Martyn4802
New member
>>
>> Subject: Commencement Address (Tex A&M)
>> Date: Thu, 24 Jan 2008 04:14:32
>>
>> Neal Boortz is a Texan, a lawyer, a Texas AGGIE (Texas
>> A&M), and now a nationally syndicated talk show host from Atlanta .
>> His commencement address to the graduates of this year's A&M class is
>> far different from what either the students or the faculty expected.
>> His views are thought provoking. It would have been particularly
>> entertaining to have witnessed the faculty's reaction.
>>
>>
>>
>> "I am honored by the invitation to address you on this
>> august occasion. It's about time. Be warned, however, that I am not
>> here to impress you; you'll have enough smoke blown up your bloomers
>> today. And you can bet your tassels I'm not here to impress the
>> faculty and administration. You may not like much of what I have to
>> say, and that's fine. You will remember it though. Especially after
>> about 10 years out there in the real world. This, it goes without
>> saying, does not apply to those of you who will seek your careers and
>> your fortunes as government employees.
>>
>>
>>
>> This gowned gaggle behind me is your faculty. You've
>> heard the old saying that those who can - do. Those who can't -
>> teach. Tha sounds deliciously insensitive. But there is often raw
>> truth in insensitivity, just as you often find feel-good falsehoods
>> and lies in compassion. Say good-bye to your faculty because now you
>> are getting ready to go out there and do. These folks behind me are
>> going to stay right here and teach.
>>
>>
>>
>> By the way, just because you are leaving this place with a
>> diploma doesn't mean the learning is over. When an FAA flight
>> examiner handed me my private pilot's license many years ago, he
>> said, 'Here, this is your ticket to learn.' The same can be said for
>> your diploma. Believe me, the learning has just begun.
>>
>>
>>
>> Now, I realize that most of you consider yourselves
>> Liberals. In fact, you are probably very proud of your liberal
>> views. You care so much. You feel so much. You want to help so
>> much. After all you're a compassionate and caring person, aren't you
>> now? Well, isn't that just so extraordinarily special. Now, at this
>> age, is as good a time as any to be a liberal; as good a time as any
>> to know absolutely everything. You have plenty of time, starting
>> tomorrow, for the truth to set in.
>>
>>
>>
>> Over the next few years, as you begin to feel the cold
>> breath of reality down your neck, things are going to start changing
>> pretty fast... including your own assessment of just how much you
>> really know.
>>
>>
>>
>> So here are the first assignments for your initial class
>> in reality: Pay attention to the news, read newspapers, and listen
>> to the words and phrases that proud Liberals use to promote their
>> causes. Then, compare the words of the left to the words and phrases
>> you hear from those evil, heartless, greedy conservatives. From the
>> Left you will hear "I feel." From the Right you will hear "I
>> think." From the Liberals you will hear references to groups -- The
>> Blacks, the Poor, The Rich, The Disadvantaged, The Less Fortunate.
>> From the Right you will hear references to individuals. On the Left
>> you hear talk of group rights; on the Right, individual rights.
>>
>>
>>
>> That about sums it up, really: Liberals feel. Liberals
>> care. They are pack animals whose identity is tied up in group
>> dynamics. Conservatives and Libertarians think -- and, setting aside
>> the theocracy crowd, their identity is centered on the individual.
>>
>>
>>
>> Liberals feel that their favored groups have enforceable
>> rights to the property and services of productive individuals.
>> Conservatives and Libertarians, I among them I might add, think that
>> individuals have the right to protect their lives and their property
>> from the plunder of the masses.
>>
>>
>>
>> In college you developed a group mentality, but if you
>> look closely at your diplomas you will see that they have your
>> individual names on them. Not the name of your school mascot, or of
>> your fraternity or sorority, but your name. Your group identity is
>> going away. Your recognition and appreciation of your individual
>> identity starts now.
>>
>>
>>
>> If, by the time you reach the age of 30, you do not
>> consider yourself to be a libertarian or a conservative, rush right
>> back here as quickly as you can and apply for a faculty position.
>> These people will welcome you with open arms. They will welcome you,
>> that is, so long as you haven't developed an individual identity.
>> Once again you will have to be willing to sign on to the group
>> mentality you embraced during the past four years.
>>
>>
>>
>> Something is going to happen soon that is going to really
>> open your eyes. You're going to actually get a full time job!
>>
>>
>>
>> You're also going to get a lifelong work partner. This
>> partner isn't going to help you do your job. This partner is just
>> going to sit back and wait for payday. This partner doesn't want to
>> share in your effort, but in your earnings.
>>
>>
>>
>> Your new lifelong partner is actually an agent; an agent
>> representing a strange and diverse group of people; an agent for
>> every teenager with an illegitimate child; an agent for a research
>> scientist who wanted to make some cash answering the age-old question
>> of why monkeys grind their teeth. An agent for some poor demented
>> hippie who considers herself to be a meaningful and talented arist,
>> but who just can't manage to sell any of her artwork on the open market.
>>
>>
>>
>> Your new partner is an agent for every person with
>> limited, if any, job skills, but who wanted a job at City Hall. An
>> agent for tin-horn dictators in fancy military uniforms grasping for
>> American foreign aid. An agent for multi-million- dollar companies
>> who want someone else to pay for their overseas advertising. An
>> agent for everybody who wants to use the unimaginable power of this
>> agent's for their personal enrichment and benefit.
>>
>>
>>
>> That agent is our wonderful, caring, compassionate,
>> oppressive government. Believe me, you will be awed by the
>> unimaginable power this agent has. Power that you do not have A
>> power that no individual has, or will have. This agent has the legal
>> power to use force, deadly force to accomplish its goals.
>>
>>
>>
>> You have no choice here. Your new friend is just going to
>> walk up to you, introduce itself rather gruffly, hand you a few forms
>> to fill out, and move right on in. Say hello to your own personal
>> one ton gorilla. It will sleep anywhere it wants to.
>>
>>
>>
>> Now, let me tell you, this agent is not cheap. As you
>> become successful it will seize about 40% of everything you earn.
>> And no, I'm sorry, there just isn't any way you can fire this agent
>> of plunder, and you can't decrease its share of your income. That
>> power rests with him, not you.
>>
>>
>>
>> So, here I am saying negative things to you about
>> government. Well, be clear on this: It is not wrong to distrust
>> government. It is not wrong to fear government. In certain cases it
>> is not even wrong to despise government for government is inherently
>> evil. Yes ... a necessary evil, but dangerous nonetheless ...
>> somewhat like a drug. Just as a drug that in the proper dosage can
>> save your life, an overdose of government can be fatal.
>>
>>
>>
>> Now let's address a few things that have been crammed into
>> your minds at this university. There are some ideas you need to
>> expunge as soon as possible. These ideas may work well in academic
>> environment, but they fail miserably out there in the real world.
>>
>>
>>
>> First is that favorite buzz word of the media, government
>> and academia: Diversity! You have been taught that the real value
>> of any group of people - be it a social group, an employee group, a
>> management group, whatever - is based on diversity. This is a
>> favored liberal ideal because diversity is based not on an
>> individual's abilities or character, but on a person's identity and
>> status as a member of a group. Yes, it's that liberal group identity
>> thing again.
>>
>>
>>
>> Within the great diversity movement group identification -
>> be it racial, gender based, or some other minority status - means
>> more than the individual's integrity, character or other qualifications.
>>
>>
>>
>> Brace yourself. You are about to move from this academic
>> atmosphere where diversity rules, to a workplace and a culture where
>> individual achievement and excellence actually count. No matter what
>> your professors have taught you over the last four years, you are
>> about to learn that diversity is absolutely no replacement for
>> excellence, ability, and individual hard work. From this day on
>> every single time you hear the word "diversity" you can rest assured
>> that there is someone close by who is determined to rob you of every
>> vestige of individuality you possess.
>>
>>
>>
>> We also need to address this thing you seem to have about
>> "rights." We have witnessed an obscene explosion of so-called
>> "rights" in the last few decades, usually emanating from college
>> campuses.
>>
>>
>>
>> You know the mantra: You have the right to a job. The
>> right to a place to live. The right to a living wage. The right to
>> health care. The right to an education. You probably even have your
>> own pet right - the right to a Beemer for instance, or the right to
>> have someone else provide for that child you plan on downloading in a
>> year or so.
>>
>>
>>
>> Forget it. Forget those rights! I'll tell you what your
>> rights are! You have a right to live free, and to the results of 60%
>> -75% of your labor. I'll also tell you have no right to any portion
>> of the life or labor of another.
>>
>>
>>
>> You may, for instance, think that you have a right to
>> health care. After all, Hillary said so, didn't she? But you cannot
>> receive healthcare unless some doctor or health practitioner
>> surrenders some of his time - his life - to you. He may be willing
>> to do this for compensation, but that's his choice. You have no
>> "right" to his time or property. You have no right to his or any
>> other person's life or to any portion thereof.
>>
>>
>>
>> You may also think you have some "right" to a job; a job
>> with a living wage, whatever that is. Do you mean to tell me that
>> you have a right to force your services on another person, and then
>> the right to demand that this person compensate you with their
>> money? Sorry, forget it. I am sure you would scream if some urban
>> outdoorsmen (that would be "homeless person" for those of you who
>> don't want to give these less fortunate people a romantic and
>> adventurous title) came to you and demanded his job and your money.
>>
>>
>>
>> The people who have been telling you about all the rights
>> you have are simply exercising one of theirs - the right to be
>> imbeciles. Their being imbeciles didn't cost anyone else either
>> property or time. It's their right, and they exercise it brilliantly.
>>
>>
>>
>> By the way, did you catch my use of the phrase "less
>> fortunate" a bit ago when I was talking about the urban outdoorsmen?
>> That phrase is a favorite of the Left. Think about it, and you'll
>> understand why.
>>
>>
>>
>> To imply that one person is homeless, destitute, dirty,
>> drunk, spaced out on drugs, unemployable, and generally miserable
>> because he is "less fortunate" is to imply that a successful person -
>> one with a job, a home and a future - is in that position because he
>> or she was "fortunate." The dictionary says that fortunate means
>> "having derived good from an unexpected place." There is nothing
>> unexpected about deriving good from hard work. There is also nothing
>> unexpected about deriving misery from choosing drugs, alcohol, and
>> the street.
>>
>>
>>
>> If the Liberal Left can create the common perception that
>> success and failure are simple matters of "fortune" or "luck," then
>> it is easy to promote and justify their various income redistribution
>> schemes. After all, we are just evening out the odds a little bit.
>> This "success equals luck" idea the liberals like to push is seen
>> everywhere. Former Democratic presidential candidate Richard
>> Gephardt refers to high-achievers as "people who have won life's
>> lottery." He wants you to believe they are making the big bucks
>> because they are lucky. It's not luck, my friends. It's choice.
>>
>>
>>
>> One of the greatest lessons I ever learned was in a book
>> by Og Mandino , entitled "The Greatest Secret in the World." The
>> lesson? Very simple: "Use wisely your power of choice."
>>
>>
>>
>> That bum sitting on a heating grate, smelling like a wharf
>> rat? He's there by choice. He is there because of the sum total of
>> the choices he has made in his life. This truism is absolutely the
>> hardest thing for some people to accept, especially those who
>> consider themselves to be victims of something or other - victims of
>> discrimination, bad luck, the system, capitalism, whatever. After
>> all, nobody really wants to accept the blame for his or her position
>> in life. Not when it is so much easier to point and say, "Look! He
>> did this to me!" than it is to look into a mirror and say, "You S. O.
>> B.! You did this to me!"
>>
>>
>>
>> The key to accepting responsibility for your life is to
>> accept the fact that your choices, every one of them, are leading you
>> inexorably to either success or failure, however you define those terms.
>>
>>
>>
>> Some of the choices are obvious: Whether or not to stay
>> in school Whether or not to get pregnant. Whether or not to hit the
>> bottle. Whether or not to keep this job you hate until you get
>> another better-paying job. Whether or not to save some of your
>> money, or saddle yourself with huge payments for that new car.
>>
>>
>>
>> Some of the choices are seemingly insignificant: Whom to
>> go to the movies with. Whose car to ride home in. Whether to watch
>> the tube tonight, or read a book on investing. But, and you can be
>> sure of this, each choice counts. Each choice is a building block -
>> some large, some small. But each one is a part of the structure of
>> your life. If you make the right choices, or if you make more right
>> choices than wrong ones, something absolutely terrible may happen to
>> you. Something unthinkable. You, my friend, could become one of the
>> hated, the evil, the ugly, the feared, the filthy, the successful,
>> the rich.
>>
>>
>>
>> The rich basically serve two purposes in this country.
>> First, they provide the investments, the investment capital, and the
>> brains for the formation of new businesses. Businesses that hire
>> people. Businesses that send millions of paychecks home each week to
>> the un-rich.
>>
>>
>>
>> Second, the rich are a wonderful object of ridicule,
>> distrust, and hatred. Few things are more valuable to a politician
>> than the envy most Americans feel for the evil rich.
>>
>>
>>
>> Envy is a powerful emotion. Even more powerful than the
>> emotional minefield that surrounded Bill Clinton when he reviewed his
>> last batch of White House interns. Politicians use envy to get votes
>> and power. And they keep that power by promising the envious that the
>> envied will be punished: "The rich will pay their fair share of
>> taxes if I have anything to do with it. The truth is that the top
>> 10% of income earners in this country pays almost 50% of all income
>> taxes collected. I shudder to think what these job producers would
>> be paying if our tax system were any more "fair."
>>
>>
>>
>> You have heard, no doubt, that the rich get richer and the
>> poor get poorer. Interestingly enough, our government's own numbers
>> show that many of the poor actually get richer, and that quite a few
>> of the rich actually get poorer. But for the rich who do actually
>> get richer, and the poor who remain poor ... there's an explanation
>> -- a reason. The rich, you see, keep doing the things that make them
>> rich; while the poor keep doing the things that make them poor.
>>
>>
>>
>> Speaking of the poor, during your adult life you are going
>> to hear an endless string of politicians bemoaning the plight of the
>> poor. So, you need to know that under our government's definition of
>> "poor" you can have a $5 million net worth, a $300,000 home and a new
>> $90,000 Mercedes, all completely paid for. You can also have a maid,
>> cook, and valet, and $ million in your checking account, and you can
>> still be officially defined by our government as "living in
>> poverty." Now there's something you haven't seen on the evening news.
>>
>>
>>
>> How does the government pull this one off? Very simple,
>> really. To determine whether or not some poor soul is "living in
>> poverty," the government measures one thing -- just one thing.
>> Income. It doesn't matter one bit how much you have, how much you
>> own, how many cars you drive or how big they are, whether or not your
>> pool is heated, whether you winter in Aspen and spend the summers in
>> the Bahamas , or how much is in your savings account. It only
>> matters how much income you claim in that particular year. This means
>> that if you take a one-year leave of absence from your high-paying
>> job and decide to live off the money in your savings and checking
>> accounts while you write the next great American novel, the
>> government says you are 'living in poverty."
>>
>>
>>
>> This isn't exactly what you had in mind when you heard
>> these gloomy statistics, is it? Do you need more convincing? Try
>> this. The government's own statistics show that people who are said
>> to be "living in poverty" spend more than $1.50 for each dollar of
>> income they claim. Something is a bit fishy here. Just remember all
>> this the next time Charles Gibson tells you about some hideous new
>> poverty statistics.
>>
>>
>>
>> Why has the government concocted this phony poverty scam?
>> Because the government needs an excuse to row and to expand its
>> social welfare programs, which translates into an expansion of its
>> power. If the government can convince you, in all your compassion,
>> that the number of "poor" is increasing, it will have all the excuse
>> it needs to sway an electorate suffering from the advanced stages of
>> Obsessive-Compulsive Compassion Disorder.
>>
>>
>>
>> I'm about to be stoned by the faculty here. They've
>> already changed their minds about that honorary degree I was going t
>> o get. That's OK, though. I still have my PhD. in Insensitivity from
>> the Neal Boortz Institute for Insensitivity Training. I learned
>> that, in short, sensitivity sucks. It's a trap. Think about it -
>> the truth knows no sensitivity. Life can be insensitive. Wallow too
>> much in sensitivity and you'll be unable to deal with life, or the
>> truth So, get over it.
>>
>>
>>
>> Now, before the dean has me shackled and hauled off, I
>> have a few random thoughts.
>>
>>
>>
>> * You need to register to vote, unless you are on
>> welfare. If you are living off the efforts of others, please do us
>> the favor of sitting down and shutting up until you are on your own
>> again.
>>
>>
>>
>> * When you do vote, your votes for the House and the
>> Senate are more important than your vote for president. The House
>> controls the purse strings, so concentrate your awareness there.
>>
>>
>>
>> * Liars cannot be trusted, even when the liar is the
>> president of the country. If someone can't deal honestly with you,
>> send them packing.
>>
>>
>>
>> * Don't bow to the temptation to use the government as an
>> instrument of plunder. If it is wrong for you to take money from
>> someone else who earned it -- to take their money by force for your
>> own needs -- then it is certainly just as wrong for you to demand
>> that the government step forward and do this dirty work for you.
>>
>>
>>
>> * Don't look in other people's pockets. You have no
>> business there. What they earn is theirs. What you earn is yours
>> Keep it that way. Nobody owes you anything, except to respect your
>> privacy and your rights, and leave you the hell alone.
>>
>>
>>
>> * Speaking of earning, the revered 40-hour workweek is for
>> losers Forty hours should be considered the minimum, not the
>> maximum. You don't see highly successful people clocking out of the
>> office every afternoon at five. The losers are the ones caught up in
>> that afternoon rush hour. The winners drive home in the dark.
>>
>>
>>
>> * Free speech is meant to protect unpopular speech.
>> Popular speech, by definition, needs no protection.
>>
>>
>>
>> * Finally (and aren't you glad to hear that word), as Og
>> Mandino wrote,
>>
>>
>>
>> 1. Proclaim your rarity. Each of you is a rare and unique
>> human being.
>>
>>
>>
>> 2. Use wisely your power of choice.
>>
>>
>>
>> 3. Go the extra mile ... drive home in the dark.
>>
>>
>>
>> Oh, and put off buying a television set as long as you
>> can. Now, if you have any idea at all what's good for you, you will
>> get the hell out of here and never come back.
>>
>>
>>
>> Class dismissed"
