Ramblings
By Truck
“The dogmas of the quiet past are inadequate to the stormy present. The occasion is piled high with difficulty, and we must rise—with the occasion. As our case is new, so we must think anew, and act anew. We must disenthrall ourselves, and then we shall save our country”.
-Abraham Lincoln 1862 Message to Congress
Remember on November 4th go out a vote; make sure you vote often, and for the right candidates. Every one of us has an opinion and a thought process on whom to vote for, so with that said go out and vote YOUR vote. Remember you can’t bitch if you don’t vote. We need everyone who can make it to the November 20th meeting to attend, not only is it time to vote for your chapters officers, but we need as many people their to discuss where our chapter is headed. We have some new people involved and have quite a few ideas on how to make our chapter stronger and more accusable to our members, but we need your feedback and ideas as well the only way to make things better is to change.
I do have to apologize Pat (Chicago’s Pres) this will be another long article maybe you should not take this newsletter into the bathroom this time, I don’t want you to get another case of the Numb Ass. Big Mike and I did it again, we went to the State Meeting and this time we took another pare of eyes, JC with us, you all can ask him what he thought of his experience at the next meeting. Here are some of the highs and lows from this meeting.
- Next time we have to stop for something to eat before this meeting, Big Mike was trying to put me on an early diet, I think I lost ten ponds before the meeting started.
- I am happy to say we did get somewhere on the budget, looks like we will have a copy do discuss at our next meeting then we will vote on this in December.
- We got to meet and listen to Rod Taylor talk about embezzlement, since last meeting we were trying to decide weather or not to peruse pressing charges agensit a region coordinator for cashing ABATE checks in his name. Rod seems to be able to talk to the “Good Ol Boys”. After all he’s just from a small town in Southern Illinois.
- The E Board elections were also held the E Board is pretty much the same if you know what I mean. 18-24 Legs got elected again.
- The State Secretary got a raise AGAIN this year; I know some of you wish you could get a rise every year. The funny thing was the State Secretary was writing down the names of the Chapter’s that voted NO so I am sure we will feel the effects of this because I was one who voted NO.
- There was quite a debate on State Pac and Fed Pac if you want more info on this subject see Big M, J.C., or me after the next meeting.
- We did have some excitement when an E Board member flipped off a chapter rep after he brought up an issue with the voting by-laws and we had to re-vote for Safety and Ed Coordinator, this was very upsetting I thought we were all there to work together, to tell you the truth I am not getting that warm fuzzy feeling I should be.
- We were informed that South Suburban will be sanctioned by the State for running a full page advertisement for the law offices of Hupy and Abraham. The state voted that the Board Members from that chapter had to be present at the next state meeting so they can answer to the E Board. Now this is a meeting you all should attend if you can. We should stand behind our brothers and sisters of this chapter and support them.
If you all remember we have run the same add as South Suburban so I can only guess that we will be on the chopping block next. I want you all to think about a few things before our next meeting, why would the State organization want to lose 600+ members when we are having a hard time with drawing new members into this organization? Why ban Mike Hupy from advertising at the chapter level when the Sate E Board, Rod Taylor, and most of the chapter reps voted to let the regional coordinator that stole money from ABATE be banned from this organization for only five years, plus after these five years he could join again and hold an office, my God have we gone mad? Mike Hupy has not stolen money from ABATE in fact he is willing to give it to us in donations and paid advertisement in order to help our cause, which by the way we seem to have forgotten that is motorcyclist rights not fighting amongst ourselves. I have to tell you after this last State Meeting I felt like I did not want to belong to an organization whose ELECTED BOARD flips off, talks down to, makes derogatory comments about, and its chapter reps. But that is not going to help change things, it is time to fight back and get things changed we need to stand together not only as a region but as a state, this is the only way we will be able to fight for our rights as motorcyclist and keep our current freedoms. Please remember when I talk about the negative E Board members it is not all but a few that are doing these things, the only problem as we all know it only takes a small number of individuals to ruin it for the rest of us. Maybe B Mike and I are not seeing the whole picture, or maybe we just want our Elected Board members to listen to new ideas and changes that we think our necessary in order to make this origination stronger then ever before, but like everything else we all have an opinion. Sorry Pat I hope you’re able to get off the toilet seat without a numb ass.
“In a word, I would not take any risk of being entangled upon the river, like an ox jumped half over a fence, and liable to be torn by the dogs, front and rear, without a fair chance to gore one way or kick the other”.
-Abraham Lincoln In a letter to Joseph Hooker