Friday, June 23, 2006
von Braun Built Our Rockets - Klinsmann Can Build A Soccer Program
The US is out of the World Cup. Two things need to happen:
A) Honor the US Caoch and celebrate the US Team getting this far in WC play
B) Fire Bruce Arena as the US Head Coach
No doubt Bruce Arena has lifted the US from being the door mat of international football. He needs to be honored for this herculean accomplishment. However, Arena needs to step down for obvious reasons especially since this latest showing in the WC was a disaster, save the spirited tie against Italy.
We need new blood. We need a new coach. We need a new direction in organization, tactics, and marketing.
The answer: A German!
Jurgen Klinsman is the answer. He is the most famous face in German Football. He has been a success in all levels of this game: the youth level programs, club play, national & international team play, and obviously the World Cup coach for Germany. And Klinsmann can do the same thing in the US with a von Braun like program.
Germany will cut Klinsman loose from Germany’s head coaching slot after this WC ends in July. And since he lives in the US and has family here, this is the best option available for the US to get back to the WC.
von Braun Built Our Rockets - Klinsmann Can Build Our Soccer Team
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A) Honor the US Caoch and celebrate the US Team getting this far in WC play
B) Fire Bruce Arena as the US Head Coach
No doubt Bruce Arena has lifted the US from being the door mat of international football. He needs to be honored for this herculean accomplishment. However, Arena needs to step down for obvious reasons especially since this latest showing in the WC was a disaster, save the spirited tie against Italy.
We need new blood. We need a new coach. We need a new direction in organization, tactics, and marketing.
The answer: A German!
Jurgen Klinsman is the answer. He is the most famous face in German Football. He has been a success in all levels of this game: the youth level programs, club play, national & international team play, and obviously the World Cup coach for Germany. And Klinsmann can do the same thing in the US with a von Braun like program.
Germany will cut Klinsman loose from Germany’s head coaching slot after this WC ends in July. And since he lives in the US and has family here, this is the best option available for the US to get back to the WC.
von Braun Built Our Rockets - Klinsmann Can Build Our Soccer Team
ACLU: Miami can't pull pro-Cuba books
inspired by Stop The ACLU email
Click on this link.
Don't be shocked. I actually agree with the ACLU on this issue. Any Pro Castro books should be on the shelves of school libraries. As a form of propaganda, they are important tools to teach children what disinformation is.
On the other hand, do we trust the teachers of this nation to provide the other side of the story - the facts of Castro's subjugation of this nation, the torture, the murder, the social engineering, the gulags, etc as witnessed here at this site and here? (This is a disturbing site)
I trust the teachers in Broward County, especially the ones who are Cuban-Americans, to show what the glories of Communism are in Fidel's Workers Paradise to children.
So stock the books as high as possible. Lies like this can't stack up against the truth.
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Click on this link.
Don't be shocked. I actually agree with the ACLU on this issue. Any Pro Castro books should be on the shelves of school libraries. As a form of propaganda, they are important tools to teach children what disinformation is.
On the other hand, do we trust the teachers of this nation to provide the other side of the story - the facts of Castro's subjugation of this nation, the torture, the murder, the social engineering, the gulags, etc as witnessed here at this site and here? (This is a disturbing site)
I trust the teachers in Broward County, especially the ones who are Cuban-Americans, to show what the glories of Communism are in Fidel's Workers Paradise to children.
So stock the books as high as possible. Lies like this can't stack up against the truth.
Thursday, June 22, 2006
Iraq Debate Pits Uncertainty Against Anxiety
Republicans think their strength is in setting a path for the future. The risk is that voters will look unhappily at how they got to the present.
By Ronald Brownstein, Times Staff Writer
June 16, 2006
WASHINGTON — The new Republican drive to focus attention on the Iraq war represents a high-stakes gamble: that doubts about the direction Democrats might set on national security exceed anxieties about the course charted by President Bush.
Through a series of high-profile efforts culminating Thursday with sustained House and Senate debates on the war, the White House and congressional Republicans are aiming to portray Democrats as too soft and too divided to steer the Iraq conflict to a successful conclusion.
But in the process, Republicans risk deepening their identification with a war that, surveys show, still sparks skepticism and concern among most Americans — even after the spike in public support that followed the killing of Abu Musab Zarqawi, the leader of Al Qaeda in Iraq.
In Thursday's debates on Capitol Hill, Republicans argued that Democrats would withdraw U.S. troops from Iraq too quickly. But they also provided the opportunity for a succession of Democrats to argue that Bush would stay too long.
The political fallout from this escalating confrontation in November's midterm election may pivot on which three words voters find more troubling: "cut and run" or "stay the course."
Steven Kull, director of the Program on International Policy Attitudes at the University of Maryland, said that although the debate illuminated divisions among Democrats, it also posed a clear political danger to Republicans.
"The Republicans have the potential of being seen as overreaching, of trying to stay in Iraq until we have it exactly the way we want it," Kull said.
The coordinated Republican push on Iraq, which included Bush's surprise visit to the country this week and a lengthy news conference after his return, highlights a core element of the GOP strategy for the fall's vote. Among Republican strategists, it is an article of faith that the party will fare better if it can shift the focus of voters from a backward-looking referendum on Bush's record to a forward-looking choice over the path America should follow.
Democratic candidates have been encouraging voters to use the election as a means of expressing discontent with the Bush administration's Iraq policy since the U.S. invasion more than three years ago. But Republicans want voters to ask which party they believe would be more likely to produce progress in Iraq in the months and years ahead.
"We think we can win that debate," said one senior GOP strategist familiar with White House thinking, who requested anonymity when discussing internal party deliberations. "We won it in 2004, and the Iraq war was not particularly popular then. It is better when we debate other people instead of debating events."
As part of this strategy, House GOP leaders offered a resolution Thursday asserting that U.S. interests would not be served by setting "an arbitrary date" for withdrawing troops from Iraq. The measure, due for a vote today, also expresses support for the Iraq war "as part of the global war on terror."
Senate Republican leaders, seeking to embarrass their Democratic colleagues, forced a vote on a resolution supporting the withdrawal of almost all U.S. troops by year's end — a plan Sen. John F. Kerry (D-Mass.) has said he expects to propose next week. The resolution failed, 93-6.
In pressing their case on Iraq, Republicans have argued that most Democrats want to precipitously withdraw U.S. troops from Iraq before the country is secured — a policy Republicans deride as "cutting and running."
Bush, at his news conference Wednesday, and GOP lawmakers, during Thursday's debates, argued that the key to success in Iraq was perseverance and determination.
"We know this: Our enemies are persistent and will stay the course," said Rep. Heather A. Wilson (R-N.M.). "So that is the choice we face as a nation … a choice between resolve and retreat."
Such pronouncements, GOP strategists say, taps into a traditional, if diluted, Bush strength — the sense among most voters that he provides strong leadership — as well as a traditional Democratic weakness — doubts about the party's toughness on national security.
Yet the Republican stress on "staying the course" allowed Democrats to maintain that Bush and his congressional supporters were promising Americans only an open-ended commitment in Iraq.
The core Democratic strategy in the House debate was to catalog the costs and disappointments of the war — Rep. Ike Skelton (D-Mo.) noted that the death toll for U.S. troops had reached 2,500 — and to charge that the Republican position guaranteed more of the same.
"Instead of staying the course, we need to chart a smarter course," Rep. Lloyd Doggett (D-Texas) said. "It's not weakness or retreat to realize the administration offers us only an endless spend-and-bleed policy."
Rep. Rahm Emanuel (D-Ill.), chairman of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, declared: "Stand pat, stay put, status quo: That is the Republican policy."
The political danger for Republicans is that although public opinion has moved in Bush's direction since Zarqawi's death, polls show that most Americans remain disillusioned with the war. For instance, in an NBC News/Wall Street Journal survey released Thursday, 52% said the war had not been worth the cost, whereas 40% said it had.
Kull, of the University of Maryland, noted that past gains in public support for the war "have had a short half-life," receding as the violence in Iraq continued.
For Democrats, the polls show political danger if Republicans can succeed in portraying them as backing a policy of "retreat" that would leave Iraq in chaos. In recent surveys, Americans have divided almost evenly on whether the U.S. should withdraw its troops before Iraq is stabilized.
Carl Forti, communications director for the National Republican Congressional Committee, predicted that the principal political value for his party from this week's congressional debate would come from identifying Democrats with an antiwar position that he argued most Americans would reject.
Americans "understand we can't walk away," Forti said. "To have Democrats so far out to the left on this is almost more effective than anything we can say ourselves."
Some critics of the war raised the opposite charge against congressional Democrats, complaining that they had not identified the party with a clear alternative to Bush's Iraq policy.
House Democrats failed to offer a partywide alternative to the GOP resolution. And the Senate's vote suggested that the amendment Kerry is planning on U.S. troop withdrawal will attract scant support. Despite intensive internal negotiations, other Senate Democrats have not reached agreement on a more moderate alternative.
"As long as no one is going to have a clear stand on the war … [Democrats] are not going to maximize the political benefits from the troubles the president finds himself in," said Ivo H. Daalder, a war critic and senior fellow at the Brookings Institution think tank.
(Hat-Tip - Col US Army Ret)
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By Ronald Brownstein, Times Staff Writer
June 16, 2006
WASHINGTON — The new Republican drive to focus attention on the Iraq war represents a high-stakes gamble: that doubts about the direction Democrats might set on national security exceed anxieties about the course charted by President Bush.
Through a series of high-profile efforts culminating Thursday with sustained House and Senate debates on the war, the White House and congressional Republicans are aiming to portray Democrats as too soft and too divided to steer the Iraq conflict to a successful conclusion.
But in the process, Republicans risk deepening their identification with a war that, surveys show, still sparks skepticism and concern among most Americans — even after the spike in public support that followed the killing of Abu Musab Zarqawi, the leader of Al Qaeda in Iraq.
In Thursday's debates on Capitol Hill, Republicans argued that Democrats would withdraw U.S. troops from Iraq too quickly. But they also provided the opportunity for a succession of Democrats to argue that Bush would stay too long.
The political fallout from this escalating confrontation in November's midterm election may pivot on which three words voters find more troubling: "cut and run" or "stay the course."
Steven Kull, director of the Program on International Policy Attitudes at the University of Maryland, said that although the debate illuminated divisions among Democrats, it also posed a clear political danger to Republicans.
"The Republicans have the potential of being seen as overreaching, of trying to stay in Iraq until we have it exactly the way we want it," Kull said.
The coordinated Republican push on Iraq, which included Bush's surprise visit to the country this week and a lengthy news conference after his return, highlights a core element of the GOP strategy for the fall's vote. Among Republican strategists, it is an article of faith that the party will fare better if it can shift the focus of voters from a backward-looking referendum on Bush's record to a forward-looking choice over the path America should follow.
Democratic candidates have been encouraging voters to use the election as a means of expressing discontent with the Bush administration's Iraq policy since the U.S. invasion more than three years ago. But Republicans want voters to ask which party they believe would be more likely to produce progress in Iraq in the months and years ahead.
"We think we can win that debate," said one senior GOP strategist familiar with White House thinking, who requested anonymity when discussing internal party deliberations. "We won it in 2004, and the Iraq war was not particularly popular then. It is better when we debate other people instead of debating events."
As part of this strategy, House GOP leaders offered a resolution Thursday asserting that U.S. interests would not be served by setting "an arbitrary date" for withdrawing troops from Iraq. The measure, due for a vote today, also expresses support for the Iraq war "as part of the global war on terror."
Senate Republican leaders, seeking to embarrass their Democratic colleagues, forced a vote on a resolution supporting the withdrawal of almost all U.S. troops by year's end — a plan Sen. John F. Kerry (D-Mass.) has said he expects to propose next week. The resolution failed, 93-6.
In pressing their case on Iraq, Republicans have argued that most Democrats want to precipitously withdraw U.S. troops from Iraq before the country is secured — a policy Republicans deride as "cutting and running."
Bush, at his news conference Wednesday, and GOP lawmakers, during Thursday's debates, argued that the key to success in Iraq was perseverance and determination.
"We know this: Our enemies are persistent and will stay the course," said Rep. Heather A. Wilson (R-N.M.). "So that is the choice we face as a nation … a choice between resolve and retreat."
Such pronouncements, GOP strategists say, taps into a traditional, if diluted, Bush strength — the sense among most voters that he provides strong leadership — as well as a traditional Democratic weakness — doubts about the party's toughness on national security.
Yet the Republican stress on "staying the course" allowed Democrats to maintain that Bush and his congressional supporters were promising Americans only an open-ended commitment in Iraq.
The core Democratic strategy in the House debate was to catalog the costs and disappointments of the war — Rep. Ike Skelton (D-Mo.) noted that the death toll for U.S. troops had reached 2,500 — and to charge that the Republican position guaranteed more of the same.
"Instead of staying the course, we need to chart a smarter course," Rep. Lloyd Doggett (D-Texas) said. "It's not weakness or retreat to realize the administration offers us only an endless spend-and-bleed policy."
Rep. Rahm Emanuel (D-Ill.), chairman of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, declared: "Stand pat, stay put, status quo: That is the Republican policy."
The political danger for Republicans is that although public opinion has moved in Bush's direction since Zarqawi's death, polls show that most Americans remain disillusioned with the war. For instance, in an NBC News/Wall Street Journal survey released Thursday, 52% said the war had not been worth the cost, whereas 40% said it had.
Kull, of the University of Maryland, noted that past gains in public support for the war "have had a short half-life," receding as the violence in Iraq continued.
For Democrats, the polls show political danger if Republicans can succeed in portraying them as backing a policy of "retreat" that would leave Iraq in chaos. In recent surveys, Americans have divided almost evenly on whether the U.S. should withdraw its troops before Iraq is stabilized.
Carl Forti, communications director for the National Republican Congressional Committee, predicted that the principal political value for his party from this week's congressional debate would come from identifying Democrats with an antiwar position that he argued most Americans would reject.
Americans "understand we can't walk away," Forti said. "To have Democrats so far out to the left on this is almost more effective than anything we can say ourselves."
Some critics of the war raised the opposite charge against congressional Democrats, complaining that they had not identified the party with a clear alternative to Bush's Iraq policy.
House Democrats failed to offer a partywide alternative to the GOP resolution. And the Senate's vote suggested that the amendment Kerry is planning on U.S. troop withdrawal will attract scant support. Despite intensive internal negotiations, other Senate Democrats have not reached agreement on a more moderate alternative.
"As long as no one is going to have a clear stand on the war … [Democrats] are not going to maximize the political benefits from the troubles the president finds himself in," said Ivo H. Daalder, a war critic and senior fellow at the Brookings Institution think tank.
(Hat-Tip - Col US Army Ret)
Wednesday, June 21, 2006
Subject: Muslims, Terrorist and the USA: A Different Spin on Iraq
(submitted by email - Ret US Army Col - this is going around the blogsphere, but it's a great read)
Please take the time to read the attached essay by Dr.Vernon Chong. It is without a doubt the most articulate and convincing writing I have read regarding the War in Iraq. If you have any doubts please open your mind to his essay and give a fair evaluation. It's also eerily applicable to other current issues (Iran's nuclear program, immigration, NAFTA's impact on American jobs, trade deficits, etc.). I had no idea who Dr. Chong is , or the source of these thoughts... so when I received them, I almost deleted them - as well-written as they are. But then I did a "Google search" on the Doctor and found him to be a retired Air Force Surgeon of all things and past Commander of Wilford Hall Medical Center in San Antonio. So he is real, is connected to Veterans affairs in California, and these are his thoughts. They are worth reading and thinking about!(the same Google search will direct you to some of his other thought-provoking writings.) If you would like to see who this fellow is, go to this Air Force web sight and look him up. http://www.af.mil/bios/alpha.asp?alpha=C
This WAR is for REAL! Dr. Vernon Chong, Major General, USAF, Retired
Tuesday, July 12, 2005 To get out of a difficulty, one usually must go through it. Our country is now facing the most serious threat to its existence, as we know it, that we have faced in your lifetime and mine (which includes WWII).
The deadly seriousness is greatly compounded by the fact that there are very few of us who think we can possibly lose this war and even fewer who realize what losing really means.
First, let's examine a few basics:
1. When did the threat to us start?
Many will say September 11, 2001. The answer as far as the United States is concerned is 1979, 22 years prior to September 2001, with the following attacks on us:
* Iran Embassy Hostages, 1979;
* Beirut, Lebanon Embassy 1983;
* Beirut, Lebanon Marine Barracks 1983;
* Lockerbie, Scotland Pan-Am flight to New York 1988;
* First New York World Trade Center attack 1993;
* Dhahran, Saudi Arabia Khobar Towers Military complex 1996;
* Nairobi, Kenya US Embassy 1998;
* Dares Salaam, Tanzania US Embassy 1998;
* Aden, Yemen USS Cole 2000;
* New York World Trade Center 2001;
* Pentagon 2001.
(Note that during the period from 1981 to 2001 there were 7,581 terrorist attacks worldwide).
2.. Why were we attacked?
Envy of our position, our success, and our freedoms. The attacks happened during the administrations of Presidents Carter, Reagan, Bush 1, Clinton and Bush 2. We cannot fault either the Republicans or Democrats as there were
no provocations by any of the presidents or their immediate predecessors, Presidents Ford or Carter.
3. Who were the attackers?
In each case, the attacks on the US were carried out by Muslims.
4. What is the Muslim population of the World?
25%.
5. Isn't the Muslim Religion peaceful?
Hopefully, but that is really not material. There is no doubt that the predominately Christian population of Germany was peaceful, but under the dictatorial leadership of Hitler (who was also Christian), that made no difference. You either went along with the administration or you were eliminated. There were 5 to 6 million Christians killed by the Nazis for political reasons (including 7,000 Polish priests). (see http://www.nazis.testimony.co.uk/7-a.htm)
Thus, almost the same number of Christians were killed by the Nazis, as the six million holocaust Jews who were killed by them, and we seldom heard of anything other than the Jewish atrocities. Although Hitler kept the world
focused on the Jews, he had no hesitancy about killing anyone who got in his way of exterminating the Jews or of taking over the world - German, Christian or any others.
Same with the Muslim terrorists. They focus the world on the US, but kill all in the way -- their own people or the Spanish, French or anyone else. The point here is that just like the peaceful Germans were of no protection to anyone from the Nazis, no matter how many peaceful Muslims there may be, they are no protection for us from the terrorist Muslim leaders and what they are fanatically bent on doing -- by their own pronouncements -- killing all of us "infidels." I don't blame the peaceful Muslims. What would you do if the choice was shut up or die?
6. So who are we at war with?
There is no way we can honestly respond that it is anyone other than the Muslim terrorists. Trying to be politically correct and avoid verbalizing this conclusion can well be fatal. There is no way to win if you don't clearly recognize and articulate who you are fighting.
So with that background, now to the two major questions:
1. Can we lose this war?
2. What does losing really mean?
If we are to win, we must clearly answer these two pivotal questions:
We can definitely lose this war, and as anomalous as it may sound, the major reason we can lose is that so many of us simply do not fathom the answer to the second question - What does losing mean?
It would appear that a great many of us think that losing the war means hanging our heads, bringing the troops home and going on about our business, like post-Vietnam. This is as far from the truth as one can get.
What losing really means is:
We would no longer be the premier country in the world. The attacks will not subside, but rather will steadily increase. Remember, they want us dead, not just quiet. If they had just wanted us quiet, they would not have
produced an increasing series of attacks against us, over the past 18 years. The plan was, clearly, for terrorists to attack us until we were neutered and submissive to them.
We would, of course, have no future support from other nations, for fear of reprisals and for the reason that they would see; we are impotent and cannot help them.
They will pick off the other non-Muslim nations, one at a time. It will be increasingly easier for them. They already hold Spain hostage. It doesn't matter whether it was right or wrong for Spain to withdraw its troops from Iraq. Spain did it because the Muslim terrorists bombed their train and told them to withdraw the troops. Anything else they want Spain to do will be done. Spain is finished.
The next will probably be France. Our one hope on France is that they might see the light and realize that if we don't win, they are finished too, in that they can't resist the Muslim terrorists without us. However, it may already be too late for France. France is already 20% Muslim and fading fast!
If we lose the war, our production, income, exports and way of life will all vanish as we know it. After losing, who would trade or deal with us if they were threatened by the Muslims. If we can't stop the Muslim terrorists, how
could anyone else?
The radical Muslims fully know what is riding on this war, and therefore are completely committed to winning, at any cost. We better know it too and be likewise committed to winning at any cost.
Why do I go on at such lengths about the results of losing? Simple. Until we recognize the costs of losing, we cannot unite and really put 100% of our thoughts and efforts into winning. And it is going to take that 100% effort to win.
So, how can we lose the war?
Again, the answer is simple. We can lose the war by "imploding." That is, defeating ourselves by refusing to recognize the enemy and their purpose, and really digging in and lending full support to the war effort. If we are
united, there is no way that we can lose. If we continue to be divided, there is no way that we can win!
Let me give you a few examples of how we simply don't comprehend the life and death seriousness of this situation.
President Bush selects Norman Mineta as Secretary of Transportation. Although all of the terrorist attacks were committed by Muslim men between 17 and 40 years of age, Secretary Mineta refuses to allow profiling. Does that sound like we are taking this thing seriously? This is war! For the duration, we are going to have to give up some of the civil rights we have become accustomed to. We had better be prepared to lose some of our civil rights temporarily or we will most certainly lose all of them permanently.
And don't worry that it is a slippery slope. We gave up plenty of civil rights during WWII, and immediately restored them after the victory and in fact added many more since then.
Do I blame President Bush or President Clinton before him?
No, I blame us for blithely assuming we can maintain all of our Political Correctness, and all of our civil rights during this conflict and have a clean, lawful, honorable war. None of those words apply to war. Get them out of your head.
Some have gone so far in their criticism of the war and/or the Administration that it almost seems they would literally like to see us lose. I hasten to add that this isn't because they are disloyal. It is because they just don't recognize what losing means. Nevertheless, that conduct gives the impression to the enemy that we are divided and weakening.
It concerns our friends, and it does great damage to our cause.
Of more recent vintage, the uproar fueled by the politicians and media regarding the treatment of some prisoners of war, perhaps exemplifies best what I am saying. We have recently had an issue, involving the treatment of a few Muslim prisoners of war, by a small group of our military police. These are the type prisoners who just a few months ago were throwing their own people off buildings, cutting off their hands, cutting out their tongues and otherwise murdering their own people just for disagreeing with Saddam Hussein.
And just a few years ago these same type prisoners chemically killed 400,000 of their own people for the same reason. They are also the same type of enemy fighters, who recently were burning Americans, and dragging their charred corpses through the streets of Iraq. And still more recently, the same type of enemy that was and is providing videos to all news sources internationally, of the beheading of American prisoners they held.
Compare this with some of our press and politicians, who for several days have thought and talked about nothing else but the "humiliating" of some Muslim prisoners -- not burning them, not dragging their charred corpses through the streets, not beheading them, but "humiliating" them.
Can this be for real?
The politicians and pundits have even talked of impeachment of the Secretary of Defense. If this doesn't show the complete lack of comprehension and understanding of the seriousness of the enemy we are fighting, the life and
death struggle we are in and the disastrous results of losing this war, nothing can.
To bring our country to a virtual political standstill over this prisoner issue makes us look like Nero playing his fiddle as Rome burned ? totally oblivious to what is going on in the real world. Neither we, nor any other country, can survive this internal strife. Again I say, this does not mean that some of our politicians or media people are disloyal. It simply means that they are absolutely oblivious to the magnitude, of the situation we are in and into which the Muslim terrorists have been pushing us, for many years.
Remember, the Muslim terrorists stated goal is to kill all infidels! That translates into ALL non-Muslims -- not just in the United States, but throughout the world. We are the last bastion of defense.
We have been criticized for many years as being 'arrogant.' That charge is valid in at least one respect. We are arrogant in that we believe that we are so good, powerful and smart, that we can win the hearts and minds of all
those who attack us, and that with both hands tied behind our back, we can defeat anything bad in the world! We can't!
If we don't recognize this, our nation as we know it will not survive, and no other free country in the world will survive if we are defeated.
And finally, name any Muslim countries throughout the world that allow freedom of speech, freedom of thought, freedom of religion, freedom of the press, equal rights for anyone -- let alone everyone, equal status or any status for women, or that have been productive in one single way that contributes to the good of the world.
This has been a long way of saying that we must be united on this war or we will be equated in the history books to the self-inflicted fall of the Roman Empire. If, that is, the Muslim leaders will allow history books to be written or read.
If we don't win this war right now, keep a close eye on how the Muslims take over France in the next 5 years or less. They will continue to increase the Muslim population of France and continue to encroach little by little, on the established French traditions. The French will be fighting among themselves, over what should or should not be done, which will continue to weaken them and keep them from any united resolve. Doesn't that sound eerily familiar?
Democracies don't have their freedoms taken away from them by some external military force. Instead, they give their freedoms away, politically correct piece by politically correct piece.
And they are giving those freedoms away to those who have shown, worldwide that they abhor freedom and will not apply it to you or even to themselves, once they are in power.
They have universally shown that when they have taken over, they then start brutally killing each other over who will be the few who control the masses. Will we ever stop hearing from the politically correct, about the "peaceful
Muslims"?
I close on a hopeful note, by repeating what I said above. If we are united, there is no way that we can lose. I hope now, after the election, the factions in our country will begin to focus on the critical situation we are in, and will unite to save our country. It is your future we are talking about! Do whatever you can to preserve it.
After reading the above, we all must do this not only for ourselves, but our children, our grandchildren, our country and the world. Whether Democrat or Republican, conservative or liberal and that include the Politicians and media of our country and the free world!
Please forward this to any you feel may want, or NEED to read it. Our "leaders" in Congress ought to read it, too. There are those that find fault with our country, but it is obvious to anyone who truly thinks through this, that we must UNITE!
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Please take the time to read the attached essay by Dr.Vernon Chong. It is without a doubt the most articulate and convincing writing I have read regarding the War in Iraq. If you have any doubts please open your mind to his essay and give a fair evaluation. It's also eerily applicable to other current issues (Iran's nuclear program, immigration, NAFTA's impact on American jobs, trade deficits, etc.). I had no idea who Dr. Chong is , or the source of these thoughts... so when I received them, I almost deleted them - as well-written as they are. But then I did a "Google search" on the Doctor and found him to be a retired Air Force Surgeon of all things and past Commander of Wilford Hall Medical Center in San Antonio. So he is real, is connected to Veterans affairs in California, and these are his thoughts. They are worth reading and thinking about!(the same Google search will direct you to some of his other thought-provoking writings.) If you would like to see who this fellow is, go to this Air Force web sight and look him up. http://www.af.mil/bios/alpha.asp?alpha=C
This WAR is for REAL! Dr. Vernon Chong, Major General, USAF, Retired
Tuesday, July 12, 2005 To get out of a difficulty, one usually must go through it. Our country is now facing the most serious threat to its existence, as we know it, that we have faced in your lifetime and mine (which includes WWII).
The deadly seriousness is greatly compounded by the fact that there are very few of us who think we can possibly lose this war and even fewer who realize what losing really means.
First, let's examine a few basics:
1. When did the threat to us start?
Many will say September 11, 2001. The answer as far as the United States is concerned is 1979, 22 years prior to September 2001, with the following attacks on us:
* Iran Embassy Hostages, 1979;
* Beirut, Lebanon Embassy 1983;
* Beirut, Lebanon Marine Barracks 1983;
* Lockerbie, Scotland Pan-Am flight to New York 1988;
* First New York World Trade Center attack 1993;
* Dhahran, Saudi Arabia Khobar Towers Military complex 1996;
* Nairobi, Kenya US Embassy 1998;
* Dares Salaam, Tanzania US Embassy 1998;
* Aden, Yemen USS Cole 2000;
* New York World Trade Center 2001;
* Pentagon 2001.
(Note that during the period from 1981 to 2001 there were 7,581 terrorist attacks worldwide).
2.. Why were we attacked?
Envy of our position, our success, and our freedoms. The attacks happened during the administrations of Presidents Carter, Reagan, Bush 1, Clinton and Bush 2. We cannot fault either the Republicans or Democrats as there were
no provocations by any of the presidents or their immediate predecessors, Presidents Ford or Carter.
3. Who were the attackers?
In each case, the attacks on the US were carried out by Muslims.
4. What is the Muslim population of the World?
25%.
5. Isn't the Muslim Religion peaceful?
Hopefully, but that is really not material. There is no doubt that the predominately Christian population of Germany was peaceful, but under the dictatorial leadership of Hitler (who was also Christian), that made no difference. You either went along with the administration or you were eliminated. There were 5 to 6 million Christians killed by the Nazis for political reasons (including 7,000 Polish priests). (see http://www.nazis.testimony.co.uk/7-a.htm)
Thus, almost the same number of Christians were killed by the Nazis, as the six million holocaust Jews who were killed by them, and we seldom heard of anything other than the Jewish atrocities. Although Hitler kept the world
focused on the Jews, he had no hesitancy about killing anyone who got in his way of exterminating the Jews or of taking over the world - German, Christian or any others.
Same with the Muslim terrorists. They focus the world on the US, but kill all in the way -- their own people or the Spanish, French or anyone else. The point here is that just like the peaceful Germans were of no protection to anyone from the Nazis, no matter how many peaceful Muslims there may be, they are no protection for us from the terrorist Muslim leaders and what they are fanatically bent on doing -- by their own pronouncements -- killing all of us "infidels." I don't blame the peaceful Muslims. What would you do if the choice was shut up or die?
6. So who are we at war with?
There is no way we can honestly respond that it is anyone other than the Muslim terrorists. Trying to be politically correct and avoid verbalizing this conclusion can well be fatal. There is no way to win if you don't clearly recognize and articulate who you are fighting.
So with that background, now to the two major questions:
1. Can we lose this war?
2. What does losing really mean?
If we are to win, we must clearly answer these two pivotal questions:
We can definitely lose this war, and as anomalous as it may sound, the major reason we can lose is that so many of us simply do not fathom the answer to the second question - What does losing mean?
It would appear that a great many of us think that losing the war means hanging our heads, bringing the troops home and going on about our business, like post-Vietnam. This is as far from the truth as one can get.
What losing really means is:
We would no longer be the premier country in the world. The attacks will not subside, but rather will steadily increase. Remember, they want us dead, not just quiet. If they had just wanted us quiet, they would not have
produced an increasing series of attacks against us, over the past 18 years. The plan was, clearly, for terrorists to attack us until we were neutered and submissive to them.
We would, of course, have no future support from other nations, for fear of reprisals and for the reason that they would see; we are impotent and cannot help them.
They will pick off the other non-Muslim nations, one at a time. It will be increasingly easier for them. They already hold Spain hostage. It doesn't matter whether it was right or wrong for Spain to withdraw its troops from Iraq. Spain did it because the Muslim terrorists bombed their train and told them to withdraw the troops. Anything else they want Spain to do will be done. Spain is finished.
The next will probably be France. Our one hope on France is that they might see the light and realize that if we don't win, they are finished too, in that they can't resist the Muslim terrorists without us. However, it may already be too late for France. France is already 20% Muslim and fading fast!
If we lose the war, our production, income, exports and way of life will all vanish as we know it. After losing, who would trade or deal with us if they were threatened by the Muslims. If we can't stop the Muslim terrorists, how
could anyone else?
The radical Muslims fully know what is riding on this war, and therefore are completely committed to winning, at any cost. We better know it too and be likewise committed to winning at any cost.
Why do I go on at such lengths about the results of losing? Simple. Until we recognize the costs of losing, we cannot unite and really put 100% of our thoughts and efforts into winning. And it is going to take that 100% effort to win.
So, how can we lose the war?
Again, the answer is simple. We can lose the war by "imploding." That is, defeating ourselves by refusing to recognize the enemy and their purpose, and really digging in and lending full support to the war effort. If we are
united, there is no way that we can lose. If we continue to be divided, there is no way that we can win!
Let me give you a few examples of how we simply don't comprehend the life and death seriousness of this situation.
President Bush selects Norman Mineta as Secretary of Transportation. Although all of the terrorist attacks were committed by Muslim men between 17 and 40 years of age, Secretary Mineta refuses to allow profiling. Does that sound like we are taking this thing seriously? This is war! For the duration, we are going to have to give up some of the civil rights we have become accustomed to. We had better be prepared to lose some of our civil rights temporarily or we will most certainly lose all of them permanently.
And don't worry that it is a slippery slope. We gave up plenty of civil rights during WWII, and immediately restored them after the victory and in fact added many more since then.
Do I blame President Bush or President Clinton before him?
No, I blame us for blithely assuming we can maintain all of our Political Correctness, and all of our civil rights during this conflict and have a clean, lawful, honorable war. None of those words apply to war. Get them out of your head.
Some have gone so far in their criticism of the war and/or the Administration that it almost seems they would literally like to see us lose. I hasten to add that this isn't because they are disloyal. It is because they just don't recognize what losing means. Nevertheless, that conduct gives the impression to the enemy that we are divided and weakening.
It concerns our friends, and it does great damage to our cause.
Of more recent vintage, the uproar fueled by the politicians and media regarding the treatment of some prisoners of war, perhaps exemplifies best what I am saying. We have recently had an issue, involving the treatment of a few Muslim prisoners of war, by a small group of our military police. These are the type prisoners who just a few months ago were throwing their own people off buildings, cutting off their hands, cutting out their tongues and otherwise murdering their own people just for disagreeing with Saddam Hussein.
And just a few years ago these same type prisoners chemically killed 400,000 of their own people for the same reason. They are also the same type of enemy fighters, who recently were burning Americans, and dragging their charred corpses through the streets of Iraq. And still more recently, the same type of enemy that was and is providing videos to all news sources internationally, of the beheading of American prisoners they held.
Compare this with some of our press and politicians, who for several days have thought and talked about nothing else but the "humiliating" of some Muslim prisoners -- not burning them, not dragging their charred corpses through the streets, not beheading them, but "humiliating" them.
Can this be for real?
The politicians and pundits have even talked of impeachment of the Secretary of Defense. If this doesn't show the complete lack of comprehension and understanding of the seriousness of the enemy we are fighting, the life and
death struggle we are in and the disastrous results of losing this war, nothing can.
To bring our country to a virtual political standstill over this prisoner issue makes us look like Nero playing his fiddle as Rome burned ? totally oblivious to what is going on in the real world. Neither we, nor any other country, can survive this internal strife. Again I say, this does not mean that some of our politicians or media people are disloyal. It simply means that they are absolutely oblivious to the magnitude, of the situation we are in and into which the Muslim terrorists have been pushing us, for many years.
Remember, the Muslim terrorists stated goal is to kill all infidels! That translates into ALL non-Muslims -- not just in the United States, but throughout the world. We are the last bastion of defense.
We have been criticized for many years as being 'arrogant.' That charge is valid in at least one respect. We are arrogant in that we believe that we are so good, powerful and smart, that we can win the hearts and minds of all
those who attack us, and that with both hands tied behind our back, we can defeat anything bad in the world! We can't!
If we don't recognize this, our nation as we know it will not survive, and no other free country in the world will survive if we are defeated.
And finally, name any Muslim countries throughout the world that allow freedom of speech, freedom of thought, freedom of religion, freedom of the press, equal rights for anyone -- let alone everyone, equal status or any status for women, or that have been productive in one single way that contributes to the good of the world.
This has been a long way of saying that we must be united on this war or we will be equated in the history books to the self-inflicted fall of the Roman Empire. If, that is, the Muslim leaders will allow history books to be written or read.
If we don't win this war right now, keep a close eye on how the Muslims take over France in the next 5 years or less. They will continue to increase the Muslim population of France and continue to encroach little by little, on the established French traditions. The French will be fighting among themselves, over what should or should not be done, which will continue to weaken them and keep them from any united resolve. Doesn't that sound eerily familiar?
Democracies don't have their freedoms taken away from them by some external military force. Instead, they give their freedoms away, politically correct piece by politically correct piece.
And they are giving those freedoms away to those who have shown, worldwide that they abhor freedom and will not apply it to you or even to themselves, once they are in power.
They have universally shown that when they have taken over, they then start brutally killing each other over who will be the few who control the masses. Will we ever stop hearing from the politically correct, about the "peaceful
Muslims"?
I close on a hopeful note, by repeating what I said above. If we are united, there is no way that we can lose. I hope now, after the election, the factions in our country will begin to focus on the critical situation we are in, and will unite to save our country. It is your future we are talking about! Do whatever you can to preserve it.
After reading the above, we all must do this not only for ourselves, but our children, our grandchildren, our country and the world. Whether Democrat or Republican, conservative or liberal and that include the Politicians and media of our country and the free world!
Please forward this to any you feel may want, or NEED to read it. Our "leaders" in Congress ought to read it, too. There are those that find fault with our country, but it is obvious to anyone who truly thinks through this, that we must UNITE!
Tuesday, June 20, 2006
In God We Trust Slideshow
|Wictory Wednesday Blogburst
This week Wictory Wednesday presents Diana Irey for US Congress. Diana is running against ex-Marine Rep. John Murtha from Pennsylvania who needs no explanation as to why he should be replaced. This race began as what seemed to be an uneventful race against an incumbent who not only didn't expect competition, but is planning on making a run to become House Minority Leader.
Diana Irey served for ten years as commissioner of Washington County and served on a number of boards and commissions bring jobs and fiscal discipline to the local government. She supports not only lower taxes but lower government spending. While Murtha's campaign seems to revolve around nothing else but the Iraq War (albeit an important issues), Irey is approaching running for office with a variety of stances on issues including supporting victory in Iraq and treating soldiers with respect,
not as criminals.
Most importantly Diana is not a beltway bureaucrat and has served only in local offices until now. She will not only bring a local perspective to a seat that is held by an individual more concerned with his own national profile, she will support balanced budgets and intelligent policy-making to a Congress that has shown itself to be free with the money entrusted to it.
Please consider supporting the campaign of Diana Irey for the House of Representatives for the 12th District of Pennsylvania.
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Diana Irey served for ten years as commissioner of Washington County and served on a number of boards and commissions bring jobs and fiscal discipline to the local government. She supports not only lower taxes but lower government spending. While Murtha's campaign seems to revolve around nothing else but the Iraq War (albeit an important issues), Irey is approaching running for office with a variety of stances on issues including supporting victory in Iraq and treating soldiers with respect,
not as criminals.
Most importantly Diana is not a beltway bureaucrat and has served only in local offices until now. She will not only bring a local perspective to a seat that is held by an individual more concerned with his own national profile, she will support balanced budgets and intelligent policy-making to a Congress that has shown itself to be free with the money entrusted to it.
Please consider supporting the campaign of Diana Irey for the House of Representatives for the 12th District of Pennsylvania.
Joe Lieberman Switches To Republican Party
No, this is not true. It's made up. But think about the title of this post this way: Democrats are targeting Lieberman for his support of some of GWB's initiatives, especially the GWOT. And if his party continues to go after him, he should come to the right side of the force.
Lieberman's 'closeness' to the current administrations initiatives is exactly what Congressman are supposed to do - work, collaborate, and debate in good-faith, the most important issues of the day. It's called statescraft and no one on the left or the right either possess this skill nor demonstrates it if it exists.
So Lieberman wants to work with Republicans. Good. How many of his buddies on the left can say the same thing? Newsmax has another take on Lieberman's closeness to GWB.
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Lieberman's 'closeness' to the current administrations initiatives is exactly what Congressman are supposed to do - work, collaborate, and debate in good-faith, the most important issues of the day. It's called statescraft and no one on the left or the right either possess this skill nor demonstrates it if it exists.
So Lieberman wants to work with Republicans. Good. How many of his buddies on the left can say the same thing? Newsmax has another take on Lieberman's closeness to GWB.
Huge Support For Ann Coulter
From Newsmax.com:
Ann Coulter’s new book "Godless: The Church of Liberalism" has created a storm of controversy, but an online poll sponsored by NewsMax.com reveals that Americans overwhelmingly support Coulter and strongly disagree with her critics.
In the book – which shot to the top of Amazon.com’s list of best sellers the day after it was published and has debuted at the No. 1 spot on The New York Times nonfiction list – Coulter criticizes four New Jersey widows who pushed for an independent commission to investigate the 9/11 attacks that killed their husbands, and backed Democrat John Kerry for president in 2004.
"These broads are millionaires, lionized on TV and in articles about them, reveling in their status as celebrities and stalked by grief-arazzis,” Coulter wrote.
Hillary Clinton immediately lashed out at Coulter for what she called her "vicious, mean-spirited attack” on the widows and said the book should have been called "heartless.”
House Democrats from New York and Long Island signed a letter demanding an apology from Coulter, and two New Jersey Democrats sought to have the book banned in that state.
Ann Coulter’s new book "Godless: The Church of Liberalism" has created a storm of controversy, but an online poll sponsored by NewsMax.com reveals that Americans overwhelmingly support Coulter and strongly disagree with her critics.
In the book – which shot to the top of Amazon.com’s list of best sellers the day after it was published and has debuted at the No. 1 spot on The New York Times nonfiction list – Coulter criticizes four New Jersey widows who pushed for an independent commission to investigate the 9/11 attacks that killed their husbands, and backed Democrat John Kerry for president in 2004.
"These broads are millionaires, lionized on TV and in articles about them, reveling in their status as celebrities and stalked by grief-arazzis,” Coulter wrote.
Hillary Clinton immediately lashed out at Coulter for what she called her "vicious, mean-spirited attack” on the widows and said the book should have been called "heartless.”
House Democrats from New York and Long Island signed a letter demanding an apology from Coulter, and two New Jersey Democrats sought to have the book banned in that state.
Ann Coulter’s new book "Godless: The Church of Liberalism" has created a storm of controversy, but an online poll sponsored by NewsMax.com reveals that Americans overwhelmingly support Coulter and strongly disagree with her critics.
In the book – which shot to the top of Amazon.com’s list of best sellers the day after it was published and has debuted at the No. 1 spot on The New York Times nonfiction list – Coulter criticizes four New Jersey widows who pushed for an independent commission to investigate the 9/11 attacks that killed their husbands, and backed Democrat John Kerry for president in 2004.
Here are the poll questions and results:
1) Was Ann Coulter wrong in criticizing four 9/11 widows known as the "Jersey Girls”?
Wrong: 15 percent
Not wrong: 85 percent
2) What is your opinion of Ann Coulter?
Favorable: 87 percent
Unfavorable: 13 percent
3) Do you agree with Hillary Clinton that Ann’s book is "vicious” and "heartless”?
Yes, agree: 13 percent
No, don’t agree: 87 percent
4) Has the media coverage of Ann Coulter and her book been fair?
Fair: 18 percent
Not fair: 82 percent
5) Of the three, who would you trust for news and information?
Katie Couric: 10 percent
Ann Coulter: 86 percent
Al Franken: 4 percent
Question 4 is silly, actually. Saying the media is not fair begets the whole point of the book. Coulter's messages are simple - Don't whine, love America first, vote, practice your religion, leave everyone else alone, raise decent God fearing children, and call a spade a spade when you have to. Pretty simple axioms.
Read AC's book - it's a cracking good read.
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Ann Coulter’s new book "Godless: The Church of Liberalism" has created a storm of controversy, but an online poll sponsored by NewsMax.com reveals that Americans overwhelmingly support Coulter and strongly disagree with her critics.
In the book – which shot to the top of Amazon.com’s list of best sellers the day after it was published and has debuted at the No. 1 spot on The New York Times nonfiction list – Coulter criticizes four New Jersey widows who pushed for an independent commission to investigate the 9/11 attacks that killed their husbands, and backed Democrat John Kerry for president in 2004.
"These broads are millionaires, lionized on TV and in articles about them, reveling in their status as celebrities and stalked by grief-arazzis,” Coulter wrote.
Hillary Clinton immediately lashed out at Coulter for what she called her "vicious, mean-spirited attack” on the widows and said the book should have been called "heartless.”
House Democrats from New York and Long Island signed a letter demanding an apology from Coulter, and two New Jersey Democrats sought to have the book banned in that state.
Ann Coulter’s new book "Godless: The Church of Liberalism" has created a storm of controversy, but an online poll sponsored by NewsMax.com reveals that Americans overwhelmingly support Coulter and strongly disagree with her critics.
In the book – which shot to the top of Amazon.com’s list of best sellers the day after it was published and has debuted at the No. 1 spot on The New York Times nonfiction list – Coulter criticizes four New Jersey widows who pushed for an independent commission to investigate the 9/11 attacks that killed their husbands, and backed Democrat John Kerry for president in 2004.
"These broads are millionaires, lionized on TV and in articles about them, reveling in their status as celebrities and stalked by grief-arazzis,” Coulter wrote.
Hillary Clinton immediately lashed out at Coulter for what she called her "vicious, mean-spirited attack” on the widows and said the book should have been called "heartless.”
House Democrats from New York and Long Island signed a letter demanding an apology from Coulter, and two New Jersey Democrats sought to have the book banned in that state.
Ann Coulter’s new book "Godless: The Church of Liberalism" has created a storm of controversy, but an online poll sponsored by NewsMax.com reveals that Americans overwhelmingly support Coulter and strongly disagree with her critics.
In the book – which shot to the top of Amazon.com’s list of best sellers the day after it was published and has debuted at the No. 1 spot on The New York Times nonfiction list – Coulter criticizes four New Jersey widows who pushed for an independent commission to investigate the 9/11 attacks that killed their husbands, and backed Democrat John Kerry for president in 2004.
Here are the poll questions and results:
1) Was Ann Coulter wrong in criticizing four 9/11 widows known as the "Jersey Girls”?
Wrong: 15 percent
Not wrong: 85 percent
2) What is your opinion of Ann Coulter?
Favorable: 87 percent
Unfavorable: 13 percent
3) Do you agree with Hillary Clinton that Ann’s book is "vicious” and "heartless”?
Yes, agree: 13 percent
No, don’t agree: 87 percent
4) Has the media coverage of Ann Coulter and her book been fair?
Fair: 18 percent
Not fair: 82 percent
5) Of the three, who would you trust for news and information?
Katie Couric: 10 percent
Ann Coulter: 86 percent
Al Franken: 4 percent
Question 4 is silly, actually. Saying the media is not fair begets the whole point of the book. Coulter's messages are simple - Don't whine, love America first, vote, practice your religion, leave everyone else alone, raise decent God fearing children, and call a spade a spade when you have to. Pretty simple axioms.
Read AC's book - it's a cracking good read.
Monday, June 19, 2006
A War That Isn't - Must Read Washington Times Editorial
This is another fascinating piece you all have to read. Link.
Most of us probably missed this since it's in the Washington Times. This is another indictment about the media and its coverage of the war. Pass this along to all you know who support our troops.
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Most of us probably missed this since it's in the Washington Times. This is another indictment about the media and its coverage of the war. Pass this along to all you know who support our troops.
Thursday, June 15, 2006
Happy Birthday Queen Elizabeth
The full text of the Queen's speech at the Mansion House lunch today - London England.
My Lord Mayor, I am most grateful to you for inviting Prince Philip and me to this lunch today to mark both my 80th birthday and the 85th birthday of Prince Philip last weekend.
"The Corporation’s generous hospitality is well-known, and I have no doubt that this is now even more the case thanks to the "Great British Menu" which I look forward to sampling shortly.
"Creating a good menu is a familiar dilemma for any host, but the solution of competitive cooking is a new concept to me - although I understand there are as yet no penalty shoot-outs.
"My Lord Mayor, as one gets older, birthdays seem to come round quicker; they are therefore less obviously excuses for wider celebration than personal moments to count one’s blessings.
"As Groucho Marx once said ‘Anyone can get old - all you have to do is to live long enough’.
"And there are in my view many other anniversaries this year which are more deserving of celebration.
"I hope you will permit me to single out two for mention: the Fiftieth Anniversary of The Duke of Edinburgh’s Award and the Thirtieth Anniversary of The Prince’s Trust.
"Both organisations in their different ways have changed - and continue to change - countless people’s lives for the better.
"This success has been the result of the imagination, energy and endless hard work of many dedicated people combined with the leadership and drive of The Duke of Edinburgh and The Prince of Wales.
"I am very happy to take this opportunity to draw attention to their achievement and to thank them both for all the support they give me each and every day.
"And as I count my blessings on my birthday I am aware of the value of the advice and encouragement that I am lucky enough to receive from every quarter - from my family, from my friends, from all of you.
"My Lord Mayor, I cannot do better than to use this wonderful occasion to express my heartfelt appreciation to the many, many thousands of people from this country and from overseas who have sent me letters, cards and messages of goodwill over the last couple of months.
"This has been truly overwhelming and I would like to thank you all for your kindness.
"I would now ask you to rise and drink a toast to ‘The Lord Mayor and the City of London Corporation’."
If only our US Reps and Senators spoke so well.
Joan Rivers had this to say about QEII in the 80s: 'I met the Queen. Oh yes. But the only pictures of her I saw were on British Stamps. So when she introduced herself, I licked the back of her head. She's all bald back there and just brushes her hair forward.' 'Can we talk?'
Happy Birthday Queen Elizabeth
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My Lord Mayor, I am most grateful to you for inviting Prince Philip and me to this lunch today to mark both my 80th birthday and the 85th birthday of Prince Philip last weekend.
"The Corporation’s generous hospitality is well-known, and I have no doubt that this is now even more the case thanks to the "Great British Menu" which I look forward to sampling shortly.
"Creating a good menu is a familiar dilemma for any host, but the solution of competitive cooking is a new concept to me - although I understand there are as yet no penalty shoot-outs.
"My Lord Mayor, as one gets older, birthdays seem to come round quicker; they are therefore less obviously excuses for wider celebration than personal moments to count one’s blessings.
"As Groucho Marx once said ‘Anyone can get old - all you have to do is to live long enough’.
"And there are in my view many other anniversaries this year which are more deserving of celebration.
"I hope you will permit me to single out two for mention: the Fiftieth Anniversary of The Duke of Edinburgh’s Award and the Thirtieth Anniversary of The Prince’s Trust.
"Both organisations in their different ways have changed - and continue to change - countless people’s lives for the better.
"This success has been the result of the imagination, energy and endless hard work of many dedicated people combined with the leadership and drive of The Duke of Edinburgh and The Prince of Wales.
"I am very happy to take this opportunity to draw attention to their achievement and to thank them both for all the support they give me each and every day.
"And as I count my blessings on my birthday I am aware of the value of the advice and encouragement that I am lucky enough to receive from every quarter - from my family, from my friends, from all of you.
"My Lord Mayor, I cannot do better than to use this wonderful occasion to express my heartfelt appreciation to the many, many thousands of people from this country and from overseas who have sent me letters, cards and messages of goodwill over the last couple of months.
"This has been truly overwhelming and I would like to thank you all for your kindness.
"I would now ask you to rise and drink a toast to ‘The Lord Mayor and the City of London Corporation’."
If only our US Reps and Senators spoke so well.
Joan Rivers had this to say about QEII in the 80s: 'I met the Queen. Oh yes. But the only pictures of her I saw were on British Stamps. So when she introduced herself, I licked the back of her head. She's all bald back there and just brushes her hair forward.' 'Can we talk?'
Happy Birthday Queen Elizabeth
Wednesday, June 14, 2006
GO/Flag Officers Conf on Iraq @ Ft. Carson, CO
Sent: Tuesday, June 13, 2006 5:33 PMTo: Subject: GO/Flag Officers Conf on Iraq @ Ft. Carson, CO (hat tip to Ret. Col US Army by email)
This is an amazing post. Please send this to all you know in the blogsphere. It's really worth reading! The press in the U. S. is rewriting their reporters stories and changing pictures to meet their own agenda!
Saturday, June 10, 2006Subject: Fort Carson General and Flag Officers Conference on Iraq, at Fort Carson, CO
Earlier this week I (a Rear Admiral) attended a retired general and flag officer conference at Fort Carson, Colorado. The conference was hosted by Major General Bob Mixon, Commanding General of Seventh Infantry Division, which calls Fort Carson its home.
Fort Carson is a huge installation located to the south of Colorado Springs; it’s becoming one of the larger Army installations in the country (26,000 soldiers) It is also the home post of the largest number of troopers who have served multiple tours in Afghanistan and Iraq and, regrettably, the largest number of troopers who have died in combat there over the past three years. There are Fort Carson units going to and returning from the combat area virtually on a monthly basis.
The conference was primarily organized to explain the modular brigade concept, and it featured a panel of officers who had either very recently returned from commands in the combat zone or were about to deploy there in the next two months. Three of the recent returnees were Colonel H.R. McMaster, Colonel Rick S., and Captain Walter Szpak.
McMaster is the commander of the 3rd Armored Calvary Regiment, the unit that, through very innovative and population-friendly tactics, rid the city of Tal Afar of insurgents. The mayor of Tal Afar came back to Carson two weeks ago to thank the troopers and their families personally for “freeing his people”. (You say you didn’t hear about that in the mainstream media?) McMaster is considered the foremost U.S. expert on modern insurgent warfare, has written a book on the subject which is widely circulated at the war colleges and staff colleges, and he was asked to testify before Congress when he returned from the 3rd ACR combat deployment. He is obviously one of the great combat leaders that has emerged from the war and is highly respected (some would say revered) by his troopers and his superiors alike.
Colonel S. is assigned to the 10th Special Forces Brigade and he headed up all of the 31 special forces A-teams that are integrated with the populace and the Iraqi Army and national police throughout the country. Many of these are the guys that you see occasionally on the news that have beards, dress in native regalia, usually speak Arabic and don’t like to have their identities revealed for fear of retribution on their families (thus the Colonel S.) Captain Szpak was the head of all the Army explosive ordnance teams in Iraq. He and his troops had the job of disarming all the improvised explosive devices (IEDs) and explosive formed projectiles (EFPs) that were discovered before they were detonated. They also traveled around the country training the combat forces in recognizing and avoiding these devices in time to prevent death and injury. IEDs and EFP s are responsible for the vast majority of casualties experienced by our forces.
Despite the objective of the conference (i.e., the modular brigade concept), it quickly devolved into a 3½ hour question and answer period between the panel and the 54 retired generals and admirals who attended. I wish I had a video of the whole session to share with you because the insights were especially eye opening and encouraging. I’ll try to summarize the high points as best I can.
· All returnees agreed that “we are clearly winning the fight against the insurgents but we are losing the public relations battle both in the war zone and in the States”. (I’ll go into more detail on each topic below.)
· All agreed that it will be necessary for us to have forces in Iraq for at least ten more years, though by no means in the numbers that are there now.
· They opined that 80% to 90% of the Iraqi people want to have us there and do not want us to leave before “the job is done”.
· The morale and combat capability of the troops is the highest that the senior officers have ever seen in the 20-30 years that each has served.
· The Iraqi armed forces and police are probably better trained right now than they were under Saddam, but our standards are much higher and they lack officer leadership.
· They don’t need more troops in the combat zone but they need considerably more Arab linguists and civil affairs experts.
· The IEDs and EFPs continue to be the principal problem that they face and they are becoming more sophisticated as time passes.
Public Affairs: We are losing the public affairs battle for a variety of reasons. First, in Iraq, the terrorists provide Al Jazeera with footage of their more spectacular attacks and they are on TV to the whole Arab world within minutes of the event. By contrast it takes four to six days for a story generated by Army Public Affairs to gain clearance by Combined Forces Command, two or three more days to get Pentagon clearance, and after all that, the public media may or may not run the story.
Second, the U.S. mainstream media (MSM) who send reporters to the combat zone do not like to have their people embedded with our troops. They claim that the reporters get “less objective” when they live with the soldiers and marines – they come to see the world through the eyes of the troops. As a consequence, a majority of the reporters stay in hotels in the “Green Zone” and send out native stringers to call in stories to them by cell phone which they later write up and file. No effort is made to verify any of these stories or the credibility of the stringers. The recent serious injuries to Bob Woodruff of ABC and Kimberly Dozier of CBS makes the likelihood of the use of local stringers even higher.
Third, the stories that are filed by reporters in the field very seldom reach the American public as written. An anecdote from Col. McMaster illustrates this dramatically. TIME magazine recently sent a reporter to spend six weeks with the 3rd ACR as they were in the battle of Tal Afar. When the battle was over, the reporter filed his story and also included close to 100 pictures that the accompanying photographer took. TIME published a cover story on the battle a week later, allegedly using the story sent in by their reporter. When the issue came out, the guts had been edited out of their reporter’s story and none of the pictures he submitted were used. Instead they showed a weeping child on the cover, taken from stock photos. When the reporter questioned why his story was eviscerated, his editors in New York responded that the story and pi ctures were “too heroic”. McMaster had read both and told me that the editors had completely changed the thrust and context of the material their reporter had submitted.
As a sidebar on the public affairs situation, Colonel Bob McRee, who was also on the panel and is bringing a Military Police Battalion to Iraq next month, invited the Colorado Springs Gazette to send a reporter with the battalion for six weeks to two months. He assured the Gazette, in writing one month ago, that he would provide full time bodyguards for the reporter, taking the manpower out of his own hide. The Gazette has yet to respond to his offer.
Ten More Years: The idea that we will have troops in Iraq for ten more years sounds rather grim, even though by contrast, President Clinton sent troops to Bosnia and Kosovo nearly ten years ago. And they’re still there with no end in sight. While Iraq is clearly a different situation right now, the panelists believe that within a few years at the most, it will become very much the same – a peace keeping, nation building function among factions that have hated one another for centuries. There is factionalism and there was bitter fighting in the Balkans before NATO intervened and with peace keepers, the panelists believe that Iraq will be a parallel situation. This, by the way, is why they all believe that linguists and civil affairs military personnel are so necessary for the future.
Colonel S. went out on a limb by suggesting that if most of the troops in Iraq were deployed home “tomorrow” he could have the entire country “pacified” and the terrorist situation brought under control with just one brigade of special forces. Since these guys are linguists, civil affairs experts, among many other skills and talents, he may not be too far wrong.
Iraqi Attitudes: The panelists agreed that the public affairs problem manifests itself most significantly in the American public belief that the people of Iraq want us out of their country which we are occupying. They have served in different parts of the country but each agreed that we are wanted and needed there. I refer you to the anecdote from Col. McMaster and the thousands of pictures available on the internet of the U.S. forces shown in very cordial relations with the locals. Of course, our media’s obsession with Abu Graib and, if the initial reports regarding the small group of Marines at Haditha prove to be true, then those attitudes will change somewhat. But as one of the panelists pointed out, the atrocities suffered under Saddam were much worse and much more common.
Morale and Capabilities: Two weeks ago, the local TV channels showed a 3rd ACR re-enlistment ceremony held at Ft. Carson and officiated by Colonel McMaster. Mind you, this unit has just returned from a one-year combat tour of hard and bloody fighting in Iraq and will likely return there again in eight to ten months. Of the 670 soldiers eligible for re-enlistment, 654 of them held up their right hands and signed on for another four years. Incredible!
The Army goal for re-enlistments for fiscal year 2006 was for 40,000 soldiers to extend their active duty commitments. With four months remaining in the fiscal year, they have already exceeded their goal of 40,000 and may have to go back to Congress for authorization to exceed their force structure manning limitations. Since Congress has been pontificating for the past couple of years that the Army is woefully under strength, that should not pose any difficulty.
Iraqi Forces: Every one of the returning commanders had experience in joint operations with the Iraqi soldiers – and in the case of some of them, with the local and national police. They are all are supportive of the quality of the forces, but culturally, they believe that we may be expecting too much from them as a pre-condition for handing over greater responsibility for area control. McMaster said that he worked with the army and the police at Tal Afar and was not the least bit reluctant to assign major responsibilities to them in the operations that were conducted.
Col. S.’s Green Berets, on the other hand, caught a national police lieutenant who was directing the emplacement of an IED by cell phone in order to disrupt a convoy – immediately after the lieutenant had been briefed on the convoy’s route. The good news in this situation was that they were able to reroute the convoy, safely, and track the lieutenant’s entire network through the use of the speed dial on his phone. Having terrorist infiltrators in both the army and the police force remains a problem. But by no means does that detract from the courage and determination of those who are loyal to the new Iraq.
Explosive Devices: The combined command in Iraq is becoming increasingly effective in countering the significant threat posed by the IEDs and EFPs. The frequency of attacks has decreased in large part through training to recognize the threat, the new technology (UAVs – unmanned aerial vehicles or drones, for example) which help to discover where the devices are emplaced, the infiltration of some of the terrorist cells, etc. However, the technology being used by the terrorists is also improving measurably. In the past six weeks, two bomb making sites were found, raided and the bad guys arrested. In both cases, the head bomb makers were master’s degree graduates (one in chemistry and one in physics) from American universities. That’s a lot of brain power to bring into the f ight, but we also have some pretty talented people in the military, industry and academia who are doing their best to even the odds.
Conclusion: This is more than I had intended to write on the subject – so what’s new a lot of you might say – but it is a subject that doesn’t get the proper balance from other sources, in my judgment at least. I trust the information that we received far more than anything that I have heard or seen in our usual news sources. The most disturbing thing that I heard was that our MSM is changing the stories filed by their own people on the scene because they sound “too heroic”.
The over riding opinion that I came away from the conference with is that we have incredibly talented and professional leaders who are facing up to the challenges and are making inexorable progress toward the goals of our nation. We’re fortunate to have courageous and valorous people on the combat front, even though there seems to be a serious dearth of these same types of people in Congress and the mainstream media.
Please pass this along to everyone you know in the blogsphere. This is the most significant analysis to date about the magnificent work our men and women are doing in Iraq.
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This is an amazing post. Please send this to all you know in the blogsphere. It's really worth reading! The press in the U. S. is rewriting their reporters stories and changing pictures to meet their own agenda!
Saturday, June 10, 2006Subject: Fort Carson General and Flag Officers Conference on Iraq, at Fort Carson, CO
Earlier this week I (a Rear Admiral) attended a retired general and flag officer conference at Fort Carson, Colorado. The conference was hosted by Major General Bob Mixon, Commanding General of Seventh Infantry Division, which calls Fort Carson its home.
Fort Carson is a huge installation located to the south of Colorado Springs; it’s becoming one of the larger Army installations in the country (26,000 soldiers) It is also the home post of the largest number of troopers who have served multiple tours in Afghanistan and Iraq and, regrettably, the largest number of troopers who have died in combat there over the past three years. There are Fort Carson units going to and returning from the combat area virtually on a monthly basis.
The conference was primarily organized to explain the modular brigade concept, and it featured a panel of officers who had either very recently returned from commands in the combat zone or were about to deploy there in the next two months. Three of the recent returnees were Colonel H.R. McMaster, Colonel Rick S., and Captain Walter Szpak.
McMaster is the commander of the 3rd Armored Calvary Regiment, the unit that, through very innovative and population-friendly tactics, rid the city of Tal Afar of insurgents. The mayor of Tal Afar came back to Carson two weeks ago to thank the troopers and their families personally for “freeing his people”. (You say you didn’t hear about that in the mainstream media?) McMaster is considered the foremost U.S. expert on modern insurgent warfare, has written a book on the subject which is widely circulated at the war colleges and staff colleges, and he was asked to testify before Congress when he returned from the 3rd ACR combat deployment. He is obviously one of the great combat leaders that has emerged from the war and is highly respected (some would say revered) by his troopers and his superiors alike.
Colonel S. is assigned to the 10th Special Forces Brigade and he headed up all of the 31 special forces A-teams that are integrated with the populace and the Iraqi Army and national police throughout the country. Many of these are the guys that you see occasionally on the news that have beards, dress in native regalia, usually speak Arabic and don’t like to have their identities revealed for fear of retribution on their families (thus the Colonel S.) Captain Szpak was the head of all the Army explosive ordnance teams in Iraq. He and his troops had the job of disarming all the improvised explosive devices (IEDs) and explosive formed projectiles (EFPs) that were discovered before they were detonated. They also traveled around the country training the combat forces in recognizing and avoiding these devices in time to prevent death and injury. IEDs and EFP s are responsible for the vast majority of casualties experienced by our forces.
Despite the objective of the conference (i.e., the modular brigade concept), it quickly devolved into a 3½ hour question and answer period between the panel and the 54 retired generals and admirals who attended. I wish I had a video of the whole session to share with you because the insights were especially eye opening and encouraging. I’ll try to summarize the high points as best I can.
· All returnees agreed that “we are clearly winning the fight against the insurgents but we are losing the public relations battle both in the war zone and in the States”. (I’ll go into more detail on each topic below.)
· All agreed that it will be necessary for us to have forces in Iraq for at least ten more years, though by no means in the numbers that are there now.
· They opined that 80% to 90% of the Iraqi people want to have us there and do not want us to leave before “the job is done”.
· The morale and combat capability of the troops is the highest that the senior officers have ever seen in the 20-30 years that each has served.
· The Iraqi armed forces and police are probably better trained right now than they were under Saddam, but our standards are much higher and they lack officer leadership.
· They don’t need more troops in the combat zone but they need considerably more Arab linguists and civil affairs experts.
· The IEDs and EFPs continue to be the principal problem that they face and they are becoming more sophisticated as time passes.
Public Affairs: We are losing the public affairs battle for a variety of reasons. First, in Iraq, the terrorists provide Al Jazeera with footage of their more spectacular attacks and they are on TV to the whole Arab world within minutes of the event. By contrast it takes four to six days for a story generated by Army Public Affairs to gain clearance by Combined Forces Command, two or three more days to get Pentagon clearance, and after all that, the public media may or may not run the story.
Second, the U.S. mainstream media (MSM) who send reporters to the combat zone do not like to have their people embedded with our troops. They claim that the reporters get “less objective” when they live with the soldiers and marines – they come to see the world through the eyes of the troops. As a consequence, a majority of the reporters stay in hotels in the “Green Zone” and send out native stringers to call in stories to them by cell phone which they later write up and file. No effort is made to verify any of these stories or the credibility of the stringers. The recent serious injuries to Bob Woodruff of ABC and Kimberly Dozier of CBS makes the likelihood of the use of local stringers even higher.
Third, the stories that are filed by reporters in the field very seldom reach the American public as written. An anecdote from Col. McMaster illustrates this dramatically. TIME magazine recently sent a reporter to spend six weeks with the 3rd ACR as they were in the battle of Tal Afar. When the battle was over, the reporter filed his story and also included close to 100 pictures that the accompanying photographer took. TIME published a cover story on the battle a week later, allegedly using the story sent in by their reporter. When the issue came out, the guts had been edited out of their reporter’s story and none of the pictures he submitted were used. Instead they showed a weeping child on the cover, taken from stock photos. When the reporter questioned why his story was eviscerated, his editors in New York responded that the story and pi ctures were “too heroic”. McMaster had read both and told me that the editors had completely changed the thrust and context of the material their reporter had submitted.
As a sidebar on the public affairs situation, Colonel Bob McRee, who was also on the panel and is bringing a Military Police Battalion to Iraq next month, invited the Colorado Springs Gazette to send a reporter with the battalion for six weeks to two months. He assured the Gazette, in writing one month ago, that he would provide full time bodyguards for the reporter, taking the manpower out of his own hide. The Gazette has yet to respond to his offer.
Ten More Years: The idea that we will have troops in Iraq for ten more years sounds rather grim, even though by contrast, President Clinton sent troops to Bosnia and Kosovo nearly ten years ago. And they’re still there with no end in sight. While Iraq is clearly a different situation right now, the panelists believe that within a few years at the most, it will become very much the same – a peace keeping, nation building function among factions that have hated one another for centuries. There is factionalism and there was bitter fighting in the Balkans before NATO intervened and with peace keepers, the panelists believe that Iraq will be a parallel situation. This, by the way, is why they all believe that linguists and civil affairs military personnel are so necessary for the future.
Colonel S. went out on a limb by suggesting that if most of the troops in Iraq were deployed home “tomorrow” he could have the entire country “pacified” and the terrorist situation brought under control with just one brigade of special forces. Since these guys are linguists, civil affairs experts, among many other skills and talents, he may not be too far wrong.
Iraqi Attitudes: The panelists agreed that the public affairs problem manifests itself most significantly in the American public belief that the people of Iraq want us out of their country which we are occupying. They have served in different parts of the country but each agreed that we are wanted and needed there. I refer you to the anecdote from Col. McMaster and the thousands of pictures available on the internet of the U.S. forces shown in very cordial relations with the locals. Of course, our media’s obsession with Abu Graib and, if the initial reports regarding the small group of Marines at Haditha prove to be true, then those attitudes will change somewhat. But as one of the panelists pointed out, the atrocities suffered under Saddam were much worse and much more common.
Morale and Capabilities: Two weeks ago, the local TV channels showed a 3rd ACR re-enlistment ceremony held at Ft. Carson and officiated by Colonel McMaster. Mind you, this unit has just returned from a one-year combat tour of hard and bloody fighting in Iraq and will likely return there again in eight to ten months. Of the 670 soldiers eligible for re-enlistment, 654 of them held up their right hands and signed on for another four years. Incredible!
The Army goal for re-enlistments for fiscal year 2006 was for 40,000 soldiers to extend their active duty commitments. With four months remaining in the fiscal year, they have already exceeded their goal of 40,000 and may have to go back to Congress for authorization to exceed their force structure manning limitations. Since Congress has been pontificating for the past couple of years that the Army is woefully under strength, that should not pose any difficulty.
Iraqi Forces: Every one of the returning commanders had experience in joint operations with the Iraqi soldiers – and in the case of some of them, with the local and national police. They are all are supportive of the quality of the forces, but culturally, they believe that we may be expecting too much from them as a pre-condition for handing over greater responsibility for area control. McMaster said that he worked with the army and the police at Tal Afar and was not the least bit reluctant to assign major responsibilities to them in the operations that were conducted.
Col. S.’s Green Berets, on the other hand, caught a national police lieutenant who was directing the emplacement of an IED by cell phone in order to disrupt a convoy – immediately after the lieutenant had been briefed on the convoy’s route. The good news in this situation was that they were able to reroute the convoy, safely, and track the lieutenant’s entire network through the use of the speed dial on his phone. Having terrorist infiltrators in both the army and the police force remains a problem. But by no means does that detract from the courage and determination of those who are loyal to the new Iraq.
Explosive Devices: The combined command in Iraq is becoming increasingly effective in countering the significant threat posed by the IEDs and EFPs. The frequency of attacks has decreased in large part through training to recognize the threat, the new technology (UAVs – unmanned aerial vehicles or drones, for example) which help to discover where the devices are emplaced, the infiltration of some of the terrorist cells, etc. However, the technology being used by the terrorists is also improving measurably. In the past six weeks, two bomb making sites were found, raided and the bad guys arrested. In both cases, the head bomb makers were master’s degree graduates (one in chemistry and one in physics) from American universities. That’s a lot of brain power to bring into the f ight, but we also have some pretty talented people in the military, industry and academia who are doing their best to even the odds.
Conclusion: This is more than I had intended to write on the subject – so what’s new a lot of you might say – but it is a subject that doesn’t get the proper balance from other sources, in my judgment at least. I trust the information that we received far more than anything that I have heard or seen in our usual news sources. The most disturbing thing that I heard was that our MSM is changing the stories filed by their own people on the scene because they sound “too heroic”.
The over riding opinion that I came away from the conference with is that we have incredibly talented and professional leaders who are facing up to the challenges and are making inexorable progress toward the goals of our nation. We’re fortunate to have courageous and valorous people on the combat front, even though there seems to be a serious dearth of these same types of people in Congress and the mainstream media.
Please pass this along to everyone you know in the blogsphere. This is the most significant analysis to date about the magnificent work our men and women are doing in Iraq.
Tuesday, June 13, 2006
Ann Coulter vs George Carlin - The Tonight Show With Jay Leno
George Carlin and Ann Coulter will be on Jay Leno's Tonight Show Wednesday June 14 - Read
The first time I heard someone cuss besides my Father and Grandfather, who both worked in obscenities the way an artist works in oils or clay (thank you Bob Clark and Jean Shepherd for allowing me to lift this line from your short stories and movie, ‘A Christmas Story’ ‘In God We Trust, All Others Pay Cash’), was on Carlin’s FM & AM album. I also got my hands on ‘Occupation - Fool(e)’ and the ‘Seven Dirty Words You Can’t Say on TV’ which was the topic of considerable reflection and mimicry to the behest of my parents and teachers alike.
But over the years, as funny as Carlin is, he cusses in spades. He didn’t used to have to cuss to remain relevant or funny. In fact, if you listen to his albums from the seventies, he rarely used vulgar language which was the whole point of his stand as a counter-culture comic revolutionary – make fun of the establishment, be nice, be funny, and use their own language to make them look like idiots.
I saw Carlin’s last special on HBO. It was funny, mostly. But I could not get past the cuss words and his bent on anything anti-American. Now this differs from his days of commenting about the lunacy of the sixties and seventies, because I remember Carlin when the seven dirty words you can’t say on tv was the exception, not the norm and his take on America was still a good place even if we did stupid stuff.
Carlin 72– ‘I got fired from a gig in Vegas for saying S*** when the big game in town is called Craps! I’m sure there was some Texan in the Casino saying, ‘Ah S***, I Crapped’
Carlin 05 – ‘Where ideas are concerned, America can be counted on to do one of two things: take a good idea and run it completely into the ground, or take a bad idea and run it completely into the ground.’
Still, I think the cussing and anti-Americanism has made Carlin a parody of himself. The sixties and seventies are long gone, no matter how hard people want to bring it back (Christmas Wish List Item – if you were not born in the sixties, you can’t wear tye-dye clothes).
Putting Carlin and Coulter on the same show is like a smoking while pumping gas. I predict Coulter will not go out of her way to attack Carlin and focus her attention to Jay if she is the second guest - but you can guess she will defend herself if Carlin goes after her. If that happens, I think Carlin will do everything he can to make himself heard by trying to be relevant with quippy and snide comments about Coulter’s stand on anything.
I still think Carlin is one the best comic minds this country has ever produced just as much as I think Coulter is an icon of conservative chutzpah.
Let's Watch And See!
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The first time I heard someone cuss besides my Father and Grandfather, who both worked in obscenities the way an artist works in oils or clay (thank you Bob Clark and Jean Shepherd for allowing me to lift this line from your short stories and movie, ‘A Christmas Story’ ‘In God We Trust, All Others Pay Cash’), was on Carlin’s FM & AM album. I also got my hands on ‘Occupation - Fool(e)’ and the ‘Seven Dirty Words You Can’t Say on TV’ which was the topic of considerable reflection and mimicry to the behest of my parents and teachers alike.
But over the years, as funny as Carlin is, he cusses in spades. He didn’t used to have to cuss to remain relevant or funny. In fact, if you listen to his albums from the seventies, he rarely used vulgar language which was the whole point of his stand as a counter-culture comic revolutionary – make fun of the establishment, be nice, be funny, and use their own language to make them look like idiots.
I saw Carlin’s last special on HBO. It was funny, mostly. But I could not get past the cuss words and his bent on anything anti-American. Now this differs from his days of commenting about the lunacy of the sixties and seventies, because I remember Carlin when the seven dirty words you can’t say on tv was the exception, not the norm and his take on America was still a good place even if we did stupid stuff.
Carlin 72– ‘I got fired from a gig in Vegas for saying S*** when the big game in town is called Craps! I’m sure there was some Texan in the Casino saying, ‘Ah S***, I Crapped’
Carlin 05 – ‘Where ideas are concerned, America can be counted on to do one of two things: take a good idea and run it completely into the ground, or take a bad idea and run it completely into the ground.’
Still, I think the cussing and anti-Americanism has made Carlin a parody of himself. The sixties and seventies are long gone, no matter how hard people want to bring it back (Christmas Wish List Item – if you were not born in the sixties, you can’t wear tye-dye clothes).
Putting Carlin and Coulter on the same show is like a smoking while pumping gas. I predict Coulter will not go out of her way to attack Carlin and focus her attention to Jay if she is the second guest - but you can guess she will defend herself if Carlin goes after her. If that happens, I think Carlin will do everything he can to make himself heard by trying to be relevant with quippy and snide comments about Coulter’s stand on anything.
I still think Carlin is one the best comic minds this country has ever produced just as much as I think Coulter is an icon of conservative chutzpah.
Let's Watch And See!
Friday, June 09, 2006
Think With The Wise And Talk To The Vulgar
It’s infallible. The left can get away with saying anything it wants to. But when a conservative says something, it’s a scandal.
Should AC have called the NJ wives Harpies? Sure. The men and women in our Armed Forces, along with the Constitution, give us all the right to say to say what we want. There are limits to speech, however, (shouting fire in crowded theaters and all). But in the case of what AC used to describe the NJ gals, Harpy is right on.
And why not? For these gals to blame the President for what happened on 9/11 is not only patently stupid, it’s irresponsible and lazy when these same women have said nothing, absolutely nothing about the murderers who killed their husbands in the first place. And since they have openly placed thier views of politics squarely to the left, after we agree that these women should receive our sympathy for the loss of their husbands, then anything thye say is fair game - human shields no more!
AC could have called them lunatics. She could have called them insane. She could have called them un-patriotic. But Harpy is a pretty good choice from a historical context and here’s why.
Look at the picture of the Harpy. It’s a vulture with the head and breasts of a woman. According to the Greeks, Harpies were pretty nasty. Besides stealing the food from King Phineas after Zeus shackled him in front of a banquet table from which he could never eat as punishment for telling it like it is, the Harpies defiled the food to make it inedible. The Harpies were eventually sent flying off, but they were never killed. Thus, their continued existence was a way for the Greeks to explain to us mortals the nastiness of anyone who does something vile for time immortal.
In the context that Coulter thinks the NJ gals are spreading verbal disease with anti-war, anti-Bush Administration talk is right on when described as Harpies. I don’t see the outrage.
Now, should Coulter have said anything about the NJ gal’s marriages? I read her book and the context of her statement. Perhaps this crosses the line of decency. But en total, anyone who claims that GWB is responsible for 9/11 is allowed to be called anything by anyone. The folks who killed AMZ yesterday give us the privilege to do just that!
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Should AC have called the NJ wives Harpies? Sure. The men and women in our Armed Forces, along with the Constitution, give us all the right to say to say what we want. There are limits to speech, however, (shouting fire in crowded theaters and all). But in the case of what AC used to describe the NJ gals, Harpy is right on.
And why not? For these gals to blame the President for what happened on 9/11 is not only patently stupid, it’s irresponsible and lazy when these same women have said nothing, absolutely nothing about the murderers who killed their husbands in the first place. And since they have openly placed thier views of politics squarely to the left, after we agree that these women should receive our sympathy for the loss of their husbands, then anything thye say is fair game - human shields no more!
AC could have called them lunatics. She could have called them insane. She could have called them un-patriotic. But Harpy is a pretty good choice from a historical context and here’s why.
Look at the picture of the Harpy. It’s a vulture with the head and breasts of a woman. According to the Greeks, Harpies were pretty nasty. Besides stealing the food from King Phineas after Zeus shackled him in front of a banquet table from which he could never eat as punishment for telling it like it is, the Harpies defiled the food to make it inedible. The Harpies were eventually sent flying off, but they were never killed. Thus, their continued existence was a way for the Greeks to explain to us mortals the nastiness of anyone who does something vile for time immortal.
In the context that Coulter thinks the NJ gals are spreading verbal disease with anti-war, anti-Bush Administration talk is right on when described as Harpies. I don’t see the outrage.
Now, should Coulter have said anything about the NJ gal’s marriages? I read her book and the context of her statement. Perhaps this crosses the line of decency. But en total, anyone who claims that GWB is responsible for 9/11 is allowed to be called anything by anyone. The folks who killed AMZ yesterday give us the privilege to do just that!
I finished reading AC's book last night. And there are far more instances of outrage the left could get upset about than going after the NJ gals. I loved this book. AC has a great sense of humor in pointing out the absurdity of the left by being absurd.
Coulter Thinks With The Wise And Talks To The Vulgar – Greek ProverbThursday, June 08, 2006
No Martyr - No Virgins!
Adios AMZ - your martyrdom was interrupted by the outstanding work of the United States, our allies, intel on the ground, and our friends in Jordan. Those 70 Virgins will have to wait for another soul the Marines, Seals, Special Ops, Army and Air Force send to heaven.
Killing AMZ won't end the violence. And we will never know, and should not know, just how this operation was performed. But you have to hand it to the perseverance, persistence, patience, planning and execution of taking this lowest form of human life off the planet.
Well Done!
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Killing AMZ won't end the violence. And we will never know, and should not know, just how this operation was performed. But you have to hand it to the perseverance, persistence, patience, planning and execution of taking this lowest form of human life off the planet.
Well Done!
Hey You, Browsing 'Godless' -- Buy The Book Or Get Out!
By: Ann Coulter: The long-anticipated book "Godless: The Church of Liberalism" was finally released this week. If the New York Times reviews it at all, they'll only talk about the Ann Coulter action-figure doll, so I think I'll write my own review.
"Godless" begins with a murder at the Louvre and then takes readers on a roller-coaster ride through the Church of Liberalism in a desperate game of cat and mouse in which the hunter becomes the hunted – with a twist at the end you simply won't believe! It's a real page-turner – even the book-on-tape version and large-print edition! Who knew a book about politics could make such an ideal gift – especially with Father's Day just two weeks away!
The main problem with "Godless" is that I had to walk through the valley of darkness to find it. You will have to push past surly bookstore clerks, proceed past the weird people in the "self-help" section, and finally past the stacks and stacks of Hillary Clinton's memoirs. If all else fails, ask for the "hate speech" section of your local bookstore. Ironically, if you find "Godless" without asking for assistance, it's considered a minor miracle.
This is not a book about liberals. I stress this in anticipation of Alan Colmes hectoring the author to name names. (For people who resented being asked to "name names" during the 1950s, these liberals sure aren't shy about demanding that conservatives do the same today.)
It is a book about liberalism, our official state religion. Liberalism is a doctrine with a specific set of tenets that can be discussed, just like other religions.
The Christian religion, for example, frowns on lying and premarital sex. That is simply a fact about Christianity. This does not mean no Christian has ever lied or had premarital sex. Indeed, some Christians have committed murder, adultery, thievery, gluttony. That does not mean there's no such thing as Christianity any more than videotape of Rep. William Jefferson accepting cash bribes means there's no such thing as congressional ethics rules.
Similarly, the liberal religion supports abortion, but that doesn't mean every single liberal has had an abortion. We can rejoice that liberals do not always practice their religion.
"Godless" examines a set of beliefs known as "liberalism." It is the doctrine that prompts otherwise seemingly sane people to propose teaching children how to masturbate, allowing gays to marry, releasing murderers from prison and teaching children that they share a common ancestor with the earthworm. (They haven't yet found the common ancestor ... but like O.J., the search continues.)
The demand that their religion be discussed only with reference to specific individuals – who is godless? are you saying I'm godless? – is simply an attempt to prevent us from talking about their religion. This tactic didn't work with "Slander" or "Treason," and it's not going to work now.
It's not just that liberals ban Reform rabbis from saying brief prayers at high-school graduations and swoop down on courthouses and town squares across America to cart off Ten Commandments monuments. The liberal hostility to God-based religions has already been copiously documented by many others. "Godless" goes far beyond this well-established liberal hostility to real religions.
The thesis of "Godless" is: Liberalism is a religion. The liberal religion has its own cosmology, its own explanation for why we are here, its own gods, its own clergy. The basic tenet of liberalism is that nature is god and men are monkeys. (Except not as pure-hearted as actual monkeys, who don't pollute, make nukes or believe in God.)
Liberals deny, of course, that liberalism is a religion – otherwise, they'd lose their government funding. "Separation of church and state" means separation of your church from the state, but total unity between their church and the state.
Two months ago, the 9th Circuit held that a school can prohibit a student from exercising his First Amendment rights by wearing a T-shirt that said "Homosexuality Is Shameful."
Even the left's pretend-adoration of "free speech" (meaning: treason and pornography) must give way to speech that is contrary to the tenets of the church of liberalism on the sacred grounds of a government school.
How might the ACLU respond if a school attempted to ban a T-shirt that said something like "Creationism Is Shameful"? We'd never hear the end of warnings about the coming theocracy.
In fact, students are actually required to wear "Creationism Is Shameful" T-shirts in Dover, Pa., where – thanks to a lawsuit by the ACLU – the liberal clergy have declared Darwinism the only true church, immunized from argument. Ye shall put no other God before it. Not one.
Liberals believe in Darwinism as a matter of faith, despite the fact that, at this point, the only thing that can be said for certain about Darwinism is that it would take less time for 1) a single-celled organism to evolve into a human being through mutation and natural selection than for 2) Darwinists to admit they have no proof of 1).
If only Darwinism were true, someday we might evolve public schools with the ability to entertain opposable ideas about the creation of man.
Posted by redguy on June 7, 2006 09:09 PM to redstatesusa
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"Godless" begins with a murder at the Louvre and then takes readers on a roller-coaster ride through the Church of Liberalism in a desperate game of cat and mouse in which the hunter becomes the hunted – with a twist at the end you simply won't believe! It's a real page-turner – even the book-on-tape version and large-print edition! Who knew a book about politics could make such an ideal gift – especially with Father's Day just two weeks away!
The main problem with "Godless" is that I had to walk through the valley of darkness to find it. You will have to push past surly bookstore clerks, proceed past the weird people in the "self-help" section, and finally past the stacks and stacks of Hillary Clinton's memoirs. If all else fails, ask for the "hate speech" section of your local bookstore. Ironically, if you find "Godless" without asking for assistance, it's considered a minor miracle.
This is not a book about liberals. I stress this in anticipation of Alan Colmes hectoring the author to name names. (For people who resented being asked to "name names" during the 1950s, these liberals sure aren't shy about demanding that conservatives do the same today.)
It is a book about liberalism, our official state religion. Liberalism is a doctrine with a specific set of tenets that can be discussed, just like other religions.
The Christian religion, for example, frowns on lying and premarital sex. That is simply a fact about Christianity. This does not mean no Christian has ever lied or had premarital sex. Indeed, some Christians have committed murder, adultery, thievery, gluttony. That does not mean there's no such thing as Christianity any more than videotape of Rep. William Jefferson accepting cash bribes means there's no such thing as congressional ethics rules.
Similarly, the liberal religion supports abortion, but that doesn't mean every single liberal has had an abortion. We can rejoice that liberals do not always practice their religion.
"Godless" examines a set of beliefs known as "liberalism." It is the doctrine that prompts otherwise seemingly sane people to propose teaching children how to masturbate, allowing gays to marry, releasing murderers from prison and teaching children that they share a common ancestor with the earthworm. (They haven't yet found the common ancestor ... but like O.J., the search continues.)
The demand that their religion be discussed only with reference to specific individuals – who is godless? are you saying I'm godless? – is simply an attempt to prevent us from talking about their religion. This tactic didn't work with "Slander" or "Treason," and it's not going to work now.
It's not just that liberals ban Reform rabbis from saying brief prayers at high-school graduations and swoop down on courthouses and town squares across America to cart off Ten Commandments monuments. The liberal hostility to God-based religions has already been copiously documented by many others. "Godless" goes far beyond this well-established liberal hostility to real religions.
The thesis of "Godless" is: Liberalism is a religion. The liberal religion has its own cosmology, its own explanation for why we are here, its own gods, its own clergy. The basic tenet of liberalism is that nature is god and men are monkeys. (Except not as pure-hearted as actual monkeys, who don't pollute, make nukes or believe in God.)
Liberals deny, of course, that liberalism is a religion – otherwise, they'd lose their government funding. "Separation of church and state" means separation of your church from the state, but total unity between their church and the state.
Two months ago, the 9th Circuit held that a school can prohibit a student from exercising his First Amendment rights by wearing a T-shirt that said "Homosexuality Is Shameful."
Even the left's pretend-adoration of "free speech" (meaning: treason and pornography) must give way to speech that is contrary to the tenets of the church of liberalism on the sacred grounds of a government school.
How might the ACLU respond if a school attempted to ban a T-shirt that said something like "Creationism Is Shameful"? We'd never hear the end of warnings about the coming theocracy.
In fact, students are actually required to wear "Creationism Is Shameful" T-shirts in Dover, Pa., where – thanks to a lawsuit by the ACLU – the liberal clergy have declared Darwinism the only true church, immunized from argument. Ye shall put no other God before it. Not one.
Liberals believe in Darwinism as a matter of faith, despite the fact that, at this point, the only thing that can be said for certain about Darwinism is that it would take less time for 1) a single-celled organism to evolve into a human being through mutation and natural selection than for 2) Darwinists to admit they have no proof of 1).
If only Darwinism were true, someday we might evolve public schools with the ability to entertain opposable ideas about the creation of man.
Posted by redguy on June 7, 2006 09:09 PM to redstatesusa
Tuesday, June 06, 2006
Remembering D-Day June 6, 1944
Remebering D-Day. One of the most important days in the last century. The day the allies set foot on Fortress Europe and began the liberation of millions from under the jackboot of Hitler. Here are some links to view:
American Expereince - D-Day
Normandy American Cemetery & Memorial
Military History on-line: D-Day
Lesser Known Facts About WWII (click 1944 for D-Day - it's a great read)
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American Expereince - D-Day
Normandy American Cemetery & Memorial
Military History on-line: D-Day
Lesser Known Facts About WWII (click 1944 for D-Day - it's a great read)
Gunnery Sgt. Carlos Hathcock - US Marine
This is worth the view. Click here to see an amazing presentation about a great American.
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Monday, June 05, 2006
New CNN Poll - Illegal Immigration Problem
A recent CNN Poll stated, that when asked, 'What do you think about the illegal immigration situation?', 43% of the respondents said that we (the US) do have a problem.
The other 57% said, 'No Habla Ingles!'
I heard Carlos Mencia talk about illegal Mexicans approaching the US Border Patrol and giving away the poistions of non-Mexican illegals crossing into the US.
Mencia said, 'Yeah, Mexicans are not stupid. They are not going to ruin a good thing. They spotted these non-Mexican crossers and went right up the Border Patrol Agents and said, 'Senor, dey no speaka Spanish!'
Classic!
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The other 57% said, 'No Habla Ingles!'
I heard Carlos Mencia talk about illegal Mexicans approaching the US Border Patrol and giving away the poistions of non-Mexican illegals crossing into the US.
Mencia said, 'Yeah, Mexicans are not stupid. They are not going to ruin a good thing. They spotted these non-Mexican crossers and went right up the Border Patrol Agents and said, 'Senor, dey no speaka Spanish!'
Classic!
Sunday, June 04, 2006
On A Hill Not So Far Away
(hat tip to Ret Col. US Army)
...if better immigration reform (no, if we don't enforce laws that already exist), this could happen!
Friday, June 02, 2006
Why?
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