Best of Bloggers 2006 Part Five

This is the penultimate wrap up of best posts submitted by bloggers reflecting on 2006. There were so many wonderful posts submitted in response to my invitation on December 26, I wanted to stretch this out into multiple parts to give each of the thoughtful posts the consideration they are due.

As I stated in the first post of this series, that as I read each of the posts submitted common themes linking most of them became apparent. History, Ronald Reagan, the nature of Islam, the War in Iraq and the "News" media were common threads which wove throughout 2006 to form a tapestry of the year just passed.

The process of reviewing and excerpting from all that was submitted is what I call "Wordlooming." I pick up the wordloom once again as we explore another common theme: Politics.

Politics: The Never Ending Campaign for What is Right and Good

It shouldn't surprise anyone that discussions of politics in an election year were front and center in the minds of most of us. Whether it's an individual issue, or the mechanics of voting or broader election themes across the spectrum, we had submissions in our look back dealing with each.

Ken Taylor, at Liberal Lies, the Conservative Truth focused on the immigration issue in his April 9, 2006 Sunday Commentary. As with so many other posts submitted, it's one that could also fit in perfectly well in the history section as he traces great things this nation has done with the benefit of LEGAL immigration. But he expresses concern, as do many of us, that the current system is broken and represents not a fast track to the American dream, but the possible destruction of that dream. We need only think about the Somali cab drivers in Minnesota who refuse to take blind passengers at the airport with seeing eye dogs because their religion, Islam, forbids contact with "unclean" animals.

Ken reminds us that the goal of LEGAL immigration is to assimilate new Americans into the great American dream. Allowing them to set up mini-Mogadishus will only lead to trouble:

If you want to live in this land then you live as an American. Honor your native heritage just as our ancestors did but do not demand that American change to meet your standards.

Immigration as an issue with it's crosscurrents in the political discourse also concerned Conservative Intelligence Report who after witnessing the disrespect shown to the American flag in protests by illegal aliens flying Mexican flags above Old Glory shown in the "distress" position reminded us all that disrespect, or improper display of the flag is a violation of Federal Law:

SEC. 4 That no disrespect should be shown to the flag the United States of America; the flag should not be dipped to any person or thing. Regimental colors, State flags, and organization or institutional flags are to be dipped as a mark of honor.
(a) The flag should never be displayed with the union down, except as a signal of dire distress in instances of extreme danger to life or property.

As the final days and hours ticked down to the November election, many of us were concerned with the problem of vote fraud by Democrats (my own post here) which has in the recent past caused the democratic will of the people to be subverted. Shortly after the election Marie's Two Cents writes a bit of satire titled "I Went Through Hell to Vote." But as I read it, I wondered if Marie hadn't just encapsulated in a concentrated form all the Democrat skullduggery which has occurred in the last three or four elections.

Days before the election, The Chatterbox Chronicles summed up the choices to be made with "Top 10 Reasons To Vote Democrat on November 7th:"

1) You want Nancy Pelosi to be speaker of the House.
2) You want Harry Reid to be Senate Majority Leader.
3) You think its okay for Senators in your party to bash the troops.
4) You love paying high taxes!
5) You want to Cut and Run in Iraq!
6) You don't want drilling in Alaska or anywhere else in the U.S. but you like to whine about how we shouldn't be dependent on the Middle East for our oil.
7) You love activist judges and how they erode our religious freedoms and re-write laws to fit their belief system.
8) You say you're concerned about national security but you're against every plan that has been implemented to prevent future terrorist attacks.
9) You want to sock it to big oil and tax them to death so our gas prices can go up even further even though they already pay an astounding tax rate
10) You believe in abortion on demand and experimentation on human life.

And right on schedule, Democrats appear eager to take the country down a road with so many hard left turns voters may get dizzy trying to figure out where we are headed.

One more look back then it's off to the races for the rest of 2007. Or should I say 2008?