My Grandparents came to Johnson City, NY in the early 1900’s humbled to find a job at the Endicott-Johnson Shoe Corporation.  EJ not only providing them an income, but a home, recreational opportunities, medical care and a close-knit, loving community, built upon around a common bond of hard-work, pride of workmanship and love of family and country.  As founding members of the First Presbyterian Church in Johnson City in 1916, my family’s religious life was just as important and integral to their well-being and the community.  Family baptisms, marriages and funerals all happened in that grey stone sanctuary on the corner of Main Street and Floral Avenue.  Five family generations have occupied the same seats in the same section of the church since then, only today, dozens dwell where hundreds used to worship.

In 1920, the grateful workers of EJ, led by my Grandfather, erected a massive stone arch over Main Street, right along side of our church.  Built to honor George F. Johnson, the founder of EJ and to immortalize a great man, these words are carved in the stone face of the monument, words that captured the sentiment those grateful workers had for their employer:  Home of the Square Deal.

In less than 100 years, the home of the square deal has yielded to the broken deal.

That hard work ethic has been replaced with the entitlement mentality.  Personal responsibility has been traded for self-gratification.  Love of God, patriotism and charity have morphed to love of self, globalism and the massive transfers of wealth from the productive to the useless.  Government throughout New York, from the Governor’s office to the school districts, is completely corrupted and rigged to work only for those on the inside of the deal.  Public sector scandals, arrests, indictments, trials and continued accusations of wrongdoing dominate the news.  Accordingly, New York taxes are the highest in the nation yet the state fails miserably in almost every measurable category of metric as compared with other states.  We spend over $16,000.00 a year to send our kids through schools ranking near the bottom.  Property taxes are the highest in the nation yet our infrastructure is pitiful.

The once glorious Empire State has managed to create in upstate a burgeoning open penal colony simultaneously populated with those walking out of the recently closed mental hospitals, creating zombie-like scenes on the streets as these miscreants wander to and from Wal-Mart in their pajamas and slippers, transfixed on their Obama phones and clutching their EBT cards.

I can’t stand to watch any more.  I drive by my childhood home and see the change and it makes me sick.  The rot and decay is advancing at a pace that I think makes it impossible to reverse.  I’ve tried my damnest to intervene, but no one seems to care.

My daughter lives in Colorado, loves it there and I’m on my way.  I’m sorry to say that after 100 years of trying, this family is giving up on New York.

Class is not a condition of birth in the United States.  The poor and rich can trade places; this is the savory allure of competitive capitalism.  The only true “class” construct in the US is the reality of the political-ruling class.  Once elected, politicians become untethered from accountability, committed to benefiting themselves.  We’re right to be suspicious of “politicians” because the story never changes; ever-higher taxes, over-regulation, intrusion and disruption of our lives.

A common sentiment heard repeated across party lines is the desire to see the country run like a business yet we have never elected such a candidate.  Presidents are hatched from the political class.  Trump offers our first non-political, business background candidate.  Self-financed and with no political experience makes him beholden to no one.  Clinton is owned by her contributors.  Support comes with expectations.  This pay-to-play system uses political power as a blunt instrument, funding winners and thumping all others.

Trump knows from experience that government is best when it is least.  Clinton is a big government liberal.  As former President Reagan said, “Government is not the solution to our problem; government is the problem.”  Mrs. Clinton clearly represents the problem.

Clinton brings a 3rd term of Obama.  Seen by her party as the lady in waiting, Bernie Sanders was sacrificed at her alter.  Inside the party trechery kept the Clinton candidacy alive not her quality as a candidate.

The unknowns of Trump are more encouraging than the givens of Clinton.  Trump sees this quest as his closing chapter, a genuine calling to make America great again.  Clinton has been plotting for this her entire life and that fact makes her motives dubious.

Everything involving Clinton’s public life has been somehow tainted and suspect.  The accumulated storm of accusations can’t all be imagined.  The slickness of Willie has burnished the hubris of Hillary.  In her wake, deception, deceit and doubt have always crept.  Can it be that the best candidate for President is a former Presidents wife?  The Clinton’s are not a dynasty and Hillary’s resume is paper-thin.  We’ve proven that affirmative action does not produce a good President.  Gender can’t invent Clinton’s validity.

It all fails the simply sniff test.

Her messy history leaves too many unanswered questions, too many unbelievable, unimaginable, extraordinary blanks spaces.  Clinton is too glibly slippery to be President.  When her denials end in pleas of ignorance, it demands of us our own stupidity in order to believe.

Trump has completely flummoxed his pundits.  Everyone was wrong about everything they said about him.  He never had a chance, yet Trump is the last man standing amongst 16 others who were all projected to do better.  A survivor under fire.

Think carefully about motives.  Clinton has been plotting and planning this her entire life, yet has no significant accomplishments.  Trump sees this calling as a duty to his country, managing the rehabilitation of our nation’s greatness.  Clinton envisions the presidency as her platform to personal salvation, vain validation at the expense of America.