” stage almost 100% of the time; learned to be able to stop and restart my heart at will; and could self-hypnotize myself deeply enough to undergo surgery to remove lumps in my breasts and even a root canal without any anesthetic. So I had come to expect that there was nothing in the world I couldn’t overcome. But the years of exerting such extreme efforts and the piling on of one disease or condition on top of another over and over again, and the years of being subjected to the intense emotional stress of 12-year long lawsuit with someone I should have been able to trust and turn to for compassion and help, finally took their toll on me over this last year. It wasn’t until that lawsuit reached yet another brick wall in November 2011 that I realized I no longer had the strength or energy to continue my pursuit of justice, that I finally realized that there simply are things outside of my control no matter how hard and earnest my efforts and no matter how reasonable, fair, or “right” my goals may be. Sometimes, a positive attitude just isn’t enough and sometimes the bad guys “win”.

I’d like to still believe that somewhere along the line G-d ensures that justice will be done and no undeserved pain, suffering, or early death will have been in vain, but I am still working on accepting the fact that I will likely never know if such belief is merely the dream of a fool. Part of that effort is learning not to be so hard on myself and to learn to enjoy even the smallest accomplishment all on its’ own and not taking it for granted or judging it as a failure for being still short of my expectations. I am trying my best to be satisfied with myself for having tried, and for doing whatever is the best I can realistically do at any particular time. In one sense, this requires lowering my expectations of myself, and I am trying to learn not to see that as a failure or to feel guilty that I could not do any better. I’ve never applied such stringent standards to my expectations from others and so just need to be able to be as forgiving and supportive towards myself. That’s somewhat of a culture shock and requires “un-learning” a lifetime of beliefs. It is this revelation and struggle that has lead me to look deeper into the lessons I can take from Buddhist, Taoist and Native American philosophies, as they strike me as being the least influenced by the material world and the most in touch with the unvarnished, true nature of man. I’ll be writing more about my progress in posts to come.

Back to the mundane: Here’s the list of the last group of posts that I have updated, followed by a fresh batch of freebies and some of the latest of my designs at IconDoIt – The Store.

MORE UPDATED POSTS

  1. The Constraints of WordPress.com
  2. Deviation to Green Day & Zack
  3. Escher-Sketch Redux
  4. Art Deco: Icons – OR – Clip Art?
  5. Fox Spokane Art Deco Icons, Pt. 2
  6. Mrs. Hudson & Sherlockian Icons
  7. Freedom Rings
  8. CSI – Mac?
  9. The Morale Chorale
  10. Cleveland Indians & Art Deco Icons
  11. Steampunk’d
  12. A Comeuppance & Twitter Birds

Free Clip-Art / Icons of the Day

The following images are either full or reduced size previews. Simply right-click (or control-click) on the preview to save the image(s) of your choice to your desktop. (Unless otherwise noted, downloads are 512px X 512px in .png format). As always, usage of any of the images offered in the “Free Clip-Art / Icons of the Day” section are free for your personal use, subject to the limitations of my Creative Commons Non-Commercial – Attribution – No Derivatives – Share Alike- 3.0 license. (See sidebar for Terms of Use) For commercial or any other use, please contact me for directly.

Aaaarrgh!SparklingScales

Constitutional Law

The Justice FIlesFla Court

What Price Truth?

WHAT’S NEW ON ZAZZLE

My Wild Irish Rose Card
My Wild Irish Rose
This St. Patrick’s Day card featuring IconDoIt’s original rendering of a richly textured-looking red, red rose against an antique moss-toned wall is really quite special in its’ beauty and message. The real St. Patrick was more about love than drinking green beer so we believe his day is as perfect a time as any to tell her you love her. And since she won’t be expecting a card of this nature on March 17, it will be far more meaningful and just might earn you that magical kiss you’ll never forget!
Truth in Action (iPad Case)
Truth in Action (iPad Case)
For the consumate legal professional, this hard-shell iPad case features IconDoIt’s original artwork of the Scales of Justice with Benjamin Disraeli’s iconic quote: “Justice is Truth in Action” or swap it out for your own logo. And don’t forget to personalize the text!
Themis Spiral Notebook
Themis Spiral Notebook
Great spiral notebook for the law student, lawyer, judge, or for those who love justice and have extraordinarily good taste! 😉 Cover design is an Art Deco inspired original by IconDoIt.

3 More Updated Posts

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Just a “heads-up” about three more of my older posts that I finished updating tonight. As mentioned in my last post, these updates may have some icons or clip-art that was not in the original post, so you might want to check them out. List of those posts with links are below. And as the December holidays rapidly approach, on my Freebie menu for tonight (this morning?) I’ve pulled out a few Christmas-themed images I originally created somewhere between 2004-2008. Enjoy!

MORE UPDATED POSTS

  1. Thoughts on Truth & Justice (& Legal Icons)
  2. Legal Adversaries, Old Flames & Divine Irony
  3. Lawyers, Guns & Money

Free Clip-Art / Icons of the Day

The following images are either full or reduced size previews. Simply right-click (or control-click) on the preview to save the image(s) of your choice to your desktop. (Unless otherwise noted, downloads are 512px X 512px in .png format). As always, usage of any of the images offered in the “Free Clip-Art / Icons of the Day” section are free for your personal use, subject to the limitations of my Creative Commons Non-Commercial – Attribution – No Derivatives – Share Alike- 3.0 license. (See sidebar for Terms of Use) For commercial or any other use, please contact me for directly.

Hj_dock-finder-2011xmas-2008-6 copy

Candles on the SIll

northstar-1northstar-B

northstar-A

northstar-2northstar-4

northstar-c

WHAT’S NEW ON ZAZZLE

IMAGE NAME
Dragon In The New Year T-Shirt
This black t-shirt is AWESOME with IconDoIt’s original design in honor of Chinese New Year (starts Jan. 23, 2012). For this “Year of the Dragon” there’s a golden dragon and the Chinese characters which symbolize the word “dragon”, all set off by a deep, warm red background. Other styles & colors available for the guys, ladies & kids. You might also like our Coordinating Spiral Notebook!
Be a Ballerina (Blonde)
Be a Ballerina (Blonde) photo sculpture
What Fun! For the many little (or big!) girl who wants to be a ballerina or fantasizes what she’d look like as one, now’s her chance with IconDoIt’s cool new ballerina design and your uploaded picture, this personalized photo sculpture will be met with squeals of delight. Shown is 8×10, you can go smaller or as large as 24″x36″! Also see our Matching Shirts!
Look Ma! I'm an Astronaut!  photo sculpture
Look Ma! I’m an Astronaut! photo sculpture
With this great free-standing photo sculpture of a an Astronaut’s Space Suit and Your Uploaded Photograph, anyone can be an Astronaut – or at least look like one! 4 Different Sizes. Photo should be 300 dpi or more. Also see our Matching Shirts!
Monkey Face - Boy  3D photo sculpture
Monkey Face – Boy 3D photo sculpture
My nephew, Bryan, is holding the place for a photo of your little monkey’s face in this fun 3D stand-up Monkey photo sculpture. Makes a cute gift for new parents or for a toddler’s birthday – or use a photo of your brother for his 50th! (you can never be too old to monkey around!) Best results with a digital photo that is at minimum, 300 ppi. (And for the girls, check out Monkey Face – Girl!)