Have you ever wondered what happened to the 56 men who signed the Declaration of Independence?

Five signers were captured by the British, charged and sentenced to death as traitors, and tortured before they died.

Twelve had their homes ransacked and burned.

Two lost their sons serving in the Revolutionary Army; another had two sons captured.

Nine of the 56 fought and died from wounds or hardships of the Revolutionary War.

They signed and they pledged their lives, their fortunes,and their sacred honor.

What kind of men were they?

Twenty-four were lawyers and jurists.

Eleven were merchants.

Nine were farmers and large plantation owners; men of means, and well educated, but they signed the Declaration of Independence knowing full well that the penalty would be death if they were captured by the British.

Carter Braxton of Virginia, a wealthy planter and trader, saw his ships swept from the seas by the British Navy. He sold his home and properties to pay his debts, and died in rags.

Thomas McKeam was so hounded by the British that he was forced to move his family almost constantly. He served in the Congress without pay, and his family was kept in hiding. His possessions were taken from him, and poverty was his reward.

Vandals or soldiers looted the properties of Dillery, Hall, Clymer, Walton, Gwinnett, Heyward, Ruttledge, and Middleton.

At the battle of Yorktown , Thomas Nelson, Jr., noted that the British General Cornwallis had taken over the Nelson home for his headquarters. He quietly urged General George Washington to open fire. The home was destroyed, and Nelson died bankrupt.

Francis Lewis had his home and properties destroyed. The enemy jailed his wife, and she died within a few months.

John Hart was driven from his wife's bedside as she was dying. Their 13 children fled for their lives. His fields and his gristmill were laid to waste. For more than a year he lived in forests and caves, returning home to find his wife dead and his children vanished.

So, take a few minutes while enjoying your 4th of July holiday and silently thank these patriots. It's not much to ask for the price they paid for freedom.

Remember: freedom is never free!

Patriotism is NOT a sin, and the Fourth of July has more to it than beer, picnics, and baseball games.

Islam Explained in Layman's Terms
(Adapted from Dr. Peter Hammond's book: Slavery, Terrorism and Islam: The Historical Roots and Contemporary Threat.)

Islam is not a religion, nor is it a cult. In its fullest form, it is a complete, total, 100% system of life.

Islam has religious, legal, political, economic, social, and military components. The religious component is a beard for all of the other components.

Islamization begins when there are sufficient Muslims in a country to agitate for their religious privileges.

When politically correct, tolerant, and culturally diverse societies agree to Muslim demands for their religious privileges, some of the other components tend to creep in as well.

Here's how it works:

As long as the Muslim population remains around or under 2% in any given country, they will be for the most part be regarded as a peace-loving minority, and not as a threat to other citizens. This is the case in:

United States -- Muslim 0.6%
Australia -- Muslim 1.5%
Canada -- Muslim 1.9%
China -- Muslim 1.8%
Italy -- Muslim 1.5%
Norway -- Muslim 1.8%

At 2% to 5%, they begin to proselytize from other ethnic minorities and disaffected groups, often with major recruiting from the jails and among street gangs. This is happening in:

Denmark -- Muslim 2%
Germany -- Muslim 3.7%
United Kingdom -- Muslim 2.7%
Spain -- Muslim 4%
Thailand -- Muslim 4.6%

From 5% on, they exercise an inordinate influence in proportion to their percentage of the population. For example, they will push for the introduction of halal (clean by Islamic standards) food, thereby securing food preparation jobs for Muslims. They will increase pressure on supermarket chains to feature halal on their shelves -- along with threats for failure to comply. This is occurring in:

France -- Muslim 8%
Philippines -- 5%
Sweden -- Muslim 5%
Switzerland -- Muslim 4.3%
The Netherlands -- Muslim 5.5%
Trinidad & Tobago -- Muslim 5.8%

At this point, they will work to get the ruling government to allow them to rule themselves (within their ghettos) under Sharia, the Islamic Law. The ultimate goal of Islamists is to establish Sharia law over the entire world.

When Muslims approach 10% of the population, they tend to increase lawlessness as a means of complaint about their conditions. In Paris , we are already seeing car-burnings. Any non-Muslim action offends Islam and results in uprisings and threats, such as in Amsterdam, with opposition to Mohammed cartoons and films about Islam. Such tensions are seen daily, particularly in Muslim sections in:

Guyana -- Muslim 10%
India -- Muslim 13.4%
Israel -- Muslim 16%
Kenya -- Muslim 10%
Russia -- Muslim 15%

After reaching 20%, nations can expect hair-trigger rioting, jihad militia formations, sporadic killings, and the burnings of Christian churches and Jewish synagogues, such as in:

Ethiopia -- Muslim 32.8%

At 40%, nations experience widespread massacres, chronic terror attacks, and ongoing militia warfare, such as in:

Bosnia -- Muslim 40%
Chad -- Muslim 53.1%
Lebanon -- Muslim 59.7%

From 60%, nations experience unfettered persecution of non-believers of all other religions (including non-conforming Muslims), sporadic ethnic cleansing (genocide), use of Sharia Law as a weapon, and Jizya, the tax placed on infidels, such as in:

Albania -- Muslim 70%
Malaysia -- Muslim 60.4%
Qatar -- Muslim 77.5%
Sudan -- Muslim 70%

After 80%, expect daily intimidation and violent jihad, some State-run ethnic cleansing, and even some genocide, as these nations drive out the infidels, and move toward 100% Muslim, such as has been experienced and in some ways is on-going in:

Bangladesh -- Muslim 83%
Egypt -- Muslim 90%
Gaza -- Muslim 98.7%
Indonesia -- Muslim 86.1%
Iran -- Muslim 98%
Iraq -- Muslim 97%
Jordan -- Muslim 92%
Morocco -- Muslim 98.7%
Pakistan -- Muslim 97%
Palestine -- Muslim 99%
Syria -- Muslim 90%
Tajikistan -- Muslim 90%
Turkey -- Muslim 99.8%
United Arab Emirates -- Muslim 96%

100% will usher in the peace of 'Dar-es-Salaam' -- the Islamic House of Peace. Here there's supposed to be peace, because everybody is a Muslim, the Madrasses are the only schools, and the Koran is the only word, such as in:

Afghanistan -- Muslim 100%
Saudi Arabia -- Muslim 100%
Somalia -- Muslim 100%
Yemen -- Muslim 100%

Unfortunately, peace is never achieved, as in these 100% states the most radical Muslims intimidate and spew hatred, and satisfy their blood lust by killing less radical Muslims, for a variety of reasons.

"Before I was nine I had learned the basic canon of Arab life. It was me against my brother; me and my brother against our father; my family against my cousins and the clan; the clan against the tribe; the tribe against the world, and all of us against the infidel."
-- Leon Uris, 'The Haj'

It is important to understand that in some countries, with well under 100% Muslim populations, such as France, the minority Muslim populations live in ghettos, within which they are 100% Muslim, and within which they live by Sharia Law. The national police do not even enter these ghettos. There are no national courts, nor schools, nor non-Muslim religious facilities. In such situations, Muslims do not integrate into the community at large. The children attend madrasses. They learn only the Koran. To even associate with an infidel is a crime punishable with death. Therefore, in some areas of certain nations, Muslim Imams and extremists exercise more power than the national average would indicate.

Today's 1.5 billion Muslims make up 22% of the world's population. But their birth rates dwarf the birth rates of Christians, Hindus, Buddhists, Jews, and all other believers. Muslims will exceed 50% of the world's population by the end of this century.

Adapted from Dr. Peter Hammond's book: Slavery, Terrorism and Islam: The Historical Roots and Contemporary Threat.

Well, boys and girls, today we are letting the fox guard the henhouse. The wolves will be herding the sheep!

Obama appoints two devout Muslims to Homeland Security posts. Doesn't this make you feel safer already?

Obama and Janet Napolitano appoint Arif Alikhan, a devout Muslim, as Assistant Secretary for Policy Development.

DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano swore in Kareem Shora, a devout Muslim who was born in Damascus, Syria, as ADC National Executive Director as a member of the Homeland Security Advisory Council (HSAC).

NOTE: Has anyone ever heard a new government official being identified as a devout Catholic, a devout Jew or a devout Protestant...? Just wondering.

Was it not "Devout Muslim men" who flew planes into U.S. buildings 8 years ago?

Was it not a Devout Muslim who killed 13 at Fort Hood?

What an honor it is for me to preach on this special day in the history of our Nation, i.e. the 234th Anniversary of the Declaration of Independence. I was here in this same church for the U.S. Bicentennial 34 years ago, and I remember it well because it was such a letdown; the Rector was on vacation, so he left his young Curate in charge….and he blew it! He started by saying words like: "after all the hype, the Big Day has arrived, and see, it is like any other day in hot July. We have endured the Bicentennial hype for months now, so it is time to get back to reality", etc. So, I am here today to say I think this day is a BIG DEAL, and I hope you feel the same as I.

On several occasions in my past, I was in a foreign country on July 4th. I found that most of my indigenous hosts knew it was a special day for Americans, and they expected us to treat it like a sacred milestone in our lives. For the U.S. Navy, that meant rigging Full Dress Ship, where we would link all the signal flags together in a long line and hoist up the center of that long line to the highest point on the ship, and secure one end to the bow and the other to the stern. On an aircraft carrier, that linkage of flags exceeds 1000 ft and the zenith is the height of a 15-story building. In the case of submarines, we did not carry many signal flags so we would breakout the largest American Flag we had and raise it on our tallest periscope, i.e. about 65 feet above the keel. Yes, it was a BIG DEAL, and especially in a foreign country.

Among the most memorable Fourths for me was in 1987 when I led a small cadre of Naval Reservists to visit 5 seacoast countries on the west coast of Africa. In prior years our Defense Department policy was to visit all countries on the Atlantic ocean with a U.S. Navy ship at least once every three years. By that time (1987) our Navy had shrunk from 2,000 ships (Korean War), to 1000 (Vietnam War), and 500 by 1987 (280 ships now). To substitute for a ship visit, I was sent in a 30 year-old Navy P3 patrol plane with the Atlantic Fleet Band of 17, plus my staff of 5…… to Nigeria, Ghana, Equatorial Guinea, Gabon, and Sao Tome. Because of our arrival in Equatorial Guinea on 5 July, the American Ambassador decided to delay his annual American Independence Day celebration to the night of 5 July to include my entourage.

The Ambassador reminded me the Soviets commonly sent a very low-ranking member of their legation to downgrade the American celebration……so I should not feel the boorish offense was aimed at me. Being part of the Receiving Line, I was entranced by many delegations, who were robed in colorful traditional dress. In the middle of it all, in came the token Soviet...the Soviet Ambassador’s chauffeur, who was having a wonderful time, intending no offense, and "stoned" out of his mind, with a broad glassy-eyed grin on his flushed face. He thought the American Independence Day was wonderful.

But you did not come here today to hear sea stories, so what does this date have to do with God, the U.S. Armed Forces, and American Independence?

Somewhere in our past we learned that God’s grace comes thru clearest when we help others. In the Armed Forces we are often required to serve in places and among people who have little in common with us, other than we are all human beings, sharing the same planet, and we are mixed together in this crucible called life. As we grow we have experiences, some good, some bad, some noble, some evil, and we learn how to discern the difference. We learn from history that there are always those who seek power and dominion over others, and if unchallenged, some of that power can be directed against those unable to defend themselves. The Bible is full of such despots, and we have many such zealots in the World today,…..and America is deemed to be above such characterizations, but we are often accused of such domination by those whom we have the military power to subdue.

Thomas Jefferson understood the "strands of liberty" well enough to weave them into the "fabric" we call the Declaration of Independence,…and adopted by the Continental Congress on July 4th 1776. The first two paragraphs of the Declaration set the stage of WHY for the Declaration; then there is a list of 29 factual reasons to support the WHAT in the Declaration. The last paragraph is the RESOLUTION in the Declaration which tells King George III of Great Britain what the American Colonists are going to do about it….thus setting the stage for the Revolutionary War. We won that one and several since, but each such confrontation consumes the lives of many of America’s youngest, best and brightest...to make it possible for the rest of us to pursue our respective lives and vocations where our biggest "enemy" is the Tax Collector. Those patriots from this church who stood the watch on the Ramparts of Freedom in World War II are listed on the two tall stained glass windows in the South Transept of this church. Those with the gold star did not come home alive. Today we commemorate a newer era of defenders of liberty from this Church’s membership who served in the Korean and Vietnam wars (1950-1975). Bronze plaques with the names for each conflict have been cast and are now mounted on the north wall of the nave and the west wall near the north entrance to the church, and we will consecrate them just a few minutes from now. Most of us know the names, and many are among us today. All served with distinction and deserve our thanks for their unselfish service at a time our Nation needed them.

And the beat goes on. Today there are many thousands of Floridians defending our Nation in some Godforsaken parts of the World, not because they want to be there, but they want to protect our Country, and they have been ordered wherever they are. Already 200,000 Floridians have served in Iraq or Afghanistan since SEP ll, 2001. My oldest grandson, Phillip Jacob, a former Acolyte in this church, is now at Parris Island SC, learning to be a Marine. He is finding out the regimen for a Marine demands his best in order to serve his fellow Marines, his family, his friends, his fellow Americans, and his God. Semper Fidelis, Phillip; what you are doing is a BIG DEAL for you, and for all of us.

Another former St. Andrew's Acolyte, my son Roy III, was honorably discharged from his Army Ranger battalion at Fort Lewis WA just days before they parachuted into Panama during Operation Just Cause. Several of those killed were friends of young Roy.

Finally, I leave you today with some Scripture, which helps explain why I have spent so much of my adult life at sea and wearing this Navy uniform (quoting from the Book of Psalms, Chapter 107, Verses 23-30)...let us bow our heads in prayer: "They that go down to the sea in ships, that do business in great waters; These see the works of the Lord, and his wonders in the deep; For he commandeth and raiseth the stormy wind, which lifteth up the waves thereof. They mount up to the heaven, they go down again to the depths: their soul is melted because of trouble. They reel to and fro, and stagger like a drunken man, and are at their wits’ end. Then they cry unto the Lord in their trouble, and he bringeth them out of their distresses. He maketh the storm a calm, so that the waves thereof are still. Then are they glad because they be quiet; so he bringeth them unto their desired haven",...or maybe just the Breton sailor’s simple prayer "Lord, the sea is so great, and my boat is so small." Amen.

/s/ LeRoy Collins, Jr.
Rear Admiral, U.S. Naval Reserve (Retired)

A fighter pilot's "Dinner speech"
(A Great Change Of Command Dinner speech by CDR "Beef" Wellington, former USN VFA-203 "Blue Dolphins" C.O.)

Two days ago I closed out my career as a Naval Aviator. The realization is just now starting to hit me, as I'm sure it will the rest of you someday. What follows are my remarks at my farewell dinner. Several of the guys in my squadron had asked me for a copy of what I had written and because it had been jotted down on the back of a cocktail napkin in my weird-assed hand writing and because these things came from my heart, I debated for a while whether or not to write it down, but the response from all the guys and their wives was so humbling and overwhelming, I thought ... why not.

Being an F/A-18 pilot and an airline pilot at the same time gives you an interesting and different perspective. Unlike others, at my airline (NWA) they do not have a history of hiring Single Seat Naval Aviators and as such we are definitely in the minority. On every trip when you first sit down next to a guy, the first volley of questions in getting to know each other always includes "What is your background?" Based on 3 years in the airline industry, I have recently decided to flat out lie and stop telling guys that I am a Naval Aviator and an F/A-18 pilot. You might be asking yourself, why would anyone do that? There are 3 reasons.

One - Because everything that the uninformed population knows about Naval Aviation they got from the movie Top Gun: a credible and reliable source of information if there ever was one.

Two - Because when I tell guys that I am an F/A-18 pilot, the machismo and bravado that immediately comes from the left side of the cockpit becomes somewhat intolerable and I am forced to sit and listen to stories for the next 4 days that go something like, "Mike, did I tell you about the time when I landed my C-5 on a 15,000 foot runway with only 30,000 pounds of fuel in the tanks, with the weather at mins, and oh, oh yeah, did I say it was at night." You gotta be kidding me!

Three - Because, in their state of curiosity, invariably questions get asked about what flying the F/A-18 is like and what this business of Naval Aviation is all about. It is in my futile attempts to answer these questions that I have finally decided that it is impossible to do so. How can anyone possibly explain Naval Aviation?

How do you explain what it has been like to have seen the entire world through the canopy of an F/A-18 like a living IMAX film?

How do you explain what is like to fly an engineering marvel that responds to your every whim of airborne imagination?

How do you explain the satisfaction that comes from seeing a target under the diamond disappear at the flick of your thumb?

How do you explain catapult shots - especially the night ones?

How do explain the exhilaration of the day trap (landing on the carrier deck)?

How do you possibly explain finding yourself at 3/4 mile [on final], at night, weather down, deck moving, hyperventilating into your mask, knowing that it will take everything you have to get aboard without killing yourself?

How do you explain moons so bright and nights so dark that they defy logic?

How do you explain sunrises and sunsets so glorious that you knew in your heart that God had created that exact moment in time just for you?

How do you explain the fellowship of the ready room where no slack is given and none is taken?

How do you explain an environment where the content of a man's character can be summed up into two simple 4-word phrases - "He's a good stick " or "He's a fricking idiot."

How do you explain the heart of maintenance professionals whose only enjoyment comes from taking care of our young sailors and providing us with "up" jets to execute our craft?

How do you explain the dedication of our young troops who we burden with the responsibilities of our lives and then pay them peanuts to do so?

How do you explain the type of women who are crazy enough to marry into Naval Aviation, who endure long working hours and long periods of separation and who are painfully and quietly forced to accept the realization that they are second to the job?

The simple fact is that you can't explain it; none of it.

It is something that only a very select few of us will ever know. We are bonded for life by our proprietary knowledge and it excludes all others from our fraternity. As I will, no matter where you go or what do, you should cherish that knowledge for the rest of your life. For when I am 90 years old sitting on my porch in my rocking chair and someone asks me what I have done with my life, I will damn sure not tell them I was an airline pilot, but rather I will reach into my pocket, pull out my Blue Dolphin money clip and tell them I was a Naval Aviator, I worked with the finest people on the planet, and that I was the Commanding Officer of the Blue Dolphins."

This says it all.

IN CONGRESS, JULY 4, 1776
The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America

When in the Course of human events it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. — That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable than to right themselves by abol ishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security. — Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.

He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.

He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.

He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.

He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their Public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.

He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.

He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected, whereby the Legislative Powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.

He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.

He has obstructed the Administration of Justice by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary Powers.

He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.

He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harass our people and eat out their substance.

He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures.

He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil Power.

He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:

For quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:

For protecting them, by a mock Trial from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:

For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world:

For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent:

For depriving us in many cases, of the benefit of Trial by Jury:

For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences:

For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these Colonies;

For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:

For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.

He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us.

He has plundered our seas, ravaged our coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.

He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation, and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & Perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.

He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the executioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands.

He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.

In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince, whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.

Nor have We been wanting in attentions to our British brethren. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace Friends.

We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare, That these united Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States, that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do. — And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes, and our sacred Honor.

June 29, 2010 Who Betrays Us?
By G. Murphy Donovan

Crystal is not glass. Strike crystal and it rings like a bell. When it breaks, crystal makes a special noise, a sound like the end of music. The other day, we heard the end of a special elegy, the 24 notes of taps, when General Stanley McChrystal furled his flag.

McChrystal was no ordinary infantryman; he chose the road not taken. Rangers are a unique fraternity where only extraordinary warriors thrive. Those who rise to the top in any calling often walk a fine line between genius and eccentricity, and soldiers are no exception. General McChrystal crossed the line more than once, but he never stepped on a land mine until Rolling Stone magazine came to do a "profile" at HQ Afghanistan.

The agent of McChrystal's demise was an effete freelancer who looks and sounds like a prep school refugee. Michael Hastings was on special assignment for a magazine whose usual fare is sex, drugs, and rock & roll. Yet, like Hugh Hefner's Playboy, Jann Wenner's Rolling Stone has cultural pretensions. Those affectations were on full display in the McChrystal issue. Lady Gaga [sic] graces the cover; equipped with a bullet brassiere on full auto. Ms. Gaga is a performance artist whose cultural niche is defined by Madonna groupies.

Like Hefner, Wenner panders to a young and, by their own definition, hip demographic of readers under 30 years of age; both publishers might charitably be described as priapic geriatrics at 84 and 64 years of age, respectively. Like all purveyors of progressive culture, Wenner has trouble separating value and vulgarity. And to no one's surprise, he consistently carries water for the left -- as a Clintonista or, more recently, as an Obama contributor.

From any perspective, we have to assume that General McChrystal and/or his staff was aware of these things and the risks of having of an antiwar zealot in their midst. The key question to be answered is: Who was using whom?

After Afghanistan, a maverick like McChrystal wasn't going to be selected for a political job like Army Chief of Staff. Hard to picture McChrystal, like the incumbent George Casey, making the rounds of the Sunday gab shows reminding citizens that the feelings of Muslims are more important than the safety of soldiers massacred at Ft. Hood, Texas. And surely McChrystal wasn't a candidate to follow Mike Mullen into the political swamp at the JCS. On the Pentagon's E Ring, Mullen is better known for social issues, like gay rights for sailors, than he is for war-fighting. There were no stars in McChrystal's future, either; he already had his four.

McChrystal is a country music fan, so no doubt he's familiar with Kristofferson's iconic line: "Freedom's just another word for nothing left to lose." When McChrystal let the fox into the Afghan hen house, he knew which huevos were in play.

Before the Rolling Stone controversy, the friction between the "White House wimps" and the military brass was the worst-kept secret in Washington. Yet the rift, from the beginning, was cultivated by the president -- and what can be described only as a cabal of divisive beltway toadies. From the start, Obama ignored the field commander, refused to define the enemy or describe the end game -- or explain to the American public why Afghanistan "is a war of necessity." The party line had three "soft" features: don't use the word "war," don't mention Islam, and restrict descriptions of the bad guys to either Taliban or al-Qaeda.

Shortly after the election, Obama put on his long pants and fired the previous ISAF commander in Afghanistan -- and then dithered for months over troop deployments. Since then, the White House has been driving on a learner's permit. In the past year and a half, the commander in chief has met the tactical commander on few occasions; McChrystal, in contrast, has met with Hamid Karzai, face to face, over fifty times during the same period. If McChrystal claims Obama is "disengaged" only on the subject of war, the general is being generous.

The hapless Senate majority leader, Harry Reid (D-NV), told America that the Iraq "war is lost" just before the last American election. A newly elected vice president followed up with very public carping at General McChrystal's expense. If there were ever a toady who should be cashiered for loose lips, it's Joe Biden (hereafter known as Joe "Bite Me" to troops in the field). Biden doesn't just put his foot in his mouth; he doesn't bother to remove his shoes after he steps in something. Biden's advice on Iraq was to subdivide it -- i.e., into three new states [sic] -- as if the U.N. didn't have enough dysfunctional members.

"Team" Obama was augmented by Richard Holbrooke and Karl Eikenberry early on, both sent to Kabul, presumably, to make sure McChrystal walked the "soft power" walk. Unfortunately, neither Holbroke nor Eikenberry plays well with other adults.

Holbrooke's function in South Asia is as a dark swan. He doesn't seem to get along with anyone but himself. In the foggy world of diplomacy, androgyny, and cookie-pushing, Holbrooke stands out. He is supposed to be a special envoy, but his specialties might be limited to arrogance and petulance. Holbrooke, former Clintonista and incumbent Karzai-basher, doesn't play well wit third-world leaders or allied military officers.

And Eikenberry's performance isn't too far removed from Holbrooke's. Soon after arriving in Kabul, Ambassador Eikenberry started to "back-channel" McChrystal, (i.e., send critical, uncomplimentary reports back to Washington). Indeed, Eikenberry's pique seems to have been tweaked because a Brit, and not Eikenberry, was appointed "viceroy" -- a slight he seems to lay at the feet of a Karzai/McChrystal conspiracy. Eikenberry was miscast in Rolling Stone as a martinet "stuck in 1985"; the year may be closer to 1895, and the Eikenberry character could have come straight out of "Gilbert and Sullivan."

On the U.N. side of Kabul, the blue helmets were having a civil war of their own. Norway's Kai Eide and his American deputy, Peter Galbraith, had a transnational shootout over the legitimacy of Hamid Karzai's election in 2009. Galbraith got fired, Karzai got a second term, and Eide took the Quisling special back to Scandinavia. Eide was and remains an ardent fan of accommodation with the Taliban.

These "team" players were supplemented by a gaggle of second-guessers back in Washington, with the president's national security advisor, Jim Jones, on point. Jones' most recent contribution to the clueless sweeps was a "greedy Jew" joke spliced into a speech that was supposed to underline American support of Israel. After eighteen months in office, the Commander in Chief has traveled to several Arab, Turkish, and Muslim capitals, yet never to Israel. Mr. Obama's Islamic globetrotting sends a message consistent with Jones' taste in jokes. From the beginning, the former Marine commandant, like Joe Biden, also made loud noises that undermined or contradicted McChrystal's strategy at the front.

So what's a soldier to do when a president hand-picks him to lead the charge in combat and then allows lower-echelon cockroaches to eat his lunch? McChrystal did what any good guerrilla fighter would do: He let another insect carry a poison pill back to a dysfunctional nest. Indeed, General McChrystal performed one final service for his country: He used a press nitwit to expose a confederacy of national security dunces using the prescribed "soft" tactics -- things like toxic ridicule.

The clincher in all of this is Hillary; she comes off like the Cheshire cat, grinning from ear to ear while the Oval Office tries to put lipstick on another pig. Clinton has kept her distance: "Give him [McChrystal] what he wants," says she. If and when the Obama national security crowd self-destructs, Hilary can say "I told you so," pick up the pieces, and do a pantssuit rendition of what Bobby Kennedy did to Lyndon Johnson in 1968.

Any idea that McChrystal was insubordinate or threatened civilian authority is bravo sierra, as they say in the barracks. The general simply raised the blinds and let in some light. He even helped the young president to grow up a bit. On the day Obama let his field commander go, the president used the word "war" to describe the Afghan conflict. That's progress! Obama then appointed a third field commander in eighteen months; demoting the CENTCOM commander to replace McChrystal in Kabul.

And yes, the new guy is the old David Petraeus, who, when serving in Iraq under George Bush, was vilified by the left, including then-Senator Obama, as a liar and traitor. Indeed, the same news outlets that published those scurrilous George Soros ads now celebrate the Petraeus choice as "inspired." General "Betray Us" under a Republican has morphed into General "Save Us" under a Democrat. So much for politics stopping at the water's edge.

So what's the plan now? It appears the exit strategy for Iraq and Afghanistan is on schedule (according to Joe Bite Me) and Petraeus will be the happy face of at least one success, even if it belongs to the previous administration. Yet the president is still hostage to a campaign slogan, that "war of necessity." Unfortunately, the Oval Office position is already flanked left and right. The incumbent does not want to carry any war, of choice or necessity, into the next presidential cycle. And the Cheshire cat just grins and waits.

All of this highlights the distinction between politics Chicago-style and principled soldiering McChrystal-style. Given a choice between sacrifice and survival, which road do men of character take? McChrystal has answered that question: He fell on his sword. Obama will get back to us in thirteen months.

Stanley McChrystal may have furled his flag, but let's hope he has not spiked his guns. In or out of Iraq and Afghanistan, the threat whose name we dare not speak will get worse before it gets better. When it does, real soldiers will need to strap on their irons again. Keep your powder dry, Stan.

The author is a Vietnam veteran with 25 years of military service. He also writes at G. Murphy Donovan and Agnotology in Journalism.

Page Printed from: http://www.americanthinker.com/2010/06/who_betrays_us.html at June 29, 2010 - 06:28

Wednesday, June 30, 2010
To: Friends & Supporters
From: Gary L. Bauer

Gaming The System

The state-run healthcare system in Massachusetts has often been cited as the model for ObamaCare. But today's Boston Globe has a very compelling report outlining one of the biggest problems with the program.

One of ObamaCare's main selling points was that health insurance companies could never deny anyone coverage for any reason, no matter their condition. Theoretically, guaranteed coverage works only if there is an individual mandate that forces everyone to buy insurance.

If you don't buy insurance, you're subject to a fine. Constitutionality aside, many analysts fear that ObamaCare's mandate isn't strong enough and many folks will simply opt to pay fines instead of paying the premiums. But once they do get sick, then they'll buy insurance because they can't be turned down. When they regain their health, they'll drop out again.

According to the Boston Globe that is exactly what is happening in Massachusetts. These "inactive members" are gaming the system and driving up costs for active members by hundreds of millions of dollars a year. And that's just in one small state.

This experiment in socialized medicine has not reduced healthcare costs in Massachusetts. Costs have, in fact, skyrocketed, insurance companies are losing money, premiums are going up and Governor Deval Patrick has resorted to price controls.

DIVE DIVE

I served on the Holland over a century ago.
I still serve to this day on the Trident, Los Angeles & Seawolf class boats and look forward to shipping on the Virginia, Texas, and Hawaii.
Places like Fremantle, Rota, LaMadd, Chinhae, Pattaya, Sasebo, and Subic stir my soul.
For I am a Submariner.

I rest in peace beneath many seas across this earth.
I was on the Barbel off Palawan, the Scorpion off the Azores and the Bonefish in the Sea of Japan. We gave them hell in the harbors at Wewak and Namkwan.
I am a Shellback, a Bluenose, a Plank Owner, a MCPO of the Navy, a CNO, and a President.
For I am a Submariner.

I heard Howard Gilmore's final order, "Take Her Down."
I heard the word passed, "Underway on Nuclear Power."
I have done every job asked of me, from Messcook to Torpedoman to Motormac to COB to Skipper.
I know "Snorkel Patty" and Admiral Rickover.
For I am a Submariner.

I have twin Dolphins tattooed on my chest and twin screws tattooed on my ass.
I know the difference between a Lady and a Hooker but treat both with equal respect.
I know Georgia Street and Magsaysay drive. And although the Horse & Cow keeps moving I will always find her.
I know the meaning of "Hot, Straight, and Normal."
For I am a Submariner.

I have stood tall and received the Medal of Honor and been thrown in the Brig for being Drunk & Disorderly.
I know the reverent tone of "Diesel Boats Forever" and the Gudgeon's "Find em, Chase em, Sink em."
I was on the Spearfish evacuating nurses from Corregidor and the Skate when she surfaced at the North Pole.
I have spent time in the Royal Hawaiian.
For I am a Submariner.

I have gone by names like Spritz, Cromwell, O'Kane, Ramage, Breault, "Mush" and Lockwood.
I have served on boats like the Nautilus, Thresher, Parche, Squalus, Wahoo and Halibut.
On December 7th I was onboard the Tautog at Pearl Harbor.
I was also on the Tusk in '49 and sacrificed myself for my shipmates on the Cochino.
For I am a Submariner.

I have stood watches in the cold of Holy Loch and the heat of the South Pacific.
I know what the "41 For Freedom" accomplished.
I was on the Sealion at Cavite in '41 and the Archerfish in Tokyo Bay in '45.
I have endured depth charges and POW camps.
I was on the Seafox when we lost five sailors to a Japanese ambush on Guam.
For I am a Submariner.

I tip beers over sea-stories with my shipmates at yearly conventions. We toll the bell and shed a tear for our buddies who are on eternal patrol.

Many pilots have been glad to see me, including a future president.
I have completed numerous highly classified missions during the Cold War.
Because "Freedom Is Not Free," be assured that I am out there at this very moment.
For I am a Submariner.

"The American submariner is the principle reason the bad guys rarely get to peek under Lady Liberty's nightie and your kids don't eat sushi at school."

WAYNE ALLYN ROOT: Overwhelm the system

Barack Obama is no fool. He is not incompetent. To the contrary, he is brilliant. He knows exactly what he's doing. He is purposely overwhelming the U.S. economy to create systemic failure, economic crisis and social chaos -- thereby destroying capitalism and our country from within.

Barack Obama is my college classmate ( Columbia University , class of '83). As Glenn Beck correctly predicted from day one, Obama is following the plan of Cloward & Piven, two professors at Columbia University . They outlined a plan to socialize America by overwhelming the system with government spending and entitlement demands. Add up the clues below. Taken individually they're alarming. Taken as a whole, it is a brilliant, Machiavellian game plan to turn the United States into a socialist/Marxist state with a permanent majority that desperately needs government for survival ... and can be counted on to always vote for bigger government. Why not? They have no responsibility to pay for it.

-- Universal health care. The health care bill had very little to do with health care. It had everything to do with unionizing millions of hospital and health care workers, as well as adding 15,000 to 20,000 new IRS agents (who will join government employee unions). Obama doesn't care that giving free health care to 30 million Americans will add trillions to the national debt. What he does care about is that it cements the dependence of those 30 million voters to Democrats and big government. Who but a socialist revolutionary would pass this reckless spending bill in the middle of a depression?

-- Cap and trade. Like health care legislation having nothing to do with health care, cap and trade has nothing to do with global warming. It has everything to do with redistribution of income, government control of the economy and a criminal payoff to Obama's biggest contributors. Those powerful and wealthy unions and contributors (like GE, which owns NBC, MSNBC and CNBC) can then be counted on to support everything Obama wants. They will kick-back hundreds of millions of dollars in contributions to Obama and the Democratic Party to keep them in power. The bonus is that all the new taxes on Americans with bigger cars, bigger homes and businesses helps Obama "spread the wealth around."

-- Make Puerto Rico a state. Why? Who's asking for a 51st state? Who's asking for millions of new welfare recipients and government entitlement addicts in the middle of a depression? Certainly not American taxpayers. But this has been Obama's plan all along. His goal is to add two new Democrat senators, five Democrat congressman and a million loyal Democratic voters who are dependent on big government.

-- Legalize 12 million illegal immigrants. Just giving these 12 million potential new citizens free health care alone could overwhelm the system and bankrupt America . But it adds 12 million reliable new Democrat voters who can be counted on to support big government. Add another few trillion dollars in welfare, aid to dependent children, food stamps, free medical, education, tax credits for the poor, and eventually Social Security.

-- Stimulus and bailouts. Where did all that money go? It went to Democrat contributors, organizations (ACORN), and unions -- including billions of dollars to save or create jobs of government employees across the country. It went to save GM and Chrysler so that their employees could keep paying union dues. It went to AIG so that Goldman Sachs could be bailed out (after giving Obama almost $1 million in contributions). A staggering $125 billion went to teachers (thereby protecting their union dues). All those public employees will vote loyally Democrat to protect their bloated salaries and pensions that are bankrupting America . The country goes broke, future generations face a bleak future, but Obama, the Democrat Party, government, and the unions grow more powerful. The ends justify the means.

-- Raise taxes on small business owners, high-income earners, and job creators. Put the entire burden on only the top 20 percent of taxpayers, redistribute the income, punish success, and reward those who did nothing to deserve it (except vote for Obama). Reagan wanted to dramatically cut taxes in order to starve the government. Obama wants to dramatically raise taxes to starve his political opposition.

With the acts outlined above, Obama and his regime have created a vast and rapidly expanding constituency of voters dependent on big government; a vast privileged class of public employees who work for big government; and a government dedicated to destroying capitalism and installing themselves as socialist rulers by overwhelming the system.

Add it up and you've got the perfect Marxist scheme -- all devised by my Columbia University college classmate Barack Obama using the Cloward and Piven Plan.

FLAG DAY 2010

On June 14, 1777, the Marine Committee of the Continental Congress adopted a resolution, which gave birth to our National Flag. The resolution read: "Resolved that the Flag of the United States be made of 13 stripes, alternate red and white, that the union be 13 stars, white in a blue field, representing a new constellation."

General George Washington explained: "We take the stars from heaven, the red from our mother country, separating it by white stripes, thus showing that we have separated from her, and the white stripes shall go down to posterity representing liberty."

On May 30, 1916, President Woodrow Wilson announced during his Memorial Day address, that June 14th of each year would be celebrated as Flag Day. "This flag, which we honor and under which we serve, is the emblem of our unity, our power, our thought and purpose as a nation. It has no other character than that which we give it from generation to generation....Though silent, it speaks to us -- speaks to us of the past, of the men and women who went before us, and of the records they wrote upon it."

Today, our Flag is a beacon for liberty, a symbol of hope for all people who "hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed -- that whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it...."

Our flag flies over a national government, which, at its foundation, was predicated on the premise that it be concerned with what can be done FOR its citizens, not on what can be done TO its citizens.

On this Flag Day 2010, we American Patriots display and pay homage to our National Flag.

To purchase the highest quality U.S. flags available (and support The Patriot Annual fund) please link to http://PatriotShop.US/ (By American -- Made in the USA!)

FATHER'S DAY
Fathers should add tangible spiritual elements to family life. This means taking your family to church, of course, because being active in a congregation grounds you in faith. But it also means bringing spirituality into your home. Play spiritual music. Incorporate grace into mealtimes. Institute regular family prayer and study. Talk about what you believe, why you believe it, and how it applies to your daily lives. Dads, you know you can expect some nice gifts from your families when Father's Day arrives. And from homemade artwork to the inevitable tie, they will be things you treasure. But nothing compares to what you can give them all year long -- the gift of faith.

Benjamin Netanyahu made the mistake of believing the president is serious about stopping a nuclear Iran.
By JOHN BOLTON

Benjamin Netanyahu's first term as Israeli prime minister collapsed in 1999 in part because he had an unhappy relationship with President Bill Clinton. It is understandable then that Mr. Netanyahu's current government had, until last week, strived to stay close to President Barack Obama.

That strategy would have been entirely sensible if Mr. Obama were simply another president in the long line since Franklin Roosevelt who vigorously asserted U.S. national interests, championed our friends (especially beleaguered ones), and kept alliances strong. But Mr. Obama is different. He is our first post-American president. He looks beyond American exceptionalism and believes that our role on the world stage should be merely one nation among many. Mr. Netanyahu's strategy is therefore out-of-date and flawed.

Israel has sought to accommodate Mr. Obama on two critical issues: negotiations with Palestinians and Iranian nuclear weapons. These efforts have largely kept bilateral disagreements out of sight. But now the suppressed conflicts are fully visible and will either be resolved or cause a serious collision between Israel and the U.S.

On the Palestinian front, Mr. Netanyahu's government has tolerated 14 months of feckless administration diplomacy that has not altered geopolitical realities between Israel and the Palestinians.

Last week's announcement of the construction of new settlements in East Jerusalem while Vice President Joe Biden was visiting Israel was an unnecessary step. But optics are not the real problem. Mr. Biden's response ("I condemn the decision"), approved in advance by Mr. Obama, and then emphasized by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in a blistering Friday phone call to Mr. Netanyahu, foreshadows what lies ahead. It won't be pretty.

Mr. Netanyahu's efforts to avoid open disputes with Washington have not won him White House plaudits. Mr. Obama almost certainly believes the real obstacle to peace is not new housing or unfortunate timing but so-called Israeli intransigence.

On Iran, Mr. Netanyahu has faithfully supported Mr. Obama's diplomacy, hoping to build credibility with the president against the day when Israel might have to strike Iran's weapons program pre-emptively. Jerusalem, for example, currently backs U.S. efforts to increase sanctions against Iran's nuclear program, doomed to failure though they are. As time passes, Israel's military option grows more difficult and the chances for success shrink as Iran seeks new air-defense systems and further buries and hardens nuclear facilities.

Mr. Netanyahu's mistake has been to assume that Mr. Obama basically agrees that we must prevent Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons. But the White House likely believes that a nuclear Iran, though undesirable, can be contained and will therefore not support using military force to thwart Tehran's nuclear ambitions.

What's more, Mr. Obama is also unwilling to let anyone else, namely Israel, act instead. That means that if Israel bombs Iranian nuclear facilities, the president will likely withhold critical replenishments of destroyed Israeli aircraft and other weapons systems.

We are moving inexorably toward, and perhaps have now reached, an Israeli crisis with Mr. Obama. Americans must realize that allowing Iran to obtain nuclear weapons is empowering an existential threat to the Israeli state, to Arab governments in the region that are friendly to the U.S., and to long-term global peace and security.

Mr. Netanyahu must realize he has not been banking good behavior credits with Mr. Obama but simply postponing an inevitable confrontation. The prime minister should recalibrate his approach, and soon. Israel's deference on Palestinian issues will not help it with Mr. Obama after a pre-emptive strike against Iran's nuclear program. It would be a mistake to think that further delays in such a strike will materially change the toxic political response Israel can expect from the White House. Israel's support will come from Congress and the American people, as opinion polls show, not from the president.

Mr. Obama is not merely heedless of America's predominant global position. He is also embarrassed enough by it not to regret diminishing it. In fact, we have achieved pre-eminence not simply to preen our American ego, but to defend our interests and those of like-minded allies. Ceding America's role in world affairs is not an act of becoming modesty but a dangerous signal of weakness to friends and adversaries alike. Israel may be the first ally to feel the pain.

Mr. Bolton, a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, is the author of "Surrender Is Not an Option: Defending America at the United Nations and Abroad" (Simon & Schuster, 2007).

The things they carry in Afghanistan
By David Fennell
Posted: 05/31/2010 01:00:00 AM MDT

Editor's note: David Fennell of Littleton is a major in the U.S. Marine Corps. He is stationed in Marjah, Afghanistan, as head of the Civil Affairs Group there. Before that, he served a tour in Iraq. His father, Denny, asked David to sum up his experiences as he nears the end of his deployment.

Although I've gotten used to things around here, this place can wear on you. Don't get me wrong, I truly believe in our mission and its importance to both the Afghan people and security back home. Still, southern Afghanistan is a hard place.

The question Marines ask themselves most when talking with folks back home is "Where do I start?" There are no easy answers.

Sand, moon dust, terrain, weather, enemy, Marines getting hurt, Marines taken out of action, high op tempo, 2 4/7, working with locals, working with civilians, working with Afghan government, working with Afghan police, working with Afghan army, working with international forces (ISAF), bad food, drinking tea with locals knowing you'll get sick, getting sick, watching for IEDs, looking for ambushes, suicide bomb threats, enemy murdering and intimidating the local population, local "friends" working with enemy, Marines getting killed, controlled IED detonations, wondering what caused an explosion, the kids, seeing bad things happen to kids, bad kids throwing rocks, bad kids taunting and making gestures that you're going to get blown up, locals gaming the system, locals complaining about everything, locals always want more, some locals step up and the enemy takes some locals down...

Sand storms, bad sleep, incoming rockets, burn pits, relieving yourself in a bag, reports, reports, reports, briefs, briefs, briefs, VIP visits (generals, ambassadors, Afghanistan officials, etc.), second-guessed by others, second-guessing yourself, media, interpreters, bad interpreters, not being able to find an interpreter, losing gear, getting gear stolen, keeping Marines motivated, rewarding Marines, punishing Marines, taking care of interpreters, patrolling through canals and irrigated farms, getting your only pair of boots wet, getting your camera wet, Medevacs, finding IEDs, waiting hours for EOD to detonate IEDs, acronyms, hearing Marines in a firefight over the radio, losing communication, incoming mortars, long days, short meals, dirty uniforms, making yourself sick from your smell...

Needing air support but not getting it, taught not to look at Afghan women, taught not to talk to Afghan women, not knowing how to react when an Afghan woman approaches, false claims of Koran burning, false claims of night searches, false claims of civilian casualties, lies, lies, lies, protests, riots, local leaders calm protests and riots for a few prayer rugs.

Taking malaria medication, flak jackets, Kevlar, bad feet, bad knees, bad back, bad haircuts, looking forward to firefights, dreading IEDs, sand in everything, too few computers, no printers, no scanner, generators go down, e-mail goes down, "where's your report?", cold winter, no heat, local gets shot, local comes to Marines for help, is local a Taliban who we shot?, Marines trying to be experts in crime scene investigations, getting mail late, getting mail stolen, not getting mail at all, being hungry, saving the last Ramen noodle, losing weight, bad shaves, hot days, no A/C, sunburned faces and necks, white arms and legs, trying to get contractors to start development projects, contractors getting intimidated and robbed by Taliban, contractors getting kidnapped by Taliban, workers being killed by Taliban, hoping a Marine "makes it," going to memorial services, hoping it's never your Marine, rules of engagement, escalation of force, taking small arms fire from house, having to let detainee go for lack of evidence, running out of wet wipes, running out of water, losing your flashlight, running into razor wire at night, living in the "gray," questioning how much corruption is acceptable, flies in your food, flies in your eye, trying not to be motivated by hate, broken-down vehicles, stuck vehicles, getting caught on an extended patrol without NVGs, did I do enough? did I do it right? and . . . did I mention the sand?

It's just a normal day or week or month out here, but Marines seldom bring up any more than a few of these things to complain about.

Military Academies: A National Treasure
May 27, 2010
By Vice Admiral Jeffrey L. Fowler, U.S. Navy
Superintendent, U.S. Naval Academy

Developing our nation's future military officers is an important national priority. Professional military officers, and the training and education systems that prepare these leaders, significantly contribute to the armed forces' ability to promote peace and prevail in war.

A May 21st opinion piece in the New York Times, The Academies' March Toward Mediocrity, casts doubt on the effectiveness of our military academies in producing the qualified leaders needed to serve in our armed services. The author of the op-ed specifically states that "mediocrity is the norm" at our academies. I strongly disagree with the author's assertions and conclusions.

My perspective on the value of our military academies emerges from 32 years of naval service to include five command tours of duty, operating with our nation's other military branches and allied nations, and encountering the full spectrum of military operations. I have observed countless military academy graduates over my career and can say without the slightest hesitation that these graduates make significant contributions to the well-being of our forces and demonstrate their value to our national defense on a daily basis. As the superintendent of the Naval Academy for the past three years, I have been honored to guide the development process of thousands of midshipmen and can state with confidence that we provide the Navy and Marine Corps with superb young officers who prove their mettle every day in the mountains and villages of Afghanistan, and on, above and below the world's sea lanes.

The op-ed author seems to base his opposition to the academies on three tenets. The first is academy graduates cost more than Reserve Officer Training Corps (ROTC) graduates and this additional cost is not providing the taxpayer with a superior product. The second is that a focus on intercollegiate athletics has had a detrimental impact on the academies' "pursuit of excellence." And the third is that there is "an unofficial affirmative-action preference in [academy] admissions." I will address each of these arguments in turn.

The military academies are of course not the sole source of our nation's officers. For more than a half-century, our officer commissioning sources have included academies, university ROTC programs and officer candidate schools (OCS). Periodic discussions that frame the commissioning source debate as simply a one-or-the-other option dismiss the fact that our military benefits from the distinctive qualities offered by each commissioning source. The military academies have the unique role of providing officers who are immersed in the traditions and values of their respective services and motivated to share and sustain those traditions and values throughout our armed forces. Those who enter the military via ROTC or OCS bring their own unique perspectives and experiences, but have not had the same intense exposure to the daily routine of military life.

The cost associated with educating a Naval Academy midshipman is also far less than stated in the May 21st op-ed. When a midshipman fails to complete the academy program and is charged for their four-year education, that bill comes to $170,000, a figure established by the Department of the Navy. The costs associated with educating an academy student are in fact comparable to or less than the total realized costs of educating an ROTC student at select private or other state-funded universities. At the Naval Academy we take seriously our obligation to the American taxpayers to achieve the maximum return on their investment.

Service academies, as compared to other commissioning sources, also have the ability to quickly adapt academic, leadership and professional curricula to emerging threats and changing world conditions. Simply stated, Naval Academy programs reflect the needs of the customer – the active duty Navy and Marine Corps. Since we control what is taught in academic and professional courses, the Naval Academy has, for example, over the past three years been able to quickly increase foreign language and cultural exposure, initiate cyber warfare studies, adjust engineering and science courses, and tailor ethical decision making case studies to the reality of today's warfare - all to better prepare our graduates to serve in an increasingly interdependent and dynamic world.

In response to the op-ed author's concern about athletic excellence, I must stress that the academies graduate physically fit leaders, not merely scholars. All academy students are student-athletes who strive for physical development via daily fitness routines and either mandatory intramurals, club sports or varsity athletics. While it may be popular to diminish the value of athletic competition at the intercollegiate level, the military academies represent some of the best examples of student-athletes who compete at the highest levels. This commitment to excellence on the field complements the classroom, where the Naval Academy continually ranks number one or two in the nation for student-athlete graduation rates.

Our commitment to athletics also contributes to our midshipmen learning about teamwork, esprit de corps and overcoming adversity. Naval Academy student-athlete graduates are serving faithfully at all levels of the Navy and Marine Corps, from the most junior officers to 4-star admirals, including two former Naval Academy varsity athletes who between them lead U.S. military operations spanning two-thirds of the globe.

Finally, I will address our admissions process. The service academies are national institutions due to our mission to produce leaders for our nation and because our student bodies are comprised of the talent from every corner of America. We search diligently in every congressional district for candidates who are well-rounded morally, mentally and physically, and offer the experience and perspectives that enrich the life of the academy and our military. The backgrounds of these potential candidates cross all racial, gender, ethnic, socio-economic, religious and geographic lines.

I must emphasize that we admit only highly motivated, well-rounded individuals based upon their combined excellence in academics, athletics, leadership potential and community service. Applicants compete in a single, fair, structured and highly selective process. Simply stated, the Naval Academy's admissions processes are in accordance with applicable federal laws and based on an individual's performance and potential for future success as a naval officer.

Not surprisingly, the competition to receive appointments to the academies is intense. Every academy has encountered an increase in the numbers of applicants over the last few years. This increase in applicants goes far beyond economic reasons and reflects the fact that young Americans want to tackle the challenge of an academy, gain useful real-world leadership experiences and be part of something bigger than themselves. Witnessing the commitment to service prevalent across the nation, this generation is running toward the fire, not away from it.

We believe the Naval Academy's reputation for excellence – both past and present – is enduring. We seek young men and women who will be able to balance a demanding academic, physical and leadership development curriculum. As a result, the military academies have been and continue to be ranked among the nation's very top colleges. Many educators, guidance counselors, professional associations and the media recognize the academies for their challenging, progressive and effectual educational programs.

Important indicators at the Naval Academy point to a program that demonstrates excellence, not "mediocrity." A 10-year analysis of semester GPA's shows an upward trend in spite of an increasingly demanding curriculum and an unwavering commitment to maintain the highest of standards in the classroom. During this same timeframe, we note similar progress in our cumulative multiple that measures a student's combined academic, physical and military performance.

The number of midshipmen achieving recognition on the academy's very competitive merit lists has increased, including a doubling of the minority students achieving this distinction over the past 10 years. Nearly 84% of the Naval Academy Class of 2010, all completing a demanding technical course load, will graduate in four years. This achievement very favorably compares to the national average that approaches 30% and 55% for the four- and six-year graduation rates, respectively.

The ultimate measure of the academies' value, however, is the performance of our graduates. Across the board, the feedback we receive is that recent academy graduates are performing superbly, and our Navy and Marine Corps are well served by these leaders. The senior enlisted and officer leaders of our Navy and Marine Corps are telling us that when our graduates report to their units, these young men and women are ready. And those units and our graduates in recent months have been called upon to provide disaster assistance in Haiti, conduct anti-piracy operations off the Horn of Africa and engage in combat in Afghanistan and Iraq. There is no room for mediocrity in these operational theaters and our graduates are proving they are up for the challenge.

A recent decision by the Navy SEALS, arguably one of the most selective and demanding training programs in our military, again points to the quality of Naval Academy graduates. To head off undesirable attrition rates in training, the SEALs increased the dispersal of Naval Academy graduates undergoing SEAL training with officers from other commissioning sources. The Naval Academy graduates' high performance and example of teamwork and drive helped to influence their peers and achieve a noticeable decrease in overall attrition within the SEAL training pipeline.

We receive additional feedback from our congressionally mandated board of visitors—comprised of elected officials, business executives and educators who are appointed by either Congress or the President. These very experienced and accomplished leaders continue to applaud the academies' accomplishments, contributions and direction.

Lastly, the military academies continue to do more than simply graduate officers. As "leadership laboratories" for our students, the mission of the military academies has and continues to include an obligation to graduate leaders to serve the nation. Academy graduates have and will continue to contribute to the military and nation in many ways. Whether our graduates serve a career in the military, or assume positions in government, business and education, academy graduates are highly sought out for their leadership skills and propensity to succeed.

The one point upon which I do agree with the op-ed author is that the academies must always remain vigilant to maintain the level of excellence demanded by our citizens and continually assess and monitor our progress. I believe we are maintaining the highest standards, preparing our young men and women for the complex and volatile world they will face and graduating extraordinary leaders to serve our Navy, Marine Corps and nation. As we march forward, we march only in one direction and that is the direction of selfless service and professional excellence.

An old country preacher.....had a teenage son, and it was getting time the boy should give some thought to choosing a profession. Like many young men his age, the boy didn't really seem to know what he wanted to do, and he didn't seem too concerned about it. One day, while the boy was away at school, his father decided to try an experiment. He went into the boy's room and placed on his study table four objects.

1. A Bible...

2. A silver dollar...

3. A bottle of whisky...

4. And a Playboy magazine...

'I'll just hide behind the door,' the old preacher said to himself. 'When he comes home from school today, I'll see which object he picks up.

If it's the Bible, he's going to be a preacher like me, and what a Blessing that would be!

If he picks up the dollar, he's going to be abusiness man, and that would be okay, too.

But if he picks up the bottle, he's going to be a no-good drunken bum, and Lord, what a shame that would be.

And worst of all if he picks up that magazine he's going to be a Skirt-chasing womanizer.'

The old man waited anxiously, and soon heard his son's footsteps as he entered the house whistling and headed for his room.

The boy tossed his books on the bed, and as he turned to leave the room, he spotted the objects on the table..

With curiosity in his eye, he walked over to inspect them. Finally, he picked up the Bible and placed it under his arm. He picked up the silver dollar and dropped into his pocket. He uncorked the bottle and took a big drink, while he admired this month's centerfold.

'Lord have mercy,' the old preacher disgustedly whispered.

'He's gonna run for Congress.'

The Academies' March Toward Mediocrity
(NEW YORK TIMES 20 MAY 10) ... Bruce Fleming

Annapolis, Md. - THE idea of a football star receiving lenient treatment after testing positive for drug use would raise no eyebrows at most colleges. But the United States Naval Academy "holds itself to a higher standard," as its administrators are fond of saying. According to policy set by the chief of naval operations, Adm. Gary Roughead, himself a former commandant of midshipmen at the academy, we have a "zero tolerance" policy for drug use.

Yet, according to Navy Times, a running back was allowed to remain at Annapolis this term because the administration accepted his claim that he smoked a cigar that he didn't know contained marijuana. (He was later kicked off the team for a different infraction, and has now left the academy.)

The incident brings to light an unpleasant truth: the Naval Academy, where I have been a professor for 23 years, has lost its way. The same is true of the other service academies. They are a net loss to the taxpayers who finance them, as well as a huge disappointment to their students, who come expecting reality to match reputation. They need to be fixed or abolished.

The service academies are holdovers from the 19th century, when they were virtually the only avenue for producing an officer corps for the nation's military and when such top-down institutions were taken for granted. But the world has changed, which the academies don't seem to have noticed, or to have drawn any conclusions from.

With the rise after World War II of the Reserve Officer Training Corps programs at universities around the country, the academies now produce 20 percent or less of the officers in each service, at an average cost to taxpayers of nearly half a million dollars per student, more than four times what an R.O.T.C.-trained officer costs.

The institutions are set on doing things their own way, yet I know of nobody in the Navy or other services who would argue that graduates of Annapolis or West Point are, as a group, better than those who become officers through other programs. A student can go to a civilian school like Vanderbilt, major in art history (which we don't offer), have the usual college social experience and nightlife (which we forbid), be commissioned through R.O.T.C. - and apparently be just as good an officer as a Naval Academy product.

Instead of better officers, the academies produce burned-out midshipmen and cadets. They come to us thinking they've entered a military Camelot, and find a maze of petty rules with no visible future application. These rules are applied inconsistently by the administration, and tend to change when a new superintendent is appointed every few years. The students quickly see through assurances that "people die if you do X" (like, "leave mold on your shower curtain," a favorite claim of one recent administrator). We're a military Disneyland, beloved by tourists but disillusioning to the young people who came hoping to make a difference.

In my experience, the students who find this most demoralizing are those who have already served as Marines and sailors (usually more than 5 percent of each incoming class), who know how the fleet works and realize that what we do on the military-training side of things is largely make-work. Academics, too, are compromised by the huge time commitment these exercises require. Yes, we still produce some Rhodes, Marshall and Truman Scholars. But mediocrity is the norm.

Meanwhile, the academy's former pursuit of excellence seems to have been pushed aside by the all-consuming desire to beat Notre Dame at football (as Navy did last year). To keep our teams in the top divisions of the National Collegiate Athletic Association, we fill officer-candidate slots with students who have been recruited primarily for their skills at big-time sports. That means we reject candidates with much higher predictors of military success (and, yes, athletic skills that are more pertinent to military service) in favor of players who, according to many midshipmen who speak candidly to me, often have little commitment to the military itself.

It's no surprise that recruited athletes have been at the center of recent scandals, including a linebacker who was convicted of indecent assault on a female midshipman in 2007 and a quarterback who was accused of rape and dismissed from the academy for sexual misconduct in 2006. Sports stars are flattered on campus, avoid many of the onerous duties other midshipmen must perform, and know they're not going to be thrown out. Instead of zero tolerance, we now push for zero attrition: we "remediate" honor code offenses.

Another program that is placing strain on the academies is an unofficial affirmative-action preference in admissions. While we can debate the merits of universities making diversity a priority in deciding which students to admit, how can one defend the use of race as a factor at taxpayer-financed academies - especially those whose purpose is to defend the Constitution? Yet, as I can confirm from the years I spent on the admissions board in 2002 and '03 and from my conversations with more recent board members, if an applicant identifies himself or herself as non-white, the bar for qualification immediately drops.

Some in the administration have justified the admissions policies on the ground that it "takes all kinds" to be officers. But that's not really what the academies recruit. They don't give preference to accomplished cellists or people from religious minorities or cerebral Zen types.

We've even given less-qualified students a backdoor into Annapolis - the Naval Academy Preparatory School, our remedial institution in Newport, R.I., for admitted students who are not prepared to enter the academy itself. And if students struggle academically when they get to the academy, our goal is to get them to graduate at whatever cost. Thus we now offer plenty of low-track and remedial courses, and students who fail can often just retake classes until they pass: we have control over their summers and their schedules, and can simply drag them through with tutoring.

I've taught low-track English classes; the pace is slower and the papers shorter than in my usual seminars, but the students who complete them get the same credit. When I've complained about this, some administrators and midshipmen have argued that academics are irrelevant to being an officer, anyway. Really? Thinking and articulating are irrelevant to being an officer?

The picture I have drawn of the academy is not what most Americans imagine when they come to a parade and see all those clean-cut young men and women standing in nice rows with their chests out (as they will at next week's graduation ceremony). Some may argue that our abandonment of merit as a criterion for officer status is simply the direction the military overall has taken - the stress of fighting two wars has lowered the bar for enlistment, and R.O.T.C. standards have also declined. But I'd like to think we could do better.

We have two choices. One is to shut down Annapolis, West Point and the other academies, and to rely on R.O.T.C. to provide officers. Or we can embrace the level of excellence we once had and have largely abandoned. This means a single set of high standards for all students in admissions, discipline and academics. If that means downgrading our football team to Division III, so be it.

We also need a renaissance in our culture. We need to get our students on board with the program by explaining our goals and asking for feedback from cadets, graduates and the armed forces at large. Now, we're just frustrating the students and misleading taxpayers.

Change won't happen from within. The short-term academy administrations want to keep the hype flowing, and tend to lack the big-picture thinking necessary to seeing the institution objectively. Rather, Secretary of Defense Robert Gates and other civilians need to mount a full re-conception of the academies: deciding what do we do that's wrong, what's irrelevant and what deserves to be saved. Otherwise, my most promising students will continue to tell me, "Sir, this place shows you what not to do."

(Bruce Fleming, a professor of English at the United States Naval Academy, is the author of the forthcoming "Bridging the Military-Civilian Divide.")

Secretary Gates' Armed Forces Day Message
By Secretary of Defense Robert M. Gates

WASHINGTON - On the 60th annual Armed Forces day, I want to express how privileged I feel to be the secretary of defense for a military that has not only shown raw courage on the battlefield, but has time and again demonstrated ingenuity and flexibility in complex and unpredictable environments.

As we draw down our troop levels in Iraq, the media spotlight may wander, but the responsibilities resting on each individual servicemember will grow in what will be a carefully synchronized and at times delicate transfer of security responsibility. In Afghanistan, in keeping with the president’s new strategy, thousands more U.S. troops will confront a ruthless enemy and the ambiguities of a country traumatized by decades of war. Our troops will be challenged elsewhere around the world – whether supplying forces in theater, or responding to natural disasters, piracy, or facing a range of other threats and missions.

The Iraq and Afghanistan campaigns demand an ever-changing set of capabilities and competencies. And yet, every day, I am awed by your ability to transform and succeed in a mission that at various stages has called on you not just to be warriors, but also scholars, teachers, policemen, farmers, bankers, engineers, social workers, and many more – often all at the same time.

Patrick Henry, one of the patriots of the American Revolution, wrote more than two centuries ago: “The battle . . . is not to the strong alone; it is to the vigilant, the active, the brave . . .” To that I would add the resourceful, the intelligent, the agile. I am thankful for your willingness to serve, and have the utmost faith in your ability to face the difficult and dangerous missions that lie ahead. Serving with you is the greatest honor of my life.

# # #

History of Armed Forces Day

Armed Forces Day is celebrated annually on the third Saturday of May.

President Harry S. Truman led the effort to establish a single holiday for citizens to come together and thank our military members for their patriotic service in support of our country.

On August 31, 1949, Secretary of Defense Louis Johnson announced the creation of an Armed Forces Day to replace separate Army, Navy, Marine Corps and Air Force Days. The single-day celebration stemmed from the unification of the Armed Forces under one department -- the Department of Defense.

# # #

Dennis McCarthy
Los Angeles Times on April 15, 2010

October 7, 1923 - April 8, 2010
Pamela Murphy, widow of WWII hero and actor, Audie Murphy, died peacefully at her home on April 8, 2010. She is survived by sons, Terry and James. Pam established her own distinctive 30 year career working as a patient liaison at the Sepulveda VA Hospital, where she was much beloved. Services will be held at Forest Lawn (Hollywood Hills) on Friday April 16 at 2:30PM.



Pam Murphy, the widow of Audie Murphy, was involved in the Sepulveda VA hospital and care center over the course of 35 years, treating every veteran who visited the facility as if they were a VIP. Pam Murphy died last week at the age of 90.



After Audie died, they all became her boys. Every last one of them.

Any soldier or Marine who walked into the Sepulveda VA hospital and care center in the last 35 years got the VIP treatment from Pam Murphy. The widow of Audie Murphy – the most decorated soldier in World War II – would walk the hallways with her clipboard in hand making sure her boys got to see a specialist or doctor — STAT. If they didn't, watch out. Her boys weren't Medal of Honor recipients or movie stars like Audie, but that didn't matter to Pam. They had served their country. That was good enough for her. She never called a veteran by his first name. It was always "Mister." Respect came with the job. "Nobody could cut through VA red tape faster than Mrs. Murphy," said veteran Stephen Sherman, speaking for thousands of veterans she befriended over the years. "Many times I watched her march a veteran who had been waiting more than an hour right into the doctor's office. She was even reprimanded a few times, but it didn't matter to Mrs. Murphy. "Only her boys mattered. She was our angel."

Last week, Sepulveda VA's angel for the last 35 years died peacefully in her sleep at age 90.

"She was in bed watching the Laker game, took one last breath, and that was it," said Diane Ruiz, who also worked at the VA and cared for Pam in the last years of her life in her Canoga Park apartment. It was the same apartment Pam moved into soon after Audie died in a plane crash on Memorial Day weekend in 1971. Audie Murphy died broke, squandering million of dollars on gambling, bad investments, and yes, other women. "Even with the adultery and desertion at the end, he always remained my hero," Pam told me. She went from a comfortable ranch-style home in Van Nuys where she raised two sons to a small apartment - taking a clerk's job at the nearby VA to support herself and start paying off her faded movie star husband's debts. At first, no one knew who she was. Soon, though, word spread through the VA that the nice woman with the clipboard was Audie Murphy's widow. It was like saying Patton had just walked in the front door. Men with tears in their eyes walked up to her and gave her a hug. "Thank you," they said, over and over.

The first couple of years, I think the hugs were more for Audie's memory as a war hero. The last 30 years, they were for Pam. She hated the spotlight. One year I asked her to be the focus of a Veteran's Day column for all the work she had done. Pam just shook her head no. "Honor them, not me," she said, pointing to a group of veterans down the hallway. "They're the ones who deserve it." The vets disagreed. Mrs. Murphy deserved the accolades, they said. Incredibly, in 2002, Pam's job was going to be eliminated in budget cuts. She was considered "excess staff." "I don't think helping cut down on veterans' complaints and showing them the respect they deserve, should be considered excess staff," she told me. Neither did the veterans. They went ballistic, holding a rally for her outside the VA gates. Pretty soon, word came down from the top of the VA. Pam Murphy was no longer considered "excess staff." She remained working full time at the VA until 2007 when she was 87. "The last time she was here was a couple of years ago for the conference we had for homeless veterans," said Becky James, coordinator of the VA's Veterans History Project. Pam wanted to see if there was anything she could do to help some more of her boys.

Funeral services for Pam Murphy will be held Friday at 2:30 p.m. in the chapel at Forest Lawn, Hollywood Hills, 6300 Forest Lawn Drive, Los Angeles. Dennis McCarthy's column appears Tuesday, Thursday, Friday and Sunday.

Women to begin serving on Navy subs in 2011, officials say
By Mike Mount
CNN Pentagon Producer
April 29, 2010

(CNN) -- The first women to serve on U.S. Navy submarines are expected to be on the job by fall of 2011, Navy officials said Thursday, ushering in a policy change to what has been an elite service open only to men since the start of the modern Navy's submarine program.

While Defense Secretary Robert Gates announced the change last month, the Navy had to wait for Congress to review and approve the policy change over a 30-day period which ended at midnight Thursday morning.

The official announcement came later Thursday from the commander of Submarine Group 10, Rear Adm. Barry Bruner, during a news conference at the Navy submarine base at Kings Bay, Georgia.

The first women chosen for the program will be selected by the Navy among upcoming graduates from the Naval Academy, the collegiate Reserves Officer Training Corps -- also known as ROTC -- and officer candidate schools.

Those women will go through the intensive 15-month submarine officer training program, which includes nuclear power school, submarine training, and the Submarine Officer Basic Course.

The Navy will implement the policy change by assigning three female officers to eight different crews of guided-missile attack and ballistic-missile submarines. The assignments involve two submarines on the East Coast and two on the West Coast, according to Navy officials.

Smaller, fast-attack submarines are considered to be too small to accommodate the necessary infrastructure change in living quarters that is possible on the larger subs, Navy officials explained.

Integrating female officers into the submarine squadrons is the first phase of the policy change. Including female enlisted sailors into the crews will take place in a second phase in the coming years, the officials said.

Women joined the crews of the Navy's surface ships in 1994, but officials had previously cited limited privacy and the cost of reconfiguring the vessels in arguing against their joining sub crews.

The change in policy was recommended by the top naval officer, Adm. Gary Roughead; the secretary of the Navy, Ray Mabus; and Gates. No Navy leaders opposed the plan, officials said.

"The young women that have come up to me since we announced our intention to change the policy have such great enthusiasm," Roughead said in a statement Thursday.

"There are extremely capable women in the Navy who have the talent and desire to succeed in the submarine force," Mabus added in the same statement.

Women make up 15 percent of the active duty Navy: 52,446 of 330,700 sailors in the service, according to Navy statistics.

Female sailors still cannot serve in the elite SEAL program, because those are considered frontline combat unit positions. Similar regulations in the other branches of the military also prevent women from serving in combat positions.

Jim . . . The webpage below describing your C-130 landing on Forrestal (with video) was found by one of my USS Cobbler (SS344) crew members and forwarded to the Cobbler submariners who attended our recent reunion in Charleston. . . demonstrating that submariners can appreciate extraordinary accomplishments, wherever they occur.

Bud

----- Original Message -----
Sent: Wednesday, April 28, 2010 7:30 PM
Subject: Fw: Blue Angels

I received this from Captain Alexander. As the Captain notes, RADM Flatley spoke to the Cobbler reunion group during the memorial service on board the USS Yorktown at Patriot's Point.

I'm sure there were more than a few nervous sailors when Admiral Flatley landed his C130 on an aircraft carrier. The story of that accomplishment is at THIS LINK.

(Sunday Times, UK, April 25, 2010)
Haiti hell continues months after earthquake
The dust has settled, the news crews have gone, and gangs are seizing the aid. Do Haitians have any hope left?
By A.A. Gill

Children's wards in emergency hospitals don't get any easier. Knowing what to expect just makes it worse. But I've learnt not to talk. You just can't trust your voice. And don't let them see you choke. The one thing they really don't need is any more expensively imported western tears.

The tented wards of this make-do hospital are pitched in the courtyard of an old concrete-and-brick one that was untouched by the earthquake, perhaps protected by the little icon of the Virgin Mary. The sick and injured won't go back inside. They're terrified of another shock, of being trapped in their beds under this sorry, suspended, crushing weight. So it hangs empty.

Outside is the Cité Soleil, on the edge of Port-au-Prince, which was, even before the earthquake, the worst place to be a child on Earth. This corrugated slum, built of slime and shit, with its open veins of infectious effluent, is also, by a fathomless irony, shaken but unshriven by the hand of God. It still sprawls triumphant, in all its malignant, blighted horror.

The maternity tent is a mixed, sweet-and-salt place. Babies are all blessings, tokens of hope, and most mothers lie on their little camp beds, safe for the moment in the bubble of relief and joy that birth brings. But this is no time or place to be an infant or a new mother. Most of these women have lost family, their own mothers, and have no homes to return to.

A woman sits, bent and shrouded in misery, on her lap a tiny sprite of a thing, baggy in its own skin. His eyes flutter, head lolls, too heavy for the spindly neck. I've seen this before, this mite, havering in the doorway of life. A doctor whispers that he has hydrocephalus. An hour or so away, in Florida, they'd fit a pipe in his head and drain the liquid. "But we can't do it here, and anyway, he'd need regular medical help over years. That isn't available."

His prognosis? The doctor shrugs. The little heart pounds in its chest, the stubborn breath stretches the ribs. Only when it's hopeless, when death waits impatient in the corner for the final count, do you truly comprehend how tenaciously fierce, how brave the imperative mechanics and the vital spark of life are.

In the cot next to the dying child is a bright little boy wedged between cushions. He has huge eyes and beams up at me, holding out his arms. "He likes to be hugged," says a Belgian logistician. "He trusts everybody. He was left in a rubbish bin." A Haitian rubbish bin, a post-apocalyptic cess-skip. He was missing a finger. "Probably eaten by rats", which is not as nightmarishly rare as you might think. Rats come in the night and eat toes, fingers, sometimes noses. He is about nine months old.

This isn't a newly unwanted child — not a guilty secret or a family sin. Someone looked after this little lad for as long as they possibly could, and then in the midst of horror, of death and the earth-moving despair, they made him rubbish. He chuckles and stretches his hands out to me, and I know that if I pick him up it will be impossible to ever put him down again. What have you called him, I ask. "Herod." Say that again? "Herod." You named this child after the man who ordered the murder of the innocents? There is no tragedy so utter that a Belgian, with the best will in the world, can't make worse.

This earthquake was a women's tragedy. It was of course a nation's tragedy, but it leant particularly heavily on women. There are no figures, but it seems that more women died than men. It was the time of day, the late afternoon, women were at home cooking, making the children's tea, when the sky fell. In the amputees' wards my rough count finds twice as many women as men, and the hospitals are beginning to see an increase in the number of rape victims. There is a lot of muttered gossip about the vulnerability of girls, their families smashed, orphaned, foisted on neighbours and distant relatives in overcrowded camps, themselves mostly built and maintained by women, who still do all the washing, cleaning and cooking and protect the young.

On the benches, women wait to see the doctor. Quiet and serene, they hold each others' hands and mantle wan children with their arms, hard, capable fingers resting in laps, their faces ironed by grief, set with a brutal resolve. There's something else I've seen before that's difficult to explain; there is a terrible, calm beauty in calamity.

I was last in Haiti for its despairing bicentennial in 2004. It was the most frightening place I'd ever been to. I was gassed, shot at, threatened with voodoo zombies; there were bodies in the streets. I watched the army beat up students, and a lad was shot and killed in a gang fight in front of me. The streets were run by trucks of thugs and murderers known as the Chimères. It's said they were paid by President Aristide, a one-time Catholic priest who was rumoured to pound live babies in a mortar and pestle to make the voodoo that kept him in power. The place seethed with fury and lashings of violence. It wasn't anarchy. Anarchy implies a philosophy, a rough purpose.

It was a howling chaos. The one belief that united most Haitians was the conviction that the country was, and always had been, cursed. As I left, I thanked God I'd never have to come back to this black and benighted place. Be careful what you're grateful for — you may get seconds.

The new airport is a surly chaos of duffel bags and boxes. Most of the people milling helplessly appear to be groups of American fundamentalist Christians. There are a lot of kids on God-sanctioned adventures dressed in African safari gear and T-shirts proclaiming their goodness. They are excited and crass. The other half are Haitians returning home to find family, to pick through rubble, bringing money and blankets and CD players. We were held up on the runway in Miami for three hours; a group of excited Baptists passed huge bags of beef jerky over the heads of the people they were coming to offer holy succour to.

The fenced-off airfield is a vast dump of stuff: military tents, warehouses, helicopters and equipment. There are hundreds of charities here, NGOs, international bodies, thousands of workers, volunteers, professionals, some more useful than others. They all need beds, food, water, western sanitation. The first concern of all these organisations is the health and safety of their members — an enormous amount of the logistics is used to support the purveyors of logistics and the mongers of prayer.

The American army and the UN police and peacekeepers sit behind their barbed wire, maintaining themselves with a bored, grumpy, fat indolence, occasionally motoring up the road in armoured personnel carriers and mirrored Ray-Bans. They don't go to the plastic-and-tarpaulin cities if they can help it. And they can help it most of the time.

At first sight, Port-au-Prince looks remarkably as I remember it — even before the disaster it was the crumbliest, most backward and pitiful capital in the western hemisphere. As we get into town, I start to notice the collapsed buildings. Tectonic plates are capricious in their choices. Random houses fall in on themselves; their neighbours remain upright. Buildings pushed onto their sides split open to reveal the eerily empty dollhouse rooms of domestic probity. Rubble spews into the street in great, emetic mounds. Electric cables swag the traffic, supermarkets, offices, hotels, the presidential palace, cathedrals, all rent and laid low by Haiti's geology.

On hillsides, the poorest breeze-block-and-concrete homes have collapsed into forlorn heaps, throwing up pathetically mutilated furniture, ragged, bright clothes, crockery, shoes, shattered ornaments, kitchen utensils, shredded books and fluttering photographs of the dead, all like a bitter harvest of chattels. It looks so insignificant. So undramatic. So bereft of gravitas and dignity — just annoying rubble. The air is hot and heavy with moisture, stiff with the stench of rot and dung, and sometimes you stumble into the sickly-sweet stink that is unforgettably a corpse. The smell of departed souls, the gagging odour of sanctity. Bodies still lie entombed under slabs. Nobody knows how many.

Just to get this straight, lest we forget, this is the greatest, most cataclysmic disaster of the modern era. The worst natural organic event since the demise of Christ. The official death toll is somewhere around 230,000. Local people think it's much higher. If you're into top-10 lists of misery, you might argue that the Asian tsunami was worse, but that was spread over two continents. This happened in the space between London and Brighton in a nation of barely 10m.

The survivors do their living in the streets. On every piece of flat land, there are lean-tos and shacks. The bivouacs of the displaced choke petrol-station forecourts and lay-bys. The parks are like human beehives. Laundry is strung from trees, charcoal fires smoke, pigs and chickens pick through the syrupy rubbish. Ranks of throat-searing portable loos cling to the outskirts in a vain attempt to stop the shit infecting everything.

As there is no regular or clean water, it has to be brought to the city every day by tanker. Urchins sell small plastic bags of water that tastes of chlorine. This doesn't feel like it's a short flight from Florida, or one half of an island that is a golf-strewn, five-star holiday getaway. Haiti has always seemed more African than Caribbean. It's like Accra or Freetown. Haiti has held onto its slave roots, the dark pride of being the very first black republic. The first black army to defeat a white one since Hannibal. The only non-European army to lay Napoleon low. The French extracted a terrible price for this humiliation. They took Haiti's entire hardwood forest as reparation, which led to the worst soil erosion of any country in the world. Now the main industry is aid, drug- and gun-running, and stitching cheap T-shirts.

The first wave of disaster relief has departed, and with it the news crews. I can find only a desk man for AFP diligently trying to rustle up a story a day, and a camera crew from Al Jazeera. Contrarily, and without apparent irony, the preferred story in a natural catastrophe is a good-news one: miraculous rescues and escapes, acts of heroism and bravery, selfless rescue workers from Rotherham, sniffer dogs from Barking, saintly surgeons from Surbiton. As the hope of more wide-eyed victims being plucked from the grave diminishes, as the disaster medics wrap up their kit and go, so too do the 24-hour rolling-news teams. This is very expensive stuff, and nobody has the budget or the audience for the grim, dull depression of resurrection.

The emergency hospitals are no longer dealing with trauma. They have to see to the grind of exacerbated poverty, the infantile diarrhoea, the constant respiratory problems, the infections and sores. In the makeshift hospital run by the Swiss, the most common complaint they're treating is Mups — Multiple, Unexplained Physical Symptoms. Aka grief. Or the need for a bed. Or the yearning for some attention, or the hope of a pill that might make it all right.

A young doctor, eyes bright with messianic ire, tells me about the initial response to the crisis: "We are finding people in the shanty slums with the metal armatures, the rods, the broken legs still in place. People holding their medical notes who were treated and dumped. There is a woman we found living in a plastic-bag tent. She had fourth-stage breast cancer. In the West it would be considered too far gone to operate, but someone flew her to the Dominican Republic, gave her a mastectomy, stitched her with metal staples and somehow brought her back and left her in Port-au-Prince. She has a CD with her medical records. A CD. Her wound is infected — we don't have the equipment to remove the staples. She is still dying. Who could do that? And the people the Americans took away — the ones with crush injuries, the respiratory trauma, who needed breathing tubes. They went to the aircraft carrier. Where is it? Gone. Where are the patients?"

There was so much haphazard, arbitrary emergency medicine, so many children flown around the globe towing film crews. Surgeons and doctors from rich, first-world hospitals took pride in giving first-world treatment, began long courses of drugs and procedures that nobody can afford, from pharmacies that don't exist. There was an assumption that someone else would arrive in their wake and turn this into a real, functioning country.

There are hundreds and hundreds of amputees. The most common injury among survivors is the guillotining of an arm or a leg, severed by a wall or a ceiling. There are many children without feet or hands. The amputations were done quickly; victims had often been lying for hours or days, crushed. Now that they have to be given prosthetics, the long process of rehabilitation, of exercising atrophied muscles, must start. A lot of stumps were left raw and weak. The victims have to have their legs re-amputated. A woman wails beside a bed, waving her hands, imploring God. Her husband and sons are dead. She is with her daughter, who lost a leg and now must have it cut again. Is there no end to the pain, to the disappointment? She cries hopelessly.

But medicine is no longer the most pressing concern. There is a boiling, unreported problem with logistics. It's getting practical aid to the millions who live under plastic. This is the second wave of the disaster. If they drive a truck full of tents, or buckets, or beans — just about anything — into a refugee camp, there is a riot. The charity workers are bullied and beaten, the goods are fought over, destroyed, stolen, to reappear again on the black market. There is no infrastructure, no order, no way to distribute aid. The government has no power. The NGOs are young volunteers who can't police themselves; the UN and the Americans have no mandate or desire to get physical; and the victims, struggling every day without practical help, grow angrier.

They know that huge amounts of money have been given for their relief, they know that third-rate pop stars and reality-show contestants are covering saccharine power ballads for their benefit, that stand-up comedians and over-the-hill soap-opera actors are running marathons on their behalf, but they're not seeing it. What they see are streets jammed with 4x4s in the branded logos of charity, driven by white kids.

This is a country that has only ever existed as a kleptocracy — a masterclass in corruption. Everyone knows that the money, the goods must have been stolen by businessmen, by charities, by American Christians, and they're being sold. So people are beginning to take desperate measures — they have started kidnapping white aid workers as a lever to get back what should be theirs. This is also kept unreported.

Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF), whom I travelled with, have just had two nurses kidnapped. They were freed after a few days, unharmed. MSF say no ransom was paid — they never pay. The police say someone paid. There are rumours about other NGOs; nobody wants to make this public, but executed bodies have appeared, and it changes the whole shape of the problem — makes everything much, much more fraught, much harder, more cautious, and slower.

The two or three expensive hotels left in the old colonial part of the city are packed. Not with charity workers but born-again baby-nappers and businessmen, here to make an opportunity out of a disaster. There is a good deal of potential here — a lot of money to be spent. Sharp-eyed buccaneers sell phone masts and digging equipment. Experts hawk their expertise. T-shirt moguls are in the market for T-shirts.

A half-trashed, ferrety little expat Englishman buttonholes me at a bar. He's selling protection: "I cover all of Latin America." He's doing a brisk trade in bodyguards, drivers, kidnap insurance, all the belt-and-braces kit of paranoia. It's expensive but, he says, charities pay to protect their staff, or rather the people who pay charities pay. It all comes out of the aid budget.

He nods at a large and threatening Haitian standing in a corner. "There's my security. Of course he carries a gun — probably won't need it, but I wouldn't go out after dark without him." I gave the bloke a long look. I wouldn't go out after dark with him. "You should think about it," he says. "You're high-profile, work for a rich international company." Thanks, but I think I'll stick with my tried-and-tested strategy. "Oh yeah, what's that?" Hysterical begging and soiling myself.

We drive to the outskirts of the Cité Soleil to deliver tents to a small community. On the way, we pass ghost camps: smart local entrepreneurs put up fake rag towns, like venus flytraps, to catch unwary charities. There are signs on the road saying simply "Help". The distribution has taken days to arrange. The community appointed a leader, a dignified and stalwart woman. There is a list of which families will get tents. The team of MSF workers hold a masterclass in putting them up. The community has spent a couple of days clearing the land; they've organised their own security. It's friendly and jolly, but it's an awful lot of work for a very small distribution.

Getting here, we drove up the wrong road and came across a gang from the slum, their faces obscured with scarves and balaclavas. They cut the attitude of hard men the third world over, and turned us back. They're guarding the city's landfill, a broad plain of smoking detritus, the stuff that has been thrown away a dozen times before it gets here. This is their fiefdom, the last scavengers at the end of a long train of disposable, replaceable western civilisation, the violent vigilantes of filth. And underneath the smoking, stinking field that is their harvest, are bulldozed 100,000 mangled corpses.

Another winning top-10 fact: this is a disaster that uniquely cost more than the country is worth. Haiti is technically an insurance write-off. In New York there is a donor conference where they're asking governments, philanthropies and charities to stump up $17 billion. That is 120% of Haiti's value. Bill Clinton said that if the international community put Haiti back to the way it was the day before the earthquake, it would have failed. This is a once-only opportunity to build a whole new country from scratch, perhaps to offer something of the good wishes the new nation should have been given 200 years ago.

The big, blue-sky idea is to build a brand-new city. This port is silted up and unusable. For this sort of money they could just abandon Port-au-Prince to the dead, leave its cursed slums to the zombies. But right now, the aid distribution of the tents, the food, the plastic legs, is a race against time and the patience of the survivors. The rains are coming. There is the serious threat of mudslides. Nobody knows how the newly fractured geology of the city will behave.

We go to another shanty town built up a precipitous hillside. They call it, with a marvellous irony, Tapis Rouge — the red carpet. In the ruins at the top of the slum, two boys hold a wailing, ecstatic service of mourning in a collapsed house. From up here you can see right across the city to the sea. The main street slaloms away with rills of red, foaming water, like pale blood. The first thunderstorm of the year has just passed. Everything gleams, the streets are full of people, vivid and energetic. Children shout and jump ropes, kick balls and fly tiny tissue kites. Neighbours sit on boxes, chat and listen to radios. "Hey, Blanc," the girls shout, "bonjour, Blanc."

The girls flirt, with hot, teasing energy. They look directly and quizzically deep into your eyes, with a hooded mischief. They flash their teeth and poke the tips of their pink tongues out. The girls, hands on their hips, sashay and shimmy. They do it not for money, nor from desperation, nor really in the expectation of any consummation, but for the quick, intense pleasure of being able to, for the exercise of their power. To feel attractive, not to waste the terrific force of their youth, and for that fleeting thrill that is lifted out of this grief like a little tissue kite. Flirting is sowing a seed of human contact, blowing a kiss to another world, a moment's light optimism, and it's heartbreakingly touching, and funny, and unnerving.

We slip down the hill in an a cappella clucking of sucked teeth, clicked fingers, skipping songs and laughter. At the side of the muddy track, wet children sell mudcakes — smooth, round biscuits made of water and soil and a little fat, baked in the sun. They are eaten by the starving: fill your mouth with earth, your stomach with the grave.

I have never seen these anywhere else in the world. Mudcakes are a Haitian speciality. We're here to see the slum's head man, to organise the giving of survival packs — a basic starter box of life: a tarpaulin, a bucket, soap, water-purifying pills, sanitary towels, nappies and some food. We find him in a lean-to, sitting behind a desk, flanked by silent muscle and lots of children. There are mobile phones, a telly, a DVD player, a satellite decoder.

He is instantly recognisable — it's the black Tony Soprano surrounded by the trappings of his power. He's amused and friendly, with an edge of smiling psycho-menace. With an air of a man who's rarely been told "no", he tries to make these negotiations for aid sound as if they were organised by him on behalf of his people. The MSF negotiators are firm and poker-faced. He does what bullies do: he pats children and makes light of the things he can't get. His lieutenants look stony. The children weave between their legs like cats. They're all aware that disasters like this only happen once in a millennium. This is an opportunity — they're strung and tense, waiting to catch the wave.

We leave and I ask why they're doing business with the gangs, these malevolent bloodsuckers who've blighted Haiti since the Tonton Macoutes, who make the poor poorer and a lot of them dead. "At the moment, these are the only people who can guarantee the security of a distribution." But they'll give it to their cronies, sell it, use it as leverage. "We hope not. We will do what we can, but it's more important to get this stuff into the community until we can deliver so much it loses its value." These are the hard truths of charity.

The late afternoon light is soft and warm. The distant sea shimmers like lamé. The slum could almost be homely, lounging in the silky red earth. On the crowded street a teenage girl bathes from a bucket; naked to the waist, she's skinny as a whip, glossy with bubbles, and gasps with a flashing white smile, her hands held in a simple, supplicant blessing as her mother pours water over her back. It is a small baptism — washing away the cruel earth, the dust of death and grief, the loss, washing away the past, leaving a laughing girl bathed in the shining, golden light.

An Age of Untruth

Posted By Victor Davis Hanson
Five Lies We Live With

Can't We All Just Get Along?

Make no mistake about it, this is a dishonest age. That our daily lives are purportedly advanced in the cause of the common good, nevertheless do not make them any less lies.

Beware of sudden and apparently reasonable "calls for civility." That pathetic mantra is usually voiced by a liberal administration and its supporters when criticism mounts that they are taking the country too far to the Left — like the Clinton implosion in 1993 or Obama today. I fear "civility" does not mean one should not write novels or produce movies contemplating murdering George Bush — that's sort of an understandable agitprop art. "Civility" does not mean the New York Times should not give discounts to run ads in wartime like "General Betray Us." That's needed dissidence. Civility does not suggest that a Sen. Durbin, or Sen. Kerry, or Sen. Kennedy not use inflammatory language that compares our own troops or personnel to terrorists, Nazis, Pol Pot, Stalinists, or Saddam Hussein's torturers; that most certainly in not uncivil. And it was certainly not impolite for Rep. Stark to call President Bush a "liar."

"Civility" does not mean that we should not spew hate at anti-war protests; that's grass-roots popular protest. It doesn't mean that we should not employ Nazi and fascistic labels to tar the President of the United States like John Glenn or Al Gore or Robert Byrd did. "Civility" does not mean that a shrill Hillary Clinton should not scream that the Bush administration is trying to silence critics, or suggest that the commanding general of an entire theater was lying to Congress in ways that require a "suspension of disbelief." That's needed pushback.

O Ye of Little Memory! Do we recall any American shock when the Guardian published Charles Brooker's lament — "John Wilkes Booth, Lee Harvey Oswald, John Hinckley Jr. — where are you now that we need you?" And I don't recall anyone felt that language was getting too heated when Howard Dean, head of the Democratic Party, fumed, "I hate the Republicans and everything they stand for." And was it not The New Republic that highlighted Jonathan Chait's infamous "Why I Hate George W. Bush" article? Of course, there was that thoroughly civil New York play, "I'm Gonna Kill the President."

So, please, spare us the sanctimonious rot about being shocked by conservative metaphors like "lock and load" or "targeting" vulnerable Democratic districts. Like it or not, "civility" has nothing to do with real civility that is bipartisan in fashion and necessary for tolerance in a politically diverse culture. It simply means that conservatives must be stopped in their Neanderthal opposition to an enlightened agenda by any means necessary — by being uncivil to them when conservatives are in power, and demanding they not do the same when liberals run things. All political parties wish it both ways; but in the present age, the media and a cultural elite really have convinced themselves that speaking out against Barack Obama is a sort of heresy while smearing the Bush "regime" was de rigueur.

Diversity? Not.

Beware of the ubiquitous "diversity." Diversity does not mean needed difference, as in a community of religiously diverse people — for example, a Harvard with plentiful booths in the free speech area promoting Mormonism, or ROTC, or support for Israel, or anti-abortion. "Diversity" does not mean 51-49 % votes in the faculty Senate over condemning or supporting the Iraq War of 2003.

"Diversity" does not equate to a faculty department equally divided among Marxists, liberals, conservatives, and libertarians. No, sadly "diversity" is a second-generation word that was by needs reinvented to supplant the Orwellian "affirmative action."

In the 1980s, American elite culture grasped that the old superstructure of racial preference was both too cumbersome and too narrow all at once: Too cumbersome in the sense that too many were asking uncomfortable questions like, "Why are we giving preference in hiring or admission to a Spanish aristocrat named José Lopes, as if he were a supposedly underprivileged Mexican-American who suffers from a legacy of racism?," or "Why is someone in the upper-middle class who is half African-American given preference, and not a poor darker Mohinder Singh from the Punjab who in theory would encounter as much or more discrimination?," or "Why are all these cynical white-looking kids claiming their grandmothers were one-eighth Cherokee?"

And yet affirmatives action was also all too narrow in the sense that should not upper-class women, and wealthy gays or hyper-achieving, wealthy Asians, likewise, be entitled to help?

In answer to both the contradictions of racial preferences and its narrowness, "diversity" came onto the scene. To the degree that anyone could establish that they were not completely white, male, Christian and heterosexual, they were "diverse" members of the community and could perhaps find some advantage or boost in the fierce competition for jobs and influence and money. No one could define diversity, but miraculously all seem to recognize it when they saw it.

The real diversity — that of differences in thinking and independence of opinion — was hardly welcome, and any sort of call for such genuine diversity of thought was seen as hostile and sometimes had to be dubbed "reactionary," "racist," "homophobic," "sexist," etc.

So we ended up with "diversity" meaning "university" — a synonym for monolithic intolerance, for everyone worshiping "diversity" without exception. If that seems harsh, it is also the way things are.

Wind and Solar and Millions of Green Jobs!

"Green Power" and "wind and solar" oddly do not mean that we are going to power our homes and cars with entirely new fuels, at least in our lifetimes.

Instead that entire green lexicon assures us that we can feel good about ourselves by symbolic gestures, like subsidizing a noble wind farm or putting up an impressive solar panel through government subsidies that mask the current non-competitiveness of such alternate power. The truth is that 21st-century internal combustion engines are revolutionary compared with their fossilized predecessors just three decades ago. Like it or not, such engines — preferably in the near future burning natural gas that is becoming more, not less retrievable, and in combination with batteries or biofuel blends — will continue to power our cars. Semi-trucks, earth-moving equipment, and tractors are not going to become electrically powered any time soon.

Nuclear power, when all the acrimony dies down, will be reluctantly seen as the real green power. Again, for now all the Gore-related vocabulary will serve two main purposes: to make those who master and manipulate it quite rich, and the rest of us feel very good about ourselves — all the while as some sort of carbon-based fuel helps to power our cars, or a nuclear fuel powers our homes and charges car batteries, allowing us energy independence and a reduction in pollution. As we see with the current unprecedented shut-down of all air travel in Europe, nature in a second, not mankind in years, determines what we puny humans will and will not do.

Stimulus Everywhere

Recoil from the word "stimulus" — whether used by a Republican or Democratic administration. There is no such thing as an easy, fuzzy notion of instant money creating economic growth. Instead it is a euphemism not for borrowing, but for massive borrowing and unsustainable debt. Indeed, note that we do not even use words like "borrowing" or "debt," but instead prefer "deficit" (e.g., It's only a year-to-year thing) and "stimulus" (e.g., spending what we don't have somehow makes us richer in the future).

"Stimulus" is thus a lie as it is used, or at best a half-truth.

The truth — even if right now we were to go ahead with a return to the Clinton tax tables, raise the caps on income subject to Social Security taxes, have the states keep increasing their sales and income taxes, and apply new Obama surcharges on health care — is that we are still going broke.

Do the math: $12 trillion is a lot of debt ($40,000 for each of us, $200,000 for a family of five starting out in the world — like a second home mortgage in other words). Twenty trillion dollars in just eight more years is doom (like two family vacation homes to pay for without the vacation homes to vacation to).

We are lied to about this almost every day: the government is going to have to cut federal spending in massive amounts, unless we choose to impose a nightmarish VAT tax, and watch thousands of new unionized federal employees spend trillions of hours deciding which item is politically incorrect enough to be VATed.

So when I hear "stimulus," or "jobs bill," I conclude that when the interest rates return to normal soon, we are going to take on Medicare, Social Security, defense, and almost everything else in the federal budget. Euphemism will perhaps again help some. Maybe we can invent new words like "furlough," as in California where it really means, "Since we can't touch your union contracted salary, you simply won't work a day a month and we won't pay you either."

Cuts to Medicare can be "adjustments." Reductions in Social Security can be "refinements." "Downsizing" means getting rid of three carrier groups. "Forward looking" will be ending NASA as we knew it. As solace, at least our politicians will feel that the lying will be of the Platonic noble sort, inasmuch as we will be creating falsity to lower rather than raise spending, albeit brought on by the law of physics rather than our wise intentions.

Illegal What?

Almost everything said in association with "illegal immigration" is false. No, the now stalled fence is not a futile symbol of apartheid; in places where it is finished, it has discouraged illegal entry and reminded us that all counties have rights of autonomy.

Do not believe that "illegal alien" is necessarily a hurtful or inexact term. Everyone who crosses the border without proper authorization is both doing something "illegal" (not a mere "infraction"), and is an alien (not a U.S. citizen; "alien" = "not of this place".) When I lived in Greece in the 1970s, I was an alien; had I overstayed my visa, or accepted work without proper documentation, I would have been an illegal alien.

"Anti-immigrant" is also a lie peddled in service to open borders — a lie by virtue that it deliberately blends "immigrant" with "illegal immigrant" to suggest opposition to all legal immigration. (In fact, Americans quite clearly support legal immigration.) It's a lie by virtue that it personalizes opposition to particular "immigrants" rather than the concept of "illegal immigration." And it's a lie by its emphasis on "anti," since opponents of open borders are not "anti" anything; they are pro-law and pro-enforcement of existing statutes. Those who break the law or advocate undermining existing legislation are clearly "anti" a lot.

Avoid blanket generalizations that all illegal aliens are either criminals or all hard-working wonderful people, just trying to get ahead. Instead, simply imagine what you would do if you lived in dire poverty under a corrupt, racist system and survival was a mere 6 hours a way to the north — and factor in all the psychological, emotional, and intellectual rationalizations that you would embrace to justify your illegal entry and efforts to feed you or your family, either through minimum wage steady employment, off the books cash for ad hoc labor, or government entitlement, or all three.

To the degree we are getting audacious bold people willing to take risks to come to America, we are also perhaps getting people who have little problem breaking the law with the acknowledgment that they will have to keep breaking law for years after arrival. I'll let you decide which plus does or does not make up for which minus in that illegal immigration equation.

To the degree illegal aliens are poor in comparison, not with their comrades back home, but with communities in their new country, is to the degree anyone would be so, who does not know the language, does not have legal sanction and does not have a high school diploma. Racism plays little, if any, role. To remedy all three as quickly and painlessly as possible, one would of course support making speaking English optional, making being legal superfluous, and making diplomas mere certificates rather than proof of rigorous years of education.

To the degree one is poor, is to the degree all unskilled laborers are in a terrible recession, and to the degree any immigrants would be, who, on limited wages, in aggregate send back a collective $25 billion home in remittances.

So what is illegal immigration? For most, it is a desperate attempt by the poor of Latin America to find a better life in America, made all the more attractive because postmodern America has no confidence in its institutions and thus asks little of its immigrants in accepting our own culture.

And for us, the hosts?

For the corporation it is a way to profit, masked in libertarian apologetics, of letting the market adjudicate labor costs without government interference.

For the racial tribalist it is payback for the Mexican War of two centuries prior.

For the liberal machine, it is an instant way through serial amnesty to hook a block constituency and redraw the electoral map of the American Southwest.

For the postmodernist, it is a way to accelerate the end of the old melting pot and to substitute a salad bowl of constantly competing ethnic and tribal interests that can be united under elite liberal guidance to thwart the entrenched interests of supposedly corporate and nativist-run America.

The problem I think right now for the liberal cause is not just the Tea Parties. Rather, tens of millions of Americans have tuned out the sermons, and no longer believe much of what they are told. They clearly do not care for the moral lectures that they are subjected to. Instead, they suspect that their self-appointed moral censors are either self-interested or disingenuous — or worse still.

So how odd: we live in an age of untruth in which millions privately shrug and nod at the daily lies of our elites.

Top Ten Iconic Business Movies of All Time
by Katie Loovis

We asked the BCLC Business & Society Relations Working Group to vote on the top ten iconic business movies. There have been many popular business movies over the last century, so we had to stick to some strict criteria. Each nominee was expected to be popular enough that the average person would recognize the movie, have a business theme run throughout, and be any genre with the exception of documentaries (that could be an entire list in and of itself!). We didn't care if the movies portrayed business in a positive or negative light, we just wanted to know what corporate citizens think are the movies that have had the biggest influence in shaping the way people think about business.

The results may surprise you:

10) Working Girl (1988) - Melanie Griffith shows the Horatio Alger story still resonates powerfully in the American psyche.

9) Trading Places (1983) - you will never look at orange juice or pork bellies the same way again.

8) Jerry Maguire (1996) - Show Me the Money!

7) Glengarry Glen Ross (1992) - ABC - "Always Be Closing."

6) A Christmas Carol (all movie adaptations) - probably has done more to prejudice little kids against bankers than any other story ever.

5) Pursuit of Happyness (2006) - "You got a dream... You gotta protect it. People can't do somethin' themselves, they wanna tell you you can't do it. If you want somethin', go get it. Period." (Christopher Gardner)

4) Avatar (2009) - crippled marine falls in love with alien and thwarts mining company's pursuit of profit while making $2.7 billion in worldwide box office; 3 Oscars to boot. And who says the contradictions of capitalism aren't alive and well?

3) Wall Street (1987) - if we thought "Greed is Good" back in the 80s, what do we think about Wall Street now? The sequel comes out later this year.

2) It's a Wonderful Life (1946) - this paean to small business and American values is a timeless classic.

1) Citizen Kane (1941) - considered by many to be the greatest movie of all time, it defines the idea that being a media tycoon isn't all it is cracked up to be.

These movies certainly convey strong perspectives on business - for better or worse. Some of the movies portray business as a destructive force in society, often led by selfish, greedy individuals (Avatar, Wall Street); while other movies feature individuals who lift themselves to a higher quality of life and accomplishing their dreams through business (Working Girl, Pursuit of Happyness). We see that honorable people can do well and do good (Jerry Maguire). More often than not, the movies portray a juxtaposition - we see business at its worst and best all in one film. Look no further than Mr. Potter vs. George Bailey or Ebeneezer Scrooge vs. Bob Cratchit (It's a Wonderful Life, Christmas Carol).

But who really cares about how business is portrayed in movies? Well... corporate citizens for starters. Just ask anyone at Wal-Mart, Nike, or Toyota if the public's perception of business matters. The public is demanding more corporate transparency and authenticity. Corporate social responsibility, done well, can influence everything from supply chain to strategy, and in the end, and the results can help earn public trust. Strong corporate citizens can be seen as a good investment by all stakeholders, including investors, employees, customers, community members, and regulators. So it's no surprise that more than 3,000 companies have a formal corporate citizenship function. And these CSR executives are working to break stereotypes, earn trust, build goodwill that their business is making a positive difference in society.

So what do you think? Who else would you include in this list?

The U.S. Chamber's Business Civic Leadership Center (BCLC) launched the "ten" campaign to help educate the public on the history, milestones, and trends in corporate social responsibility. Commenced in March 2010 in conjunction with BCLC's ten-year anniversary, "ten" is a ten-month multimedia campaign that includes a series of ten top-ten lists, forums, and an interactive portal for the public to talk-back and engage in this national discussion. The next list "Misperceptions" will be released in May.

THE ONLY FLAG THAT DOESN'T FLY

Between the fields where the flag is planted, there are 9+ miles of flower fields that go all the way to the ocean. The flowers are grown by seed companies. It's a beautiful place, close to Vandenberg AFB. Check out the dimensions of the flag. The Floral Flag is 740 feet long and 390 feet wide and maintains the proper Flag dimensions, as described in Executive Order #10834. This Flag is 6.65 acres and is the first Floral Flag to be planted with 5 pointed Stars, comprised of White Larkspur. Each Star is 24 feet in diameter; each Stripe is 30 feet wide. This Flag is estimated to contain more than 400,000 Larkspur plants, with 4-5 flower stems each, for a total of more than 2 million flowers.

April 9 – National Ex-POW Recognition Day

From Gerald Burrus, POW coordinator, Indianapolis VAMC

Some historians may see this date and recall the end of the Civil War in 1865, but April 9th, holds a special recognition for many veterans. On April 9, 1942, U.S. Major General Edward King surrendered to the Japanese 14th Army on the northern island of Luzon in the Philippine Islands. What followed became known as the Bataan Death March. From 1942 until 1979, April 9 remained the day on which all U.S. Prisoners of War (POW) were remembered. The following article is reprinted from a speech given in Washington, D.C, in 1945 by a former POW.

"I know that you wonder what caused the capture of your loved ones. The prisoners of war worry about that. They are afraid their relatives and friends will not understand why they were captured. Those men are captives because of being wounded and left on the battlefield; or having held positions while their comrades withdrew for defense positions, and those of the air corps who have been shot down. Those soldiers are entitled to, and; of course, do have the sympathy and understanding of all of their fellow countrymen. We try to put that over to the newly captured man. It is a terrible depression that strikes him. He thinks he is a failure. He not only did not fail, he carried out his mission."

Prisoners of War Bulletin, American Red Cross, Vol. 3, No.2, February 1945.

There are fewer than 30,000 former Prisoners of War living today. We remember these courageous veterans on April 9th.

Gen. Giap was a very famous and knowledgeable General in the North Vietnamese Army

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General Vo Nguyen Giap

General Giap was a brilliant, highly respected leader of the North Vietnam military. The following quote is from his memoirs currently found in the Vietnam war memorial in Hanoi:

"What we still don't understand is why you Americans stopped the bombing of Hanoi. You had us on the ropes. If you had pressed us a little harder, just for another day or two, we were ready to surrender! It was the same at the battles of TET. You defeated us! We knew it, and we thought you knew it. But we were elated to notice your media was definitely helping us. They were causing more disruption in America than we could in the battlefields. We were ready to surrender. You had won!"

General Giap has published his memoirs and confirmed what most Americans knew. The Vietnam war was not lost in Vietnam -- it was lost at home. The exact same slippery slope, sponsored by the US media, is currently well underway. It exposes the enormous power of a biased media to cut out the heart and will of the American public.

A truism worthy of note: Do not fear the enemy, for they can take only your life. Fear the media far more, for they will destroy your honor.

Roy:

Thank you for copying me in on this. The photos are magnificent in revealing the magnitude of the operation. It is interesting to hear about the Florida site used in training for the invasion. I never knew that, though I was living here at the time.

There are two things I am prompted to share with you in this vein:

The day after Pearl Harbor was bombed Don Chavous and Jack Chavous, two brothers from Cross City, Florida and sons of the Dixie County Sheriff, went to Camp Blanding to enlist. Don into the Marines and Jack into the Army.

Don served in the Pacific in combat and came home at war’s end unscathed.

Jack became a paratrooper Sergeant and was sent to Benning to train new parachutists.

As word of the planned invasion permeated the ranks, Jack went to his CO and asked to be allowed to participate in the invasion. He was told he had to take a reduction to Cpl to do so, which he accepted.

On D-Day he parachuted into Normandy and was never heard from again. His mother and siblings always wondered ‘what happened to Jack?”. His mother and two brothers passed on without knowledge of what happened leaving only his sister remaining. Sarah’s mother.

In November of 2008 Sarah’s mother, Roma, got a call from a researcher who said he thought he knew what had happened to Jack. Sarah and I got involved, to include my checking the legitimacy of the guy with DoA in DC. The man said he thought Jack had been captured by the Germans, along with a few hundred others, held for several days as they dug a big pit and were then shot and dumped in the grave they had been forced to dig with their own hands.

After the war, the mass grave was discovered, unearthed and remains reburied in the new Normandy cemetery. Those who could be identified were buried with their names on their cross or star David. Those unidentified were noted as to size, etc on the burial records and buried in graves marked ‘Known only to God’. The names of the missing were noted on the curved wall Memorial at one end of the cemetery. Jack Chavous’ name is there.

The researcher had determined through military and burial records that, due to his short stature and small feet, that matching remains were in grave X91.

Upon hearing this, I contacted the American Battle Monuments Commission (which runs Normandy and the other cemeteries’ around the world where our honored war veterans rest in peace). The looked up records and said they could not verify the researcher because there were two graves registrations numbered X91.

Waiting until the 65th anniversary ceremonies had well passed, Sarah and I took he mother, Roma Chavous Beville, along with her sister and brother, named Jack after his missing uncle he never knew, on a trip to Normandy last August. She is now 89 years old and walking with difficulty.

As part of a larger tour we reached the cemetery with a light mist falling and limited time. I sent the family off to look for the grave while I went into the ABMC office. After explaining my plight, they went into the archives of the original graves registration forms and retrieved both X91 files. The director returned with a smile and said, ‘I may be able to solve the mystery’. He went on to add ‘This X91 was an infantryman, while this one was a paratrooper’.

They immediately summoned a six place golf cart with side curtains and went out to gather the family and proceed to a grave marked ‘Know only to God’ but now we knew it was really Jack Chavous. They placed flags and we took pictures. From there we went to the memorial wall so they could touch his name inscribed thereto. A 65 year old mystery was solved at last.

As Paul Harvey used to say; ‘now the rest of the story’.

When we returned to the tour bus we were 15 minutes late and 44 strangers were seething about not being at the lunch place yet. As we boarded, I asked for the microphone and in a few words told them why were tardy and how an 89 year old now knew where her hero brother was buried. Before I made it to my seat they were applauding and some were crying as the patted my mother-in-laws arm and shoulders.

As a second item: I am attaching a power point slide show of some remarkable photographs. The first shows a street scene after the invasion. The second photo, on the same page, shows the same spot 65 years later.

Hope you enjoy. See you on the 8th.

Ted

Thank you so much for sending this to me.....This was particularly dear to me since I spent last weekend down at Carrabelle for the Camp Gordon Johnston reunion . Each year there are less vets from WW2 returning but many were there....wearing pieces of their old uniforms. I spent five years there as a child and lived on the beach where the maneuvers for the invasion of Normandy were an everyday...and night occurrence. We didn't know at the time that particular invasion was in the works but we knew the training was intense. Each night when we left the base and crossed the bridge to the beach we had to follow a jeep with a little red light since no lights were allowed on the beach. Landing crafts, barrage balloons, and soldiers crawling around our cabin with rifles became a normal event. School buses were not allowed on the base so the MP's drove me to and from school in Carrabelle...sometimes in an amphibious jeep or duck. We ate all our meals in the headquarters mess and the German prisoners were our cooks. At one of the reunions I met Herman Blumgard, a German POW that baked my birthday cake when I was 11. This year at the reunion I sat at breakfast with a German fellow that was looking for some reminders from his dad when he was a prisoner. The museum at Carrabelle is quite remarkable with so many of the things that they have found from those days. I gave them things we had saved in the memory of my mom and dad. Carrabelle goes all out and the parade is bigger every year. I never thought any of those guys would ever want to return to Camp Gordon Johnston....it was a really tough training base but our pen pals wrote us that they thanked the training they got....especially those in the jungles of the Philippines. I will forward these photos on to the museum down there and know they will be so happy to have them. If you have a chance, drive down and take a sentimental journey and tour the museum. I talked to Kitty and she said that she and Bud want to go with me to the reunion next year....maybe you and Patsy would like to join us. Thanks again for sending this to me....Love to Patsy.....Vivian

The invasion of Normandy......

Absolutely incredible. I had no idea such an array of pictures existed.

Click for photo essay at the Denver Post.

Nepalese doc is "God of Sight" to nation's poor

Physicians worldwide adopting surgeon’s novel way of removing cataracts

Click to read AP story

How's This For Nostalgia?

All the girls had ugly gym uniforms.





It took three minutes for the TV to warm up.





Nobody owned a purebred dog.





When a quarter was a decent allowance..





You'd reach into a muddy gutter for a penny.





Your Mom wore nylons that came in two pieces.





You got your windshield cleaned, oil checked, and gas pumped, without asking, all for free, every time? And you didn't pay for air? And, you got trading stamps to boot?





Laundry detergent had free glasses, dishes or towels hidden inside the box.





It was considered a great privilege to be taken out to dinner at a real restaurant with your parents.





They threatened to keep kids back a grade if they failed. . and they did it!





When a 57 Chevy was everyone's dream car...to cruise, peel out, lay rubber or watch submarine races, and people went steady?





No one ever asked where the car keys were because they were always in the car, in the ignition, and the doors were never locked.





Lying on your back in the grass with your friends? and saying things like, 'That cloud looks like a...'?





Playing baseball with no adults to help kids with the rules of the game?





Stuff from the store came without safety caps and hermetic seals because no one had yet tried to poison a perfect stranger.





And with all our progress, don't you just wish, just once, you could slip back in time and savor the slower pace, and share it with the children of today?





When being sent to the principal's office was nothing compared to the fate that awaited the student at home?





Basically we were in fear for our lives, but it wasn't because of drive-by shootings, drugs, gangs, etc. Our parents and grandparents were a much bigger threat! But we survived because their love was greater than the threat.

. .as well as summers filled with bike rides, Hula Hoops, and visits to the pool, and eating Kool-Aid powder with sugar.

Didn't that feel good, just to go back and say, 'Yeah, I remember that'?





I am sharing this with you today because it ended with a Double Dog Dare to pass it on. To remember what a Double Dog Dare is, read on. And remember that the perfect age is somewhere between old enough to know better and too young to care.

Send this on to someone who can still remember Howdy Doody and The Peanut Gallery, the Lone Ranger, The Shadow knows, Nellie Bell , Roy and Dale, Trigger and Buttermilk.





How Many Of These Do You Remember?

Candy cigarettes



Wax Coke-shaped bottles with colored sugar water inside.



Soda pop machines that dispensed glass bottles.



Coffee shops with Table Side Jukeboxes.



Blackjack, Clove and Teaberry chewing gum.



Home milk delivery in glass bottles with cardboard stoppers.



Newsreels before the movie.
Telephone numbers with a word prefix...( Yukon2-601). Party lines.



Peashooters.
Howdy Doody.
Hi-Fi's & 45 RPM records.



78 RPM records!



Green Stamps.



Mimeograph paper.
The FortApachePlay Set.

Do You Remember a Time When..
Decisions were made by going 'eeny-meeny-miney-moe'?
Mistakes were corrected by simply exclaiming, 'Do Over!'?
'Race issue' meant arguing about who ran the fastest?



Catching The Fireflies Could Happily Occupy An Entire Evening?



It wasn't odd to have two or three 'Best Friends'?



Having a Weapon in School meant being caught with a Slingshot?



Saturday morning cartoons weren't 30-minute commercials for action figures?



'Oly-oly-oxen-free' made perfect sense?
Spinning around, getting dizzy, and falling down was cause for giggles?
The Worst Embarrassment was being picked last for a team?
War was a card game?



Baseball cards in the spokes transformed any bike into a motorcycle?
Taking drugs meant orange - flavored chewable aspirin?



Water balloons were the ultimate weapon?



If you can remember most or all of these, Then You Have Lived!!!!!!!

Pass this on to anyone who may need a break from their 'Grown-Up' Life...
I Double-Dog-Dare-Ya!

So I said to him, "Barack, I know Abe Lincoln, and you ain't Abe Lincoln."

You cannot help the poor by destroying the rich.
You cannot strengthen the weak by weakening the strong.
You cannot bring about prosperity by discouraging thrift.
You cannot lift the wage earner up by pulling the wage payer down.
You cannot further the brotherhood of man by inciting class hatred.
You cannot build character and courage by taking away people's initiative and independence.
You cannot help people permanently by doing for them, what they could and should do for themselves.

Marvelous photo taken of the space shuttle from the 210 bridge in Ponte Vedra.

Enjoy! Terry

This picture was taken by James Vernacotola and sent to me by a friend. It was taken in Ponte Vedra from the top of the 210 bridge crossing the intracoastal looking south towards St, Augustine and Cape Canaveral.

He got up very early and took this picture of the last nighttime space shuttle launch and was kind enough to share with his co-workers and whomever else would appreciate the beauty of the space launch.

He took the picture using a tri-pod and the elapsed time for the picture was several minutes in order to get the full fire-trail (this is why the stars are little lines instead of dots).

Monday, February 8, 2010 @ 4:14 am
Top of the Intracoastal Waterway Bridge in Ponte Vedra, FL
115 Miles from the launch
34 Degrees outside!

Gerald Ensley: Two pieces of Tallahassee history preserved

By Gerald Ensley
Tallahassee Democrat senior writer
February 14, 2010

We said goodbye to Mary Call Collins in December. Her husband, former Florida Gov. LeRoy Collins, died in 1991.

But we continue to owe both a thank you.

Because the Tallahassee-native couple left a physical legacy: San Luis Mission Park and The Grove.

One is the westside park the Collinses sold to the city in 1981. The other is the historic home in which they lived, which will soon become a museum. Both will serve for generations as a way to appreciate Tallahassee landscape and history.

I've appreciated San Luis Park for the nearly 25 years I've lived in the adjoining neighborhood. Almost daily, I run or walk my dog in the park – and enjoy every visit.

The park is 69 acres of hilly woods laced with pedestrian/bike paths surrounding Lake Esther. A hike into the woods insulates you from the din of the city. Foxes, hawks and owls rustle around at twilight. Turtles, geese, egrets, herons and the occasional alligator work the lake, to the delight of families walking the lake's boardwalk. College kids and their dogs romp in the dog park. Though many use it, the park is always peaceful.

Such peace and nature could have been lost.

Gov. Collins and former Tallahassee mayor and banker John Humphress bought the land many years before as an investment. It was part of a still mostly rural west Tallahassee. Historic Mission San Luis, on the park's southeast shoulder, was still a private preserve. Fishermen snuck into the future park to fish bass-filled Lake Esther (which, sadly, was ruined for anglers when the lake was incorporated into the city's stormwater drainage system).

Collins and Humphress could have sold the land to developers – apartment complexes now flank two sides. Instead, they sold it to the city for $765,000, which was 15 percent below its appraised price. When it opened to the public in 1985-86, it was the city's largest passive park (a designation since eclipsed by Klapp-Phipps and A.J. Henry parks).

"It was definitely needed; it was the only park in the northwest (part of the city), which was growing," said David Chapman, a retired city parks and rec director. "It was a great acquisition and a beautiful piece of property."

Equally beautiful is The Grove.

The stately old home sits next door to the Florida Governor's Mansion. It was built in 1825-1831 by Richard Keith Call, an early territorial governor and ancestor of Mary Call Collins. The centerpiece of a 640-acre plantation, it passed through various branches of her family – and ever-declining levels of upkeep — until she inherited it and its remaining 10 acres in 1942.

The Collins family lived at The Grove for most of the next 67 years. They moved next door when he was governor (1955-1961). They spent several years in Washington D.C., when Gov. Collins worked for President Lyndon Johnson.

But it was where their four children largely grew up. It was where their daughters and granddaughters were married. It is where Call, Gov. Collins and his wife and other family members are buried. It is a piece of Florida history Mary Call and Gov. Collins lovingly restored. They rescued historic furniture that had been sold. They rehabbed long-neglected interior spaces. They landscaped the grounds.

"It was a wonderful mission in Mother's life," said daughter Mary Call Proctor. "She really loved bringing back the place to the way it is now."

Soon, it will become a museum. The Collins sold the house to the state for that purpose in 1985, with the stipulation they be allowed to continue living there until they died. The state paid $2.2 million and the Collinses paid rent for the next 24 years.

State officials are mapping out ideas and logistics and working with the Collins family to determine which artifacts and furniture to retain in the museum. No date has been set for the opening to the public, but it should be relatively soon.

Jane Aurrell, another Collins daughter, said the state indicated the house museum will tell the story of Florida from territorial days to the present.

"(The Grove) goes beyond our family; it's a vehicle to interpret what went on in the state," Aurrell said. "It is a little sad (the house will no longer be in the family). But we know the house will be taken care of. And that is so important."

To all of us. Which is why we say thanks.

According to the Trustees for the Social Security Administration, "THERE WILL NOT BE A COST OF LIVING INCREASE FOR THE NEXT TWO YEARS IN SOCIAL SECURITY BENEFITS.

They, the Congress (BOTH "REPUBLICAN AND DEMOCRATS TOGETHER") say no increase is warranted because of the losses in gross national product and other cute things..

NOW SPORTS FANS THIS IS THE ONE THAT WILL FLIP YOU OUT!!

THE SOCIAL SECURITY ADMINISTRATION IS FUNDING TWENTY FOUR MILLION DOLLARS-- LET ME REPEAT THAT AMOUNT... SO YOU UNDERSTAND IT $24,000,000.00 DOLLARS FOR NEW ELECTRONIC MEDICAL RECORDS PROCESSING FOR OUR CONGRESSMEN AND SENATORS!!

THEY ARE OBTAINING THESE FUNDS..And I QUOTE DIRECTLY FROM THE SOCIAL SECURITY WEBSITE...

"THIS MONEY WILL BE COMING FROM THE SAVINGS TO BE GENERATED FROM WITHHOLDING "COST OF LIVING INCREASES FOR 2010 & 2011 In SOCIAL SECURITY BENEFITS FOR THE ELDERLY AND A $2.00 INCREASE ON ALL MEDICARE RX BENEFIT CO-PAY"

Please pass this to ALL your friends and have them "PROTEST TO THE IDIOTS WE ELECTED TO CONGRESS" Who by the way, have just voted themselves ANOTHER 3% SALARY INCREASE!!!

We must put a stop to this outright thievery! It is THE HOUSE AND THE SENATE, BOTH REPUBLICAN AND DEMOCRATS, WE CAN'T FIRE THEM, BUT WE SURE CAN NOT RE-ELECT THEM, And WE CAN IMPEACH THEM Or DEMAND RECALL ELECTIONS!!! HOW ABOUT WE ALL GET TOGETHER AND DUMP THESE CLOWNS.

All I ask is that you consider the suggestion here.

The entire Congress of the United States is corrupt. And I mean both Houses and I mean both major parties. I realize that a few Members of each House are trustworthy, But, As a group they are absolutely the most corrupt bunch To ever disgrace our Nation.

In November of 2010 The entire House of Representatives will stand for re-election; All 435 of them. One third of the Senate, A total of 33 of them, will also stand for re-election. Vote every incumbent out. And I mean every one of them. No matter their Party affiliation.

Let's start all over in the House of Representatives with 435 people Who have absolutely no experience in running that body, With no political favors owed to anyone but their own constituents. Let's make them understand that they work for us... They are answerable to us And they simply have to run that body with some common sense. Two years later, in 2012, Vote the next third of the incumbents in the Senate out. We can do the same thing in 2014 and, By that time we will have put all new people in that body as well..

We, the People, Have got to take this Country back and we HAVE to do it peacefully. That's what the Framers of our Constitution envisioned.

I am also suggesting term limits on the NEW BUNCH - 8 YEARS FOR REPRESENTATIVES AND 12 YEARS OF SENATORS. NO EXCEPTIONS. THE LONGER THEY STAY IN OFFICE THE MORE POWER THEY GET AND THEY LOVE IT AND WILL DO ANYTHING TO GET RE-ELECTED.

WE HAVE TERM LIMITED THE PRESIDENT - NOW LET'S TERM LIMIT THE LEGISLATORS.

Please, If you love this Country, Send this (as I have done) to absolutely everyone Whose email address appears in your address book.. This thing can permeate this Country in no time. Let's make it happen.**

VOTE THE POWER ABUSERS OUT... LET'S TAKE AMERICA BACK!!!

IF YOU LIKE THE WAY THINGS ARE GOING IN OUR COUNTRY, THEN DO NOTHING...

This is SAD....makes me MAD! I feel BAD!

Having spent three weeks in a hospital in Naples, Florida with my wife I couldnït help noticing what was going on in the hospital and I had a lot of time to talk to the doctors and nurses about what I had observed. Below is a commentary from an ER Doctor. Do you think this might be a big reason our health care system and our social security system are so screwed up? Do you think this might be a big reason our taxes keep going up? Who do you think these people are going to vote for?

From a Florida ER doctor:

"I live and work in a state overrun with illegals. They make more money having kids than we earn working full-time. Today I had a 25-year old with 8 kids - that is right 8; all illegal anchor babies and she had the nicest nails, cell phone, hand bag, clothing, etc. She makes about $1,500 monthly for each; you do the math. I used to say, We are the dumbest nation on earth. Now I must say and sadly admit: WE are the dumbest people on earth (that includes ME) for we elected the idiot idealogues who have passed the bills that allow this. Sorry, but we need a revolution. Vote them all out in 2010."

--- REMEMBER ---

IN NOVEMBER 2010, WE HAVE A GOLDEN OPPORTUNITY TO CLEAN OUT THE ENTIRE HOUSE AND ONE-THIRD OF THE SENATE! This is an insult and a kick in the butt to all of us...

Get mad and pass it on - I don't know how, but maybe some good will come of this travesty. If the immigrant is over 65, they can apply for SSI and Medicaid and get more than a woman on Social Security, who worked from 1944 until 2004. She is only getting $791 per month because she was born in 1924 and there's a 'catch 22.'

It is interesting that the federal government provides a single refugee with a monthly allowance of $1,890. Each can also obtain an additional $580 in social assistance, for a total of $2,470 a month.

This compares to a single pensioner, who after contributing to the growth and development of America for 40 to 50 years, can only receive a monthly maximum of $1,012 in old age pension and Guaranteed Income Supplement.

Maybe our pensioners should apply as refugees! Consider sending this to all your American friends, so we can all be ticked off and maybe get the refugees cut back to $1,012 and the pensioners up to $2,470. Then we can enjoy some of the money we were forced to submit to the Government over the last 40 or 50 or 60 years. And not to receive a increase for 2010 Vote them all out of office.

Please forward this to every American to expose what our elected politicians have been doing for the past 11 years to over-taxed Americans.

SEND THIS TO EVERY AMERICAN TAXPAYER YOU KNOW.

Subject: John Glenn on the Senate Floor

Some people still don't understand why military personnel do what they do for a living. This exchange Between Senators John Glenn and Sen. Howard Metzenbaum is worth reading. Not only is it a pretty impressive impromptu speech, but it's also a good example of one man's explanation of why men and women in the Armed Services do what they do for a living. This IS a typical, though sad, example of what some who have never served think of the Military.

Senator Metzenbaum to Senator Glenn: "How can you run for Senate when you've never held a "real job?"

Senator Glenn: "I served 23 years in the United States Marine Corps.I served through two wars. I flew 149 missions. My plane was hit by antiaircraft fire on 12 different occasions. I was in the Space Program. It wasn't my checkbook, Howard; it was my Life on the line. It was not a nine to five job, where I took time off to take the daily cash receipts to the bank.

I ask you to go with me ... as I went the other day... to a Veterans Hospital and look those men - with their mangled bodies - in the eye, and tell THEM they didn't hold a job!

You go with me to the Space Program at NASA and go, as I have gone, to the widows and orphans of Ed White, Gus Grissom and Roger Chaffee...and you look those kids in the eye and tell them that their DADS didn't hold a job.

You go with me on Memorial Day and you stand in Arlington National Cemetery, where I have more friends buried than I'd like to remember, and you watch those waving flags. You stand there, and you think about this Nation, and you tell ME that those people didn't have a job?

I'll tell you, Howard Metzenbaum, you should be on your knees every day of your life thanking God that there were some men - SOME MEN - who held REAL jobs. And they required a dedication to a purpose - and a love of country and a dedication to duty - that was more important than life itself. And their self-sacrifice is what made this country possible.

I HAVE held a job, Howard! ---What about you?"

For those who don't remember - During W.W.II, Howard Metzenbaum was an attorney representing the Communist Party in the USA. Now he is a U.S. Senator!

If you can read this, thank a teacher.... If you are reading it in English, thank a Veteran.......

(AUTHOR UNKNOWN….written in the 1970s)

Fm: Joe Tranchini
Wonderful and amusing assessment of the USN.

The Navy

This is a copy of the speech that our Honored Guest made on 19 January 2002 to the members of the St. Louis Council of the Navy League of the United States at our Annual Dinner Meeting.

Mr. Levins has consistently offered to our local citizens interesting and supportive articles concerning our military services. This speech was remarkable in its recognition of the role our Navy and Marine Corps is playing in the war against terrorism.

A brief bio of Mr. Levin's career follows -- in his own words: "Harry Levins is senior writer of the St. Louis Post Dispatch, specializing in military coverage. He is a Vermont native whose journalism career spans 39 years and three newspapers -- the Rutland (Vt.) Daily Herald, Long Island's Newsday, and the Post Dispatch. From 1963-65, he served as an Army infantry lieutenant, mostly in West Germany."

I am sending this message to all of my friends, military and otherwise, because I believe it to be important in these troubled times. It is a long read but very informative, with a touch of the wry humor that was a trademark of Mark Twain (Samuel Clemens).

John Kane, USNA '44

________________________

My thanks to Capt. Kane for inviting me here tonight. You ought to know how honored I am. After all, I'm an old soldier. To me, the Navy is a mysterious institution. It's an institution in which the NCOs dress like the officers, and the officers almost never get their hands dirty. It's an institution whose people call a rope a line, and a stairwell a ladder, even though it's as plain as the nose on your face that you're looking at a rope or a stairwell. It's an institution that never warns you about wearing a hat into the wardroom - and then glares at you when you wear a hat into the wardroom.

It's an institution in which people take frightfully brief showers. I've gotten damper in the predawn dew. And it's an institution that sometimes speaks and behaves as if we're all Englishmen living in, oh, 1880 or so, and Queen Victoria is now and forever on the throne. I guess I'm saying that to me - and to millions of my countrymen - the Navy is the least American of the services. Now, nobody would ever say that about the Air Force. Hell, Americans invented air power. The airplane, too. The Air Force is high-tech, high-speed, zoom-and-boom. It's as American as hot rods and forward passes.

I'm aware that the Marines are a part of your Navy. And yes, they have their own odd vocabulary. They call a hat a cover. But maybe they're even more American than the Air Force. Who's the all-time No. 1 Marine? No, it's not Chesty Puller, and it's not Smedley Butler, and it's not even Ted Williams. It's John Wayne - and you just can't get more all-American than John Wayne.

And then there's the Army, my Army. One author wrote a book about the cultural differences among the services. This author - he was once a sailor, by the way - said that the Air Force's first loyalty is to technology, to its airplanes. He said the Navy's first loyalty is to the Navy itself. And he said the Army's first loyalty was to the Republic, of which the Army views itself as the loyal servant. By the way, he added, this is why the Army so often gets screwed. But the Army is America, from Audie Murphy to Beetle Bailey. That leaves us with the Navy, and the question of why it seems to be outside the rest of society.

For one thing, physically speaking, the Navy is outside the rest of society. No carrier task force ever made a port call in St. Louis, or Des Moines, or Evansville. By definition, the Navy does its work out of sight, somewhere out there beyond the hazy horizon. Even along the coasts, few Americans pay attention. The United States is a maritime nation. We depend on seaborne commerce. But how many Americans ever pause to consider that fact? We like to think of ourselves as self-sufficient -- as alabaster cities and amber waves of grain. We're wrong, of course. But even in major ports like New York, residents ignore what the oceans mean to America.

A few years back, I asked a friend in the Bay Area to take me by the Oakland docks. My friend had some trouble finding his way in. He'd lived on the East Bay for almost his entire life, and he'd never toured the docks. What we saw was as fresh to him as it was to me - mile after mile of cranes and containerized cargo, Subaru’s and Sony’s and who knows what. And all of it got here by sea. But most of us think the stuff just shows up in showrooms and stores in St. Louis. When we think about it at all.. And if our maritime-nation status is way off in the back of our minds, so is the Navy that protects that status.

Oh, sure, America has its Navy towns - but not nearly so many as it once did. And a lot of those Navy towns are stuck off in some coastal corner. Bangor, Washington. Kings Bay, Georgia. Those places aren't exactly Brooklyn, or Philadelphia, or Boston, or San Francisco.

The only sailors most Americans ever see is the chief at the recruiting station. Think about it. Here in St. Louis, we see a lot of the Army, thanks to the kids in ill-fitting uniforms who come and go from Fort Leonard Wood through Lambert Field. And although we see less of the Air Force, we're aware that it's just across the river, at Scott Air Force Base. But the sea services? The Marine Corps is small, and far away. The Navy is big, but it, too, is far away -- on the coasts, in places like Norfolk and San Diego, places we rarely visit. And then, as I said, when we do make contact with the Navy, we're up against an institution that draws most of its vocabulary and traditions from the Royal Navy of a century and half ago - from Victorian England. To people like me, sometimes, it seems quaint - people saying Aye Aye, sir; instead of Yes, sir, and talking about port and starboard, instead of left and right. But sometimes, it seems downright alien. On a sunny day in December 1991, I was chatting with some lookouts on the battleship Missouri, bound for Pearl Harbor for the 50th anniversary observance. We were on the flying bridge, or whatever it is that you people call the open bridge on top of the enclosed bridge. Like most young military people dealing with reporters, they asked whether I had prior military experience. Yes, I told them, I had once been an infantry platoon leader in the Army in Germany. They asked me what I thought of the Navy. I said, Good chow. They nodded. And I said, but I can't get over the class system. They asked what I meant.. I said, Well, in the Army, I wore the same fatigue uniform as the enlisted men. When they got muddy, I got muddy. When they got cold, I got cold. And when the chow truck came out to the field, the other officers and I stood at the end of the line. If the chow ran out, we went without. The sailors' eyebrows rose. I continued, if I'd ever had an enlisted man wait on me the way they do in the wardroom, I'd have been court-martialed. And don't the officers ever talk to you guys? Does everything go through the chiefs?

Just then, the lookout with headphones barked, XO on the bridge! Away flew the cigarettes. Up shot the binoculars. I don't know if those kids could have spotted a Soviet submarine ambush. But the XO never had a chance.

Later, back on the fantail with a cigar, I ruminated about the officer-enlisted relationship. I concluded that on a crowded ship - even on a ship as big as the battleship Missouri -- it probably has to be that distant and aloof. Still, I felt odd every time I saw those signs that said Officers' Country -- Official Business Only. Think about it - all the great Army novels are enlisted-man novels, and all the great Navy novels are wardroom novels. And most Americans are enlisted men at heart.

Ah, well. I won't change the Navy. If Franklin D. Roosevelt couldn't, I can't. Roosevelt once said that trying to change the State Department was all but impossible - but that trying to change the Navy was even worse, like punching a feather pillow. No matter what you do to the feather pillow, he said, it always returns to its original shape. But - and here's the serious part of this speech - this era seems to be the perfect time for America and its Navy to get to know each other. If you kept up with Washington rumors before Sept. 11, you know about the talk in the Pentagon of cutting back on carriers. Defense Secretary Rumsfeld's people were talking up something called transformation -- and for the Navy, that meant mothballing a couple of carriers, maybe more. After all, the thinking went, in an age of cheap and accurate missiles, the carriers are big fat targets. And in an age of precision weapons, the carriers' air power can be replaced by cruise missiles and long -range Air Force bombers with smart bombs. Well, after Afghanistan, that kind of talk sure went away, didn't it? I think Afghanistan showed that in a messy age with no clear-cut big enemy, expeditionary forces are utterly and absolutely priceless. And by definition, a Navy and a Marine Corps are expeditionary forces. You folks seem to own the franchise on the future. You'll get an argument from the airpower people on that one. In fact, you are getting an argument from the air power people. The Air Force Association pumps it out daily. But the Air Force is also putting all of its money into short-range fighters. They're nifty, but only when you have runways in the neighborhood. Otherwise -- as we have learned in Afghanistan, only the carriers will do. They're expensive-- no, they're frightfully expensive -- but it's beginning to look as if they're indispensable. Same thing with the Marines. A Marine Expeditionary Unit is a frightfully expensive way to put a reinforced battalion of infantry on the scene. The Army is cheaper, but without staging bases, the Army is irrelevant. Now, the Association of the United States Army makes less noise than the Air Force Association. The Army people tend to sigh, and then to hope that when they're needed, the nation will remember them. And someday, they will be needed. Remember: Afghanistan is almost the last war - and you know what they say about getting ready to refight the last war.

Still, I think you folks are wonderfully positioned. If we have to do Somalia, or Sudan, or the Philippines, or Indonesia, we'll turn first to the sea services. In the Cold War, you folks took a back seat to the Air Force and Army. Now, it's your turn to shine - and in Afghanistan, you shone.

Don't be shy about it. Let your fellow Americans know that a big Navy has its uses, after all. Capt. Kane told me that I should speak briefly, and I'm pushing the brevity envelope, so I'll sit down and shut up. But not without one last question: Why do you call it a brow instead of a gangplank?

Thank you very much.

THE OLD MAN

As I came out of the supermarket that sunny day, pushing my cart of groceries towards my car, I saw an old man with the hood of his car up and a lady sitting inside the car, with the door open.

The old man was looking at the engine. I put my groceries away in my car and continued to watch the old gentleman from about twenty five feet away.

I saw a young man in his early twenties with a grocery bag in his arm, walking towards the old man. The old gentleman saw him coming too and took a few steps towards him.

I saw the old gentleman point to his open hood and say something. The young man put his grocery bag into what looked like a brand new Cadillac Escalade and then turn back to the old man, and I heard him yell at the old gentleman saying, 'You shouldn't even be allowed to drive a car at your age.' And then with a wave of his hand, he got in his car and peeled rubber out of the parking lot.

I saw the old gentleman pull out his handkerchief and mop his brow as he went back to his car and again looked at the engine.

He then went to his wife and spoke with her and appeared to tell her it would be okay. I had seen enough and I approached the old man. He saw me coming and stood straight and as I got near him I said, 'Looks like you're having a problem.'

He smiled sheepishly and quietly nodded his head. I looked under the hood myself and knew that whatever the problem was, it was beyond me. Looking around I saw a gas station up the road and told the old man that I would be right back... I drove to the station and went inside and saw three attendants working on cars.

I approached one of them and related the problem the old man had with his car and offered to pay them if they could follow me back down and help him.

The old man had pushed the heavy car under the shade of a tree and appeared to be comforting his wife. When he saw us he straightened up and thanked me for my help. As the mechanics diagnosed the problem (overheated engine) I spoke with the old gentleman.

When I shook hands with him earlier, he had noticed my Marine Corps ring and had commented about it, telling me that he had been a Marine too. I nodded and asked the usual question, 'What outfit did you serve with?'

He had mentioned that he served with the first Marine Division at Tarawa, Saipan, Iwo Jima and Guadalcanal.

He had hit all the big ones and retired from the Corps after the war was over. As we talked we heard the car engine come on and saw the mechanics lower the hood. They came over to us as the old man reached for his wallet, but was stopped by me and I told him I would just put the bill on my AAA card.

He still reached for the wallet and handed me a card that I assumed had his name and address on it, and I stuck it in my pocket. We all shook hands all around again and I said my goodbye's to his wife.

I then told the two mechanics that I would follow them back up to the station. Once at the station I told them that they had interrupted their own jobs to come along with me and help the old man. I said I wanted to pay for the help, but they refused to charge me.

One of them pulled out a card from his pocket looking exactly like the card the old man had given to me. Both of the men told me then,that they were Marine Corps Reserves. Once again we shook hands all around and as I was leaving, one of them told me I should look at the card the old man had given to me. I said I would and drove off.

For some reason I had gone about two blocks when I pulled over and took the card out of my pocket and looked at it for a long, long time. The name of the old gentleman was on the card in golden leaf and under his name -- 'Congressional Medal of Honor Society.'

I sat there motionless looking at the card and reading it over and over. I looked up from the card and smiled to no one but myself and marveled that on this day, four Marines had all come together, because one of us needed help. He was an old man all right, but it felt good to have stood next to greatness and courage and an honor to have been in his presence. Remember, OLD men like him gave you FREEDOM for America.

The Jihad Candidate
by Rich Carroll

Conspiracy theories make for interesting novels when the storyline is not so absurd that it can grasp our attention. 'The Manchurian Candidate' and 'Seven Days in May' are examples of plausible chains of events that captures the reader's imagination at best-seller level. 'What if' has always been the solid grist of fiction. Get yourself something cool to drink, find a relaxing position, but before you continue, visualize the television photos of two jet airliners smashing into the Twin Towers in lower Manhattan and remind yourself this cowardly act of Muslim terror was planned for eight years.

How long did it take Islam and their oil money to find a candidate for President of the United States? As long as it took them to place a Senator from Illinois and Minnesota? The same amount of time to create a large Muslim enclave in Detroit? The time it took them to build over 2,000 mosques in America? The same amount of time required to place radical wahabbist clerics in our military and prisons as 'chaplains'? Find a candidate who can get away with lying about their father being a 'freedom fighter' when he was actually part of the most corrupt and violent government in Kenya's history. Find a candidate with close ties to The Nation of Islam and the violent Muslim overthrow in Africa, a candidate who is educated am ong white infidel Americans but hides his bitterness and anger behind a superficial toothy smile. Find a candidate who changes his American name of Barry to the Muslim name of Barak Hussein Obama, and dares anyone to question his true ties under the banner of 'racism'. Nurture this candidate in an atmosphere of anti-white American teaching and surround him with Islamic teachers. Provide him with a bitter, racist, anti-white, anti-American wife, and supply him with Muslim middle east connections and Islamic monies. Allow him to be clever enough to get away with his anti-white rhetoric and proclaim he will give $834 billion taxpayer dollars to the Muslim controlled United Nations for use in Africa.

Install your candidate in an atmosphere of deception because questioning him on any issue involving Africa or Islam would be seen as 'bigoted racism'; two words too powerful to allow the citizenry to be informed of facts. Allo w your candidate to employ several black racist Nation of Islam Louis Farrakhan followers as members of his Illinois Senatorial and campaign staffs.

Where is the bloodhound American 'free press' who doggedly overturned every stone in the Watergate case? Where are our nation's reporters that have placed every Presidential candidate under the microscope of detailed scrutiny; the same press who pursue Bush's 'Skull and Bones' club or ran other candidates off with persistent detective and research work? Why haven't 'newsmen' pursued the 65 blatant lies told by this candidate during the Presidential primaries? Where are the stories about this candidate's cousin and the Muslim butchery in Africa? Since when did our national press corps become weak, timid, and silent? Why haven't they regaled us with the long list of socialists and communists who have surrounded this 'out of nowhere' Democrat candidate or that his church re-p rinted the Hamas Manifesto in their bulletin, and that his 'close pastor friend and mentor' met with Middle East terrorist Moammar Gaddafi, (Guide of the First of September Great Revolution of the Socialist People's Libyan Arab Jamahiriya)? Why isn't the American press telling us this candidate is supported by every Muslim organization in the world?

As an ultimate slap in the face, be blatant in the fact your candidate has ZERO interest in traditional American values and has the most liberal voting record in U.S. Senate history. Why has the American main stream media clammed-up on any negative reporting on Barak Hussein Obama? Why will they print Hillary Rodham Clinton's name but never write his middle name? Is it not his name? Why, suddenly, is ANY information about this candidate not coming from main stream media, but from the blogosphere by citizens seeking facts and the truth? Why isn't our media connecting the dot s with Islam? Why do they focus on 'those bad American soldiers' while Islam slaughters non Muslims daily in 44 countries around the globe? Why does our media refer to Darfur as 'ethnic cleansing' instead of what it really is; Muslims killing non Muslims! There is enough strange, anti-American activity surrounding Barak Hussein Obama to peek the curiosity of any reporter. WHERE IS OUR INVESTIGATIVE MEDIA!?

A formal plan for targeting America was devised three years after the Iranian revolution in 1982. The plan was summarized in a 1991 memorandum by Mohamed Akram, an operative of the global Muslim Brotherhood. 'The process of settlement' of Muslims in America, Akram explained, 'is a civilization jihad process.' This means that members of the Brotherhood must understand that their work in 'America is a kind of grand jihad in eliminating and destroying the Western civilization from within and sabotaging its miserable hou se by their hands and the hands of the believers so that it is eliminated and God's religion is made victorious over all other religions.'

There is terrorism we can see, smell and fear, but there is a new kind of terror invading The United States in the form of Sharia law and finance. Condoning it is civilization suicide. Middle East Muslims are coming to America in record numbers and building hate infidel mosques, buying our corporations, suing us for our traditions, but they and the whole subject of Islam is white noise leaving uninformed Americans about who and what is really peaceful. Where is our investigative press? Any criticism of Islam or their intentions, even though Islamic leaders state their intentions daily around the globe, brings-forth a volley of 'racist' from the left-wing Democrat crowd. Lies and deception behind a master plan - the ingredients for 'The Manchurian Candidate' or the placement of an anti-A merican President in our nation's White House? Is it mere coincidence that an anti-capitalist run for President at the same time Islamic sharia finance and law is trying to make advancing strides into the United States? Is it mere coincidence this same candidate wants to dis-arm our nuclear capability at a time when terrorist Muslim nations are expanding their nuclear weapons capability? Is it mere coincidence this candidate wants to reduce our military at a time of global jihad from Muslim nations?

Change for America?

What change?

To become another 'nation of Islam'?

Prime Minister Kevin Rudd - Australia

Muslims who want to live under Islamic Sharia law were told on Wednesday to get out of Australia, as the government targeted radicals in a bid to head off potential terror attacks..

Separately, Rudd angered some Australian Muslims on Wednesday by saying he supported spy agencies monitoring the nation's mosques.

IMMIGRANTS, NOT AUSTRALIANS, MUST ADAPT. Take It Or Leave It. I am tired of this nation worrying about whether we are offending some individual or their culture. Since the terrorist attacks on Bali , we have experienced a surge in patriotism by the majority of Australians.

This culture has been developed over two centuries of struggles, trials and victories by millions of men and women who have sought freedom.

We speak mainly ENGLISH, not Spanish, Lebanese, Arabic, Chinese, Japanese, Russian, or any other language. Therefore, if you wish to become part of our society. Learn the language!

Most Australians believe in God. This is not some Christian, right wing, political push, but a fact, because Christian men and women, on Christian principles, founded this nation, and this is clearly documented. It is certainly appropriate to display it on the walls of our schools. If God offends you, then I suggest you consider another part of the world as your new home, because God is part of our culture.

We will accept your beliefs, and will not question why. All we ask is that you accept ours, and live in harmony and peaceful enjoyment with us. This is OUR COUNTRY, OUR LAND, and OUR LIFESTYLE, and we will allow you every opportunity to enjoy all this. But once you are done complaining, whining, and griping about Our Flag, Our Pledge, Our Christian beliefs, or Our Way of Life, I highly encourage you take advantage of one other great Australian freedom, 'THE RIGHT TO LEAVE'.'

If you aren't happy here then LEAVE. We didn't force you to come here. You asked to be here. So accept the country YOU accepted.

Maybe if we circulate this amongst ourselves, WE will find the courage to start speaking and voicing the same truths.

Mary Call Darby Collins remembered as a 'great Floridian'
By Gerald Ensley and Angeline J. Taylor

Mary Call Darby Collins, descendant of one Florida governor and widow of another, died Sunday after a long illness.

Collins, 98, is remembered for her great sense of humor, caring ways and love of Florida.

"She defined the word 'lady,'" said former Sen. Bob Graham. "She was a great Floridian."

Collins was the great granddaughter of Richard Keith Call, an officer in Andrew Jackson's army who served two terms as a Florida territorial governor. She was married for 59 years to Gov. LeRoy Collins — who served from 1955-1961. He died in 1991.

"She was as pleasant as she could be," former Gov. Reubin Askew said. "She was very supportive (to Gov. Collins) but offered her own opinion."

Mary Call Collins was renowned for her charm and graciousness as a Florida First Lady. She was active in historic preservation causes, including saving the Union Bank and her ancestral home, The Grove.

Gov. Charlie Crist called the former first lady a "beloved leader" who "stood by the side of principled leader LeRoy Collins."

"She offered both support and advice during some of the most turbulent times in our state's history," Crist said.

Collins lived in The Grove up until her death. The home was built by Richard Keith Call in the 1820s and is adjacent to the Florida Governor's Mansion. It passed through several generations of the family before then-state Sen. LeRoy Collins and Mary Call Collins moved into it in 1942.

The home was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1972. Several years ago, Mary Call Collins deeded the home and its 10 acres to the state, with the provision she could live there until her death. The state eventually hopes to turn the home into a museum.

Born in New York on Sept. 11, 1911, Mary Call Darby moved to Tallahassee as a young child. She graduated from Leon High and Florida State College for Women.

In 1932, she married fellow Leon High classmate LeRoy Collins, embarking on a long career as a politician's wife. Collins served in the Florida House and Senate before being elected governor. He became famous for opposing racial segregation as Florida's governor and was tapped as the first Director of the Community Relations Service after the passage of the 1964 Civil Rights Act.

Daughter Mary Call Proctor said the family was together through the Thanksgiving weekend leading up to her mother's death.

"She had just a wonderful sense of life," Proctor said. "She was proud of Florida. She felt we should all do our part."

Daughter Jane Aurrell echoed her sister's sentiments.

"She had a long and full life," Aurrell said. "Mother had (nearly) 20 more years than daddy. She had a chance to meet and know all the grandchildren and great-grandchildren. We're just all so grateful for her part in our lives."

Collins is survived by her four children: LeRoy Collins Jr.; Jane Aurrell; Mary Call Proctor and Darby Collins; 12 grandchildren and her 23 great-grandchildren.

There will be a private burial service at the family cemetery. Today, between 4 p.m.-6 p.m. friends will be welcomed at The Grove. In lieu of flowers, donations in her memory may be made to St. John's Episcopal Church, the LeRoy Collins Leon County Public Library or Big Bend Hospice.

Bigger is Not Always Better

Years from now, the record books will show Navy defeating Missouri in the Texas Bowl. But what they won't show is the David and Goliath nature of the contest both on and off the field. You had to be there to appreciate the game, fan support, marching bands and press conference.

At the game ending press conference, Coach Pinkel, the Missouri coach was still in shock when he paid Navy a "compliment"...they (Navy) had a "nice little scheme" and did "nice little job". And we know a "nice little" back handed compliment when we hear one!

Missouri was favored by the pundits for many reasons, not the least of which was their Big Twelve schedule, fourth ranking rushing defense (96 yds/pg), and NFL pro style offense and talent (Danario Alexander, No.81). Coupled with this is the undeniable fact that Missouri was much bigger than Navy. Missouri players outweighed Navy by at least 40 pounds a man. As a fan, you don't really appreciate the Missouri size advantage until you see them on the field next to the Midshipmen. Missouri dressed 21 players over 285 pounds, with 13 tipping the scales over 300 pounds. Navy on the other hand, had just 3 such behemoths (2 @ 285 and one @ 301 pounds). There's an old adage in football –"you can't coach size" – you either have it or you don't. And evidenced by the humiliating loss of a much bigger Big Twelve team to a "little scheming" Independent, they can't coach size...very well at Missouri.

Size isn't the only thing they can't coach at Missouri. On the second play of the game, No. 81, the 6'5, 215 pound future NFL draft pick scored on a 58 yard pass reception and while en route to the end zone, he turns his head and sticks his tongue out at the Navy secondary. No doubt thinking, "Hey, this is easy - fool!" This man-child's tongue extension was captured for NFL scouts by a photo journalist and published in the Houston Chronicle. It probably won't cost No. 81 any singing bonus money because in contrast, the NFL will draft any felon if he can play football. However, the game is played for 60 minutes and Navy controlled the ball 41 of those. While rushing 385 yards Navy clearly outgained, out scored and outclassed a modern day Goliath.

If you can't win the game at least the bigger school could win the battle of the fans, right? This season, Missouri averaged 64,000 fans per home game while "little" Navy could only mustered an average of 32,000 - advantage Missouri. Each school was allotted 11,000 tickets (@ $65). Missouri finished a distant second to "little" Navy in ticket sales (4,200 v. 18,000 of the paid attendance - 69,441). This loss cost the Big Twelve and Missouri dearly because instead of receiving half of the $1.25 million dollar guarantee, they must "buy" the unsold tickets (approximately $400,000). Navy's ticket sales also included over 800 tickets purchased by the alumni and given to the Midshipman who attended the game. In addition, Navy sold over 5,000 tailgate tickets (@$25) for the pre game meal in a tent that covered half a football field. The rout continues for the "little" Independent on the Severn.

If you can't win the game or tailgate at least Missouri could win the battle of the bands, right? The safe bet was on the "Golden" Missouri Marching Band dominating the Naval Academy's Drum and Bugle Corps. After all, the Golden Band fielded 10 times more "brass" than Navy. Compared to Navy's silver bugles and drums, Missouri was imposing with their larger golden euphoniums, tubas and sousaphones. Outweighing Navy's thin blue line by at least forty pounds per "player," Missouri's Golden Band was intimidating. It was easy to see that Navy's D&B was in for a long afternoon.

Together, when both school bands took to the field at half time and played a rousing rendition of Deep in the Heart of Texas (which can only be appreciated by Texans), the "little" Navy "players" were lost in the sea of a really big, Big Twelve Band. However what the TV viewing audience could not appreciate happened after the last whistle blew. As is tradition at the Naval Academy, when the game is over, the Navy football team assembles by the Drum and Bugle Corps and their fellow Midshipmen in the stands for the singing of Navy Blue and Gold, the school alma mater. Also remaining in the stands and stretching the length of the field were most of the 18,000 Navy faithful and alumni, staying to sing the alma mater and celebrate the trophy presentation. Only a small portion of the fans were able to sing along because, the "not so" Golden Band, in an unsporting display of their huge sound advantage, drowned out Navy's "little" D&B. After the cheer "Beat Army" went up by those closest to the D&B, the remaining 16,000 Navy alumni treated the "not so" Golden Band from Missouri to a crescendo of boos.

Now this "not so golden" one-upmanship might seem trivial to those who never attended the Naval Academy but for those that have, it was an insult equal to playing your school fight song to drown out "God Bless America." The Naval Academy is not your typical college nor is Navy Blue and Gold the typical college fight song, the kind you hear at Notre Dame, Ohio State or Missouri. Its somber, hymn-like quality speaks not only to the tradition and purpose of the Naval Academy but to the bravery and colors of the United States Navy.

• Now, colleges from sea to sea
• May sing of colors true;
• But who has better right than we
• To hoist a symbol hue?
• For sailors brave in battle fair,
• Since fighting days of old,
• Have proved the sailor's right to wear
• The Navy Blue and Gold

Years ago Coach Holtz brought a Notre Dame team to play in the Academy's Navy Marine Corps Memorial Stadium (emphasize Memorial), and after reading the 42 names emblazoned on the façade of the second deck, - names like Guadalcanal, Inchon, Iwo Jima, and Midway, - he remarked, "Now that's one heck of a schedule." Indeed it is. It's a schedule Navy never bargained for, but was prepared to win...because loosing wasn't an option.

This year, Notre Dame lost to the smaller Navy team in South Bend and out of respect, Notre Dame's Coach Weiss had his team stand behind the Navy during the dulcet tones of Navy Blue and Gold. Likewise, Ohio State's Coach Tressel invited the smaller Navy football team to take the field along side his Big Ten team to avoid the traditional jeering and booing of a visiting team by the 80,000 Ohio State fans. Coach Tressel received an award for this rare display of sportsmanship. Let it be said there are some football programs that know how to coach size.

Besides class there is something that can't be coached, and that intangible is "heart"...you either have it or you don't.

Go Navy! Beat Army!

Doug Bateman, USNA '70
former Navy Seal
former FBI Special Agent

The Truth About the Health Care Bills
by Michael Connelly
Retired Constitutional Attorney



Well, I have done it! I have read the entire text of proposed House Bill 3200: The Affordable Health Care Choices Act of 2009. I studied it with particular emphasis from my area of expertise, constitutional law. I was frankly concerned that parts of the proposed law that were being discussed might be unconstitutional. What I found was far worse than what I had heard or expected.

To begin with, much of what has been said about the law and its implications is in fact true, despite what the Democrats and the media are saying. The law does provide for rationing of health care, particularly where senior citizens and other classes of citizens are involved, free health care for illegal immigrants, free abortion services, and probably forced participation in abortions by members of the medical profession.

The Bill will also eventually force private insurance companies out of business, and put everyone into a government run system. All decisions about personal health care will ultimately be made by federal bureaucrats, and most of them will not be health care professionals. Hospital admissions, payments to physicians, and allocations of necessary medical devices will be strictly controlled by the government.

However, as scary as all of that is, it just scratches the surface. In fact, I have concluded that this legislation really has no intention of providing affordable health care choices. Instead it is a convenient cover for the most massive transfer of power to the Executive Branch of government that has ever occurred, or even been contemplated If this law or a similar one is adopted, major portions of the Constitution of the United States will effectively have been destroyed.

The first thing to go will be the masterfully crafted balance of power between the Executive, Legislative, and Judicial branches of the U.S. Government. The Congress will be transferring to the Obama Administration authority in a number of different areas over the lives of the American people, and the businesses they own.

The irony is that the Congress doesn't have any authority to legislate in most of those areas to begin with! I defy anyone to read the text of the U.S. Constitution and find any authority granted to the members of Congress to regulate health care.

This legislation also provides for access, by the appointees of the Obama administration, of all of your personal healthcare information, your personal financial information, and the information of your employer, physician, and hospital. All of this is a direct violation of the specific provisions of the 4th Amendment to the Constitution protecting against unreasonable searches and seizures. You can also forget about the right to privacy. That will have been legislated into oblivion regardless of what the 3rd and 4th Amendments may provide.

If you decide not to have healthcare insurance, or if you have private insurance that is not deemed acceptable to the Health Choices Administrator appointed by Obama, there will be a tax imposed on you. It is called a tax instead of a fine because of the intent to avoid application of the due process clause of the 5th Amendment. However, that doesn't work because since there is nothing in the law that allows you to contest or appeal the imposition of the tax, it is definitely depriving someone of property without the due process of law.

So, there are three of those pesky amendments that the far left hate so much, out the original ten in the Bill of Rights, that are effectively nullified by this law It doesn't stop there though.

The 9th Amendment that provides: The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people;

The 10th Amendment states: The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are preserved to the States respectively, or to the people. Under the provisions of this piece of Congressional handiwork neither the people nor the states are going to have any rights or powers at all in many areas that once were theirs to control.

I could write many more pages about this legislation, but I think you get the idea. This is not about health care; it is about seizing power and limiting rights. Article 6 of the Constitution requires the members of both houses of Congress to "be bound by oath or affirmation to support the Constitution." If I was a member of Congress I would not be able to vote for this legislation or anything like it, without feeling I was violating that sacred oath or affirmation. If I voted for it anyway, I would hope the American people would hold me accountable.

For those who might doubt the nature of this threat, I suggest they consult the source, the US Constitution, and Bill of Rights. There you can see exactly what we are about to have taken from us.

Michael Connelly
Retired attorney
Constitutional Law Instructor
Carrollton, Texas

I think I need to read this every year at Christmas.

Pa never had much compassion for the lazy or those who squandered their means and then never had enough for the necessities. But for those who were genuinely in need, his heart was as big as all outdoors. It was from him that I learned the greatest joy in life comes from giving, not from receiving.

It was Christmas Eve 1881. I was fifteen years old and feeling like the world had caved in on me because there just hadn't been enough money to buy me the rifle that I'd wanted for Christmas. We did the chores early that night for some reason. I just figured Pa wanted a little extra time so we could read in the Bible.

After supper was over I took my boots off and stretched out in front of the fireplace and waited for Pa to get down the old Bible. I was still feeling sorry for myself and, to be honest, I wasn't in much of a mood to read Scriptures. But Pa didn't get the Bible, instead he bundled up again and went outside. I couldn't figure it out because we had already done all the chores. I didn't worry about it long though, I was too busy wallowing in self-pity.

Soon Pa came back in. It was a cold clear night out and there was ice in his beard. "Come on, Matt," he said. "Bundle up good, it's cold out tonight." I was really upset then. Not only wasn't I getting the rifle for Christmas, now Pa was dragging me out in the cold, and for no earthly reason that I could see. We'd already done all the chores, and I couldn't think of anything else that needed doing, especially not on a night like this. But I knew Pa was not very patient at one dragging one's feet when he'd told them to do something, so I got up and put my boots back on and got my cap, coat, and mittens. Ma gave me a mysterious smile as I opened the door to leave the house. Something was up, but I didn't know what...

Outside, I became even more dismayed. There in front of the house was the work team, already hitched to the big sled. Whatever it was we were going to do wasn't going to be a short, quick, little job. I could tell. We never hitched up this sled unless we were going to haul a big load. Pa was already up on the seat, reins in hand. I reluctantly climbed up beside him. The cold was already biting at me. I wasn't happy. When I was on, Pa pulled the sled around the house and stopped in front of the woodshed. He got off and I followed. "I think we'll put on the high sideboards," he said. "Here, help me." The high sideboards! It had been a bigger job than I wanted to do with just the low sideboards on, but whatever it was we were going to do would be a lot bigger with the high side boards on.

After we had exchanged the sideboards, Pa went into the woodshed and came out with an armload of wood - the wood I'd spent all summer hauling down from the mountain, and then all Fall sawing into blocks and splitting. What was he doing? Finally I said something. "Pa," I asked, "what are you doing?" You been by the Widow Jensen's lately?" he asked. The Widow Jensen lived about two miles down the road. Her husband had died a year or so before and left her with three children, the oldest being eight. Sure, I'd been by, but so what?

Yeah," I said, "Why?"

"I rode by just today," Pa said. "Little Jakey was out digging around in the woodpile trying to find a few chips. They're out of wood, Matt." That was all he said and then he turned and went back into the woodshed for another armload of wood. I followed him. We loaded the sled so high that I began to wonder if the horses would be able to pull it.

Finally, Pa called a halt to our loading, then we went to the smoke house and Pa took down a big ham and a side of bacon. He handed them to me and told me to put them in the sled and wait. When he returned he was carrying a sack of flour over his right shoulder and a smaller sack of something in his left hand. "What's in the little sack?" I asked. Shoes, they're out of shoes. Little Jakey just had gunny sacks wrapped around his feet when he was out in the woodpile this morning. I got the children a little candy too. It just wouldn't be Christmas without a little candy."

We rode the two miles to Widow Jensen's pretty much in silence. I tried to think through what Pa was doing. We didn't have much by worldly standards. Of course, we did have a big woodpile, though most of what was left now was still in the form of logs that I would have to saw into blocks and split before we could use it. We also had meat and flour, so we could spare that, but I knew we didn't have any money, so why was Pa buying them shoes and candy? Really, why was he doing any of this? Widow Jensen had closer neighbors than us; it shouldn't have been our concern.

We came in from the blind side of the Jensen house and unloaded the wood as quietly as possible, then we took the meat and flour and shoes to the door. We knocked. The door opened a crack and a timid voice said, "Who is it?" "Lucas Miles, Ma'am, and my son, Matt, could we come in for a bit?"

Widow Jensen opened the door and let us in. She had a blanket wrapped around her shoulders. The children were wrapped in another and were sitting in front of the fireplace by a very small fire that hardly gave off any heat at all. Widow Jensen fumbled with a match and finally lit the lamp.

"We brought you a few things, Ma'am," Pa said and set down the sack of flour. I put the meat on the table. Then Pa handed her the sack that had the shoes in it. She opened it hesitantly and took the shoes out one pair at a time. There was a pair for her and one for each of the children - sturdy shoes, the best, shoes that would last. I watched her carefully. She bit her lower lip to keep it from trembling and then tears filled her eyes and started running down her cheeks. She looked up at Pa like she wanted to say something, but it wouldn't come out.

"We brought a load of wood too, Ma'am," Pa said. He turned to me and said, "Matt, go bring in enough to last awhile. Let's get that fire up to size and heat this place up." I wasn't the same person when I went back out to bring in the wood. I had a big lump in my throat and as much as I hate to admit it, there were tears in my eyes too. In my mind I kept seeing those three kids huddled around the fireplace and their mother standing there with tears running down her cheeks with so much gratitude in her heart that she couldn't speak.

My heart swelled within me and a joy that I'd never known before, filled my soul. I had given at Christmas many times before, but never when it had made so much difference. I could see we were literally saving the lives of these people.

I soon had the fire blazing and everyone's spirits soared. The kids started giggling when Pa handed them each a piece of candy and Widow Jensen looked on with a smile that probably hadn't crossed her face for a long time. She finally turned to us. "God bless you," she said. "I know the Lord has sent you. The children and I have been praying that he would send one of his angels to spare us."

In spite of myself, the lump returned to my throat and the tears welled up in my eyes again. I'd never thought of Pa in those exact terms before, but after Widow Jensen mentioned it I could see that it was probably true. I was sure that a better man than Pa had never walked the earth. I started remembering all the times he had gone out of his way for Ma and me, and many others. The list seemed endless as I thought on it.

Pa insisted that everyone try on the shoes before we left. I was amazed when they all fit and I wondered how he had known what sizes to get. Then I guessed that if he was on an errand for the Lord that the Lord would make sure he got the right sizes.

Tears were running down Widow Jensen's face again when we stood up to leave. Pa took each of the kids in his big arms and gave them a hug. They clung to him and didn't want us to go. I could see that they missed their Pa, and I was glad that I still had mine.

At the door Pa turned to Widow Jensen and said, "The Mrs. wanted me to invite you and the children over for Christmas dinner tomorrow. The turkey will be more than the three of us can eat, and a man can get cantankerous if he has to eat turkey for too many meals. We'll be by to get you about eleven. It'll be nice to have some little ones around again. Matt, here, hasn't been little for quite a spell." I was the youngest. My two brothers and two sisters had all married and had moved away.

Widow Jensen nodded and said, "Thank you, Brother Miles. I don't have to say, May the Lord bless you, I know for certain that He will."

Out on the sled I felt a warmth that came from deep within and I didn't even notice the cold. When we had gone a ways, Pa turned to me and said, "Matt, I want you to know something. Your ma and me have been tucking a little money away here and there all year so we could buy that rifle for you, but we didn't have quite enough. Then yesterday a man who owed me a little money from years back came by to make things square. Your ma and me were real excited, thinking that now we could get you that rifle, and I started into town this morning to do just that, but on the way I saw little Jakey out scratching in the woodpile with his feet wrapped in those gunny sacks and I knew what I had to do. Son, I spent the money for shoes and a little candy for those children. I hope you understand."

I understood, and my eyes became wet with tears again. I understood very well, and I was so glad Pa had done it. Now the rifle seemed very low on my list of priorities. Pa had given me a lot more. He had given me the look on Widow Jensen's face and the radiant smiles of her three children.

For the rest of my life, whenever I saw any of the Jensens, or split a block of wood, I remembered, and remembering brought back that same joy I felt riding home beside Pa that night. Pa had given me much more than a rifle that night, he had given me the best Christmas of my life.

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