Next week we go to the polls…..and if you’re like me then you likely feel that this election is bigger than just any other election…..it is….it has the sense of being huge…..it has the feeling of being a gamechanger or a game loser….I’m told that Coach Bear Bryant had a saying that “in every game there is one play that can swing the momentum in the other direction but you have to grab that play and move the momentum forward”……this election is a swing play…..because the existential threat to all that we as freedom loving Americans hold dear is real ……it is the fight going on within our own culture.

Like many conservatives across the nation I feel as though I’ve gone through Alice’s looking glass lately. Conservatives are told now that what we have always believed is right is now wrong and that basic discourse is not allowed. Dissenting opinions are considered somehow fringe – …..The President of the United States just branded anyone who disagrees with him as “garbage”…..the left says that little ol’ me and anyone else who dares to think or vote like me is a threat to democracy itself…… I fought for democracy!

Government leaders at all levels have browbeaten citizens over the past four years…..they have pushed agendas and ruined lives…..crushing businesses by declaring the winners and losers of society during the pandemic…..declaring some businesses nonessential, shuttering society, keeping loved ones from visiting dying relatives in hospitals, and then using federal relief dollars to largely fund more more government …...

“Big Tech”, protected by sanctuary laws written to protect them, is in full survival mode now knowing that they must cancel opposition in order to maintain their status quo….I don’t know what would have happened to public discourse if Elon Musk had not spent billions to buy Twitter…..

To add to the Mad Hatter’s tea party there is actual government action being taken to legitimize the misguided notion that a boy can be a girl, and that defining a woman scientifically is impossible.

Liberals across the nation have generated legitimate concern that given the opportunity they will do all that they can to water down our Supreme Court, degrade the efficiency and accuracy of voting, and label everything as “infrastructure” so they can spend our grandchildren’s money…… Four years ago these concerns would seem far-fetched….. But then, four years ago Georgia was a red state, elections were sacred, borders were secure, and riots were not allowed….think how much has been done to diminish our country in just four years…..

It is not a question of accepting a differing viewpoint. Politics is always cyclical – what goes around comes around they say. I have often debated the issues and at times I did not feel as though I was prevailing but I learned to keep working, continue with life, and just fuss at political differences. This is not that. This feels different.

For conservatives, what are experiencing today feels like a crushing attempt to literally change our way of life. Forever.

But there are times when the left pushes too far….good people who would normally be content to be quiet, to live quietly, to work quietly….can bow up and get loud when all that they love and hold dear is being threatened…..

Have you ever seen or experienced one of those moments when someone is just pushed a little too far…..like the ones doing the pushing couldn’t grasp the fact that there might be a limit to the amount of pushing they could get away with……and then suddenly the person getting pushed has just had enough and they become the worst nightmare of the pushers…….well, you can just push someone so far before suddenly the pushee becomes the pusher……

Case in point….anyone who knows my sweet wife Charlene will know what an amazingly gentle spirit she has…..she has the gifts of mercy and of helping others…..she is the one that is often called upon to help other people make things special for parties, events, weddings and the like….but she can even take the most normal days and make them special…..there are always fresh flowers in our house, there are always special things for the kids and grandkids….there’s a very good reason that her grandparent name is actually “Sweetie”…..no kidding, the grandkids call her Sweetie, and it’s a perfect fit…..

But don’t be fooled by the sweet appearance… push too far, especially when it comes to her family, and you will have awakened a sleeping dragon”…….

In our family, like all of you I’m sure…..we have stories and inside jokes…..there are plenty of stories about me, or the kids, but one of my favorite stories of all time is one that I will just call “Sweetie and the Sergeant Major”……

Here's the deal……I left home for Army Ranger School in the winter of 1991….I was a Platoon Leader in a Long Range Surveillance Company……I got to Ranger School and for various reasons apparently my orders got jacked up……I was in the Mountain Phase in north Georgia when I learned that my pay had stopped….my orders were messed up and we hadn’t been paid….well, that’s a big deal….her living at home by herself with a 2 year old and no way to pay the bills (that’s push #1)…. the unit was absolutely no help whatsoever which is a story in itself…..They actually told her to call State Headquarters (that’s push #2)…..when she did she got Sergeant Major O’Kelly, a man with no fondness for soldiers who go to special schools like Ranger and Airborne. He proceeded to tell her he felt no need to address the issue and wondered aloud why I should have been “allowed” to go to such an expensive military school (that was the last push)……Hell hath not the fury of a Sweetie scorned…..she called back after SGM O’Kelly had abruptly ended the call and demanded to talk to his boss, Brigadier General MacLaughlin if memory serves….I was a Lieutenant! And my wife just got mad and called the General!.....but the General was an old paratrooper who loved our unit and he got on the phone with her right away, he listened, and then he said, “Mrs. Williams. We’re going to get this fixed right away. You just sit tight and I will get right on it.” He wished her well and said he looked forward to me graduating Ranger School…..it wasn’t five minutes later that Sweetie got a call from the Sergeant Major….his tone had changed like only the butt-chewing of an angry General can bring about…..”Mrs. Williams” he said, “I’m sorry about that last call. We’re going to get that pay issue resolved today and make sure it gets to you asap. Again, I’m very sorry.”…..I would like to believe that the General was standing over him while he called……My son is a Major, I’m a Colonel, but neither one of us has a better story about squaring someone away than Sweetie does……Charlene had really been pushed just too far, and she came back with a passion and got something done about it……

Here's my point……the progressive counter-culture is pushing and pushing and pushing…..its as if they have no measure of the fact that there is a vast swath of America that has been pushed just about to their limits…..well, then they can easily find themselves on the opposite end of the pushing when good natured folks decide they’ve been pushed just too far…….I’m here to say that some good quiet folks need to find their spine…..and let it be known that they’ve been pushed far enough……

This next week at the polls….that’s our swing play…..We have got to capture the momentum…..and the only way to do that is for good, solid, salt of the earth, well-meaning and often unassuming folks to go from being the pushee to the pusher……we’ve got to go full-on Sweetie against the Sergeant Major mode…..

That’s what its going to take to retake our country

And that’s a wrap for the Rightside Way!