About six months ago, in my interminable search for a CD burner for my planned Belch Dimension compilation project, I asked one of my old friends and Herald coworkers Mark Berky for assistance.

Berky, as my readers well know, was the man who got me my start as a Herald columnist. Since he currently holds the post of archivist in the AS(S)U library and it's good to have someone on the inside, I thought perhaps I could count on him for assistance. Below is the sightly-excerpted text of his e-mail response, dated Mar 30, 2009:

Quite frankly, this is nasty, disrespectful, and huirtful. It misreperesents, insults, and threatens me at every turn. If this is how Herald advisor Bonnie Thrasher encourages staffers to treat people they don't agree with, perhaps it's time to reexamine its publishing licence. She forgets that the newspaper exists to serve the A(S)U community--not her--and that includes all students, present and former. Further, if this is how AS(S)U teaches its faculty to treat its alumni, it's little wonder they're hemhorraging money. Any University employee who is this rude to an alumni's request for help should perhaps have his contract reexamined as well.

But I'm not here to pick Berky apart (specifically)... rather, I want to use this to illustrate the hypocricy of the left's drive for wealt redistriution. (P)resident Barack Obama calls for "redistributive change" in America...a war horse he's been riding since his days as an obscure U.S. Senator seven or eight years ago. He claims those who don't wish to pay hire taxes are "selfish" and asks that Americans "sacrifice". He famously told Joe "The Plumber" Wurzelbacher last November "I think when you spread the wealth around, it's good for everybody."

What Obama--and all liberals--means is that we cheerfully give up everyhing that makes us happy and prosperous. They want us to rip out our souls and hand them right over to the American government.

But try asking a liberal to surrender his goodies for the sake of this noble notion of "sharing the wealth", and they immediately turn into retarded three-year-olds at the toy shelf. "No! How dare you! Them's our perks! D-uh! You not good enough to haves that! I's not gives you nothin!" I notice that the left doesn't seem to be giving up anything. In the midst of 9.8% unemployment nationwide, Michelle Obama takes sumptuous vacations with her husband in private jets which presumably leave all sorts of carbon footprints, wears expensive tailored suits, and takes a limosine a block to buy fresh kale at an organic market. Most people don't drive fancy cars to the market to buy kale. Hell, I wager most people don't even know what kale is.

Obama talks a good game on equality--but he can't fathom that everybody isn't the same.We all have different talents, work ethics, and pocketbooks. The only way to really make everyone equal is to grab from everybody's hands so no one has any more than anyone else. In other words, make everybody equally poor, miserable, and essentially reduce us all to a bunch of animals fighting for a handful of scraps.

Liberals talk an equally good game on charity, but it's well proven that Republicans give more charitable donations anually than Democrats. Former veep Al Gore's charitable offerings are downright pitiful. Vice-President Joe Biden is litle better, he has has been shown to give a mere $300 or so annually on average to the needy. Barry and Michelle gave about 5% percent of their yearly income--barely half the Biblical tenth--while Sen. John McCain gave nearly 30%. Bill Clinton once gave away some old skidmarked underwear to the Salvation Army so he could declare it on his taxes. And Sen. John and Mrs. "Ketchup Queen" Kerry? Goose eggs for 1991 and 1995 (though he did manage to cough up just under four Gs for charity in '03, or about 11% of his Senate salary--though not a penny of the vast store of Heinz moolah). So...total disconnect here? Yes.

Why? Simple. Though it's well-know liberals hate the rich, they don't really like the poor either. The so-called Party of the people can't go about giving its own money to the needy, because then they would no longer be needy--hence, they would no longer be dependent on the Party for its happiness, thus, liberalism would become obsolete. Helping poor people would be tantamount to the left cutting its own throat. So they give people just enough to keep them alive, no more, while at the same time killing their drive to succeed on their own, creating a nation of entitlement and victims--all under the guise of "compassion". There's the dirty little secret of social(ist) welfare programs for you.

Reconstituting wealth is a game akin to running a fan in a stuffy room, or a small child pushing his hated peas about on his plate to make it look as if he's eaten them--all you get is the same stale dead air recirculated, and a bunch of unappetizing mush on the plate. A liberal would never even consider giving a dollar of his own money to anyone; rather, they want to push your money into the pockets of those they arbitrarily feel is more deserving than you are. They work to kill American initiative, discourage small business and private ownership through punitive tax codes, and impose government control over manufacturing giants like GM.

As for Berky, like any good little rank-and-file liberal he fails to get it. It isn't just about the CD burner. If it was I'd have simply bought one and been done with it. I would like to visit ASU again, see some of the changes, and touch base with my literary roots. I care about those students. I write of, for, and about them. If I had had someone like me writing honestly about AS(S)U issues, I might be better off today. I wouldn't have made many of the mistakes I did, if someone was there to warn me of the many pitfalls of demanding college careers and illusitory relationships. I'd certianly be much more physically and emotionally happier now. I want to sit down and talk to these kids. I want to listen to their struggles, share stories, and see what I can do to help them through the same pitfalls that once tripped me up. College is a woefully understudied part of a young person's life--it's as if parents plunk their teens down in the ivy jungle for 2-4 years and are completely ignorant of what wild things really go on in there. I want to be the one to expose the largely misunderstood world of sexual debauchery, socialism, entitlements, free no-questioned-asked sex, and rampant drug and alcohol abuse to students and parents. I would like to live in or near the Sodom of the South in order to gather material for my books and to better get a handle on the problems faced by the student community ...but as long as Thrasher, Lee, and that useful idiot Berky remain fixtures at AS(S)U they will continue to be roadblocks to my dream. I have now lost all respect for this man. He may not lose any sleep over that, sure, but if his bosses get a look at this blog entry and see how bad his attittude makes them look, I wonder just what he will end up losing...?

Next week: the truth about Obama's vision for America and just why I hate change so much. Till then, adios.