The Declaration of Independence | The Direction of Intention

Saddle Soap And Lavender [David’s blog on KS Friday]

Posted on April 10, 2026 by davidrobinsoncreative

Tom told stories of the phone his family had when he was a child. It was the kind with a crank. It required an operator, an actual person, to connect callers. It was a party line, meaning the single line was shared with multiple households. When I was a child, we were tethered to the phone by a cord. The phone was connected to the wall. It was possible to lift the extension – the other phone – and listen in. One line into the house with multiple phones sharing the line. And now we walk the world with our phones. They come with us everywhere we go. No sharing necessary. Considering how long it took humans to invent the wheel, the pace of change in our lifetime is breathtaking.

Tom also told me a story that is particularly poignant given our current state-of-the-union. When he was very young, an ancient woman would visit the ranch on Sundays. She had a driver and would remain in the back seat of her car. Tom’s mother would join her and they would chat for an hour. One Sunday the old woman opened the car door and asked Tom to join them. He was small and climbed onto her lap. She looked into his eyes and said, “I want to remember what I am about to tell you. When you are older it will matter. You are sitting in the lap of someone who sat in the lap of Abraham Lincoln.” She added, “He smelled of saddle soap and lavender.”

Skip a stone across time. My mentor told me a story about sitting in the lap of an woman who, as a child, sat in the lap of one of the most revered presidents in our history. I am merely three generations from that man and the republican party that he helped to create. A party formed to fight a war to end slavery, a party that believed in the promise of the Declaration of Independence, “dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.” Their corruption and collapse has been sickening.

Take a moment and read The Declaration of Independence. Pay particular note to the list of grievances against the king. They read like a current list of abuses by the wannabe authoritarian who now sits behind and soils the resolute desk. “A Prince, whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people”.

The man who smelled of saddle soap and lavender would not tolerate this tyrant. He would not sit in the same room with the men and women, the descendants of his republican party, who currently soil the of government, “of the people, by the people, for the people”. They are enablers of the same racist rot in our nation that Abraham Lincoln gave his life to defeat.

“It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us-that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion-that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain-that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom-and that government of the people, by the people, for the people shall not perish from the earth.” ~ Abraham Lincoln, The Gettysburg Address

His words are not antiques. They are not out of style. They are as relevant today as the day he spoke them.

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read Kerri’s blogpost about THE PHONE

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Filed under: KS Friday, Perspective | Tagged: Abraham Lincoln, artistry, corruption, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, democracy, equality, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, racism, republican, story, studio melange, The Declaration of Independence, The Gettysburg Address, the melange | 1 Comment »

“Too Bad, So Sad.” [David’s blog on saturday morning smack-dab]

Posted on July 5, 2025 by davidrobinsoncreative

It turns out that the thing that makes capitalism viable is the same thing that makes a democracy healthy: a strong middle class. A stable consumer base is the essential ingredient for social cohesion and constructive civic engagement. It’s Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs: when people are secure in their basic needs they turn their attention to meeting the needs of the community – things like equal rights, education and affordable healthcare; they ask, “What is my purpose?” and “How can I help make the world a better place?”

I’ve long believed that the greatest challenge to our democracy is that one of our political parties – the republicans – simply do not believe in it. The Reagan revolution might as easily be called The Great Erosion of the Middle Class. In the past forty years 50 trillion dollars have moved into the pockets of the top 1%. What was branded as trickle down economics has proven to be – just as economists foretold – pick-pocket economics. If we’ve ever needed proof of the republican’s repudiation of democracy we see it manifest in their Mega-Murder-Bill.

Democracies need a strong middle class. Authoritarian states need to keep their populace poor. They need to eliminate the middle class. That, too, is Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs: when people are trapped in survival-mode, insecure and daily struggling for their basic needs, they cannot focus on making the world a better, safer place. They ask, “How am I going to live another day?” Poverty is an authoritarian’s greatest tool for maintaining their grip on power.

In my lifetime I’ve seen firefighters run into The Twin Towers, an indelible act of courage. Now, I’ve seen an entire political party tuck their tails and vote to rob their constituents to enrich the top 1%* – an extraordinary act of cowardice. A permanent stain. It’s as if the NYC firefighters on September 11 had walked away from the burning buildings, saying, “Too bad, so sad,” and patted each other on the back for a job well done.

Cowardice. Unless, of course, their actual aim is authoritarianism. Then, the systematic decimation of the middle class and callous assault on the social safety net makes perfect sense. It is the ultimate fulfillment of the republican revolution against democracy.**

*They passed their Mega-Murder-Bill. This egregious betrayal of their constituents will most certainly haunt them in the next election. The threat of being “primaried” if they voted against the bill presented, at best, a conundrum, since both paths lead to the loss of their seat. The only possible way that their choice of constituent-betrayal makes sense is if they believe that they will never have to run in another election: in the face of such extreme cowardice, the suspension of free and fair elections cannot be far behind.

**To be fair, they might actually believe in democracy – but just not for everyone. When they read, “All men are created equal” they very likely understand that ideal to only include wealthy white men who claim to be Christian while ignoring all of its precepts. No matter, a wealthy ruling class rigging the system and exploiting the labor that makes their bloated-money-hoard possible is authoritarianism regardless of the label they paste on their back-slapping boy’s club.

read Kerri’s blogpost about COWARDICE

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Two Idioms [David’s blog on Merely A Thought Monday]

Posted on January 20, 2025 by davidrobinsoncreative

“A Prince whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.” ~ The Declaration of Independence of The United States of America, Congress, July 4, 1776

Today in the Rotunda, the symbolic center of our nation’s capitol, we bear witness to our nation willingly and publicly soiling itself. Our founding documents rendered little more than toilet tissue by a career-criminal swearing an oath to the Constitution that he has no intention of keeping. The oath administered by a Supreme Court judge who violated his oath to the Constitution by ruling the tyrant was immune from justice and, therefore, a king.

The tyrant did not arrive to the dais unassisted. A corrupted justice system, the complete moral collapse of the once grand old party, a gullible and/or apathetic* citizenry unwilling or incapable of discerning fact from fox-fantasy.

As we soil ourselves, we soil the world.

“Every man for himself!” is an idiom used in two distinct circumstances: 1) the moment when the ship is going down and no hope remains, and 2) when the rot of self-interest corrupts the heart of a community. “Every man for himself!” is the battle cry of giddy robber-barons plundering the public. Today, with the elevation of the tyrant, with the election of the oligarchy, we bear witness to both uses of the idiom. The ship of public service founders in a hog trough of personal gain.

It is no small irony that today we also celebrate Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., champion of The Civil Rights Movement, the voice of the nation’s conscience, protesting the racial discrimination written into our laws. An eloquent moral compass. A man with a dream guided by another idiom, “I am my brother’s and sister’s keeper.”

The line of division in our nation is now crystal clear, made symbolic by the two idioms colliding on our public calendar. Today there is no middle ground; we necessarily choose sides.

I believe more of us identify with, follow and uphold the example set by MLK. Today we can choose to celebrate the best of us. Today we can choose to be keepers of the dream.

Or, we can choose to applaud the worst of us. The man is unfit. He knows it. We the people know it. We need not resign ourselves to jump aboard an already stinking ship of thieves declaring loyalty to a character-less man with no greater vision than that of public plunder. Every man for himself. The idiomatic killer of the dream.

Today we can choose to be our brother’s and sister’s keeper. We. The People. Keepers of the dream.

Our sacred documents were written to prevent this moment of public debasement. It is astonishing on this day to see our founding documents, our highest ideals, so easily and with great ceremony flushed by the very people sworn to protect them.

*Approximately 90 million eligible voters did not vote in 2024, 36% of the electorate simply did not show up. Since DJT won the election with 77 million votes, slightly less than 50% of votes cast, he ascends the dais with less than 32% of the electorate. Less people voted for the despot than those who couldn’t be bothered to vote and stayed home. A sad and cautionary tale.

read Kerri’s blogpost about WE THE PEOPLE