What am I thankful for as I sit down to write this column a day before Thanksgiving? The same things most of you are probably thankful for - family, health, central air and heat, indoor plumbing... my iPhone. I love all of those things but I don’t want to write about any of those things. It’s overdone. My family knows how much I love them, as does my iPhone.

A few weeks ago, I was visiting with family in northeastern Tennessee. Out to dinner with my brother and his wife, we were joined by their 7-year-old granddaughter, Annie.

The perceived necessity of a Manhattan Declaration would have jarred the Pilgrims from prayerful contemplation of game birds and the like at harvest festival time, 1621. What — religious liberty so uncertain a thing as to warrant, five centuries later, a 4,700-word document justifying Christian defense of Christian principles?

No one will really understand politics until they understand that politicians are not trying to solve our problems. They are trying to solve their own problems — of which getting elected and re-elected are number one and number two. Whatever is number three is far behind.

I’m sure I would like Sarah Palin if I got the chance to meet her. We share many things in common. She is still married to her first spouse, as am I. She has a Down syndrome son. I have a brother with Down syndrome. We share the same faith and we both like the outdoors. She is conservative on economic and social issues, and so am I.

How many things in our lives would we like to depend upon the generosity and selflessness of our fellow man, and do you think we would like the outcome?

Many years ago I earned an A in my college macro-economics course, thereby proving the hypothesis there is no relation whatever between a report card and mastery of a subject. I still remember how much my head hurt every time I took a seat in that classroom and when I studied hard for exams. An economist I am not.

Mayoral candidate Cyndi Plunkett mailed her third campaign postcard. For the third time, she does not include a single word about any accomplishments or her voting record of the last four years. Anyone who attended the council meetings or kept up with the local news knows why.

Not all revolutions begin in the streets with tanks and guns. Some advance slowly, almost imperceptibly, until a nation is transformed and the public realizes too late that their freedoms are gone.

Thanksgiving is a time to come together and celebrate a family’s beloved characters, the ones who give us many stories to declare and laughter to share.

Home schooling has its merits, but a lack of intrusions is not one of them. Big grown-up Isaac is going to a Christian school in Loudon County, Va., and Jean sorely misses his help with the little boys. He’s playing football and seems very happy with the way his life is going.

Presnell Wood tells about a boy growing up in a simple cottage nestled on the side of a mountain. His family was poor, but they enjoyed a millionaire’s view of a wooded valley.

Well it’s happened again. The Wife has left me. For those who are regular readers of this column, the news may come as a surprise. Others may be wondering why it has taken so long for her to come to her senses.

What does Santa Claus look like? He may just look like a United States Marine. In 1947, according to the national Toys for Tots website, when Major Bill Hendricks, USMCR, and a group of Marine Reservists in Los Angeles collected and distributed 5,000 toys to needy children, Toys for Tots was born. The idea came from Bill’s wife, Diane.

In the string of amazing decisions made during the first year of the Obama administration, nothing seems more like sheer insanity than the decision to try foreign terrorists, who have committed acts of war against the United States, in federal court, as if they were American citizens accused of crimes.

At Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s Oct. 29 press conference, a CNS News reporter asked, “Madam Speaker, where specifically does the Constitution grant Congress the authority to enact an individual health insurance mandate?”

Joseph Stubbs, president of the American College of Physicians — the second largest doctors’ group in the country — confirms that “the supply of doctors just won’t be there” for the 30 million new patients Barack Obama wants to cover.

We have a problem. This could be “the big one” — bigger than coping with the Ahmadinejads, Kims, and Chavezes of the world and bigger than our current economic woes. Our republic, our society, may be heading for a crackup. We are bankrupt, both financially and politically.

Big bank predatory lending practices that played a major part in causing the current financial crisis have been widely publicized.

Art Linkletter coined the phrase, “Kids say the darndest things.” To borrow from Mr. Linkletter, politicians also say the darndest things.

In Belfast, in the stunningly gorgeous building dedicated by Prince Edward in 1932 (he who abdicated), where the Northern Ireland Assembly convenes, I learned why I can never be president of the United States.

Our world prizes perfection and we come to expect it. We expect it of others, and we expect it of ourselves. We strive for it and fall short and that often gets us demoralized, making us think that we’re somehow inadequate. We’re all too aware of our shortcomings, our mistakes, our past failures.

The cruise ship Noordam we boarded last summer cost a small fortune, but that’s why I write. Dave takes responsibility for keeping the house intact, paying for prescriptions and groceries, and for vehicular maintenance. My meager wages go into an account labeled “Fun.”

When I was a young pastor, 24 or 25 years old, my denominational supervisor offered me a book on theology by Karl Barth. I declined his gift and said that I didn’t need it.

After more than a decade of public healthcare with mandatory coverage, so many Canadian doctors have left the practice and so many young people have entered other fields that Canada ranks 26th of 28 developed nations in its ratio of physicians to population. Once, Canada ranked among the leaders in the number of physicians — but that was before government healthcare drove doctors out of the practice in droves.

The early morning sun streamed through the bedroom window blinds, warming my face. A slight breeze slipped past the cracked window and tickled my neck, trying to awaken me.

Government and military officials have issued statements since last week’s shooting rampage at Fort Hood, Texas that have nothing to do with the reality of what occurred, what is occurring and what our enemies would still like to have occur all over the United States.

Going through some old files recently, I opened one slugged “ants” and dated exactly one year before today. Talk about your déjà vu….

Each year when Veterans Day comes again to honor those who served their country, my mind often drifts to those who served in the life-saving business, the medics, helicopter crews, doctors and nurses who make a memorable difference in the lives of so many.

The 1-year-old Fayette-Coweta Clyde Thomason chapter of the Marine Corps League held its first Marine Corps birthday event in Sharpsburg, Ga., Saturday, Nov. 7, and with 40 Marines and spouses in attendance, it was a very successful first effort.