The days crawl slowly on one by one And your birthday is past and done I am still thinking on what it means That my baby girl has turned seventeen
Wasn't it only just yesterday That you entered this world's way Laying there like an angel I had seen And now here it is, and you're seventeen
Soon enough, you will reach eighteen I still won't be sure what all this means I'll only know that I love you more than life My wish for you is peace, love, and no strife
As you make your way with words to be spoken I hope for you that your heart won't be broken And know a father's affection is only a token Of the love you deserve to go always unbroken
I remember you looking up at me, and the deal we made Daddy to baby that you'd walk this world unafraid This was the first time for us both, and we'd go easy I took your smiling laugh that you agreed with me
You don't remember - I read to you in your mother's womb And now I watch as you read in the living room Then you write songs that you create and bring And I wait to hear you on stage as you bravely sing
These are some of my thoughts on you turning seventeen Knowing that a dad's love continues and that means Even forever after, once you've reached past eighteen You will remain one of two of my favorite human beings
I've watched as you've grown into the young lady I know All your experiences and struggles only go to show You are one of the best persons I've had a privilege to know It's been my pleasure to watch you as you bloom and grow
Promise me to make the most of what comes your way Making the best of your each and every passing day You have so much to give this world, and I am so proud Filled with more smiles and love than maybe allowed
I remember when you were prematurely born I didn't give a darn what the doctor warned You were going to live and you would thrive I kept you near me night and day to survive
And here you are, my precious daughter, very alive They were wrong, and I watch now as you do thrive And maybe this is where I should end this bit of poetry Knowing that a father's love is for all of eternity
Wherever you go in life, wear your father's love Even as one day I look down from the heavens above I know your life will have a lot of different stages And I long to read each of your future turning pages
Here we are days past you having turned seventeen Blessed by God, loved by me, for all that means As long as I breathe, my promises will be duly kept With all of the love and the tears we both have wept
(c) August 8, 2024 Michael Doyle All Rights Reserved
“And can the liberties of a nation be thought secure when we have removed their only firm basis, a conviction in the minds of the people that these liberties are the gift of God? That they are not to be violated but with his wrath? Indeed I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just: that his justice cannot sleep for ever.” – Thomas Jefferson (1781)
God's grace rewrote my story To be touched by His glory By grace, I will testify About the God that I deify
Greater things have yet to come As we join linked to His kingdom All that good that I can conceive Becomes as possible as I believe
And I stand somehow justified Despite the times, I've self-crucified Seeking to kill all the wrong in me The Lord guided me to new possibilities
In all the efforts that I have tried There is only one path to be justified Through the span of a thousand generations Let our praise be given in veneration
That resonates across the ages It is written across a thousand pages His holy name is above us all Remaining always worthy of recall
And I stand somehow justified Despite the times, I've self-crucified Seeking to kill all the wrong in me The Lord guided me to new possibilities
As the Church, we stand separate and apart Joined as we are to be holy inside our hearts We are wiser than we are close to clever But smart enough to praise His holiness forever
In all the times that my life has crumbled I have somehow been held up as I tumbled Blessed to be healed by the Lord's sacred hand This life has shown me, and I've come to understand
And I stand somehow justified Despite the times, I've self-crucified Seeking to kill all the wrong in me The Lord guided me to new possibilities
(c) August 7, 2024 Michael Doyle All Rights Reserved
“A dependence on the people is, no doubt, the primary control on the government; but experience has taught mankind the necessity of auxiliary precautions.” – James Madison (1788)
“A university’s essential character is that of being a center of free inquiry and criticism – a thing not to be sacrificed for anything else.” – Richard Hofstadter
So then, if this former member of the Communist Party, USA, and highly regarded historian on the Left believed that, why do universities today cave to the Left and not allow conservative intellectuals to speak on Ivy League campuses? It seems like a very questionable practice, doesn’t it?
Everywhere I look, it seems forgot Is it just me, or have we lost the plot I feel it in the murderous laughter The distant thunder is lost but chases after
Society's fracturing psyche is in trauma As wordlessly we watch all the drama Freudian visions shape society's rhapsody Atonal as it is, where then is the melody
Let alone the harmony that lets us feel alive When did the plot of this take its nosedive There in the disturbing architecture is narrative It's just quietly spoken yet still declarative
There is something to fantasy and hallucination Let's keep enough structure to reach a destination Otherwise, we are swimming in the loose impression With nothing to share or bear any real consideration
As one of the audience who no longer cares to play I still demand some sort of end to passing days Doesn't anyone else feel the need for a cohesive whole There is only so far surrealism expresses our souls
This becomes especially true when as we look around Weird has become the summation of most things found The horrors of it all are crouched, waiting to surface And dreamscape logic alone fails humanity in its embrace
The present has become the future in retrospect As our children and their children cry in neglect No longer allowed to hope or to hold onto their dreams Until Debussy's ethereal melodies fill our bursting seams
(c) August 6, 2024 Michael Doyle All Rights Reserved
“We Start With First Principles. The Constitution Creates A Federal Government of Enumerate Powers.” – William Rehnquist, in United States v. Lopez (1995)
Biden’s recent proposals to change the law, specifically the United States Supreme Court, encroach on longstanding legal precedents and traditions. They are radical and dangerous to the stability and predictability of law in the United States. See also Article 1, Section 8 of the US Constitution.
“Stare decisis is the preferred course because it promotes the evenhanded, predictable, and consistent development of legal principles, fosters reliance on judicial decisions, and contributes to the actual and perceived integrity of the judicial process.” – USSC Justice William Rehnquist
This is not some radical notion of law as Biden and his underlings argue in the media.
It is no secret that laws weren't to be numerous Nor were our laws meant to be written as voluminous Every one of our Founding Fathers made that clear When they said as much and asked the nation to adhere
Ordinary Americans work their way through the maze Poring over regulatory law that seems to openly graze On the souls of those who had never casually expected So much of their freedom and liberty to be rejected
All the facts behind the acts of the open human story Reveal the rationale for what law shouldn't be for glory But of the average man in such as way as to lend a hand Never tyrannical in practice or simply by kingly command
Law has exploded and expounded across far too many pages And in doing so has subjected the people to outrages Outrages that while we must take the moments to explore Must be tolerated seldom or not at all for any more
This should be our national goal and living aspiration That we Americans should live for the freedom of the nation That founded our republic all those many years ago Qualitative and quantitative, it is the measure of our soul
It all comes down to measures of perplexing complexity All in regard to matters that required utmost simplicity No law should be more complex than the average understand This isn't only needed but what we must truly demand
(c) August 5, 2024 Michael Doyle All Rights Reserved
Heading out of Australia to escape this Aussie winter. First stop Japan, then UK/Ireland and if work doesn't call me back, onto Chicago. I will make it up as I go along
