Forget the American dream – try the Irish dream. It’s not exactly the most exotic place to visit, and you can be promised rain more than the sun. But the atmosphere, historical beauty, and iconic Irish charm will keep you going back for more.

Ireland is where you need to be in 2024. There are some cheap travel deals on and, as always, plenty of things to do.

Ireland’s Must-Visit Cities

Ireland is a pin drop in the ocean compared to the US, but its cities pack a punch:

• Dublin: The most-visited city, the capital, the wonder. Visit the legendary Guinness Storehouse. The Little Museum of Dublin or the Jameson Distillery Bow St. are great.
• West Cork: West Cork is stunning. One of the best things to do in West Cork is Blarney Castle and Gardens.
• Waterford: Waterford isn’t as well known as the other locations on the list, but it’s well worth a visit. The Waterford Treasures Medieval Museums are really good. Mount Congreve gardens are also beautiful.

The Great Irish Outdoors

Ireland’s landscapes are usually the reason people visit (and the alcohol).

The Cliffs of Moher will take your breath away. They’re always a stop-off point for international travellers. Not much scenery can compete with it.

For a serene experience, the Ring of Kerry offers miles of quaint villages and stunning vistas. It’s something you won’t be able to find in the US.

If you’re feeling adventurous, the Wild Atlantic Way is a road trip you won’t forget. The stretch along the west coast has rugged coastlines, hidden beaches, and the chance to say you’ve stood at the edge of the world.

But it’s 1600 miles in total, so you’ll have to pick your favourite route on the trip and go for it. Unless you want to do 1600 miles – you could rent a motorhome.

The Warmth of Irish Culture

Google why people go to Ireland, and the culture is the reason. They have to be some of the most welcoming people on the planet. And they know how to hold a good conversation. There are cosy pubs with lively music in every town, incredible places to eat, and just people smiling everywhere.

In Dublin, experience the literary legacy of James Joyce with a pint at the historic Davy Byrnes. In Dingle, Dick Mack’s pub is a must-visit for its whiskey selection and vibrant atmosphere. And that’s just two examples. Google Irish pubs with the best atmosphere, and you’ll find more. You have to spend most of your time in Ireland in a pub, of course.

Irish music is the country’s soul, and the pubs are where it’s at.

Ireland is more than a destination. It’s an experience that stays with you forever. Whether it’s the lively streets of its cities, the breathtaking beauty of its landscapes, or the unforgettable charm of its people, it’s just incredible. We promise you’ll fall in love with everything about it. And as they say, they’re waiting with a “Céad míle fáilte” (a hundred thousand welcomes)!

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Why Elon Musk allowed Walter Isaacson 2 years of unfettered access and to write a biography that Musk did not in any way change is a mystery. It could be that Steve Jobs did the same and Musk felt a need to share his story similarly, but it does not matter.

His personal life, thought process, work strategies, accomplishments, and flaws were laid bare.

Born into an extremely dysfunctional family and brought up in a violent South African environment Musk learned from an early age to work hard and fight to achieve success. Gifted with a genius aptitude in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math {STEM}, he made his way to college in Canada, transferred to the University of Pennsylvania, and graduated with an engineering degree. Musk existed on a different intellectual plane and his interpersonal skills can be summed up as he did not care what others thought and suffered no fools. Society would ordinarily crush such an obnoxious person, but Musk brought to the table unique skills. Skills that a capitalist society could leverage and make investors rich. The unifying theme throughout Musk’s biography is that Musk is a shining star, a renaissance man with a vision to preserve humanity from destructive forces. But what sets Musk apart is the way he turns his visions into reality. He gets venture capitalists to see the potential profits and they put up the funds needed to get the companies off the ground. Musk then drives worker productivity and delivers on-time product success.

We want to thank James Betti for this Contribution – Please direct yours to Steve@GraniteGrok.com.
You can review our ‘Op-Ed Guidelines‘ on the FAQ Page.

All of Musk’s visions involve creating STEM products. Engineers design the products, and workers build them. “Musk’s Rules” for success are quite simple. Discover what part of the product assembly was taking too long or costing too much and find a way to make it go faster and cost less. Challenge every regulation, and if it does not make sense, ignore it. Make the engineers who designed the product work near the production site so they could see the design flaws that made assembly difficult or costly, and then correct the flaws. But what made Elon Musk unique is in difficult times, he would walk the assembly line, day and night, interacting with all problem areas, giving advice, and demanding engineers and workers alike be more efficient, innovative, cost-effective, and most importantly, take risks. If 10% of the risks did not fail, Musk decreed the employees were not risking enough. Musk made few friends and terminated workers who did not meet expectations, and not surprisingly, employee burnout was substantial. But as opposed to the cost-plus contracts the government routinely awarded to other private companies, contracts the companies never completed on time and for which they always came back for more funding, Musk delivered on time and within budget. SpaceX is an excellent example of Musk’s modus operandi. Musk felt there was a high probability humans would destroy themselves and that for humanity to survive, other planets must be colonized. Musk recognized that America’s space program was in tatters and to realize his vision of interplanetary colonization, the space program needed to be revitalized. He raised investor capital with the vision that if a private company could cost-effectively launch rockets into orbit, satellite placement could be monetized by capturing lucrative government and private contracts. He implemented “Musk’s Rules” and personally oversaw the work. SpaceX succeeded in creating a cost-effective reusable rocket that could be launched into orbit, and SpaceX became profitable. Musk’s creation launched thousands of satellites that, when linked together, formed the satellite-based internet connection “Star Link.” During its Ukrainian invasion, Russia was able to jam all earth-based internet connections, and without Musk allowing Ukraine to use Star Link, Putin would have overrun Ukraine. SpaceX continues to try and develop a massive rocket capable of leaving orbit and propelling humans to Mars. While Elon Musk has been overseeing multiple other ventures, six prototypes have failed. The Space X story highlights Musk at his best, but it also demonstrates his inherent weakness. The truth is colonizing Mars in Musk’s relatively short time frame is not going to happen. Even if SpaceX can produce a rocket capable of reaching Mars, the technology and infrastructure required to mount a colonization effort does not exist. Until spaceships can achieve a velocity approaching the speed of light or a breakthrough occurs that allows time and space to be warped, the present nine-month one-way trip to Mars would be self-limiting. Not to mention the harsh atmosphere’s lack of oxygen and the planet’s lack of usable water. If there were easily harvested profitable Mars assets, investors might be interested, but this is not the case. SpaceX demonstrates by the sheer force of his vision, engineering innovation, “Musk rules,” and refusal to accept defeat, Elon Musk can produce a marketable futuristic product. But until the rest of the universe’s infrastructure catches up to Musk’s new product, his vision hits a dead end. As with his rockets, the same can be said about his electric cars. A Tesla is a wonderful technological achievement, but present-day electric grid infrastructure and electricity production cannot support America’s transition to all-electric vehicles, and charging stations are not readily available. Middle and lower-class Americans cannot afford the expensive electric cars or the price of installing home charging stations. The massive amounts of electricity needed will have to be derived from fossil fuels, and thus defeat the purpose of electric cars. Both SpaceX and Tesla are examples of putting the proverbial cart before the horse. This does not mean the companies founded by Musk will be in financial trouble. Both SpaceX and Tesla have morphed away from Musk’s initial vision. SpaceX is more of a vehicle for access to space, and Tesla is moving towards high-end driverless electric cars and artificial intelligence. With Musk distracted by X {formerly Twitter}, these successful companies may decide they no longer need or want Elon Musk’s” Rules”. Musk has moved into the public square and labeled the progressive agenda as a “woke mind virus” triggering civilizational suicide and he has told the biological truth about there being only two sexes. By liberating Twitter from its woke masters, Musk has plunged a knife into the progressive elites’ plans to control and censor free speech. But in doing so, he has made very powerful enemies. Enemies who never cared about Musk’s lofty visions and only tolerated Elon Musk’s unsophisticated rudeness because he previously served their purpose. Enemies who know how to bring the force of government against him. Enemies that can manipulate the media to harm both him and his family. If Elon Musk’s simmering star is not to be extinguished by the coming global elite onslaught, he needs to prioritize his vision to save humanity. Most importantly, Musk has to keep X and free speech alive. Because spreading the truth on a platform that reaches billions and leveraging every bit of his formidable abilities will fuel Musk’s star, morphing Musk into a white-hot weapon. A weapon perfectly suited to incinerate the “woke mind virus” and thwart those who would enslave us all.

 

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Contrary to several detractors, our “Live Free; Die Free” act (House Bill 1283) does not “legalize physician-assisted suicide”: it, in effect, simply removes a current law that prevents the dying from buying medicine that they want.

If the dying further chooses, it would be the dying – and no one else – who would self-administer that medicine. It is more accurately thought of as “Right to Buy” – but only for the almost dead, and only if we just can’t stand the pain any longer.

The state currently cruelly prevents us who are suffering horrible deaths from obtaining medicine that could help us die peacefully, in our sleep, quietly, and (my personal preference) amongst friends & family. Instead, the state, righteously wielding its violence of law, forces us to continue to be tortured by our disease, to stretch out our pain, indignity, desperation, and loneliness for days or weeks, even though the end for which we may be long past ready is inevitable.

Oh, its apologists will offer to us (with a whisper and a wink) “other ways” to end our misery – ways that are less successful, less peaceful, more scary, and/or more painful. You see the state graciously countenances us, the desperately dying, to starve ourselves to death, or to refuse water until we dehydrate to death, or (the most commonly suggested alternative) to “accidentally clean” our guns. The state’s benevolence certainly accepts our suffering and our screams. (“But not too loudly, dear! After all, there are other patients on this floor.”) Or it will tolerate drug-comas to quiet our cries (until we wake up, panicked, pressing our call button).

We want to thank Dennis Pratt for this Contribution – Please direct yours to Steve@GraniteGrok.com.
You can review our ‘Op-Ed Guidelines‘ on the FAQ Page.

What would we do without its compassionate over-lording? Surely, we, the dying, are too feeble-minded, too unaware of the disease consuming our bodies! Should we not be thankful to be so selflessly served by such wise and courageous white knights?!

You see, the righteously ruling ultimately don’t see us, the dying, as equal to them. During the last days of our lives, when we are most vulnerable, they steal our bodies from us, patronizing us that they know better than we (who are actually suffering inside those very same disease-wracked bodies). They even have the audacity to argue that this hard-hearted violation of our most basic self-ownership is not evil but an actual kindness to us!

But here’s their error: granite staters are no one’s slaves, not even when we’re dying.

Even we, the dying, have the right of self-ownership. You see, no matter how much busy-bodies busy their bodies, our bodies never magically become theirs. The state has no right to torture us – not for sadistic ritual or political posturing. The decision over my body, especially at my life’s end, is mine, not theirs. (And over your body? At your life’s end? It’s yours, and still not theirs.)

Whether we, the dying, decide to buy the medicine or not (most of us will not), whether we, the dying, decide to ingest our purchased medicine or not (at least 15% of us will not), is not the human rights issue at the center of House Bill 1283.

Its central human rights issue is: “Who decides for this human being’s body right here?” Is it the person trapped inside that anguished body, or is it some outside master? May I – now that I am dying for sure – buy something I desperately need? Or does that pitiless master own my body more than I do, remote-controlling my suffering from his bureaucracy?

In New Hampshire, the freest state in the world, we should be free to not only live free, but also to die free, not on our knees begging a master for relief.

 

Dennis Pratt lives in Dover with his wife Carol of 43 years, and their two dogs. He is head of “Die Free,” a liberty-based group for recognizing end-of-life sovereignty, and has worked for the last two years with the grass-roots organization NH Options on House Bill 1283. He has written over 1800 essays on libertarian ethics and is the Chair of the Judicial Committee for the Libertarian Party of New Hampshire. Sure, he’s sparring with cancer, but don’t think that makes him a wuss.

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