Peace. We all seek peace. In our lives. In our families. Among our friends and neighbors. In our country, and in the world.
But we may ask ourselves, “Is peace even attainable?” And, “Is there anything I can do to bring peace into my life and into the world?”
Deep down we know that peace begins with us, and that if we can find the peace that lives deep inside, we can share it with others. If we can heal ourselves of feelings like anger, fear, and restlessness, we will be able to achieve freedom in our lives.
Freedom is peace, and peace is freedom.
Let us work on ourselves in the new year, so that we can work together with others to find peace in our homes, our neighborhoods, our cities, our country, and on our beautiful planet. It is worth all the effort we can give.
“Peace on Earth” is more than words we speak during the holidays. It is the reason for which we were born. It can only be realized if we believe in peace and do our part to make it real.
Gale McNeeley
Santa Maria
This article appears in 2025 Year in Review.
So says says another self-satisfied white liberal. “Peace” is a concept only attainable when the majority of people’s needs are met, I’d encourage you to reexamine Maslow’s hierarchy of needs.
Try creating “peace” when you can barely pay the rent, have no assets, your family is starving, you may have lost your job, don’t have a college degree, and every day you wake up the dollar buys less and less as you look around and see people like you, who did nothing other than get born at the close of WWII and were the recipient of the Post War Boom, sit there and write letters to the editor judging others who have more pressing priorities than “peace.” This isn’t 1968. Your generation created the conditions for all the chaos and strife we now see. Wonder why Trump was reelected? Because your liberal party is a joke and not only sent our jobs overseas, but called anyone who questioned doing so members of a “basket of deplorables. ” Want “peace?” Pay for it, put your money where your mouth is.
Yep, Mr. Fly subscribes to the adage, “us against them.” His enemies are old people and anyone who is not white like him (and somehow entitled to something he didn’t earn). He loves Donald Trump for his simple minded philosophy that America will be great again once it gets rid of all the immigrants and others who Mr. Fly feels have somehow stolen his opportunity in life. He appears to be a poor fisherman who can barely feed his family (a possible Hemingway novel), but we all know he’s probably living in his parent’s basement because he really doesn’t like to work—see the thousands of posts from Mr. Fly from all hours of the day—he is quite prolific with his doom and gloom scenario of an America that really doesn’t exist, though he does have moments of clarity, like many insane and bipolar individuals. My guess is that when he’s not providing comments to New Times he’s playing a video game where he blows stuff up and kills zombies.
Yes, it’s true, I do work. I have two jobs and both of them comport with providing state mandated lunch and breaks (“all hours of the day”) which I use to the fullest to submit the very commentary you resent on these pages.
I’m in my mid 50s and both my parents are dead. I wish I lived in their basement, instead, I’m forced to pay overpriced rent.
As for playing video games, the only one in my household who does so is my 20yo stepson. I don’t even bother him about doing so and actually encourage him to. Why not? After all, like most young Americans, there’s nothing to look forward to out the front door. What awaits is underemployment, unemployment, low wages, high taxes, drugs, violence, hollowed out public institutions, and gender norms that are almost impossible to perform without a good income. I’m quite happy to barely ever see him because of his hours of video game playing. He is in his 3rd semester of college, and as a Muslim from Asia, very respectful and driven. If only more Americans were like him.
Yes, I’m very happy that the freeways have opened up, parking is easier to obtain, the cartels are being driven out of California, and rents are dropping slightly, all due to Donald J. TRUMP. Is he omnipotent? Absolutely not. At least his team has eliminated DEI nonsense.
Our economy is collapsing no matter which party is in office, the nation is in a debt spiral. Do you know what that is?
Well, it’s 548am, I have to get ready for one of my two jobs. See you on break….
Addendum:
My wife and stepson both have green cards, which I was able to provide for them by doing all the paperwork myself. Im quite proud of that and never had to hire a lawyer.
I met my wife surfing overseas in 2003, they are both brown and Muslim. Does that make me a liberal and sympathetic to illegal immigration? Absolutely not, in fact, considering the cost and work involved in getting them green cards, I’m more convinced of the need for a strong border and highly regulated system of induction. My wife is shocked, as well as many of the legal immigrants we know, of how normalized illegal immigration has been in the US. They don’t understand it, in their country, illegals are turned around on the high seas in the boats they use to try and arrive illegally on.
1.7 million dead Ukrainian soldiers.
250,000 deserters.
Millions of Ukrainians fled the country.
Grabbing and kidnapping young men in the streets and throwing them in vans to be sent to the front lines to die.
A Ukrainian, corrupt dictator in office who froze elections, closed the opposition press, and outlawed the Russian language.
NATO did this and the American defense contractors who made BILLIONS selling weapons.
The U.S. just kidnapped a president in Venezuela and conducts acts of piracy on the high seas stealing oil to put in our strategic reserves.
This desperation and shows just how scary our economy is. It’s completely hollowed out.
AI is being shown as nothing more than intelligent chat bots. Circular financing.