JD Vance named as Trump's vice president

 

J.D. Vance campaign for senate

I've heard the anti-JD Vance political ads using his comments about Trump during the 2016 election. Hey, my comments about Trump during the primaries when I supported Cruz were just the same as his. Trump's accomplishments in 4 years turned me around. Also Glenn Beck was a huge critic as was Dennis Prager--before they saw the results. Read about the Walk Away movement--thousands of Democrats are now awake to Marxism, not woke loving it. Or, look at Biden's accomplishments since January 20. He's turned the U.S. into the nation that runs, the nation that gave up energy independence to return to begging OPEC, the nation that has no borders and wants to reward illegal behavior, and the nation of weak citizens who submit to government mandates about children that aren't necessary. What Biden has "accomplished" in 10 months is frightening, and both parties in Congress have enabled it.

 Vance is the author of the best selling Hillbilly Elegy.  Issues - JD Vance for Senate Inc.   From here on out, you'll probably not be able to believe anything you hear about Vance--either because there are probably 5 other candidates who will only talk trash and because of the Left because he's an American success story and they hate that.

"J.D. Vance’s life was rife with drug abuse, childhood trauma, and self-destruction. For example, his mother was a drug addict, his community was falling apart spiritually and financially, and he had a distant relationship with his father. Although his grandparents were a light in his life, they too were abusive, flawed, and broken people.

Despite his upbringing, J.D. broke the cycle of violence and abuse. He joined the military, settled down, grappled with his trauma, and achieved financial success. As with all remarkable individuals, he overcame the hell he was borne into. Hillbilly Elegy by J.D. Vance | The Five Powerful Lessons I Learned (becomeanindividual.com)"  This review is overly dramatic--read the book.  He was fortunate to have the love of his grandparents and some good mentors along the way.  The military service was a turn around for him.

Also read my blog about Vance from 2017. Collecting My Thoughts: Family support vs. public policy

Catching up with CBS

Listening to CBS News this morning I hear they are still blaming Trump for New Zealand. Big worry about "white supremacists." Nothing about all the Christian churches, Jewish Temples and Islamic Mosques attacked or bombed by Islamists in the past year. Everything is about Trump since 2016--the media just bump, grind and strip on this false narrative, pushing up his poll numbers. There was a big bombing of a Catholic Cathedral in the Philippines on January 29—did you hear about it?  I just noticed it in a social media post yesterday.  Don’t recall prayers for them from our pulpit as we did for New Zealand.  And in early March, it was Christians in Nigeria.

https://www.ctvnews.ca/world/20-dead-111-hurt-in-jan-29-bombing-at-catholic-cathedral-in-philippines-1.4270952?

I rarely watch 60 Minutes (CBS)., but last night saw J.D. Vance (Hillbilly Elegy) of Columbus talking about the lack of venture capital in areas beyond the coast. At first (2016) the liberals loved Vance--talked about him sort like a cute pet--but a quick glance at newer reports I see they are back to hating common sense, believing someone who actually was poor and knows the system, and who used his grandparents' love (changed his name to theirs) and his own determination to pull himself out of poverty. The Left just doesn't like anyone who leaves the government run plantation.

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/venture-capitalist-steve-case-spreading-funding-to-middle-america-with-rise-of-the-rest-60-minutes/?

Family support vs. public policy

JD Vance ponders at the close of his book, "Hillbilly Elegy," whether there is a public policy that can correct/assist/compensate for his disastrous, difficult childhood. Why did he make it from the socioeconomic "hillybilly" bottom rung of the culture to the top--high school, university, Yale, law career, good marriage, high income--when so many don't?

He attributes a great deal of his success to his grandparents (he took their surname as an adult) who were a stable presence, and even his mother with her drug problems, many husbands and revolving door of boyfriends instilled in him the importance of education and learning. His older sister always protected and advised him, several aunts and uncles opened their homes and loved him through the tough spots. Even when he didn't follow them, he had good role models. "I was often surrounded by caring and kind men. . . Remove any of these people from the equation, and I'm probably screwed."

But he also acknowleges the tough, hillbilly, working class culture as giving him and others he knew the strength to work out solutions when the main stream culture and elites were totally foreign to them. For instance, if he hadn't lied for his mother when he was 12, he could have gone into foster care, removing him from all the people who loved him and helped him succeed.

After a successful career in California, Vance has returned to Columbus (he's an OSU graduate) to start a non-profit to address some of the problems like job training, the opioid crisis in Ohio and the crumbling social structures. It is reported his next book is on the decline of community churches.
http://radio.wosu.org/post/hillbilly-elegy-author-jd-vance-back-ohio#stream/0

Hillbilly Elegy, porch reading at Lakeside

JD Vance grew up in Middletown, OH and is the author of Hillbilly Elegy. While stationed in Iraq as a young Marine, he has an epiphany after seeing the delight of a young Iraqi boy over a small eraser.

"For my entire life, I'd harbored resentment at the world. I was mad at my mother and father, mad that I rode the bus to school while other kids caught rides with friends, mad that my clothes didn't come from Abercrombie, mad that my grandfather died, mad that we lived in a sm...all house. That resentment didn't vanish in an instant, but as I stood and surveyed the mass of children of a war-torn nation, their school without running water, and the overjoyed boy, I began to appreciate how lucky I was: born in the greatest country on earth, every modern convenience at my fingertips, supported by two loving hillbillies, and part of a family that, for all its quirks, loved me unconditionally. At that moment, I resolved to be the type of man who would smile when someone gave him an eraser. I haven't quite made it there, but without that day in Iraq, I wouldn't be trying." (p. 173-74)

I've read one review in the New York Times, and heard one review at Women's Club.  Both were condescending, and I think those authors missed the point of the book.

http://collectingmythoughts.blogspot.com/2017/05/book-club-titles-for-2017-2018.html

Book Club titles for 2017-2018

Yesterday our book club (originally formed by a group of young mothers in Clintonville over 30 years ago and I joined in 2000 when I retired) selected titles for the 2017-2018 year. I’m partial to non-fiction, so I’m excited about this list. All will meet at Bethel Rd. Presbyterian except where noted.

September: Hero of the Empire; The Boer War, a Daring Escape, and the Making of Winston Churchill by Candice Millard. This will be at Peggy's

October: Being Mortal; medicine and what matters in the end by Atul Gawande. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VDdtAiTrwt4

November: Immortal life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot

December: Hidden figures by Margot Lee Shetterly, now a movie.  Meets at Carolyn's.

January: Worst hard time The Untold Story of Those Who Survived the Great American Dust Bowl by Timothy Egan

February: Leopard at the door (novel) by Jennifer McVeigh

March: Bad ass librarians of Timbuktu And Their Race to Save the World's Most Precious Manuscripts by Joshua Hammer

April: Hillbilly Elegy; A Memoir of a Family and Culture in Crisis by J. D. Vance (he now lives in Columbus)

May: Cod a biography of the fish that changed the world by Mark Kurlansky. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xAmVU2WL7bY He wrote a book about Salt, and if it’s anywhere near as good, I’m looking forward to this one.