Seriiously, should we be surprised by this opinion at the Times by Margarent Renkl? It seems there is always some sort of crank doing this yearly, and, by crank, I mean a Democrat. Do you ever see Republicans saying “nah, no more fireworks or burgers or hot dogs”?
Enough With the Fireworks Already
For 15 straight years, our old dog Clark — a hound/shepherd/retriever mix who was born in the woods and loved the outdoors ever after — spent the Fourth of July in our walk-in shower. He seemed to believe a windowless shower in a windowless bathroom offered his best chance of surviving the shrieking terror that was raining down from the night sky outside. (snip through many paragraphs about pets being upset over fireworks)
And those were all companion animals, the ones whose terror is clear to us. We have no real way of knowing how many wild animals suffer because the patterns of their lives are disrupted with no warning every year on a night in early July. People shooting bottle rockets in the backyard might not see the sleeping songbirds, startled from their safe roosts, exploding into a darkness they did not evolve to navigate — crashing into buildings or depleting crucial energy reserves. People firing Roman candles into the sky above the ocean may have no idea that the explosions can cause seabirds to abandon their nest or frighten nesting shorebirds to death.
Then there’s the wildlife driven into roads — deer and foxes, opossums and skunks, coyotes and raccoons. Any nocturnal creature in a blind panic can find itself staring into oncoming headlights, unsure whether the greater danger lies in the road or in the sky or in the neighborhood yards surrounding them.
Appealing to emotion, when, the reality is that Democrats just look for excuses to stop Other People from enjoying Independence Day, because Democrats hate America. And Margaret whines about guns, of course. But, wait, it’s 3pm. What do I usually post at 3pm?
Addressing climate change and biodiversity loss on a planet with eight billion human residents won’t be simple. How to grow affordable food without using petrochemical fertilizers and pesticides that poison pollinators, for example, is a challenge. How to build enough housing for human beings without also disrupting natural ecosystems is a challenge. Such things are doable, though they won’t be easy.
But there are easy things we can do at no real cost to ourselves. We can eat more vegetables and less animal protein. We can cultivate native plants. We can seek out products that aren’t packaged in plastic, spend less time in cars and airplanes, raise the thermostat in the summer and lower it in the winter. As Dr. Kimmerer points out in “The Serviceberry,” her forthcoming book, “We live in a time when every choice matters.”
Somehow we went from “fireworks are scary to animals” to the climate crisis scam. No, totally not a cult, where it has to be dragged into everything.
The conflation of selfishness with patriotism is the thing I have the hardest time accepting about our political era. Maybe we have the right to eat a hamburger or drive the biggest truck on the market or fire off bottle rockets deep into the night on the Fourth of July, but it doesn’t make us good Americans to do such things. How can it possibly be “American” to look at the damage that fireworks can cause — to the atmosphere, to forests, to wildlife, to our own beloved pets, to ourselves — and shrug?
The truly American thing would be to join together to make every change we can reasonably make to alleviate the suffering of our fellow creatures, human and other-than-human alike. The truly American thing would be to plant a victory garden large enough to encompass the entire natural world.
Well, that’s what you believe, Margaret. That’s not what the rest of us think. Mind your own f’ing business.
As we watched the Democrat talking heads melt on television, as we listen to them arguing amongst themselves in newsrooms as well as in political settings all across the fruited plains it’s amusing to say the least.
They’ve been calling us names for eight years now and we’ve been telling them for eight years they’re completely wrong we’re not fascists we’re not blind and we’re not stupid. But they have been so completely take an over by TDS and the rotting brain that it causes they can’t think of anything else. I’ve pointed out more than once here that almost every single comment made by Elwood and H has to include trump whether it’s about him or not. They feel mentally compelled to bring him into the conversation. It’s an illness. And I’ve noticed it with all Democrats that I run across they’re all mentally ill at this point which is why they can’t see this stuff for what it is their entire party is fracturing and their leader is melting in front of their eyes.
Adolf Biden is suffering from dementia. He’s been suffering from dementia since we started talking about it six years ago. And it’s gotten worse and worse and worse. The funny thing is they can’t get rid of them because kameltoe would become president and although she’s not demented she’s a total moron picked because of DEI. This is why you gotta pick people based on their credentials not on whether they check boxes for being queer or black or whatever.
They’re stuck they know it and they’re striking out at everybody. Watch the reaction on television they’re going absolutely nuts. It would be amusing to watch if it weren’t so dangerous in the fact that they hold all the power. And didn’t the Supreme Court just say that whatever Adolf Biden does in his official capacity is legal?. That means he could have us all executed if he wants. He could take all the conservatives he could find, line them up against the wall and kill them. At least according to what I heard from MSNBC this morning but naturally they were talking about trump killing them but trump’s not president adolph biden is so I assume they were just projecting.
L.G., L.G.,
Do you believe the Supreme Court ruling on immunity motivates the Dems and independents to vote for President Biden?
I suspect this is more important than even the ridiculous Trump Abortion Gambit (TAG)!
MAGA has pushed just a little too far. Now more than ever America needs a President who is not Trumpian (i.e., immature, selfish, ignorant, thoughtless, reactionary). This is the only protection we have against authoritarianism.
America and Americans have a clear choice!! I happen to believe they’ll choose wisely and reject MAGAtism/Nazism/fascism!!
“I happen to believe they’ll choose wisely and reject MAGAtism/Nazism/fascism!!”
So you are saying neither the Republicans nor the Democrats will win the election? Because obviously the Democrats represent the Nazism/fascism and the Republicans represent MAGAism.
L.G.B
They are only stuck because they haven’t been given permission yet to start supporting “Plan B”.
It’s Not Harris. She wasn’t selected due to DEI. She was selected because she agreed to be a willing puppet for the shadow government. Hillary would never do that. I suspect that the Democratic party is intentionally keeping “Plan B” a secret until the last possible moment so that Republicans have less time for opposition research and effective campaigning. I don’t believe any of the state minimal deadlines to be on the ballot are important. Democrats have a long history of ignoring rules whenever it suits them and getting away with it.
We the public will know the direction this is going after the Stephanopolous interview. That will be a carefully currated and edited production in front of a loyal party member. If Biden looks bad there, it’s because the Party has decided to ditch him and intended for him to look bad. Within 48 hours, Hairy, Jeff and Z will be all in on it and will finally be mentioning Joe “has done really great things for America but is starting to show his age”.
I personally think the Dems will continue to publicly talk about Biden being “sharp, and all there” right up until they announce his replacement at the Democratic convention.
If Trump is smart, he will find out who Plan B is and publicly announce it, thus making the Democratic Hype machine burst early. Of course, Trump doesn’t have the assistance of the FBI and CIA to spy on the Democrats for him. He will have to depend on whistle-blowers and molested interns to go public.
Obviously my Austrailian Cattle Dog is more of a man than they are.
Fireworks are for pussies.
Real men shoot hundreds of bump-stocked AR-15 rounds into the air on the Fourth. Now that’s patriotism!!
The roar of a 12g 3″ mag semi-auto also makes a deep racket!! So does a 7-mag!!
Shop at Goodwill and no fireworks….we’re saved! What morons…
Clop, the black-and-white spotted dog, is very afraid of thunderstorms, so I would guess that he’d also be afraid of fireworks. But, out here in the sticks, the fireworks shows aren’t visible, though there’s a place across the river and up some which shoots of fireworks.
My neighbors all shoot their own fireworks. Normally 4th of July starts in late June. Fireworks also are used to celebrate Christmas, New Years, Veterans day, Memorial day, Thanksgiving, and any time there is a sale at the fireworks store.
Mochi, the dog, and Alfie are not afraid of fireworks or thunderboomies.
Chloe the Hound, when she wasn’t killing squirrels, rabbits and ‘possums out back, would quake under the table during thunderstorms and fireworks.
The cats, busy killing voles, birds and field mice, didn’t seem to mind loud blasts.
Fireworks injure some 10,000 Americans, cause some 30,000 fires and over $100 million in damages.
You always come up with some crazy unsupported statistic. I think you’re a hysteric by nature. But you do make your comments amusing.
Jake Tapper drops hammer on Chris Coons! Tapper presses Biden campaign co-chair – Video
https://commoncts.blogspot.com/2024/07/jake-tapper-drops-hammer-on-chris-coons.html
I do too. They terrify my hound dawg. Stick with the awesome commercial displays, but don’t set my roof on fire.
Aw, Bite me, Buttercup!
Dogs and other animals have been trained to serve on the front lines of wars for quite some time.
It’s likelier that the excessive trembling is coming from the owners – the animals are picking up on the fear of their closest family members.
No, my aging dog doesn’t like the noise. He is losing both sight and hearing, and sudden loud noises do startle him. But, he also isn’t reduced to a pile of mush, either.