In HinzSight, one of the best friends I never met, I met at Redstate


Rest in Peace

Dave Hinz, who died in an auto accident on his way to work early Friday morning, will be missed.  Steve Foley broke the tragic news at TMR, and the local paper gives us more details on Dave’s life and death.  Below, Gamecock remembers him.   The Directors and Contributors share the grief of our readers at Dave’s loss.  - Dan McLaughlin.

The first time I moved to Atlanta was in 2001 after losing my father, best friend and pastor in South Carolina. Now, three months after moving back, this time from North Carolina after a 30 month absence, I lose one the best friends I never saw.

Dave Hinz and several other close friends I made on-line over the years, beginning at Redstate.com, helped to fill part of the void even though we never met face-to-face. I don’t like to leave the house, you see, unless I just have to.

After yesterday’s tragic loss of my good friend, I never will see Dave in the flesh, but am thankful that I got to know him so well and learned so much from him via telephone, email and the web. God surely sent Hinz my way to help guide the DeVine dinosaur (He always forded me to make technological leaps, as he said, beyond communication via smoke signals through Tweets!) in his new Atlanta, 21st Century life.

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Saving Freedom This Thanksgiving


68 years ago, Americans around the nation settled into a peaceful Thanksgiving weekend and celebrated with their loved ones. A week later, the nation was viciously attacked by Japan – an attack that sparked our involvement in perhaps the greatest of all wars.

This Thanksgiving holiday is different from that weekend. While we should likewise celebrate and give thanks for our innumerable blessings, this time, the American people are staring at an attack on our nation and can stop it. This attack is coming from within. The Obama/Reid/Pelosi healthcare bill – in its various forms - is an assault on the American way of life and an affront to all the generations before us who fought to preserve and protect our cherished freedoms.

Why? Because the bill will eliminate your God-given ability to care for your family according to YOUR wishes and YOUR conscience. It will insert Washington D.C., and the incompetent bureaucrats who live there, into your hospital room, your doctor’s office, your insurance company, your home and ultimately, into your personal health decisions. As analyzed here, the bill is loaded with active-government terms like “shall,” “tax,” and “require.” And, even a cursory review of the text will show how much power this bill gives Washington to interfere with your healthcare (you know, the town that brought you the TARP bailout, Katrina-relief and over $12 Trillion in debt and counting…). Qualifications, panels, reports, studies, mandatory insurance whether you want it or not, penalties, taxes, fees, mandates on coverage but restrictions on prices… and 2079 pages of non-stop assaults on your right to live free and care for your family as you see fit.

Say hello to lines, waiting rooms, priority lists and more expensive, less effective healthcare. Say goodbye to freedom.

That is, unless you act now. It is your job – indeed, it is your duty – to talk to your friends and family this weekend and in the coming weeks. Call them to action. Other than our fine men and women in uniform fighting around the world, there is nothing more important that you can be doing right now to preserve our children’s birthright – heirs to the greatest nation the world has ever known.

Read over the bill. Read summaries. Whatever you need to do. Try the Heritage Foundation’s website, http://fixhealthcarepolicy.com/. Then… pause the football games and take a break from the turkey and cranberry sauce. Talk to friends and family this weekend. Explain it to them.

Then… next week, when the Senate come back in session - call your Senator. Email more friends. Email more family. Then… Call your Senator AGAIN. Don’t stop. Repeat. Then… call Senators on the fence. And, feel free to start with Senators Ben Nelson (R-NE), Blanche Lincoln (D-AR), and Mary Landrieu (D- LA). They represent solidly red states - and need to have their feat held to the fire. The list of Senate office phone numbers can be found here. Shut their phones down. Flood their offices. Visit their offices.

The American people can win this, but only if you take action to stop it. There is one thing that elected representatives fear - and that is YOU, the American people. Celebrate Thanksgiving this year in the American way - by fighting for freedom and working hard to preserve this, the last best earthly hope for mankind.