Sometimes the knights in shining armor appear as crews’ wearing jeans, overalls and steel toed boots.
It doesn’t take an emergency beacon to activate them, just a need… and they come. Purposefully, without condition, ready to move, activate and respond. They throw the gear bags, kiss the ladies & babies, and head out. The rest is figured out upon arrival.
Superior Construction, came from Jacksonville, Ajax Paving from Fort Myers, Honc from the Cape and trucks with subs from just about everywhere. There’s both a unity and similarity that flows when callouses are clasped and the melding of purpose comes together. Few words are needed, because it’s a task centered outlook, let’s git r’ done – no quit.
I asked Richard to put this together. {Direct Ruble Link} The drone video is from FAI photography. The song is by Lucy Thomas. The message, well, given all of the critics who say America’s best days are behind, perhaps they need to pause a little bit and remind themselves what we are capable of. Enjoy:
.
What has been accomplished in two weeks of 24/7 reconstruction is nothing short of remarkable. Then again, this is the Christian America we know well. The truckers, pullers, spreaders, drivers, welders, machinists, heavy equipment operators, tugboat operators, barge haulers, diggers, pumpers, tradesmen, all of them, just people.
Damn good people at that.
People who represent what makes our nation unique. The invisible, salty, mostly scruffy and beautifully comfortable about it, yet critical network of blue-collar crews that keeps it all operating. God, how I cherish them so.
At the core of our American purpose is a decency and unity. Critics don’t like to talk about it, but American workers are fundamentally good. When something seems impossible, for blue-collar Americans ‘impossible‘ is just another starting point, if you get out of the way. Don’t lose sight of that.
No other nation on earth was ever conceived on the principle of allowing people to manifest their own destiny, while keeping government out of their lives. The vision, the premise and the purpose, was to allow you the freedom to determine your place in life; and even, at any time, change that determination and strike off in an entirely new direction.
Our labor and aspirations would not be pre-determined by caste, tier, creed or social status; but rather by our personal vision for our own future. The right of self-determination.
This election is a time to reflect on the value of work; the great personal benefit of endeavors achieved; the pride in accomplishment -regardless of scale- amid this thing we call life; and all of these considerations have absolutely nothing, not-one-thing, to do with the money we assemble in the process.
What is the current value of a former seed that became a tree nurtured toward its continued maturity over decades? What was that seed worth at the time it was planted? We can only see the value in hindsight many years later. What value lay in the blood at Fort McHenry?
The job, per se’, was simple. Hold the flagpole in place. Keep that representative flag held high, no matter the cost. And yet, that cost, my God THAT COST, could it ever be quantified appropriately? A simple yet consequential task that expressed the fullest measure of devotion to the underlying premise, freedom.
America!
Several years ago, Florida Power and Light won the prestigious international Edward Demming Award for excellence in multi-platform engineering, efficiency, superiority and total quality in the process of energy management.
However, the scruffy rednecks did not blow every PhD intellectual out of the water with slide rules, CAD programs, articulated and quantified quality improvement processes and engineering acumen. They did it with hard hats and dirty fingernails.
Because they lost the award, the jaw-agape Japanese spent 6 months visiting and reviewing FPL and later published a 1,000-page study essentially saying FPL “wasn’t really good, they were just lucky.”
You see, the reviewers couldn’t actually quantify the reason why the Florida-based energy company was so successful. In response the FPL field leadership laughed, took out magic markers and wrote on the back of their hard hats: “WE’RE NOT GOOD, WE’RE RUCKY.”
A few years later, every single Kuwaiti oil field was blown up by Saddam Hussein. Global analysts and think-tanks proclaimed it would take 5 years to cap them all off and restart the Kuwait oil pumping industry. Well, the Kuwaiti’s and Saudi’s called Texans, who had them all capped and back in working order in 6 months.
We are a nation that knows how to get shit done.
A few more years pass, and the Northern Chile mine workers were trapped two miles underground. The eyes of the world began to tear as the word spread. Most began to whisper no one could save them. Who did they call for help? A bunch of hick miners from USA coal country who went down there, worked on the fly, engineered the rescue equipment on site, and saved every one of them.
Yup, that’s our America. Ingenuity born from freedom.
Across the pond a half-breed Islamic whack job, armed with an AK-47 and a goal to meet his virgins, began opening fire on a train in France. The scruffneck Americans on board didn’t run to the nearest safe room and hide themselves amid baguettes and brie. They said, “let’s go”, and beat the stuffing out of that little nut with a death wish.
Legion d’Honneur or not, that’s us. That’s just how we roll.
Lady Liberty can stroll along the Champs-Elysées with a swagger befitting Mae West because without her arrival, they’d be speaking German in the Louvre.
Yet, for the better part of the past decade, a group of intellectual leftists have been teaching our children that it’s better to be sitting around a campfire eating sustainable algae cakes and picking parasites off each other; because ‘save the planet’, or something similarly minded. It would appear, they hate the outcomes and inequities from freedom.
So, we get to today, and right now those who wish to “fundamentally change” our nation are waging a full-frontal assault against our constitutional republic. The bombardment seems overwhelming.
Leftist city and state leaders have abandoned rule of law in favor of supporting a mob effort to destroy our sense of national unity. Political activists, left-wing ideologues under the guise of democrats, and a host of media allies are conducting information warfare on behalf of their objective. Big tech social media companies are attempting to remove the voices of those who are fighting back.
There is a great deal of purposefully driven anxiety and fear amid our nation as this multi-faceted internal war takes place. However, there is a primary element to this effort that each person can shield themselves from, and act to counter. We are, yet again, in Fort McHenry.
Do not let your sense of self succumb to this assault. Do not let them win the battle for your peace of mind.
It might, heck, -check that- it does seem overwhelming at times. But that is the nature of this collectivist strategy. That is the purpose of this bombardment. We must hold strong and push back against their lies and manipulations. If you look closely at their attack, it is weak and much of it is psychological bait. Do not fall into the trap of despair.
When we share the message, “live your best life”, it is not without purpose.
Every moment that we allow the onslaught to deter us from living our dreams, is a moment those who oppose our nation view as us taking a knee. Do not allow this effort to succeed.
You might ask yourself how I can, one person, a flea looking into a furnace, retain an optimistic disposition while all around me seems chaotic and mad.
That’s the point; it ‘seems’ chaotic and mad because it has been created to appear that way. There are more of us than them; they just control the systems that allow us to connect, share messages and recognize the scale of our assembly. We cannot comply our way out of tyranny.
Every second that you live your life with thankfulness for the abundance within it; every moment that we CHOOSE to engage with fellowship; every day that we accept guidance from God – however you define him to be; and every moment we cherish this time to be a beacon of optimism; is a moment that we withstand that barrage and hold the flag in place. It is a genuinely patriotic position not to succumb to the attack.
If you allow yourself to be drawn into crisis and despair, you allow them to win. If your center of normal is based around this overwhelming onslaught, you will eventually concede liberty in favor of peace. Once we stop living in liberty, we no longer have peace.
It is time to hold that flagpole again. To remember the reason the seed was planted. To cherish the tree of liberty.
We must withstand this onslaught, any onslaught, and rally to the origin of our true national spirit. We must rally to a standard of Americanism and accept this is not that. In essence, we must individually take a stand. Purposefully, deliberately and with forethought, we must engage those around us to get rid of this sense of foreboding.
This approach is how we win the larger battle. Again, it seems simple, but keeping that flag standing tall requires the heart of a lion and dirty fingernails.
All around us, in every tribe and region, there are people who need you to show them the strength that you have. Strength of spirit. Strength of fellowship that you will not relent from expressing. Lead your children, your children’s children, and the children of community with an unwavering and steadfast example.
No matter what noise is shouting from the loudspeakers we must withstand it; you must withstand it. We must make eye contact and remain joyful.
We cannot allow despair to be the status quo; and we cannot allow a generation to experience a world without joy.
Our nation needs more people like you, right now. Don’t wait… engage life. Resolve to get optimistic however you need to do it. Then let that part of you shine right now. This is how we fight.
Hold up that flag; give the starter smile. Rally to the standard you create and spread fellowship again. God knows we need it.
When I hear President Donald Trump say, “Let’s Make America Great Again”, I also hear the familiar echo “cowboy up” people.
Git ‘r done.
It’s high time we stop being embarrassed about our exceptional American nature, and start being proud of it again.
Because when it matters most, when it really counts, when it’s really needed, there’s a whole bunch of people all around this world of ours that are mighty happy when swagger walks in to solve their problems.
Yeah, let us recommit to “Make America unapologetically Great Again”.
Swagger on, MAGA. NO QUIT!
Beautiful essay….not just MAGA.
ULTRA MAGA, and proud of it.
Yes, beautiful essay! 😊
Most foreigners know and appreciate the “heart” of the real American culture… that is why they want to come to the USA… that is why now so many foreigners here are recognizing it is time to fight and vote for MAGA, because they don’t want America changed.
Mega MAGA!
That works as well😊
Darned proud of it!
Thanks Sundance!
Tears in my eyes after reading and watching the video. This election may be the most important of this Country’s lifetime, get out and vote.
I most certainly intend to!
That’s beautiful Sundance. You have a gift with words. MAGA. Git ‘r done. Cowboy up. That is truly the heart of America and of most Americans.
Proof of exceptionalism flourishing because of liberty is precisely why the commie dems hate the truckers, pullers, spreaders, drivers, welders, machinists, heavy equipment operators, tugboat operators, barge haulers, diggers, pumpers, tradesmen…all of them.
They put the lie to the victim mentality.
7 Bridges Road
I just saw the original artist Don Felder (founding member of the Eagles) perform this tune with his band a few weeks ago.
Amazing, geter done and do it with oil. That’s the American way.
One of your best, Sundance.
This article juxtaposed with the preceding one, with Elizabeth “you didn’t build that” Warren’s bugged-eyed stare, had to be a little intentional.
Whew – for a second there I thought that Larry The Cable Guy had passed away lol.
It’s wonderful to know that many people in our country still believe in the values they learned from their parents and / or other significant people in their lives. I refuse to believe that America’s best days are behind her – we will be great again 😊 🇺🇸
I believe that our spirit has never been greater, because in these times us MAGA folks are not only not backing down, we are pushing forward stronger than ever…as the saying goes; when the going gets tough, the tough get going !
This same Americaism, the hard hat Get er done, is just one side of the same America attitude that kicked Japan’s and Germany’s ass in WW2. The old movie Strips where Bill Murray’s character is telling his platoon of misfit soldiers
“But we’re AMERICAN soldiers, we’re 10 and one, it’s the American fighting spirit that’s in each one of us” was and is as true today as it was at any time in US history
Salubrious masculinity.
What a blessing.
Masculinity yes, but my guess there some tough womenisculinity in there too..God Bless them all.
“Hear, hear!”
You got me when you mentioned Fort McHenry.
Having visited it, I can no longer hear the Star Spangled Banner without thinking of those who did not let Our Flag fall.
Gosh, my eyes are watering again.
one of my old Pastors used to tell the tale of the British attack on Fort McHenry in 1814 with Francis Scott Key on the prisoner brig…….their attempts to use cannons to take down the Stars and Stripes were met throughout the night by Americans willing to step into the breach and keep it aloft through the bombardment…as morning sun arose there were more than 200 casualties surrounding Old Glory who had been prepared to Git er Done and our flag still waved in the morning breeze
Thank you for the excellent video and essay.
“Cowboy Up!” Might have to share those 2 words far and wide.
Heck of a lot of toxic masculinity on display in that video.. thank God for every one of them!
Indeed!
Talk about fueled
~and gasoline of course.
And yet an cabal of unelected, illegally installed criminals wants to destroy America and everything it stands for. F them.
“Unelected, illegally installed criminals” who haven’t built one damned thing with their soft, manicured hands in their lives, but who, nevertheless, continue to look down upon and sneer at all those who do.
As the mother of a son whose dirty fingernails and scarred hands attest to his membership in the brigade Sundance highlights, I can say there is no bottom to the depth of my contempt I hold for those, to coin a phrase “useless” people.
Sundance, excellent writeup! Thank you for creating it & thank you for sharing. There’s a bunch of us “dirt under the fingernails” folks. United we stand; divided we fail.
MAGA/SA!
There are no finer skilled workers in the World than here in the United States. They might be blue collar, but they are true Golden to me. Thank you all.
AWESOME! Great and necessary message
WE ARE AMERICANS! Be proud of that and if anybody has a problem with that they can kiss my…
Time after time our system of governance proves superior when the rubber meets the road, not so much in the teachers lounge.
ULTRA-MAGA!
Beautiful post! I’ve lived among those “hicks from coal country” for many decades and have always felt blessed to be here, that God brought me here. This post will definitely be sent to my children to be shared with my grandchildren. Thank you.
The video gave me chills and the words gave me courage and resolve. Thank you, Sundance.
Damn nice!
With tears streaming down my face, “Hallelujah, and God Bless the Americans that make this country great daily”. God is good, everyday.. God is good. God Bless you Sundance, you are truly one in a million.
Oh I so needed this today. Was getting a little or maybe a lot caught up in the despair and the fight. Thank you, thank you. Praise God. Like being filled strength and renewal…I am blessed. Blessings.
Most Americans are hardworking, conscientious people who care. God bless them.
I have witnessed the “step up and help” mentality of communities everywhere I have lived (many different states).
It is the administrative state with a stranglehold on the Republic that needs to be exterminated.
The majority of the people within are rock solid.
God bless hem all!
God bless the Workers.
We humbly ask Lord that you restore our beloved country.
So beautifully written…well said! Thank you for posting this for all of us who want to see America Great Again, as she has always been the beacon for the world! God, I believe created America for that purpose to be the beacon of light, of freedom for the world to see!
Great visuals and summary! Men at work! It’s little wonder this is hardly mentioned on national news. The last thing the left wants is people cheering Americans.
There has to be some way for someone who’s talented with this stuff of taking the attitudes and sour hearts of the leftists, and then show them as the Grinch, sitting up in his miserable mountain hideaway, weeping bitter tears because patriots are SINGING!
“A few years later, every single Kuwaiti oil field was blown up by Saddam Hussein. Global analysts and think-tanks proclaimed it would take 5 years to cap them all off and restart the Kuwait oil pumping industry. Well, the Kuwaiti’s and Saudi’s called Texans, who had them all capped and back in working order in 6 months.”
RED ADAIR!!!!! Yes!!!!!!!!!!!!
https://www.asme.org/topics-resources/content/red-adair-to-the-rescue
Excerpt:
From the “Devil’s Cigarette Lighter” in the Sahara Desert in 1962, to the deadly Piper Alpha platform in the North Sea in the 1988, to the intentionally torched oil fields of post-Gulf-War Kuwait, Adair was at every major hotspot. And when Walter Cronkite or Huntley and Brinkley assured the public that Adair was on the scene, victory was a foregone conclusion.
I’ve read everything I ever found re this man from the time I first learned who he was and what he did–decades and decades ago.
He never did anything because it was easy: it did it because it needed to be done.
Me too. Fascinating man.
Paraphrasing Larry Bird “ the more I practice the luckier I get” when told he was just lucky his shots went in the basket. FP&L could say the harder and smarter they worked the luckier they got.
That was a tear jerker. Makes me proud to be an American. ULTRA MAGA ALL DAY….EVERYDAY!
Amidst the gloom, a ray of sunshine illuminating the path home.
Bless you for your uplifting words. When you’re in the foxhole, there’s nothing more you want to hear.
Thank you.
Sundance, as usual: Beautifully stated. I will continue to, as you say “live your best life.” Thank you.
Awesome! Thank you, Sundance!
This kind of rebuilding only happens in certain states like Florida and Texas and a few other states.
The rest of the country holds their hands out and waits for the federal government to come.
Believe it or not, but when the Santa Monica Fwy overpass came down during the Northridge Quake, it got fixed in less than 6 months. Plus the connector road from the SB14 to the SB5, and other such disasters on our SoCal roads. It all got fixed in a hurry!
Meanwhile, when the quake in Loma Prieta hit the Bay Area, they demolished the freeways in San Franciskovich and outsourced the work on the Bay Bridge to China ( hint: it started to rust ten years ago…). And it took them 22 years to fix the 880 in Oakland.
Should I note that the West Seattle Bridge took two years to fix the cracks under it? Two years!
Don’t break down the Country into States, break it down into Counties and even so, take into account that not all Counties are alike. When it comes to freeways, even LA County tells SF and Sacramento to go FO’off.
You have done so much for my wife & I that it was an honor to put that together for you, your family, and your friends.
It made my wife cry. ☺
God bless! ❤
You are the best Richard. Thank you for your friendship.
God Bless Andrew.
As always my friend Thank You Sundance you always seem to know when a pep talk is needed and Lord did I need one now
R.D
I’m speechless Sundance- best ever post – brought me to happy proud tears
How many people even know that a small group of Texas roughnecks saved the lives of untold hundreds of thousands of Muslims by capping those oil wells. If left unchecked those smoke fumes and those billions of droplets of oil spewing from those wells would have spread eastward and contaminated soil and human lungs in Iran. Some of those men died doing that dangerous work.
And upon whom did the media’s eye fall on. A black guy named Rodney King, who was used to spin a fable anout police brutality, which eventually led to riots in LA. What would we do without our intellectual betters?
I read this to my husband and choked up several times. Thank you Sundance to putting into words what is in the hearts of patriots. We will not let they steal our joy of life!
Needed that!!! Thank you!
“We are a nation that knows how to get shit done.”
It’s still true, despite the efforts of those who wish us to be helpless and dependent. Thanks for the reminder. My throat got a lump reading and watching.
Americans have as ancestors those that stepped out on their own and did not follow convention or often the established rules in the societies they came from…….the civilization built on these shores could have been built by no other in the time that it was
ATTITUDE CHECK?…
HOORAH!!!
Sundance, you are a good Morale Officer
We need to use our practical problem solving skills, aka American ingenuity, to confront and outsmart the totalitarian psychopaths who are always lurking in free societies, looking for opportunities to destroy, despoil and dehumanize anything they can’t exploit/control.
Our tolerance of their aggression, and our misplaced awe at their grandiose, esoteric theories, have put us in the chaotic, lawless peril we are living in real time. Surely we have superior resources to call upon to fend off the evil forces that have turned third world countries into totalitarian hell holes.
How many Antifa wusses do you think are on those crews? 🙂
Lol! They can’t even build a shanty town.
They were gonna use some of that antifa stuff to shore up the bridge pilings, but research determined it ain’t reliable for supporting anything useful.
On boy did that make my day!
I’m thrilled for the people of Sanibel and SW Florida, really happy to see the giterdone.
It’s a little bittersweet for me though. Superior was the bane of my existence for 7 long years. They had the contract to widen the main highway in our area, which was to be a two year project that morphed into just shy of 7.
They’re big around here, do a lot of projects. Glad to see they can giterdone if they are motivated to.
Also, again very, very happy they were able to help get this project done in record time. Hopefully every day more and more normalcy will return to the area.
3 weeks since Ian
Maybe DC bureaucrats should just be disolved and save taxpayers money.
Maybe?
many governments and ours in history have used a system called the “spoils” system where the bureaucrats were appointed by the incoming political power brokers and would change with each change of administration….Dimm/commies convinced the GOP this method was too disruptive and political so it was made harder to dismiss bureaucrats and LBJ actually let them organize into unions……now they are fully politicized with 95% of DC bureaucrats donating to the Dimm/commies and their efforts/work is counterproductive to the efforts of the general population and private business……PDJT had just signed an EO making it much easier to dismiss up to 50,000 of them had he legitimately taken office on 20 Jan 2021 but Slo Joe revoked it
Many Thanks as I wipe away the tears ,
I needed this today, you have no idea. Thank you
You took the words from my mouth. This is so inspiring.
GIT ‘R DONE!!
What would take years “up north” is done in weeks by the people of Florida.
SF working on the Bullet Train for 10 years! Estimate 13 years more to finish it and over budget by 5,000% Three years to build a single stall public toilet for $1.7 million .
That is what liberals can accomplish!
The Brightline–well that’s what it’s call lately goes thru my hamlet.
We’ve watched the progress—the workers here are good guys and they do produce.
They aren’t part of the politics.
That being said—this thing is NOT about carrying people—it is about FEC getting some one else to pay for a parallel set of tracks for freight, plain and simple.
For decades we’ve had a commuter train that has multiple daily runs from Miami to WPB and reverse it does not have and has never had enough riders to be on the profit side of the ledger, funding from the counties is all that keeps it running.
Yet they are going to run another right next to it.
On a side note BL has a very bad record for collisions and death, and it’s not even running yet.
LOL…while CA is screwed up (lived there near 50 years) $33 – 110B is NOT anywhere near +5000%
Not that they would have wanted me to but I could kiss every one of those construction workers down there.
… And the drone pilot too!
The drone pilot did a fabulous job. Thank you for bringing that up.