Highly Opinionated

Still Alive.............

2012-01-20T13:41:00.005-06:00

It's been an interesting time away. I'm not going into everything right now for time constraints, but I do have a message: I'll be back...soon.

In the meantime, I've found a little something that I really and truly states where I'm at right now, at this point in my life, and I thought I'd pass it along.

Still Unbroken

Be back soon.

The Hawk

Don't Tread on Me

2009-03-22T12:57:00.003-05:00

I have a question to ask you, America: have you had enough?

It's been three months since my last posting, nearly four. Three months, during which time the Obama administration has taken charge of the nation, with all the smoothness and finesse of hippo doing ballet.

Have

you

had enough?

I'm not even going to go into the laundry list of issues where the Obama administration has been less than stellar in their handling of things. It would be soooooooooooooooo easy to sit back and say, "see, we tried to warn you, we tried to tell you, but you just wouldn't listen."

So.

We're not going to do that.

It is too important to our nation that we make our government listen, that we demand accountability from them, that we demand in a loud, united voice, "WE THE PEOPLE."

Not we the Government.

April 15th is approaching rapidly. April 15th is your chance to unite, Americans, and make a statement to our representatives in government. On April 15th, there are other envelopes that you need to be mailing other than your income tax returns. You need to be mailing envelopes containing a single bag of tea to each of your congressmen, senators, the President, your state governors and state level and local representatives. One tea bag.

Have you had enough?

It's time to express your rights for redress of grievances with your Representatives.

One tea bag.

One statement.

"Enough."

Fear the government that fears an armed citizenry.

Fear the government that fears the voice of the citizenry.

Fear the government that ignores the living, breathing document that is the basis and foundation for our law, the United States Constitution.

Fear it, and change it...

15APR09 America, have your tea bags ready to go into the mailbox. The links for the addresses can be found here:

White House

United States Senate

United States House of Representatives

Governors of the United States of America

Sic vis pacem parabellum.

Once and Always, an American Fighting Man

.

Wandering Warriors

2009-01-08T06:37:00.004-06:00

Work had kept me from here for the past few months, until around Thanksgiving, then a little family situation took up my time on through Christmas and the job situation has changed again, leaving me more time to be back here to do this that we do.

That being said, I'm not picking up the sword and shield again just yet. For personal reasons, I need some time just to regroup, to think, to heal. My reasons are my own, but there are reasons for this. I know I've never gotten overly personal about my own private life here; I'm a private individual, I tend to play my hand pretty close, as it were. I see no reason to change that right now. Doesn't mean that I intend for people to stop by here and wonder, "Did he die? Leave? What?" Right now my heart just isn't in the fight.

I'm still following events, but for now, I'm sidelining myself for a bit.

Until next,

A wandering warrior

Wandering...

My mind goes drifting, floating, gently and peacefully into the far away places.
It is a quiet time into which I go, into a place where men dwelleth not,
A place where the rivers run softly and unicorns run gaily across the mead.
Fireflies softly light the evening sky as the sun hangs lazily upon the horizon.
I turn and see a spray of water as a dolphin jumps happily in the water...

To ancient valleys and rolling hills, I ride my horse like
A blowing, rushing wind, his mane flying wildly behind his head
The salty taste of sea air heavy in my mouth, and its scent in my nostrils
As the horse takes me along a sandy beach, waves lapping gently across the shore
Like a lover, greeting a lost love and pulling together in a warm and familiar embrace.
Gulls fly over my head, crying their call as they hunt the waves for food.
And as my trusty black steed carries me along, I go awandering by the sea...

J. Michael Tippitt

.

Three Days...

2009-01-05T19:56:00.002-06:00

I'm back, and I'm going to be back with a vengence from now on.

Tomorrow, there will be a renewed full frontal assault on the left and their attempts to pull the wool over the eyes of the American people, and indeed, the world. Democrats, Republicans, Libertarians, I don't care what party you call yourself, if you attempt to lie and mislead the American people, you will be called on it here.

Tonight, we're going to start with some very, very startling images, just a little something that should piss you off and make any of you Hamas supporters rethink your stand.

I hope this leaves you with pleasant feelings about supporting Hamas.

Black Hawk Coeur de Lion

.

Regarding Sarah

2008-11-06T19:34:00.005-06:00

I have sat mostly quietly, since coming in from traveling with work for the past few weeks this rotation off duty, recharging myself, regrouping, and reorganizing my thoughts after the past year or more of Presidential election wrangling by the parties, the candidates, and the media.

Now, before I leave for my next extended run in which I will be gone for a month or so, I'm going to have my say. I'm taking my turn, if indeed there are any "turns" to be taken in this process of expressing opinion and ideas.

I want to address this specifically to one individual, one person to whom it is intended to be said, in the hopes that mayhap she sees what is said here and takes heart in it.

Governor Palin, you have been in the eyes of the conservative movement of many of us here in the lower 48, specifically the former Confederate south, for some time now. We have watched you come into the spotlight, quietly but determined, the proverbial blip on the radar at first in the minds of the left. But we have been watching you.

It is no coincidence that your addition to the Republican ticket for this past election cycle recharged the conservative base of the Republican party. We understand and know where you're coming from; you speak our language, and you put action to your words.

It is no small thing that you have done on the national level for the conservative movement. Your joining with a candidate that we, conservatives, were less than thrilled to have as the top Republican coming out of the primaries; you gave us hope, gave us a rallying point, a single candle burning brightly as a beacon for us to rally to in a time when we were less than enthused about the choice we were going to have to make on November 4th.

A great many of us swallowed our pride, stuck our our chest, and took up the banner of McCain, knowing that the choice we faced from the Democrats was considerably less than desirable. We knew Senator McCain, we knew him to be far less conservative in his own principals and ideology than he was trying to present himself to be. This does not detract from the man's character; I admire Senator McCain greatly, most conservatives do, for being a man of honor and integrity, having that maverick reputation that does, indeed, get things done, but as the base of the party, we really, truly were not given a candidate in this past election cycle that spoke to the conservative membership and to conservative independents. There was one who gave us a glimmer of hope, but it was a fast and fading hope as the one candidate who we considered to be a real conservative with a possibility of leading this nation entered late into the campaigns and showed less than desirably.

Take heart, Governor Palin, you have not let the conservative movement down in any way, by any means, or in any shape, form, or fashion. You came into the campaign fighting, you continued to fight in spite of "gotcha" interviews by the dinosaur media, and you carried that fight right up until the end.

We are proud of you.

And we are still watching you, and you have our support.

We shall endure...

Once and always, a Southern American Fighting Man

.

Regarding the Klan, the Panthers, and Confederate Gray...

2008-11-04T13:29:00.004-06:00

I want to make things perfectly clear as I write this. I come from a mixed racial background; I'm classified as Caucasian, but that's really only a surface issue in regard to that I'm not as dark as my Cherokee ancestors. No one of mixed heritage, and most, I repeat, MOST Americans ARE from a blending of ancestors of different heritage, has any right or reason to take up the outmoded and degrading concept of racism. I equate the Black Panthers as being on equal ground with the Ku Klux Klan in their concepts of racial ideology.

That being said...

I was asked in town today by someone I know if I had voted. I smiled and said "I'm a veteran, I'm a soldier at heart still today, and I'm a patriot. I wore my Confederate gray shirt and went to the polls and voted.

In the past couple of years I've written a few times about the attitude and demeanor of a great number of Southerners that I know and have been associated with in my work travels. We don't see an Obama victory as healing anything; we don't see him as a unifier, we don't see him as a healer, we don't see him as a "messiah." Most of us see him for what we read him to be by listening to him speak and examining his associations. We see him as a Black Liberation Theology Marxist Totalitarian who's been manipulated into a position he has no business nor experience in being elevated to, and in my mind, and the minds of some I've talked to today, it's become obvious in part who has been behind the rise of the Obama as Black Panthers have stationed themselves at polling places in Pennsylvania.

I don't believe in coincidence.

I'm too damned old to start believing in it now.

The time for campaigning by those of us working to bring out the truth is coming to an end, today, as today we decide, as a nation, who we are going to send not only into the White House, but into a great number of Senate and House seats that are up for election today as well. We stand at a crossroads that many Americans who don't understand nor study and research history understand.

We are reliving a collision of the Compromise of 1850 and the 1860 election cycle all over again.

May God help us as a nation, whichever way this election day goes. It is highly conceivable, and I'm not calling for anything in saying this, I'm merely reporting the rumblings that I hear when I'm traveling, that our nation fractures once again into armed conflict depending upon how the numbers come in tonight.

If and when that happens, some of us will have to make a decision, once again, as our ancestors did over a century and a half ago, of which flag we fight under.

I'm a veteran, and I'm a patriot. But I know that I speak for many others out there who are also veterans and patriots when I say, God help me, I don't know that I can say for sure what I'll do when what many Southerners have been expecting to happen through the generations since 1865, that feeling in the back of our mind, that knowledge of a day that will come when the Stars and Bars will be dusted off and someone will look to the South and say, "It's back on..."

And for most of us, like last time, it will have nothing to do with race, and everything to do with personal liberty and states rights.

Once and Always, a Southern American Fighting Man

.

Germans remember...

2008-11-02T15:43:00.002-06:00

I got this in email today, and found it to be very poignant and telling in what it had to say. Since the senders have requested that it be forwarded to others, I'm doing just that, for you, anyone out there who wishes to read the experience of Germans who have seen times of hardship before those imposed upon us today by our government and the media, have to say about what they experienced...

May God help us all should we fail to learn the lessons of history.

Once and Always, an American Fighting Man

A German Lady Remembers and Speaks

by Lori Kalner

In Germany, when Hitler came to power, it was a time of terrible financial depression. Money was worth nothing.

In Germany people lost homes and jobs, just like in the American Depression in the 1930s, which we have read about in Thoene's Shiloh books.

In those days, in my homeland,
Adolph Hitler was elected to power by promising 'Change.'

He blamed the 'Zionists' around the world for all our problems.
He told everyone it was greedy Zionist Bankers who had caused every problem we had.
He promised when he was leader, the greedy Zionist bankers would be punished. The Zionists, he promised, would be wiped off the face of the earth.
So Hitler was elected to power by only 1/3 the popular vote.

A coalition of other political parties in parliament made him supreme leader.
Then, when he was leader, he disgraced and expelled everyone in parliament who did not go along with him.

Yes. Change came to my homeland as the new leader promised it would.
The teachers in German schools began to teach the children to sing songs in praise of Hitler.

This was the beginning of the Hitler Youth movement.
It began with praise of the Fuhrer's programs on the lips of innocent children.
Hymns in praise of Hitler and his programs were being sung in the schoolrooms and in the playyard.

Little girls and boys joined hands and sang these songs as they walked home from school.

My brother came home and told Papa what was happening at school.
The political hymns of children proclaimed Change was coming to our homeland and the Fuhrer was a leader we could trust.

I will never forget my father's face. Grief and fear. He knew that the best propaganda of the Nazis was song on the lips of little children.

That evening before he said grace at the dinner table, he placed his hands upon the heads of my brothers and me and prayed the Living Word upon us from Jeremiah 1:4-5.

'Now the Word of the Lord came to me, saying,
'Before I formed you in the
womb I knew you,
and before you were born I
consecrated you;
I appointed you a prophet to
The nations.'

Soon the children's songs praising the Fuhrer were heard everywhere on the streets and over the radio. 'With our Fuhrer to lead us, we can do it! We can change the world!'

Soon after that Papa, a pastor, was turned away from visiting elderly parishioners in hospitals. The people he had come to bring comfort of God's Word, were 'no longer there.'

Where had they vanished to while under nationalized health care? It became an open secret.

The elderly and sick began to disappear from hospitals feet first as 'mercy killing' became the policy.

Children with disabilities and those who had Down syndrome were euthanized.

People whispered, 'Maybe it is better for them now. Put them out of misery.
They are no longer suffering.And, of course, their death is better for the treasury of our nation. Our taxes no longer must be spent to care for such a burden.'
And so murder was called mercy.

The government took over private business. Industry and health care were 'nationalized.' (NA-ZI means National Socialist Party)

The businesses of all Jews were seized. (Perhaps you remember our story in Berlin on Krystalnacht in the book Munich Signature)

The world and God's word were turned upside down.
Hitler promised the people economic Change?
Not change. It was, rather, Lucifer's very ancient Delusion leading to Destruction.

What began with the propaganda of children singing a catchy tune ended in the deaths of millions of children.

The reality of what came upon us is so horrible that you in this present generation cannot imagine it. Our suffering is too great to ever tell in a book or show in a black and white newsreel.

When I spoke to Bodie about some of these things, she wept and said she could not bear to write them.

Perhaps one day she will, but I asked her, 'who could bear to read our suffering?'
Yet with my last breaths I warn every Christian and Jew now in the name of the Lord,
Unless your course of the church in America is spiritually changed now, returning to the Lord, there are new horrors yet to come.

I trembled last night when I heard the voices of American children raised in song, praising the name of Obama, the charismatic fellow who claims he is the American Messiah.
Yet I have heard what this man Obama says about abortion and the 'mercy killing' of tiny babies who are not wanted.

There are so few of us left to warn you.

I have heard that there are 69 million Catholics in America and 70 million Evangelical Christians.

Where are your voices?
Where is your outrage?
Where is passion and your vote?

Do you vote based on an abortionist's empty promises and economics?
Or do you vote according to the Bible?

Thus says the Lord about every living child still in the womb.

'Before I formed you in the womb I knew you,
and before you were born I consecrated you.'

I have experienced the signs of the politics of Death in my youth.
I see them again now.
Christians! Unless you stand up now, you will lose your freedom of religion.

In America priests and preachers have already lost their freedom to speak openly from their pulpits of moral danger in political candidates.

They cannot legally instruct you of which candidate holds fast to the precepts of scripture!
American law forbids this freedom of speech to conservative pastors or they will lose their 'tax exempt' status.

And yet I have heard the words of Obama's pastor Damning America!
I have heard the words of Obama damning and mocking all of you in small towns because you 'Cling to your religion.'

But I am a woman whose name is unknown. My life is recorded as a work of fiction.
I have no fear of reprisal when I speak truth to you from the pages of a book.
(Though the Zion Covenant books are mocked and condemned by the Left in America.)

I am an old woman and will soon go to be with my Lord.
I have no fear for myself, but for all of you and for your children, I tremble.

I tremble at the hymns to a political leaders which your children will sing at school.
(Though even now a hymn or a prayer to God and our Lord Jesus is against the law in public school!)

Your vote must put a stop to what will come upon America if Barrack Obama is elected.
I pray you will personally heed this warning for the sake of your children and your grandchildren. Do not be deceived.

The Lord in Jeremiah 1:7-8 commands every believer to speak up!

'Do not say, 'I am only a youth,' for to all whom I send you, you shall go,
and whatever I command you, you shall speak.
Do not be afraid of them for I am with you, declares the Lord!'

I am in Prayer for you, and for the Church!
Spoken to you in the authority of Jesus the Christ,
the Name Above All Names,

Republican's Balk at ACORNs in the Recipe

2008-09-28T16:51:00.001-05:00

Republicans have been balking at Democratic propositions on fixing the economy, and the main reason has finally come to light. There has been a taint of ACORN in the original propositions.

Republican protests that any propositions forwarded for consideration in the "bail-out" discussions have a root cause to them. Original proposals included a plan for some of the profits earned by the governmental loaning of funds to financial institutions to go to ACORN, a group closely associated with the Democratic party that does work to ensure Democrats are elected to office. Republican opposition members issued a statement on Saturday expressing their outrage at such inclusion on the part of the Democrats, outlining the reasons they would not support any proposal including monies allocated for ACORN.

In issuing the statement, House leaders are reflecting -- and also feeding -- a reaction to the provision that has exploded in the last day or more. Our colleague Ben Smith says he's gotten more than a dozen anti-ACORN e-mails in just the last few hours. The viral uprising is both organic and institutionally driven. Prominent bloggers have fed the flames and so has the Wall Street Journal editorial page; several of the e-mails sent to Smith reference a House leadership alert on the "ACORN Slush Fund" and others refer to the Journal opinion. On Thursday night, Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) told The Crypt that his friend Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) opposes the provision.

"The draft bill includes a left-wing giveaway that would force taxpayers to bankroll a slush fund for a discredited ally of the Democratic Party," reads one leadership alert. "At issue is ACORN, an organization fraught with controversy for, among other scandals, its fraudulent voter registration activities on behalf of Democratic candidates. Rather than returning any profits made in the long-term from the economic rescue package, Democrats want to first reward their radical allies at ACORN for their (often illegal) help in getting Democrats elected to office."

In the end, how much of the bailout's potential profits are earmarked for ACORN? "None. Absolutely none. All funds would go to state and local governments," said Steven Adamske, spokesman for Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.), the chairman of the Financial Services Committee and a lead negotiator.

A proposal rife with the possibility of more corruption, more mismanagement, and more mishandling of money, proposed by the democrats? But how can this be, out of the party that had promised that if elected to majority status in 2006 it wouldn't be "politics as usual?" So far, and especially in light of the most recent situation regarding the financial market, that has been exactly what the majority party has given the American people. Despite this shady and underhanded attempt by Democrats, Nancy Pelosi has deemed to accuse Republicans of being "unpatriotic."

Fortunately, perhaps, all references and inclusions of ACORN in the Democratic proposals have been removed from their offerings, as shown in a side by side comparison of proposals that have been considered.

The question of the Constitutionality of the entire process has still not been answered completely, in the minds of many Americans. One can look throughout the contents of the Constitution and be hard pressed to find anything regarding the nation's economy, other than powers of levying taxes and tariffs and the responsibility of Congress to mint the nation's money.

We have reached, perhaps, a cross-roads, as a nation, one in which it must be decided whether to remain a free-market nation, or one that begins to turn a hard turn to socialism. The efforts of the Roosevelt administration during the great depression put the United States on the road to a quasi-socialistic state of economy that the nation has existed under ever since, growing the government larger and more intrusive into the lives of the American citizenry by leaps and bounds with each passing year.The current economic crisis, if not handled carefully and with cool heads, could change the scope of not only the American economy in coming years, but the very structure under which we, as a nation, exist. Socialism, the control of business and industry by the state, and capitalism can not exist side by side under the same roof. If the past nearly 70 years has not shown that, nothing will.

Once and Always, an American Fighting Man

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Klan Announces They Will Have A Presence at Debate

2008-09-26T19:12:00.001-05:00

In what is sure to be a headache already for Secret Service members and other security officials in charge of making sure the candidates are safe during tonight's debate, a wild card has been thrown into the deck. The Klan is planning to show.

Confirming rumors that have been circulating the past few days, the Mississippi White Knights of the Ku Klux Klan have announced that they will have members present in the audience for tonight's scheduled Presidential debate between candidates John McCain and Barack Obama at the University of Mississippi in Oxford.

The Klansmen will be “invisible,” trying to blend in just as anyone else, the emperor of the MWK said in an e-mail.

The emperor wrote, “The Mississippi White Knights will have officers and Klansmen on hand for the presidential debate on September 26, 2008. Our people will be in Oxford and on the campus ‘invisible.’ That means our people won’t be in regalia or demonstrating. So, I guess you’ll just have to guess which of the people present are Klansmen.

“Please feel free to contact me if you have any other questions about the Mississippi White Knights.

‘NON SILBA SED ANTHAR’

Emperor,

Mississippi White Knights of the Ku Klux Klan.”

The e-mail came from the address, emperor@mississippiwhiteknights.com, but the sender would not identify himself nor respond to more questions.

The Latin words, “Non silba sed anthar,” translate to: “Not for oneself but for others,” a motto the Klan has used since the 19th century.

Why it should be a surprise to anyone that the Klan should put a presence at a Presidential debate in Mississippi where the first non-white candidate for a major party will be in attendance? This is a possibility and a scenario that should have been expected and made ready for from the outset, for which the Secret Service, undoubtedly, has contingency plans in place and ready. If not, then they are sorely deficient in their security arrangements.

Race has been an under the surface issue for this campaign from the outset, from the primary season in which other candidates tap danced around the issue in order not to be offensive to the Obama campaign to Obama's campaign using his race as a tool, themselves, proclaiming any and all disagreements with Obama to be based in racist attitudes. There are many, many reasons not that Obama is undesirable for the Presidency that have nothing to do, whatsoever, with his race, and those are the reasons that should be focused upon by the voting public who intend not to vote for him in the upcoming November elections.

The Klan, with it's bastardization of Confederate regalia and their adoption of the emblems of a proud nation that lasted for less than five years, has been and remains a thorn in the side for true Southerners who have, since the inception of the Confederacy in 1860, desired nothing more than the rights of the state, and more importantly, the individual, taking precedence over the powers of the federal government.

Does the Klan have the right to have a presence at tonight's debate? As American citizens interested in the political process of the nation, yes. To create a disturbance by promoting hatred based in nothing other than outdated notions of racial superiority of one skin color over another? It is a shame and a disgrace that in the 21st century such attitudes are still around and fomented by those who live their lives promoting the hatred of others who are different. In contrast and comparison, the same can be said of those members of the Islamic world who promote the same sort of hatred from their standpoint. It could be argued that there is no difference between the Klan and al Qaeda save the color of skin of their members.

Once and Always, an American Fighting Man

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Iraqi Benchmark Reached During U.S. Economic Crisis

2008-09-26T19:09:00.002-05:00

During the focus by the American media on the circus activity going on in Washington in regards to the nation's economy and House and Senate efforts to devise a plan to fix it, an important benchmark achievement has gone all but unnoticed in Iraq.

Iraqi Parliament members have unanimously passed a resolution opening elections in 14 of Iraq's 18 provinces next year, opening the door for a more stable political environment in the country and allowing for a new, more secular and more inclusive legislative body to be elected. The current system, which allowed religious authorities to dominate in the previous elections, have been reworked in order to make the electoral process more secular and less open to religious influence. It also allows for women to occupy approximately 25% of legislative seats, and will allow Sunni sects inclusion into the process, which they have boycotted since 2005, but who have allied themselves with U.S. troops in fighting against the al-Qaeda, thus allowing them to compete for positions within the the Iraqi government.

As always in Iraq's halting journey toward a new order, the reform was not complete. Elections were put off in the province surrounding the volatile city of Kirkuk, where Kurds, Sunni Arabs and other groups compete for power, and in three Kurd-run provinces. Staging fair and peaceful elections will be another major challenge: In the south of Iraq, competition among Shiite parties, including those of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki and Mahdi Army leader Moqtada al-Sadr, could easily spill over into violence. The importance of securing the elections is one good reason for President Bush's decision to withdraw only 8,000 of the 146,000 remaining U.S. troops in Iraq between now and February. Still, the precipitous drop in violence in Iraq during the past year offers strong reason for hope that a good election can be held -- and that the new Sunni and Shiite leaders who emerge will be well positioned to jump-start reconstruction in the provinces and negotiate with each other.

This latest benchmark has been what Ambassador Ryan Crocker has been calling one of the most important for the Iraqi's to reach and achieve. Another key benchmark expected to be reached is the distribution of revenue from Iraq's oil industry into the provinces and local economy. Perhaps, in light of the current economic crisis that is distracting the nation, for the moment, from Iraq and it's ground gaining, it should be noted that the strategy of gradual withdrawal of forces from the country has allowed it the time to develop a political system in which such benchmark achievements have been possible. Should the balance and pace that have been established be disrupted by an escalated withdrawal of American forces, it remains possible that the political stability that the region has been working toward might be undermined.

Once and Always, an American Fighting Man

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Boehner Takes Democrats to Task

2008-09-26T19:04:00.004-05:00

In a letter from House Republican Leader John A. Boehner (R-OH) to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA), the issues of a day of fruitless negotiation are addressed, making clear, in no uncertain terms, the Republican stand on the "joint proposals."

Despite claims by House Democrats early on that there was a "joint proposal" that had been prepared in dealing with the economic package being bandied about by legislators, a group of Republicans have asserted that no such joint proposal had yet been agreed upon yesterday, leading to a letter sent from House Republican Leader John Boehner to House Speaker Pelosi, detailing the position of the Republicans on the issues that still need to be addressed before any proposals can be considered "joint," and taking to task certain House members, and the speaker herself, for allowing word to be given that such an item existed, leading to misinformation and confusion in an already confusing and difficult situation.

In his letter to the speaker, Boehner threatened that "a large majority of Republicans cannot - and will not - support Sec. Paulson's plan" unless she actively considers some of the measures offered by his working group.

"In the interest of the men and women we represent in Congress, I hope it does not come to that conclusion," Boehner said in his letter to the speaker.

With Republicans still overwhelmingly opposed to Treasury's bailout proposal - as well as the principles on which House and Senate Democrats agreed to on Thursday - Democratic leaders can't do much until GOP leaders iron out concerns on their side of the aisle. Leaving a meeting of Democratic leaders on Friday, House Majority Leader Steny H. Hoyer said, "The reality is that you're going to need very significant votes from both sides of the aisle."

Mentioned in particular in Boehner's letter were House Financial Services Chairman Barney Frank (D-MA) and Senate Banking Chairman Christopher Dodd Christopher Dodd (D-CT) for "announced that a bipartisan deal was at hand even though the reservations about the underlying proposal I had expressed to you had not been addressed. Each time such announcements were made, or even rumored, I or my staff made it clear to media and to your staff that any such deal did not include House Republicans."

Given the activity of the Democrats during yesterday's negotiations in their conduct in public eyes, it brings their reliability, honesty, integrity, and fitness to hold office into question in the eyes and minds of many American citizens. If elected officials can't be trusted to be honest in something as simple as announcing that there was no agreed upon proposal in their attempts to handle a time of crisis, what else are the Democratic officials prepared to lie about to the American people?

Once and Always, an American Fighting Man

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GOP Claims Leverage on Bailout

2008-09-25T17:13:00.001-05:00

Republicans are holding out on any bail out proposals being offered up for bail out measures in the current Wall Street financial debacle. What is the driving force behind their stand, and how will it affect the outcome of any proposal that does pass?

Senator Richard Shelby (R-AL) is not pleased with the Democratic proposals coming out to "bail out" for the financial system. Shelby, who until the early 90's served in the Senate as a Democrat, is no stranger to the way that Democrats do business, which is part and parcel the reason he chose to switch parties, with the support of the majority of his constituency in his home state of Alabama, who have chosen to return him to his office since his party switch.

Republicans by and large are claiming that they have the leverage that they need to make sure that any "bail out" that is approved be done the way that they want it to be done, otherwise they will continue to balk at proposals being laid forth by Democrats, claiming that the Democrats alone will be responsible for any flawed legislation that is passed in an effort to save the United States financial system.

Reps. Eric Cantor (R-Va.) and Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) are leading an effort by House Republicans to circulate the set of principles to their colleagues and like-minded Democrats, according to a senior Republican.

Asked whether the effort comes too late, the GOP official said the votes would be leverage enough to have the principles considered by congressional negotiators.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) has indicated that a bill will not be brought to the floor without broad Republican support.

GOP presidential candidate Sen. John McCain (Ariz.) and the White House have been made aware of their alternative.

Fingers are being pointed on both sides of the aisle, as always, as politicians attempt to pass the blame for the economic situation from one to the other, with neither side truly being capable of standing in either blame nor credit for the state of the nation's economy, unless it such blame lies in economic policies that put burdens upon American businesses and their ability to conduct trade and commercial ventures both at home and abroad. The decline of the American economy lies more in the way that we have been forced, by necessity of economic survival on the part of our industry, to have our manufacturing base moved overseas and off shore due to regulatory and tax structures that make it unprofitable for large industry to maintain operations domestically. Both parties can take credit for that development.

Who suffers? The American people. There is much caution that needs to be undertaken in any federal aid lent to the financial system; caution that the tenets of the United States Constitution are not violated, caution that any aid is not a first step towards nationalization of any industry, caution that any aid rendered does no harm to the American public.

To give credit where it is due, several Republican members of the House and Senate have been warning of this coming meltdown for years, with Democrats calling for and pushing legislation for cheaper and more available credit for the public. Cheap and easy credit, if one looks to history, were the main causes for the market failures leading to the great depression, a global economic nightmare that gave rise to the regime of Adolf Hitler and the Third Reich, a situation that I don't think anyone wishes to see repeated less than 100 years after the rise of the last world war.

Any "bail out," a misnomer created by the main stream media, once again, for a loan proposal in which money lent to the financial institutions would be repaid to the federal government, will have to be carefully crafted and such safeguards included that the monies lent are tightly regulated, monitored, and assurances made that there be no room for abuse of the funds lent to companies so that they can continue to operate. The failure of these businesses, the inability of banking and lending to lend money to business, means an overall shutdown of the American economy at large. Such a situation would have global repercussions, creating a hole in the economic stability of other nations who trade with us, and who, in turn, trade with other nations.

This is a much larger and more broad scoped problem than many people realize.

Once and Always, an American Fighting Man

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Hefner Sacking Bunnies? Imagine That...

2008-09-25T17:07:00.003-05:00

As economic tides continue to be in turmoil, and economic advisers are recommending that CEO's make cutbacks in order to continue to operate, how does Hugh Hefner deal with the economic crisis? By firing models, of course.

Tough times have hit the Playboy mansion. While being held as a closely guarded secret, reports have leaked out that the multi-million dollar Playboy empire may be struggling with its budget. Only the top brass at the mansion are reported to really know the true situation going on financially in the Hefner empire and the "little house that Hugh built." Rumors are that Hefner has been advised to lay off some of his staff in New York and Los Angeles or face bankruptcy, which has been denied by Hefner spokeswoman Elizabeth Austin, who said, in response to the rumored sackings, "It is our policy not to comment on corporate matters such as employee issues."

The news will be another blow to Hefner who recently discovered that two of his "bunnies" may have been cheating on him.

Holly Madison, who has previously been named as Hefner's "No.1" girlfriend, is alleged to have had an affair with magician Criss Angel and another bunny, Kendra Wilson, is reportedly dating football star Hank Baskett.

Playboy spokesman Rob Hillburger denied the rumours, saying: "The rumours that Holly left Hef for Criss Angel are not true. Holly and Kendra are all still living at the Mansion."

Actually, I wasn't aware that Hefner was a man to cringe from a blow that was delivered to him, as he has made an entire industry into and of itself out of selling sex. One would have to think that sacking staff would be something of a common occurrence at the Playboy Mansion, but it seems to be that they take great umbrage at reports of anyone being sacked over the economy...

Once and Always, An American Fighting Man

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Senator Joseph Biden is the Mouse That Roared

2008-09-25T17:03:00.001-05:00

Joe Biden, a long term Senator from Delaware cum Vice Presidential candidate, has taken upon himself the mantle of the attack dog for his running mate, Barack Obama. But is it working, or is Biden finding himself trying too hard to make himself heard?

In Leonard Wibberley's novel and the subsequent Peter Sellers movie of the same name released in 1959 The Mouse that Roared, a small and insignificant country does the unthinkable, with hilarious results; they attack the United States. While the truth is indeed often stranger than fiction, in the novel, and the movie, the theme works, and the upstart little nation wins, by losing.

Joseph Biden, while not necessarily an insignificant political candidate, has, however, taken on a task that it could be argued that he isn't up for. Biden has undertaken to attack Republican Presidential candidate Senator John McCain over issues of foreign policy. Biden, of course, as chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, seems to think he has the upper hand on understanding how to handle foreign relations over John McCain, and possibly, in his own way of thinking, he does, as he in a recent speech criticized McCain over several points, including McCain's attitude toward Russia:

“John McCain has gotten it wrong on so many fundamental issues. Imagine; imagine if we had listened to John McCain when he tried to remove Russia from the G8. That’s the industrial nations, last year. Such a move would not have done anything to stop Russia from the inextricable and unfair and overwhelming invasion of an independent country of Georgia. But I tell you what it would have done: it would have triggered a crisis in our alliance since no one else in Europe thought that action should be taken. An alliance we now need, we now need to help us in dealing with Russian aggression.”

Is Biden saying here that Russia was stopped from invading Georgia? I don't know what news outlet he was watching or where he was getting his information, but Georgia was in fact invaded by the Russians this summer and there are still, today, Russian troops occupying territory inside what is sovereign Georgian territory. Of course, Senator Biden has a record of changing things a bit to suit his own purposes, himself, having supported, initially, the war in Iraq and then changing his position on that, as well as supporting military action in Bosnia.

Perhaps there is another issue that needs to be addressed in the case of Senator Biden in examining his attacks on John McCain over issues of foreign relations. Biden, who has been a lawyer and a politician for his entire working life (Biden is one of the six longest term senators to hold office in the nation), Biden doesn't have the up close and personal experience in dealing with representatives of foreign nations in the worst of times that McCain has:

John McCain's capture and subsequent imprisonment began on October 26, 1967. He was flying his 23rd bombing mission over North Vietnam, when his A-4E Skyhawk was shot down by a missile over Hanoi.[30][31] McCain fractured both arms and a leg, and then nearly drowned, when he parachuted into Truc Bach Lake in Hanoi.[30] After he regained consciousness, some North Vietnamese pulled him ashore, then others crushed his shoulder with a rifle butt and bayoneted him.[30] McCain was then transported to Hanoi's main Hoa Lo Prison, nicknamed the "Hanoi Hilton".[31]

Although McCain was badly wounded, his captors refused to treat his injuries, instead beating and interrogating him to get information, and he was given medical care only when the North Vietnamese discovered that his father was a top admiral.[33] His status as a prisoner of war (POW) made the front pages of major newspapers.[34][35]

McCain spent six weeks in the hospital while receiving marginal care.[30] Now having lost 50 pounds (23 kg), in a chest cast, and with his hair turned white,[30] McCain was sent to a different camp on the outskirts of Hanoi[36] in December 1967, into a cell with two other Americans who did not expect him to live a week.[37] In March 1968, McCain was put into solitary confinement, where he would remain for two years.[38]

A far cry, it would seem, from state dinners and conferences. McCain is often criticized by opponents and naysayers about having no experience outside of politics and military service. That same scrutiny can be applied to Senator Biden, who is one of the six longest term senators to serve in Washington, and to Barack Obama, as well, whose work as a "community organizer" is a dressed up name for "lobbyist." Adding to that Biden's failure twice to win in a bid of his own for his party's nomination for party candidate for the Presidency, Biden, in what could be considered a conciliatory position as Vice Presidential candidate, could be, himself, that roaring mouse trying to make a bluster and noise bigger than he is capable of achieving.

Once and Always, an American Fighting Man

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Biden Confirmation Tainted By Family Legal Problems

2008-08-24T19:27:00.001-05:00

On the day after the confirmation as Senator Joe Biden of Delaware as the Vice Presidential choice for presumed Democratic nominee Barack Obama, his son and brother are reported to be named in lawsuits for allegations of fraud.

Hunter Biden, son of Senator Joe Biden, and the Senator's brother James, are named in a lawsuit involving fraud and millions of dollars that has been playing out in the New York Supreme Court since 2007, revolving around their involvement in the hedge fund industry during their involvement with Paradigm Companies LLC. A Washington lobbyist, the younger Biden served for a time as the Paradigm's president.

A lawsuit filed by their former partner Anthony Lotito Jr. asserts in court papers that the deal was crafted to get Hunter Biden out of lobbying because his father was concerned about the impact it would have on his bid for the White House. Biden was running for the Democratic nomination at the time the suit was filed.

Hunter Biden was made president with an annual salary of $1.2 million, despite his inexperience in the hedge fund industry, the lawsuit said. Before that, he had been part of the Washington law firm Oldaker, Biden & Belair, which earned $1.76 million in lobbying revenue in the first half of 2006, according to Congressional Quarterly's CQ MoneyLine. One of its biggest clients is the National Association of Shareholder and Consumer Attorneys, a District-based group representing law firms specializing in investment and corporate law.

The details of the case can be found in the article itself at the Washington Post site by following the above link. What is truly fascinating, and needs to be taken into consideration, is that this information was out there prior to the announcement of Joe Biden as Obama's running mate, a choice that was supposedly made after Biden had been fully vetted and confirmed as being viable for the position.

The vetting process is supposed to uncover this kind of thing and eliminate a potential candidate from position because of the possibility of bringing a scandal into a campaign. Obama's campaign has already seen enough scandal as it is, because, as has been said over and over, he's an unknown. And it seems there is a lot of effort being put in play to make sure that he's an unknown, considering that there are sealed documents regarding him at the University of Illinois, Chicago's Richard J. Daley Library, among other missing records.

We're not going to count this one as strike three for Obama yet for the past several days. This one can be considered a hard flying fowl ball into left field.

Biden, the vetted running mate. Makes you wonder how much effort was really put into the process, doesn't it?

Once and Always, an American Fighting Man

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Russia Withdraws, Georgia Prepares for Refugee Flood

2008-08-23T17:46:00.000-05:00

As Russian forces withdraw, finally, behind the buffer zone back into South Ossetia, Georgia prepares for a new crisis: the influx of thousands of refugees who had fled the area during the conflict returning to try and rebuild their lives after leaving.

Despite skepticism and in spite of still maintaining a presence in several key Georgian locations, Russian forces have finally begun to withdraw into territory in South Ossetia, as they said they would do by yesterday. This creates a new situation for Georgian authorities, that of masses of people displaced by fighting who now wish to return to their homes and attempt to resume their lives.

Georgia has deployed a “massive police presence” in and around the city of Gori to help guarantee security for returning residents in the wake of the Russian withdrawal on Friday evening, said Shota Utiashvili, a high-ranking Interior Ministry official.

At dusk on Friday, columns of armored personnel carriers and troop transports ferried most of the Russian forces in Georgia back to Kremlin-defined security zones in Abkhazia, a separatist enclave in Georgia’s west, and South Ossetia, the breakaway region where the war broke out two weeks ago.

On Saturday, Russian armored columns continued to flow over the Inguri River from the Georgian city of Zugdidi into Abkhazia, a local police spokesman said. The Russians have also left the Georgian military base in Senaki, but only after confiscating almost everything of value, including televisions, refrigerators and even toilets, according to local residents who have watched the steady stream of Russian trucks moving in and out of the base for more than a week.

Russian troops still maintain checkpoints and are entrenched in the Georgian cities of Poti, a port city on the Black Sea, and have several locations within Georgian territory along the border area of South Ossetia. Russia's Col. Gen. Anatoly Nogovitsyn, deputy chief of the Russian military’s general staff, stated that the Russians would not "sit behind the fence and watch as they drive around in Hummers,” a reference to captured United States Marine Corps captured by Russian forces last week. Georgia and Western allies maintain that the Russians are in violation of earlier agreements and demand a Russian return to their prewar positions. Russia, meanwhile, intends to announce it's recognition of two separatist enclaves, which creates an even more murky diplomatic and political situation in the region.

Currently some 112,000 refugees have been registered by the Georgian government, with estimates being that there are possibly closer to 200,000 in total. Refugees who are moving back into areas still held by Russian forces are cautiously optimistic that the conflict has begun to come to an end. Housing for refugees has not been an easy task to undertake. Many refugees have been forced to seek housing in dilapidated buildings that have been far from capable of handling the large numbers of people flooding into them; in one case, a shelter housing around 1,700 refugees shared a single, rigged up water faucet and two toilets.

As Russia withdraws, even to the point that they have and are withdrawing, the main concern now for the people of the nation of Georgia is certain: for Georgians to return to any semblence of their former lives is going to be a slow, hard process. Especially if they're keeping a watch out for bears wandering the countryside.

Once and Always, an American Fighting Man

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Forming Ranks, as Veterans Solidly Backing McCain Over Obama

2008-08-22T17:16:00.002-05:00

It's been an ongoing battle between McCain and Obama in the attempt to win the hearts and minds of the American Veteran vote in recent weeks. An August 19th Gallup Poll shows which candidate leads among voters, and by how wide of a margin.

According to Gallup, American veterans, after recent addresses by both McCain and Obama to the Veterans of Foreign Wars convention, registered voting veterans are more solidly in support of McCain than his prospective Democratic opponent, Barack Obama, and the margin of separation between the candidates is telling.

With both presidential candidates addressing the Veterans of Foreign Wars convention this week (John McCain on Monday and Barack Obama on Tuesday), Gallup finds that registered voters who have served in the U.S. military solidly back McCain over Obama, 56% to 34%.

This is based on aggregated data from Aug. 5-17 Gallup Poll Daily tracking, involving interviews with more than 11,000 registered voters, including 2,238 military veterans. Veterans are defined as those who are or have been members of the U.S. military. Obama leads McCain 46% to 43% among all registered voters during this time.

A 22% difference between McCain and Obama among polled veterans, and only a 3% lead by Obama nationally according to Gallup, which is a slip in the polls for Obama since his initial emergence as the likely nominee of the Democratic party.

Perhaps it is telling that veterans prefer McCain, a fellow veteran, to become the next Commander-in-Chief of the United States armed forces, over Obama, who has no military experience whatsoever. Leadership experience, especially actual combat leadership experience, is critical to understanding and analyzing information in times of crisis; this is experience that McCain has and Obama does not.

Still, there does seem to be a trend among veterans to vote Republican rather than Democrat, as shown in the final Gallup Poll results of the 2004 elections, in which President Bush lead opponent Senator John Kerry 55% to 39%. Nationally, veterans tend to be more along the lines of 47% Republican, 39% Democrat, as compared to the rest of the nation, which according to Gallup tends to run 48% Democrat to 37% Republican.

With the veteran vote secured, the uncommitted voters are the essential battleground for McCain and Obama. With a slipping lead that is now down to 3 points over McCain, Obama may very well be discovering how having a retired veteran fighter pilot on his tail is not a to his advantage.

I know this American Fighting Man is voting for him...

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So You're an Evangelical Christian Supporting Obama...

2008-08-22T17:08:00.001-05:00

For evangelical Christians, the issue of abortion is a hot topic, especially in regards to politics. Knowing a candidate's record on the issue can be either supportive or damning for the candidate when they try to move from one level of office to another.

There is an ongoing debate about when life begins. For some, there is no question that life begins at conception; for others, life begins at birth, and for others still, life begins somewhere in between. So what about a baby that has been through the abortion procedure and was able to survive outside the womb? Can there be any doubt that once a breathing, pulse bearing infant is out in the air that it's alive? If you're Senator Barack Obama, there is obviously some question to that state.

Looking back over Obama's record, there is one significant case that comes to bear from his days in the Illinois state senate, such a long, long time ago (2002), and his challenging of a bill that would protect the lives of infants who had survived the abortion procedure, called the Born Alive Infants Protection Act. The legislation was created after Illinois nurse Jill Stanek had held a baby for 45 minutes that had been left to die after surviving a late term abortion procedure, and her subsequent reporting of the incident to the Illinois Department of Human Services, who determined that no laws had been broken in the incident (see her commentary here).

What is disturbing about all of this in the case of Senator Obama is his stand on the issue, as shown in statements made while challenging the passage of this legislation in the Illinois Senate.

So — and again, I’m — I’m not going to prolong this, but I just want to be clear because I think this was the source of the objections of the Medical Society. As I understand it, this puts the burden on the attending physician who has determined, since they were performing this procedure, that, in fact, this is a nonviable fetus; that if that fetus, or child — however way you want to describe it — is now outside the mother’s womb and the doctor continues to think that it’s nonviable but there’s, let’s say, movement or some indication that, in fact, they’re not just coming out limp and dead, that, in fact, they would then have to call a second physician to monitor and check off and make sure that this is not a live child that could be saved. Is that correct?

"Not coming out limp and dead?" Would "limp and dead" not imply that there had been life to begin with? Apparently the Senator from Illinois believes that it is more important to protect the physician performing the abortion than the life of the child, it would seem. Is this a position that Christians, evangelical or otherwise, are willing to support and promote out of a candidate?

Personal note: I'm sure that there are going to be those who come out with the tired old "separation of church and state argument" on this issue. Let me make one clear little reminder before that is bandied about on here: there is absolutely no wording in the United States Constitution that proclaims such a thing. The Constitution clearly states that there shall be no laws enacted that protect or promote any one religion as being a state institution.

Once and Always, an American Fighting Man

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Who can it be now? Evidently it won't be Hillary Clinton...

2008-08-22T14:06:00.001-05:00

She gave him a derby-esque run for the roses during the primaries, hanging on as long as she could before conceding, and then offered her support for his campaign as she suspended hers. Now it seems the final snub of Hillary Clinton is being readied.

It's one of the most anticipated announcements of the year. The announcement of the running mate for likely Democratic nominee Barack Obama. Over the past few weeks, names have been bandied about across the country as analysts and pundits have speculated on who the candidate for Vice-President of the United States will be, but one thing seems clear: it won't be Hillary Clinton.

There are so many, many reasons that Clinton is the obvious choice for Obama to pick as his running mate. A master politician in her own right, Clinton was the ultimate insider during the administration of a former President, having been First Lady to husband Bill during his own terms in the White House. She's connected, she's definitely been vetted as a candidate, and she has a huge following among Democratic voters, which gave her the wherewithal to run such a tight race against Obama in the primaries to begin with. With Hillary as Vice President, Obama would have the potential for a more intimate relationship with former President Bill Clinton.

And yet she hasn't even been vetted as a potential running mate by team Obama.

Obama has often said, most recently on NBC’s “Meet the Press” on July 27, that Clinton “would be on anybody’s short list.”

But apparently not his.

“She was never vetted,” a Democratic official reported. “She was not asked for a single piece of paper. She and Senator Obama have never had a single conversation about it. How would he know if she’d take it?”

The official also said Clinton never met with Obama’s vetting team of Eric Holder and Caroline Kennedy.

Perhaps it's no wonder that a Clinton supporters are outraged at the DNC for playing such an active role in the rocket rise of a candidate that no one had heard of nationally two years ago. The Democratic party is in such disarray that the upcoming Democratic National Convention slated for next week in Denver is already a media and public relations circus, with local law enforcement officials clearing room in the local lock-ups to handle a large number of out of hand protesters, should the need arise. And given the punitive measures placed against Florida and Michigan for their holding primaries ahead of the approved Democratic National Party schedule having possibly been the determining factor in Clinton's failed bid for the nomination, there is little doubt as to why she would be a less than whole-hearted supporter of Obama in rallies across the nation, as mentioned by one Democrat campaign worker noted after a rally in Boca Raton, Florida.

Minutes after pushing through the rope line to thank Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton for “all that you do,” Robin Shaffer said she was worried. She feared that the senator she respected and admired for being tough and experienced had not done all that she could to unify Florida’s fractured Democratic Party while campaigning here on Thursday for her former opponent.

“It was good that she said my supporters need to now support Barack Obama,” said Ms. Shaffer, 46, reflecting on Mrs. Clinton’s speech before about 700 people. But, she added, “I wanted her to repeat that one more time.”

Many who had supported Mrs. Clinton’s run for president shared Ms. Shaffer’s opinion. Democrats who said they had recently accepted that Mr. Obama, of Illinois, would be the Democratic presidential nominee greeted Mrs. Clinton’s 30-minute speech — her first rally in Florida on his behalf — with warmth but also demands for more.

The reasons for Hillary Clinton not being selected for the Vice Presidential position can and will be speculated over for some time to come, as well as the "what-if" factor had she been chosen for the spot and Obama winds up losing to McCain in the November race. The presence of unhappy Clinton supporters in Denver also shows a severe lack of the purported party unity that the Obama camp keeps harping to the media, lending itself to a potential black eye for the convention before it even has a chance to begin.

Party of unity? Don't bet on it.

Once and Always, an American Fighting Man

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Obama Swings, Misses, Strike Two...

2008-08-21T20:27:00.001-05:00

In another stunning example of inexperience in running for office at the national level, Barack Obama has gone after John McCain over how many houses McCain owns, only to hear the swishing sound of air as McCain's Rezko fastball gets by him.

Maybe Obama should stick to playing basketball.

In an attempt to show how that John McCain is "out of touch" rich, Obama released an ad today in which he proclaimed that McCain doesn't even know how many houses he owns. Once again, leaving himself wide open for a counter-attack, Obama shows that his inexperience is not only in international affairs and domestic policy, but in political wrangling, as well. His own dealings with Tony Rezko have left Obama a vulnerable place for a McCain counter-attack, which McCain had no qualms in making sure was put out for public consumption before the end of the day.

Perhaps we can see Obama go after McCain on something else he is vulnerable on. Religion, perhaps, or military service. Or possibly even financial investing, since he doesn't seem to be aware that there are some who invest in real estate, not necessarily to live in, as is obviously the case with the McCain's, but rather as an investment, along with other investments, such as stocks and bonds.

This is the kind of knowledge and experience we need in the White House? That would be change, all right, and it would definitely give us all a reason to hope, as in, "I hope that we can survive three more years of this moron that we've elected..."

Once and Always, an American Fighting Man

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Report States Third WTC Tower Fell Due to Fire

2008-08-21T14:41:00.001-05:00

The official report on 7 WTC is complete, but it's sure not to set well with conspiracy theorists who are no doubt going to cry "cover-up" when the news becomes more widely known. The third tower collapse on Sept 11, 2001, was caused by fire.

Rosie O'Donald is sure to come out claiming that it is all part of a cover-up. Others will undoubtedly claim that the report is further evidence of a conspiracy on the part of the Bush administration to cover their tracks in having been behind the attacks of 9-11. The fact remains, however, that the official report on the collapse of 7 World Trade Center states that the third building fell as a result of structural failure caused by fire, not by bombs or incendiary devices positioned to bring it down after the planes were flown into the twin towers.

Fires in the 47-story office tower at the edge of the World Trade Center site undermined floor beams and critical structural columns, federal investigators concluded Thursday, as they attempted to curb still-rampant speculation that explosives or fuel fires were responsible for the building’s collapse of Sept. 11, 2001.

The long-delayed report by engineers here at the National Institute of Standards and Technology in suburban Washington is intended to solve one of still lingering central questions about the 2001 attacks: Why did 7 World Trade Center fall, if it was not hit by an airplane.

“Heating of floor beams and girders caused a critical support column to fail,” said Shyam Sunder, the lead investigator. “Video and photographic evidence combined with detailed computer simulations show that neither explosives nor fuel oils played a role in the collapse that brought the building down.”

Fire, as pretty much any firefighter will tell you, is considered by those in the fire service to be a living entity. It consumes, and when fed, it grows; it is created, and it dies. The more it consumes, the larger it becomes, the larger it becomes, the hotter and faster it burns, affecting even the materials in it's path that it can not consume.

To say that there is any substance that can't be consumed, ultimately, by fire, is a misconception. The very earth that the iron and other metals that are used in making steel are the result of the life cycle of the planet: the earth's core is not a solid mass, but a molten, churning mixture of elements that are constantly being consumed and reintroduced into the upper levels of the interior of the planet. Everything that exists on planet earth was initially forged by the fires of the core of the planet. Metals are purified, shaped, and formed of fire, as it requires heat make solid construction grade metal malleable for working. And, regardless of Ms. O'Donald's uninformed opinion as expressed some time back on The View, steel girders can be heated to the point at which they will fail.

Perhaps if the water main had not been broken and the fire suppression system had been able to work in 7 World Trade Center, the building would not have collapsed some seven hours after the collapse of the twin towers. At this point, that can only be a matter of speculation. The fact is, however, after years of research and study into the cause of it's collapse, the determination has been made, and the official report has been filed. All that remains now is for the conspiracy theorists to once again begin tossing wild theories and explanations.

For my 343 brothers and sisters who gave all. May God give you rest.

Once and Always, an American Fighting Man

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Russia Announces Pullout Date - What, Again?

2008-08-21T12:33:00.001-05:00

Russia has announced a "firm" date for withdrawing it's troops from central Georgia back into an area behind a "buffer zone" in South Ossetia. Hasn't the world been assured of a Russian pullout before?

Russia has announced that it will begin withdrawing troops from Georgia back into South Ossetia behind a buffer zone where Georgian forces will not be allowed by late Friday, according to reports coming out of Moscow. The announcement comes from General Anatoly Nogovitsyn, the deputy head of Russia's General Staff, who made the announcement at a Moscow news conference, stating that Russia will observe a 1992 peacekeeping agreement between Russia and Georgia. He further stated that Georgia had violated the terms of the agreement by withdrawing their own peacekeepers and sending them toward the regional capital, Tskhinvali, thus negating their right to engage in peacekeeping operations within the region.

Georgian officials say that Russia is the aggressor, and may not be considered a peacekeeper itself. Interior Ministry spokesman Shota Utiashvili told VOA that the buffer zone around South Ossetia is ill-defined and that Russia is "playing games" with the facts.

Utiashvili says Russian officials show journalists one thing during the day, and return their forces at night. He claims that the number of checkpoints and amount of territory held by Russian forces are not decreasing.

Given the previous announcements of cease-fire orders and troop withdrawals by Moscow, it's a reasonable understanding why Georgian officials are skeptical that Russia will withdraw it's troops at this point. Georgia isn't alone in doubting Russia, as negotiations between Russia and NATO reached a near total breakdown yesterday, with U.S. Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice harshly criticizing Russia for it's actions in Georgia.

U.S. Secretary of State led the charge against Russia, beginning with sharply-worded statements to journalists on the plane over to Brussels. At the meeting, Rice also spoke of Russia’s increasing aviation presence in near Alaska. “It is not cost free,” Rice commented. “This is a very dangerous game, and perhaps one the Russians might want to reconsider.” Moscow responded to that statement through Deputy Chief of the General Staff Anatoly Nogovitsyn yesterday. “That is a Russian issue,” Nogovitsyn said. “The decision on those flights was made by the supreme commander. Strategic aviation will no longer remain laid up. There is nothing criminal about it. We’ve been flying there for half a year already.”

Sources in Western diplomatic circles say the NATO session was tense. The United States, some of the Scandinavian countries and the vast majority of Eastern European countries were in favor of taking a hard line against Russian actions and quickly providing Georgia with a membership action plan. Western European diplomats, in particular French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner and German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier, opposed a harsh position. The final statement from the four-hour-long session was a compromise.

For now, the world can only wait, watching to see if Russia will, this time, follow through with it's word to withdraw troops back at least into South Ossetia. From there, the future remains uncertain. One thing that is certain, as the situation in Georgia begins to, hopefully, wind down, Russia has certainly shown exactly how much her current government can be trusted by the rest of the world.

Once and Always, an American Fighting Man

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Obama and McCain take off the gloves

2008-08-20T19:34:00.001-05:00

In a case of making an attempted uppercut to McCain, team Obama has released a new ad linking the Republican to high level wrong-doing in his past. Perhaps the Obama people should have realized that their own chickens would come home to roost, as well.

The Obama campaign has a new political ad out today linking John McCain to Jack Abramoff, alleging corruption and conspiracy on the part of Obama during the entire Abramoff situation, a situation in which McCain had very little, if any actual, involvement in the entire scandal other than possession of an email communication, protecting Alabama Governor Bob Riley. Hardly, in the grand scheme of things, as controversial and damning as some of the things in Obama's past, as McCain is more than willing to point out in response to the Obama ad:

“Barack Obama’s ad is ridiculous. Because of John McCain, corruption was exposed and people like Jack Abramoff went to jail. “However, if Barack Obama wants to have a discussion about truly questionable associations, let’s start with his relationship with the unrepentant terrorist William Ayers, at whose home Obama’s political career was reportedly launched. Mr. Ayers was a leader of the Weather Underground, a terrorist group responsible for countless bombings against targets including the U.S. Capitol, the Pentagon and numerous police stations, courthouses and banks. In recent years, Mr. Ayers has stated, ‘I don’t regret setting bombs … I feel we didn’t do enough.’

“The question now is, will Barack Obama immediately call on the University of Illinois to release all of the records they are currently withholding to shed further light on Senator Obama’s relationship with this unrepentant terrorist?” —McCain spokesman Brian Rogers

The records surrounding the relationship of Obama and Ayers are currently housed at the Richard J. Daley Library at the University of Illinois, Chicago, and are not accessible for public viewing, as journalist Stanley Kurtz discovered earlier this month, despite his having been promised access to the files.

Is Obama hiding things that he, and his supporters, would rather not be seen by the public eye? If so, they're certainly not doing an impressive job in covering their tracks. Rather than moving in a way that doesn't attract attention, Obama and his cronies have a history and record of making major errors in regards to public appearances, leaving themselves wide open to scrutiny and speculation.

For Obama to have gone after McCain on Abramoff, while having so many questions concerning his own relationship with Ayers under such scrutiny, Obama has shown a very significant lack of skill in maneuvering in the arena of national politics.

Once and Always, an American Fighting Man

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The 2008 Denver DNC: Rise of the Machines?

2008-08-20T16:11:00.001-05:00

Denver is in full swing as preparations are being made for the upcoming Democratic National Convention, an event that promises to have all the drama and intrigue of Terminator, Othello and Macbeth rolled into one neat package.

The question "Is it dead, yet?" seems to be floating around Democratic circles in regards to the Hillary Clinton campaign. With grass roots organizations such as PUMA and others around, it seems that there is still life in the Clinton machine, something that creates a very dangerous political situation for the presumed nominee for the DNC, Barrack Obama.

History has shown time and again that you can't turn your back on the Clinton machine, nor can you count it out of the game until the game is officially over and team Clinton has been left on the sidelines watching someone else sprint to victory. Thus seems to be the case for the Denver convention, as there is discussion of a brewing coup being planned by Clinton supporters that will take place on the floor of the convention.

As of July 31, the Democratic National Convention was still in need of one-fourth of the estimated cost of the Denver convention – amounting to 10 million of the $40 million.

Moreover, Washington Examiner political columnist Tony Campbell explains in detail why this national convention could be absolutely explosive:

"I talked to a Clinton delegate here in Maryland. He told me they have been instructed to vote for Hillary (for president) on the first ballot. To make things more interesting, there is a movement to swing 160 delegates from Obama to Clinton. If that happens, Clinton could re-establish her campaign and face John McCain in the fall."

And further:

"The group P.U.M.A. (for Public Unity My A--) claims that 15 delegates have switched from Obama to Clinton in July. There is still the possibility of a floor convention vote to fully seat the delegations from Michigan and Florida – which would benefit Senator Clinton.

Given the mood and atmosphere surrounding the Clinton "defeat" by Obama in the primaries, in which both Florida and Michigan were stripped of their delegates initially, the issues surrounding Obama both in his relationships with controversial figures and the funding he's been receiving from Middle Eastern backers, the relentless work by Hillary supporters in trying to make sure that the message is clearly delivered that they are NOT happy with the Democratic National Party for what they see as having lauded Obama by virtue of race over substance, the new allegations that Obama is "selling" tickets to his planned and potential acceptance speech, among other issues, the party is clearly not moving forward in a united front toward the November elections. Clinton supporters, to be sure, are anything but fully behind the potential nomination of Obama:

A massive e-mail and Internet campaign is under way aimed at derailing the nomination of Barack Obama and making Hillary Clinton the party’s standard bearer next week at the Democratic National Convention in Denver.

“It’s downright nasty,” said Memphis, Tenn., superdelegate and city council member Myron Lowery, who has shared dozens of the messages he’s received with The (Memphis) Commercial Appeal newspaper.

“I think it’s divisive for the ‘Support Hillary’ campaign to continue at this time. She made the decision to fully support Mr. Obama,” said Lowery, who initially supported Clinton but later switched his allegiance to Obama. “I don’t know why they’re not taking their cue from Hillary and falling in line.”

But is that really the cue that Hillary is sending forth? Lowery thinks so, but with statements made by the Senator from New York and former First Lady to the effect that her supporters should be heard at the convention, is she truly putting one hundred percent effort behind Obama? Given the "terminatrix" image that some pundits have created around Hillary, I somehow can't imagine her standing over Obama and saying "Come with me if you want to live." I think, personally, she would be more inclined to use the "I'll be back" line made famous during the FIRST movie. This concept becomes more apparent with the news that Senator Clinton's brother and chief campaign backers have met with McCain a top McCain surrogate in Phoenix, Arizona, raising speculations as to what sort of topics where discussed and where the Clinton support will truly rest come the conclusion of the convention.

With the Democratic National Convention less than a week away, the gathering raises questions about the support Illinois Sen. Barack Obama can expect from former local supporters of Mrs. Clinton, who dominated at the polls in the Northeast in the April primary election. Mrs. Clinton won 74 percent of Lackawanna County Democrats to Mr. Obama’s 26 percent.

Ms. Fiorina’s daylong local visit, part of a two-day bus tour of the state, was aimed at talking disenchanted former supporters of Mrs. Clinton into supporting Mr. McCain. The private gathering was not a fundraiser.

“I think there’s going to be a groundswell of support for McCain,” said Lackawanna County District Attorney Andy Jarbola, a Republican and one of the people who attended. “I think a lot of Hillary supporters are going to be for McCain.”

Neither the Obama camp nor members of team Clinton have been available for comment, and Obama, once enjoying a more comfortable lead in the polls, has recently seen that lead slipping as McCain, a former fighter pilot, has begun to come in on him from behind, a position the Senator from Arizona has stated in the past that he feels very comfortable being in.

Once and Always, an American Fighting Man

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More 'Weather' Challenges for Obama

2008-08-20T10:46:00.001-05:00

The story that isn't a story just won't go away for Barack Obama. His connection with Weather Underground Pentagon bomber cum professor William Ayers has never been fully explained, and if files pertinent to their relationship remain sealed, it may not.

Stanley Kurtz is an unhappy camper. And he's unhappy because he's been denied access to files that may fill in the blanks surrounding the relationship between Democratic Presidential candidate Senator Barack Obama in his association with a known terrorist, William Ayers.

According to Obama and Ayers, there is simply no story. They both sat on a foundation together, they've had passing acquaintance through the years, but there is no "relationship." If that's the case, then why are there files relating to the Obama and Ayers connection that are not viewable at the Richard J. Daley Library at the University of Illinois, Chicago? That's what Kurtz wants to know in his article in National Review, detailing his pursuit of a story that supposedly "isn't there," but very much seems to be, in that there is such large evidence of a cover-up going on surrounding the relationship between Obama and Ayers.

Unfortunately, I don’t yet have access to the documents. The Special Collections section of the Richard J. Daley Library agreed to let me read them, but just before I boarded my flight to Chicago, the top library officials mysteriously intervened to bar access. Circumstances strongly suggest the likelihood that Bill Ayers himself may have played a pivotal role in this denial. Ayers has long taught at UIC, where the Chicago Annenberg Challenge offices were housed, rent-free. Ayers likely arranged for the files of the Chicago Annenberg Challenge to be housed in the UIC library, and may well have been consulted during my unsuccessful struggle to gain access to the documents. Let me, then, explain in greater detail what the Chicago Annenberg Challenge (CAC) records are, and how I have been blocked from seeing them.

Is there something that the Obama campaign is afraid of the American people seeing? Is there something there that Ayers doesn't want uncovered? What, exactly, is in these files that is such a secret that access to them is being treated with the same scrutiny as official classified governmental documents? It should be noted that these files are being housed at a library, a place that is, by definition, a repository of information that is made available to the public. The government is not in possession of these files.

So why the secrecy, unless there is something in there that someone doesn't want to be made public?

Kurtz plans to continue his endeavors for access to these documents. I wish him well, and hope that he can gain access to them. I won't discount, however, the possibility that by the time he is allowed access that there will be things that have been removed, after all of the hooplah surrounding his initial probe into this story.

Once and Always, an American Fighting Man

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McCain to Announce VP: Who Says Timing Isn't Everything?

2008-08-18T21:03:00.001-05:00

What's the best birthday present John McCain could give himself this year? The media blitz that will accompany his announcement of his running mate overshadowing the Democratic Convention and the nomination of Obama.

It's been one of the most anticipated and speculated upon decisions on the minds of both Democrats and Republicans. Who will be the running mates?

It is very likely Obama will announce his decision during the Democratic convention in Denver, an event that is already promising to be a media circus with the expectations of protests BY groups that claim to carry the Democrat mantle.

In a strategic move slated for August 29, McCain's birthday, the likely Republican candidate is expected to announce his choice for a running mate for the November general election in the key battleground state of Ohio.

The campaign has begun building a crowd of 10,000 for Dayton, Ohio, according to an organizer. McCain is scheduled to appear with his running mate at a large-scale event in Pennsylvania shortly thereafter.

Senior Republicans are in the dark about who he’ll name, although they say former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney and Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty are prime contenders after a trial balloon by McCain gave him very negative feedback about the idea of picking an abortion-rights running mate such as Tom Ridge, the former governor of Pennsylvania and the first secretary of homeland security.

Another speculative prospect has been Senator Joseph Lieberman (D-Conn), which would have been the first time in history since the candidacy of Abraham Lincoln, whose vice-Presidential choice was Andrew Johnson (D-Tenn) to have seen a vice-Presidential candidate not of the same party as the Presidential nominee.

As of now, the announcement is slated for 29 August, although McCain, who has been playing a very close hand concerning his choice of running mate, has stated that he may make his announcement sooner than that.

UPDATE: According to Drudge, Obama appears to be close to announcing his running mate, as well.

Once and Always, an American Fighting Man

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Georgia On My Mind...

2008-08-17T14:39:00.000-05:00

For days on end the world has had it's attention torn in several directions. With the U.S. Presidential race entering the convention phase, the controversies surrounding the Olympics in Beijing, the Middle East, and now Russia and Georgia?

If you asked the average American on June 27, 1914, who Archduke Franz Ferdinand was, the vast majority would have looked at you and said "never heard of him. Indeed, almost a full century later, if you mention Franz Ferdinand you're likely to bring to mind the rock group from Glasgow, Scotland, who's hit song "Take Me Out" was featured in commercials for the Sony PSP.

On June 28, 1914, Europe began it's decline into a state of continental war that would become, at the end, the most costly and devastating war to ever face the world. Even with the American entrance into the conflict in 1918, many Americans weren't sure why the U.S. was involving itself in a European conflict. And a great many Americans still weren't exactly sure what had started the war to begin with.

It's a century later, nearly, and until a few days ago, the vast majority of Americans really didn't have a clue that there was a problem in the former Soviet satellite nation of Georgia, let alone having any knowledge of a region known as South Ossetia. Yet once again the less well known regions of Europe have engaged the attention of the world as they become an object of turmoil and strife. The reason? South Ossetia has been seeking to break away from Georgia, as a large percentage of the population of the region are ethnic Russians, and wish for closer ties to Moscow than to Tbilisi. Or at least, that's what the Russians claim.

To some in the west, Russia has proven itself, at the governmental level, not to be trusted at their word. With the claims of having given cease-fire orders to their forces that rolled into the region on the one hand, and the first-hand accounts of Russian armor rolling into flanking positions around key Georgian cities, the bombing of the infrastructure (communication facilities and the like), and the sinking of Georgian ships by Russian warships, one can only speculate as to the long term goal of the Russian government. Georgia was, after all, one of the nations that made up the former Soviet Union, and Prime Minister Vladimir Putin was a member at one time of the KGB's "Fifth Directorate," which focused on political dissenters against Soviet policy, as well as having worked in the KGB's foreign intelligence divisions. Relevant? Perhaps not, unless one looks at the documented history of the practice of disinformation practiced by the KGB and Soviet Union throughout the years. To be fair, the United States and other western nations have practiced this method through the years, as well, but in this case it is Russia that is claiming non aggression at the governmental level while Russian troops have been occupying Georgian sovereign soil.

There will be, and probably are already, those who shrug their shoulders and proclaim, "It's no different from the United States invading Iraq and Afghanistan." In the case of the United States in regards to both Afghanistan and Iraq, there was evidence that has been documented and gone over ad nauseum to show terrorist activities being sponsored by or supported by both countries. Ethnic Russians living in the nation of Georgia are citizens of Georgia, not mother Russia, and the conflict that was brewing between South Ossetia and Tbilisi was an internal matter, not something for Russia to become, legally, involved in, which leads to the question; is the world witnessing the awakening of the Russian bear after a period of hibernation?

Once and Always, an American Fighting Man

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Traveling time

2008-07-16T17:57:00.000-05:00

The time has come. After some time off it's time to go back to work again, and I'll be out for probably about a month. I should be able to pop on here from time to time for a bit, but probably won't have much time, if any, for writing, while on the road.

Ya'll take care, and I'll be back in soon as I can.

Once and Always, an American Fighting Man

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Denver Imposes Restrictions on Protesters Tactics

2008-07-15T18:31:00.003-05:00

Field commanders and generals know that the best way to win a battle is to be prepared ahead of time for any tactics and tricks the opposing side will use in a pending conflict and confrontation. Denver is making plans now for the DNC convention.

There will be no urine tossing in Denver. Nor will there be any buckets filled with feces nor "cut-proof" devices that protesters can use to thwart local police officers as protesters gather outside the Pepsi Center in Denver when the DNC gathers there to meet next month for the party's convention. Denver law enforcement and lawmakers are working together to make sure that they have as many bases covered as possible to keep protesters from blocking traffic and creating undue disturbance in the Mile-High City.

"Protesters are getting pretty sophisticated," said Councilman Doug Linkhart, chairman of the council's safety committee.

"In other cities, they're not just handcuffing themselves to each other," he said. "They put their handcuffs inside PVC tubes, which are inside concrete. They've figured out ways that keep the police from just using bolt cutters to cut them apart. They also use buckets of urine and feces and various noxious substances to pour on themselves or the police."

Denver's proposed ordinance would make it illegal to carry any "tool, object, instrument or other article" that can be used to obstruct streets, sidewalks and entry or exits from buildings or for hindering emergency equipment.

"We're just trying to very narrowly define an area where, if they have these kinds of tools and we can prove intent, then we can arrest them," Linkhart said.

Among banned items will be chains, quick-setting cement, and locking devices resistant to bolt cutters, along with containers used to transport urine and feces, and any other items that might be seen as being used as a tool for disrupting order. Arapahoe County, where some delegates will be staying during the convention, has also placed bans on items that could be used as weapons, including gas masks that protesters might be carrying to use in case of tear gas being employed by law enforcement officials for crowd control.

Personally, I'm kind of amazed at the mindset of some protesters. I can understand picketing, I can understand the chants used by marchers, but there are some things my mind can not fathom. Urine and feces? Are we talking about people protesting, or chimpanzees here? Mind boggling.

In all honesty, while I can see why there would be a lot for Democrats to protest in regards to their party, especially those who belong to such groups as PUMA, I can't really say that I see many of the Hillary Clinton supporters that would be attending being the feces flinging type.

Of course I could be wrong.

What does sinking to this level of primate behavior accomplish, really? It smells, it potentially spreads disease, and we won't get into the whole concept of that one has to actually take the time to collect containers filled with feces or urine in order to take that one pride filled moment in which they can proclaim, "I tossed my shit on a cop!" I'm sure they have a mother somewhere who would be very proud of them for such adult behavior.

Protesting in such manner does little to accomplish actual real political change. It creates a breeding ground for violence, lawlessness, and potential injury to both the protesters and public safety officials who are there to maintain order. The rare exceptions were the non-violent protests led by Dr. Martin Luther King in which he urged passive resistance. But the days of King are over, and I'm certain that he would have highly disapproved of the use of human/animal waste as a means of attempting to make a point.

I wonder if they've also banned jamming devices for the undercover officers who will be communicating by shoe phone? Just a thought.

Once and Always, an American Fighting Man

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McLaughlin Steps In It, Calls Obama an Oreo

2008-07-14T21:40:00.001-05:00

Perhaps the question of the day for John McLaughlin could be "got milk?" The long time host of "The McLaughlin Group" is catching heat for his comments on last Sunday's edition in regards to Jesse Jackson and Barack Obama.

It's one of the signs that something has been going on for far too long. People start getting edgy, tense, and, using the word used by someone near and very dear, "punchy." This is what we are seeing out of Presidential race that has gone on for way too long in the United States. And the tension begins to show in everyone closely watching or participating in the races.

A prime example of this was found on Sunday's "The McLaughlin Group," when host John McLaughlin, a long time journalist and correspondent, referred to Presidential hopeful Senator Barack Obama as an "oreo" when discussing how Jesse Jackson must feel about Obama's reaping the benefits of the votes from the black community without having put in the work that Jackson is seen to have done through the years.

The veteran Washington journalist was discussing the recent comments from the Rev. Jesse Jackson, who was caught last week by an open microphone on Fox News saying the Illinois senator is "talking down to black people" as he campaigns for the White House. Those remarks were largely seen in reference to Obama's recent admonishment at a Chicago church of some black men who he said were not living up to their responsibilities as parents.

Referencing Jackson's comments, McLaughlin said Obama "fits the stereotype blacks once labeled as an Oreo — a black on the outside, a white on the inside."

"Does it frost Jackson, Jesse Jackson, that…an Oreo should be the beneficiary of the long civil rights struggle which Jesse Jackson spent his lifetime fighting for?" McLaughlin asked his panelists.

The term "Oreo" is often viewed as a derogatory term toward some African-Americans who appear not to exhibit certain stereotypes of their race.

Heat of the moment freudian slip? True inner feelings coming out? Or is it, as Obama called a his recent stand on Jerusalem, a matter of "poor phrasing?" In any event, McLaughlin is certainly taking heat for his choice of words. Panelists from McLaughlin's show and other commentators have spoken out against McLaughlin's use of "oreo" in describing Obama, expressing their disappointment in the turn of phrase and the meaning behind it.

Race certainly has been an issue in this election cycle, and rightly so. It's been a very important thing to many members of the media and many politicians in the Democratic party that Obama become the first black President. His skyrocketing career from practically out of nowhere bespeaks of some sort of behind the scenes maneuvering to ensure that he is the one to take the place in history, should he be elected, to become the first black United States President. His race, especially his mixed race of being African and white, has been an issue of discussion in many quarters during his rock star rise to the top, and anyone who even mentions it is generally labeled as a racist, a label McLaughlin has seemingly hung upon his own neck of his own accord. Given the context in which the statement was made (watch the video archive), he may very well be innocent of such a labeling. It still doesn't detract from the fact that the term was used and used in such a manner as to be seen as a racial slur.

Once and Always, an American Fighting Man

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Bush Lifts Presidential Ban on Off-Shore Drilling, Congressional Ban Still in Place

2008-07-14T18:23:00.002-05:00

There is an old saying, "Desperate times call for desperate measures." Given the state of the nation's economy and the exorbitant price of fuel, President Bush has removed the Presidential ban on offshore drilling, and calls for Congress to follow suite.

Recent polling data has shown a shift in the American desire to drill off our coastal shores. Soaring fuel prices over the past two years, despite Democratic promises to work to bring them down, have put a strain on the American economy and the wallet of the average American family. Rising fuel prices have driven up the cost of nearly everything, from food to services, and American's are demanding something be done to truly change the situation.

The introduction of bio-fuels in certain markets has proven unreliable as a current alternative and remedy to the fuel situation; even the blending of grain fuels into petroleum products have left consumers complaining of decreased fuel mileage and performance in their automobiles. The auto industry itself is suffering from a lack of sales, and a look in the vehicle section of the local classified ads in newspapers around the country show a significant increase in the number of SUV's, pick-up trucks, and larger cars being offered for sale at near give-away prices.

Today, President Bush took the first step in doing something from a governmental level to help take the stress off of consumers by signing an executive order rescinding the Presidential ban on off shore drilling along the United States coastal regions, and called for Congress to remove the Congressional ban, as well. (Full text of speech here)

"This is a difficult period for millions of American families," Bush said. "Every extra dollar they have to spend because of high gas prices is one dollar less they can use to put food on the table or send a child to school. And they are rightly angered by Congress' failure to enact common-sense solutions."

Bush said increasing access to offshore exploration of the Outer Continental Shelf is one of the most important steps the country can take. He laid blame on Democrats who he said have rejected "virtually every proposal" to expand domestic oil production.

"... Congress has restricted access to key parts of the OCS since the early 1980s," Bush said. "Experts believe that these restricted areas of the OCS could eventually produce nearly 10 years' worth of America's current annual oil production. And advances in technology have made it possible to conduct oil exploration in the OCS that is out of sight, protects coral reefs and habitats, and protects against oil spills."

Historically significant is the fact that the original Presidential ban on drilling was signed into being by the President's father during his term in office as President in 1990. The Congressional ban came around the same time period.

This is President Bush's second call for Congress to remove their ban, having made the first request in June.

Environmental groups and activists are already denouncing the executive order, with Senator Barbara Boxer (D-California) proclaiming that such a move will destroy the economy of the country's coastal region.

Frankly, I'm not sure how that would be the case, given that there would be a migration of oil workers to towns along the coast for access to transportation to and from work on ocean based oil rigs, a move that would bring commerce into those regions in the form of housing sales, goods and services being sold and rendered, and the addition of jobs in those fields to support the influx of new population into those regions.

It is by no means going to be a quick fix, if and when Congress does lift their ban on off-shore drilling, but such an action would clear the way for oil production domestically, and perhaps the reinvestment of refinery processes on American soil, thereby creating more jobs in that area, as well.

The next move is up to Congress, leaving the American people to wait and see if their Congressmen and Senators are paying attention to what the American public is demanding of them.

Once and Always, an American Fighting Man

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And We're Back to Global COOLING Again...

2008-07-14T14:04:00.002-05:00

To hear the media and any number of politicians and climatologists who have come on board with the concept, the world is facing a crisis because of the onset of global warming. Not so fast, say paleontologists, who are coming out to show otherwise.

Back in May I did a piece regarding the changing of weather and temperature patterns around the globe and the back and forth teeter-tottering that climatologists have been putting the world through since the 1970's, as well as other agenda driven science. Before that there was my article showing how 400 scientists around the world disagreed with the man-made global warming concept, and of course there is the report by Lord Christopher Monckton of Brenchley, entitled 35 Inconvenient Truths, The Errors in Al Gore's Movie.

Needless to say, I'm a huge skeptic of the whole man-made global warming hysteria, and there is a reason for it. Other than my required science courses for my education degree in college (I chose geology, and there's a reason for that), I have always had a fascination and more than a passing layman's interest in natural science, geology, paleontology, and archeology. According to my geology professor, when I was considering switching majors to geology (a move I still regret not making, actually), most of his converts into geology and paleontology come from the history disciplines. Needless to say, I've more than just the passing knowledge of how research is done than just to listen to the news or read an article in a newspaper or magazine. There are procedures that are followed, and there is data that is collected, correlated, researched, so on and so forth.

Any respectable scientist will tell you that there is nothing that is ever conclusively proven, there are only hypotheses that become accepted as fact due to sufficient evidence supporting them. Despite the hysteria created by Al Gore, Hollywood, and the main stream media, there is more sound and verifiable evidence to support that we are NOT facing a crisis because of man-made global warming, and that overall, the planet is actually going back into a cooling pattern, as discussed by Dennis T. Avery, co-author of Unstoppable Global Warming: Every 1,500 Years, in an interview with Right Wing News.

Over the course of the interview, Avery answers questions and discusses the effects of solar radiation upon the Earth, how that geological records are obtained and studied, and what evidence is obtained from those records from the very planet itself, including taking samples from ice shelves. He also discusses in the interview how that, despite the claims of the alarmists, geological evidence shows that the current warming cycle that the planet is coming out of, which peaked somewhere in the 1940's, is much milder than other warming periods the Earth has gone through in the history of mankind, stating, "The...warming before our last ice age was much warmer than anything we've had since. We had a warming that peaked 9000 years ago, another warming that peaked 5000 years ago. Both were warmer than today. Probably the Roman warming and the medieval warming were both warmer than today -- and we've had 8 warmings of the earth since the last Ice Age."

According to Al Gore, who is heavily invested in has a great financial interest in the promotion of global warming and the subsequent "green" industry to counter it, "the debate is over," but according to scientists like Avery and Lord Monckton, it hasn't even "warmed up."

Once and Always, an American Fighting Man

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Satyrical or Offensive? You Decide

2008-07-13T21:01:00.003-05:00

The new issue of The New Yorker Magazine has a very interesting political cartoon on it's cover, and people are going nuts about it even though it's only been out for less than a day. The cartoon features Barack Obama in Muslim garb and his wife, Michelle, with an AK-47 slung across her back. Both the Obama and McCain camps have issued statements denouncing the cartoon and The New Yorker Magazine for publishing it, but what does it really say for political opinion in America in regards to candidate Obama?

Here is the picture:

The cartoonist has issued a statement in which he said, "Retrospect? Outcry?" The magazine just came out ten minutes ago, at least give me a few days to decide whether to regret it or not..."

What do you say, America?

Once and Always, an American Fighting Man

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Obama Creates New Dance Step, the Jerusalem Two-Step

2008-07-13T20:06:00.001-05:00

Jerusalem is and has been a hot spot of controversy and contention between Israel and the Arabic nations through the Palestinians for several years. Each side claims it, neither has been willing to back down, and Obama has stepped in it. Literally.

How many times can a Presidential candidate in the United States change his position on an issue? No one knows, yet, because Barack Obama is still in the running for the Presidency, and today has issued yet another reversal of position on a significant issue.

In early June, speaking before the American-Israeli Public Affairs Committee, Obama stated that it was his belief that Jerusalem must remain an undivided city, and the capital of Israel:

Egypt must cut-off the smuggling of weapons in the Gaza. And Israel can also advance the cause of peace by taking appropriate steps consistent with it security to ease the freedom of movement for Palestinians and improve economic conditions in the West Bank and to refrain from building new settlements as it’s agreed to do with the Bush Administration at Annapolis. Now let me be clear; Israel’s security is sacrosanct. It is non-negotiable; the Palestinians need a State--the Palestinians need a State that is contiguous and cohesive and that allows them to prosper, but any agreement with the Palestinian people must preserve Israel’s identity as a Jewish State with secure, recognized, defensible borders. And Jerusalem will remain the capital of Israel and it must remain undivided.

This is an utterly fantastic and strong statement to be making in front of a group comprised of a large Jewish representation. Exactly the right thing to say to them in order to garner their trust and their favors, as well as catching a few votes for the General election cycle.

And yet it brings to mind and to bearing another Obama expression that I use when he says something and then tries to backpedal. "Just words, Senator?"

In the following month since the speech, the Arab world has expressed their absolute shock and dismay at Obama's speech before the AIPAC, which was broadcast live over several Middle Eastern news channels.

Palestinian and Arab hopes were dashed by a speech that U.S. Democratic presidential candidate Senator Barack Obama gave to a pro-Israeli lobby, in which he promised his full support to Israel and went further by adopting Israeli policy that sees Jerusalem as the "undivided capital" of the Jewish state.

After having discreetly vouched for Obama since the party race to the White House began last year, his speech – just hours after he won his party's backing on Wednesday – has prompted second thoughts about what changes the African-American could bring to Washington's Middle East foreign policy.

Millions of Arabs were able to watch the address to the powerful American-Israeli Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), which was aired live on some Arab television networks, serving as a "rude awakening" that the United States, regardless of its leadership, would continue to favor Israel at the expense of Palestinian and Arab rights.

In other words, it's not enough that Obama has thrown American Muslims under the bus, he's also tossed the Palestinians and Arabs there along with them, and now he's throwing bricks at them from the platform of Jerusalem. Muslims living in Jerusalem, who had been closely following the Obama campaign and were holding out hope that he truly was the candidate of change, have changed their minds as well, with one shop keeper in eastern Jerusalem, Ayman abu Syrieh, stating, "We were looking at him differently, from Bush and the others. We thought he would bring real peace to the Middle East. I have to be honest with you, I am shocked now."

Not so fast with the dismay, Syrieh, because Barack Obama, the candidate of "change," has exhibited once again his definition of the meaning of the word "change" by changing his position on the subject of Jerusalem, stating that in his speech he used "poor phrasing."

"You know, the truth is that this was an example where we had some poor phrasing in the speech. And we immediately tried to correct the interpretation that was given," he said in an interview aired on Sunday on CNN's "Fareed Zakaria -- GPS."

"The point we were simply making was, is that we don't want barbed wire running through Jerusalem, similar to the way it was prior to the '67 war, that it is possible for us to create a Jerusalem that is cohesive and coherent," Obama said.

Just words?

Just words that were poorly phrased?

Not if one returns to the text of the speech and reads them, then watches footage of the speech at the time it was given, in which he proclaims himself as a "true friend of Israel," and pledging the unbreakable bond between the U.S. and Israel. Poorly phrased? His entire speech was a proclamation of his understanding and appreciation of Zionism, acknowledging the centuries that Israel spent without a homeland and the importance of American support of the security of Israel as a nation.

Just words?

Apparently Obama's concept of "change" applies to his position on any given issue whenever it is politically expedient to do so.

"Change you can believe in." You can believe there will be a change from Barack Obama whenever the political winds shift, evidently.

Once and Always, an American Fighting Man

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Obama - Mission: Implausible

2008-07-11T21:20:00.002-05:00

Barack Obama just might need the help of Tom Cruises "Ethan Hunt" character to pull of one of his biggest campaign promises. Some things sound great when discussed, but the actuality of the situation may not always make things come off like promised.

Members of the United States armed forces face a unique situation that other American citizens generally are unaware of. While members of the armed forces can participate in the electoral process of the nation's business like anyone else, they are not as free to express individual political opinion as civilians, especially in regards to candidates who will potentially become their commander-in-chief. That doesn't mean, however, that they can't express their opinions on the feasibility of ending a mission before it's completion, or giving their analysis of the consequences of premature termination.

One of the key elements that put Barack Obama ahead of Hillary Clinton in the Democratic race for the party nomination was the issue of bringing U.S. troops home from Iraq. Senator Clinton, in a reasonable and sensible approach, maintained that the war in Iraq should be ended as quickly as possible, but maintained that she would reserve judgement on the return of combat and support forces for after being briefed, as President, by top military officials on the effects and eventualities that a sudden exodus of forces from Iraq would bring.

Senator Obama, on the other hand, has maintained that he will begin bringing troops home, withdrawing all combat troops, two brigades per month, over the first sixteen months of his presidency. Such a withdrawal, according to many military personnel, could have dire and long term effects in Iraq, and for the rest of the world as well.

Military personnel in Iraq are following the presidential race closely, especially when it comes to Iraq.

The soldiers and commanders we spoke to will not engage in political conversation or talk about any particular candidate, but they had some strong opinions about the military mission which they are trying to accomplish, and the dramatic security gains they have made in the past few months.

We spent a day with Maj. Gen. Jeffery Hammond in Sadr City. He is the commander of the 4th Infantry Division, which is responsible for Baghdad. Hammond will likely be one of the commanders who briefs Barack Obama when he visits Iraq.

"We still have a ways to go. Number one, we're working on security and it's very encouraging, that's true, but what we're really trying to achieve here is sustainable security on Iraqi terms. So, I think my first response to that would be let's look at the conditions.

"Instead of any time-based approach to any decision for withdrawal, it's got to be conditions-based, with the starting point being an intelligence analysis of what might be here today, and what might lie ahead in the future. I still think we still have work that remains to be done before I can really answer that question," Hammond said when asked how he would feel about an order to start drawing down two combat brigades a month.

Asked if he considered it dangerous to pull out if the withdrawal is not based on "conditions," Hammond said, "It's very dangerous. I'll speak for the coalition forces, men and women of character and moral courage; we have a mission, and it's not until the mission is done that I can look my leader in the eye and say, 'Sir, Ma'am, mission accomplished,' and I think it is dangerous to leave anything a little early."

This doesn't even begin to touch on the logistical considerations for moving that many troops, and that much equipment, in that short of a time frame, without creating a situation that affects the military budget and capacity to wage an effective combat operation if redeployed elsewhere because of having to abandon equipment in country in order to meet a political time line.

Ed Morrissey of Hot Air has this take on it:

This is the kind of information that policy makers usually get before formulating policy. We can rotate troops out of Iraq on the kind of timetable Obama suggests, but we’d have to leave all of our heavy equipment in Iraq. Unless Obama plans some kind of nationwide garage sale, that would be a rather large loss for the American military in materiel as well as making our exit look more like Dunkirk.

Obviously, Obama didn’t have any awareness of logistics when he made this proposal — and that’s the point. His lack of experience, combined with a hubris that he has consistently shown on the campaign trail, makes clear that he is in way over his head at this point of his career. He has no sense of military policy at all, and got the biggest call of the war — the surge — completely wrong. Yet he insists that he’s ready to lead this nation’s military during a time of war as Commander in Chief?

Realistically, it's not plausible. Obama himself has even begun to waffle on the issue verbally, but maintains, on his official website, that this is still one of his key campaign promises that he will fulfill upon taking the office of the President, if he is elected to such.

Just words?

Words mean things, and if one is going to make such a straight forward and committed position as Obama has made, one should be prepared, in advance, to be able to achieve such tasks as one promises to deliver. Obama, in true political fashion and demonstrating a marked lack of experience and understanding of the deployment of military forces, has committed himself to a politically suicidal position, should he gain the office of President. On the one hand, if he is elected and is unable to deliver on his promise to bring the troops home from Iraq within the first sixteen months of his administration, he has delivered, upon the proverbial silver platter, ammunition for a Republican opponent (as well as potential Democratic opponents) for the 2012 election cycle. On the other hand, should he manage to move 2 full brigades of troops back to the states per month, forcing a wholesale abandonment of equipment in country in Iraq (which undoubtedly will fall into the hands of those whom we would prefer not to have said equipment, provided the military doesn't render it unusable prior to departure), our military will face a state of unpreparedness unseen since the days of the Carter administration.

Should Obama become President, his lack of experience and understanding of the military, and his lack of willingness to listen to expert advice, has caused Obama to create for himself, within the less than a year and a half of taking office, the ultimate political death; he has backed himself into a no-win situation.

Once and Always, an American Fighting Man

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If a cow farts in a plastic bag, does a global warming advocate inhale it?

2008-07-10T18:34:00.003-05:00

There is an ancient Chinese curse that says, "May you live in interesting times." Sometimes, it seems, the world must surely be damned, for these are definitely interesting times.

I truly wonder where PETA is on this?

Some time back, over the course of the past few years, former U.S. Vice-President Al Gore referred to methane gas from cattle flatulence as being a contributing factor to global warming. Now there is a study being undertaken to determine how diet affects the gas a cow produces in the digestive process.

Brace yourselves (and that isn't meant as redneck foreplay. This time): there are backpacks that have been made for Argentinian cattle with devices being used to capture their farts and burps so that researchers can measure the amounts of methane and carbon dioxide produced when the cattle eat certain feeds.

Experts said the slow digestive system of cows makes them a key producer of methane, a potent greenhouse gas that gets far less public attention than carbon dioxide.

In a bid to understand the impact of the wind produced by cows on global warming, scientists collected gas from their stomachs in plastic tanks attached to their backs.

The Argentine researchers discovered methane from cows accounts for more than 30 per cent of the country's total greenhouse emissions.

Right. Cow farts, gas goes into plastic container on the backpack, and then it's off for research and study. A study on cow farts?

Bill Clinton said he didn't inhale, during his campaign for the Presidency years ago. An astonishing number of people actually believed that, just like they believed Al Gore when he said "the debate is over" on the subject of global warming.

Gore didn't ask for the opinion of Lord Monckton.

And looking at this contraption strapped to the back of that poor cow, somebody obviously must have inhaled, at some point, and figured out a new way to inhale a lot more...

Perhaps in a related study research can be done on the gas of college guys after ingesting beer and pickled eggs?

Once and Always, an American Fighting Man

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Bush Trimming Deemed to be Discriminatory against Gays

2008-07-10T15:20:00.002-05:00

It's a matter of gay rights activists versus the city council in Bristol, UK. The city wants to clear undergrowth from an area called the Downs, to "encourage rare wildlife" into the area, a move that local gays say is discrimination against them.

Nature lovers of more than one kind are heating up over the issue of the Downs, which has become a popular social spot for local gays, who claim that the city's plans to clear the area of undergrowth in an effort to cut down on the accessibility of the area as being a "hot spot" for gay lovers to meet. Their claim in effect, is that bush trimming is discrimination against the local gay community.

Bristol City Council wants to prune bushes and remove cover from an area known as the Downs to improve the landscape and encourage rare wildlife.

But its own gay rights group has opposed the move, claiming that cutting back the bushes was "discriminating" to homosexual men who used the area for late night outdoor sex known as dogging.

Work on the beauty spot has been temporarily delayed while talks with gay rights groups take place to try and break the deadlock.

The Downs is located along the top of the Avon Gorge, in the Clifton suburb of Bristol, and is the home to various species of wildlife and plant life. Over the past twenty years, the area has become overgrown with thick brush that covers an area along Circular Road, and has become a hot spot for gay men and couples seeking an outdoor area for sex.

The area hit the headlines within the last year after four firemen were fined for shining lights into the brush on couples engaged in sexual activities.

Personally, I'm not sure that the city council's reasoning for attracting wildlife will stand up to close scrutiny. Wildlife tend to flourish in areas undisturbed by human clearing, and it's quite possible that if one looked closely, abundant nocturnal wildlife could be found, such as certain varieties of lizards and quite possibly, though I must admit I'm not familiar with the local fauna, the occasional beaver, perhaps seeking to partake of the local wood. I'm sure that there is probably an abundance of squirrels and a great many birds, likely several Great Tits flashing about from tree to tree, which I'm sure include, possibly white oak, Dutch elm, and perhaps pussy willows.

A few lines from Bob Seger's Horizontal Bop come to mind:

If we cant find a house
Then someone better find a field
Grass is good as carpet
Anyplace is fine
Its time to get to rockin
Babe its time to make it shine

It's sure to be an interesting debate as it unfolds, but perhaps, in retrospect, the city council might have taken a more honest direction with their announcement to clean out the area, simply by saying that they wished to remove the undergrowth to discourage illicit behavior outdoors. But it remains to be seen if neatly trimmed bush will indeed be a discouragement, or will only make for a smoother access to an area that has already become a hot spot.

Once and Always, an American Fighting Man
(with tongue firmly planted in cheek)

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Kennedy Receives Standing Ovation on Senate Floor

2008-07-09T20:51:00.001-05:00

Senator Edward Kennedy of Massachusetts made his return today to the Senate. Under normal circumstances, not a big deal for a long term Senator to return to work, but for Ted Kennedy, today was important, as being there meant not breaking his word.

It's been a rough couple of months for Ted Kennedy. Recently diagnosed with a cancerous tumor on his brain and having undergone surgery and radiation and chemical treatment for it, Kennedy's health has not been the best over the course of the summer. Cancer patients can tell you, the treatment saps your energy and your strength, leaving you feeling weak and tired more easily than before the illness.

But Ted Kennedy has a tenacity about him, that, love him or hate him for his political views, has to be admired. It is this tenacity and integrity that prompted the senior Senator from Massachusetts, who is chairman of the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee and is an influential Democrat on health care issues to, despite the advice and urgings of friends and family, return to the Senate floor today in order to be present for a vote on a Medicare bill that he had pledged his support for. Upon casting his vote the Senate chambers, he received a standing ovation from the assemblage.

Today, the Senate chamber erupted into loud cheers when Sen. Ted Kennedy (D-MA) returned to cast his vote on long-stalled Medicare legislation. Senators gave Kennedy, who has been battling a brain tumor, a long standing ovation. As he registered his vote, Kennedy said in a loud voice, “Aye,” and made a thumbs-up gesture.

In a statement today, Kennedy explained his return:

I return to the Senate today to keep a promise to our senior citizens and that’s to protect Medicare.

Win, lose or draw, I wanted to be here. I wasn’t going to take the chance that my vote could make the difference.

Personally, I'm not a huge fan of Kennedy's record. His controversies, both personal and public, leave a lot to be desired, in my opinion, for some of the issues he tackles and makes a stand for. However, one does not necessarily have to be a student of the teachings of Sun Tzu to realize respectability in one's opponents. Ted Kennedy has definitely earned that respect from me today.

Once and Always, an American Fighting Man

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Press 1 for English - you do know what a 1 looks like, right?

2008-07-09T16:32:00.001-05:00

In a gathering at Powder Springs, Georgia, this week, Barack Obama responded to a question in the audience regarding the number of high school drop outs and his (present) position on bilingualism.

The "English-first" debate seems to be far from over. While out of the headlines in recent months, it's still a topic of debate for those who believe that the U.S. should pass legislation declaring English as the national language to those who don't see the need for a national language at all. It's interesting to note that the United States is one of the few nations, if not the only nation, that does not have an official national language.

Many Europeans, as Obama points out in his reply to a question regarding bi-lingual education, speak more than one language. A great number of Europeans are multi-linguistic. Not so for the majority of Americans, who speak only English, or a great number of Mexican illegals who speak only Spanish. It is because of the catering of a large number of businesses to the non-English speaking Hispanic population that has created such an uproar throughout the nation, with many Americans growing increasingly frustrated with business machines and automated telephone systems with a "Press 1 for English" menu at the beginning of the menu features.

You know, I don't understand when people are going around worrying about, "We need to have English- only." They want to pass a law, "We want English-only."

Now, I agree that immigrants should learn English. I agree with that. But understand this. Instead of worrying about whether immigrants can learn English -- they'll learn English -- you need to make sure your child can speak Spanish. You should be thinking about, how can your child become bilingual? We should have every child speaking more than one language.

You know, it's embarrassing when Europeans come over here, they all speak English, they speak French, they speak German. And then we go over to Europe, and all we can say [is], "Merci beaucoup." Right?

You know, no, I'm serious about this. We should understand that our young people, if you have a foreign language, that is a powerful tool to get ajob. You are so much more employable. You can be part of international business. So we should be emphasizing foreign languages in our schools from an early age, because children will actually learn a foreign language easier when they're 5, or 6, or 7 than when they're 46, like me.

Admittedly, Obama has a point. Our education system should be geared, in my opinion, to ensuring that there is a variety of secondary and tertiary language curriculum available as an option for students who wish to pursue a more international means of communicating. And while I personally see Obama as an elitist over other issues, and perhaps even a bit so in his approach and reasoning behind his desire to see American children learning foreign language skills, it isn't for the reasons stated by Andrew Leonard at Salon:

There's nothing particularly exceptional about Obama's position, unless you are an English-only partisan cowering in fear of your cultural identity being swamped by funny-looking people from strange lands. Or one of the similarly insecure patriots who believe any criticism of the U.S. is a sign of "blame-America-first" treachery. And I suppose the whole comment about "going to Europe" opens Obama up to more charges of elitism, and disconnection from the lives of those who, right now, can't afford to even think about going to Europe.

My problem with Obama's views lies in other areas, and they are all directly related to the way that we conduct public education today, and for those who think this is going to be a partisan take on public education from a conservative standpoint, think again. What I'm going to say is going to be broad sweeping and will cover what I see wrong with public education be it under the administrations of the Democrats or the Republicans, and I will say up front I was never and still am not a supporter of President Bush's "No Child Left Behind" faux pas.

America's public education system today is the victim of two things: corporate textbook and testing and political correctness. I'm not going to dive into the statistical data supporting this, as this is an opinion piece, but it is out there to support what I'm saying. Those of you with children in school know what I'm talking about. Students are being taught a curriculum that is designed to teach them what they need to know in order to pass standardized tests that are required by the state for them to advance from one grade level to the next. They are spoon fed this information to ensure that it stays in their memories long enough in order for them to take their tests and move on to learning the material that will be required for them to pass the next level of testing, an endless cycle of spoon feeding and testing that begins at the kindergarten level and extends on through college.

Gone are the days of children learning at a young age the art of critical thinking. Indeed, it is a rare thing today to find students in whom this now rare trait continues to exist, generally amongst the intellectual rebels classified by school psychologists as "the classic underachiever (I fell into that category myself)."

Despite Senator Obama's contention that our problem with the education system is that we aren't geared to bi-lingual education, a much more deep rooted problem exists: our education system isn't geared to education.

And requiring, by law, that students who don't belong in a classroom and have no desire or interest in staying there, simply because it keeps funding coming into the school system for the body count on a daily basis, doesn't help matters in the least. It creates, often, a classroom setting where those who can and wish to learn can not because of the interference of those who would be better served in some sort of vocational program and not being forced to drag down others simply for the sake of "no child left behind."

Senator Obama's approach doesn't work, and it doesn't make sense, when the system itself can not do the job that it is supposed to do in the first place. The first focus needs to be ensuring that little Johnny and Peggy Sue can comprehend what they are reading and writing in the first place, as well as being able to come up with an answer of "10" when adding 8 + 2. Instead, they're being taught such concepts as why that it's not a bad thing for Heather to have two mommies, when such decisions and morality is the responsibility of the parent to instill, not public education.

This is the thinking of Senator Obama's "nanny state" mindset. "Government knows better." Obviously, it doesn't, unless the goal of government is to create generation after generation of a population that can be controlled and programmed on a whim, and the way to achieve this is the breakdown of true education of the youth of the nation.

Once and Always, an American Fighting Man

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Call in the roughnecks, the majority of Americans want off-shore drilling

2008-07-08T16:43:00.003-05:00

For years, our nation has had a noticeable lack of off shore drilling in the Gulf of Mexico, an area where vast stores of crude are both known and believed to be located. What is the United States to do now, though, if the Gulf is being pumped by others?

If you want to make an environmentalist extremist sweat drops of blood (or maybe crude) mention two topics, ANWR or offshore drilling. For years, the environmentalist movement has kept big oil from drilling in the oil rich region that feeds from the foot of the Mississippi River, arguing that drilling has such a huge negative impact on the environment that it isn't feasible to drill under the floor of the ocean to recover the "black gold" that we all rely upon for heating and energy. And for years, the American public has nodded their collective head, yeah-yeahing the environmentalist lobby, relying on an ample supply of relatively inexpensive fuel supply from the Middle East, so the nation didn't really NEED the Arctic or Gulf Oil.

How quickly a nation forgets the fuel lines from the Carter administration.

The American people have found themselves in a pinch, having allowed governmental agencies to put such heavy restrictions on the oil industry that there have been no new refineries built in the United States in literally decades, existing refineries are operating far below capacity because investment in new equipment to replace old has been lacking, due to funds being allocated for overseas projects, and a heavy reliance on OPEC for a large percentage of our oil.

Through in a little sales process called "speculating," and the American people are facing the highest fuel and oil prices on record. And they're getting very tired of being over a barrel, in a very literal sense.

And they're starting to look at ANWR and at the Gulf of Mexico with the activity going on in international waters by other countries and asking, "Why aren't we getting in on this ourselves?" Polling data from a mid-May Gallup poll shows that 57% American voters are ready to start drilling for oil again on our own soil, both in the Gulf of Mexico and in the frozen northern wastelands of Alaska. This information has put Congress in a bit of a tizzy.

House Democrats are in a bind on the focal point of their energy plan.

Worried that a floor vote on any energy-related measure would trigger a Republican-forced vote on domestic drilling, the leadership has scrubbed the floor schedule of the energy legislation that it vowed to tackle after the Fourth of July recess.

Just before leaving for their districts, a number of House Democrats called a press conference to declare victory on a number of energy bills — including overwhelming passage of a bill to rein in excessive oil market speculation.

Democrats declared victory on a bill they failed to pass on the suspension calendar — their “use it or lose it bill” to force energy companies to either start drilling on their federally leased land or give it back — saying they had put 176 Republicans on record as siding with the oil companies over consumers.

And they vowed that the bill, the centerpiece of their energy message, would be back.

So far, there are no energy related bills slated for discussion in the first week Congress has reconvened following the Independence Day holiday weekend, leading the Republicans to cry "foul," accusing the Democrats of backtracking on their word after realizing that the Republicans could shoot down any marketing changes with legislation of their own calling for new and expanded drilling. Democrats counter that they are simply discussing their options and looking to bring forward the best plan to the table first before making an official presentation out of committee.

At this point, Democratic plans lean toward reforming how oil is sold, putting an end to the practice of speculating, or at the very least putting limitations on how speculating is done in an effort to keep prices from skyrocketing as they have done over the last year. Republican plans call for drilling that would begin immediately, with the intended results of adding more available crude and refined oil products into the market; a larger supply driving prices back down to reasonable figures. The problem here lies in the age of existing drilling and refinery equipment and the urgent need for more and newer equipment in order to significantly increase production of domestic oil, as well as the number of new wells that would need to be drilled to operate along with standing wells that are operating with older pumps, and would include, despite the outcry of the environmentalist left, actually drilling for oil where it can be found such as the Gulf of Mexico and ANWR.

Perhaps, looking objectively outside the box for a moment, some bright soul in Congress (don't hold your collective breath looking for that individual to appear) can come up with a plan that would incorporate both ideas into one piece of legislation that actually does something that benefits the American public for a change, rather than benefiting either one party or the other in the race to make tally marks on who's winning more pieces of useless legislation coming through the government.

Once and Always, an American Fighting Man

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Killing your child in the name of "honor"

2008-07-07T19:36:00.002-05:00

It seems to be a growing trend outside of the Middle East that has crossed over into Western culture with the migration of Islam. If your children disgrace you, kill them.

There is a line where culture and rule of law have to come to an agreement. The line exist because it has been determined that there are things that are not going to be permitted, regardless of the culture one has come from. In the United States, there are no laws that allow for family members to kill family members over matters of "honor," and arranged marriages are something that generally went by the wayside long ago. And yet we are seeing an incident involving both of these situations coming out of Georgia today as a Pakistani man, Chaudhry Rashid, has allegedly killed his daughter, Sandeela Kanwal, after she expressed the desire to be released from an arranged marriage to a man, who lives in Chicago, that she has not seen in months.

According to police, there was "friction between father and victim" in the weeks leading up to the killing. Rashid had not spoken to his daughter in more than two months.

Police said Rashid was so angered that his daughter planned to divorce her husband that he killed her after a heated argument at the family's home, FOX News affiliate MyFoxAtlanta reported.

Police who arrived at the scene said they found Rashid's two sons at the end of the driveway and their father sitting behind a car smoking a cigarette. Officers said that Rashid appeared "distraught and possibly mournful" and told police "my daughter is dead" when they arrived.

After entering the home, Kanwal's body was discovered in the doorway of a bedroom, cold to the touch, officials said.

All indications are that the girl was strangled to death, according to ligature markings on her throat and neck.

So many random thoughts run through the mind in these instances.

So many questions.

There are many times when parents are displeased or disappointed by the desires or actions of their children; there are many times when the inverse is true, as well, and children are disappointed by their parents. There is no excuse, however, in the case of divorce, or the expressed desire for a divorce, that justifies the murder of one's child for seeking to remove themselves from a situation that they find untenable.

Honor killings are carried out for a number of reasons. From refusal or trying to leave an arranged marriage to even finding ones self (female) the victim of a sexual assault, the results wind up being the same; a woman is killed at the hands of a man or men for bringing about "dishonor."

I'm curious how someone who has been the victim of a sexual assault is the one doing the dishonoring? That line of thinking seems to be inverted, in my way of thinking. And it would seem that the law is on my side in this matter.

The First Amendment to the Constitution of the United States states, "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances." This is another one of those things in which a mountain is made of a mole hill in it's meaning. There is no "seperation of church and state" implied here other than that "Congress shall make NO LAW respecting the establishment of religion or prohibiting the free expression thereof."

Law's prohibiting murder are not a prohibition of "the free expression thereof."

Western culture is at a crossroads, and many do not seem to realize the very nature of the situation at hand as it plays out daily in towns and communities across the area once referred to as Western Christendom. The foundations of nations and their cultures are being challenged by an influx of a mind-set that has not, in some instances, left the Middle Ages and progressed into modern time. One can not refer to ones self as being "progressive" in ones thinking when one is allowing a mindset that victimizes the victim.

The "honor killings" are a misnomer. There is no honor, nor is there valor, in the murder of one's child for seeking to leave a marriage.

Once and Always, an American Fighting Man

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Obama still in uphill battle against Clinton supporters

2008-07-07T19:32:00.001-05:00

Senator Hillary Clinton may have suspended her campaign for the Presidency, but that doesn't mean that her supporters have embraced the presumed Democratic nominee Barack Obama. Despite his top spot, he's still battling to gain their support for him.

In a move being called dissent by some, top Hillary campaign supporters and funders have basically shut down in transferring their support to Barack Obama, ensuring that their displeasure with the treatment of Clinton by Obama, the Party, and the media, are being heard in the most effective way possible; financially.

Some have gone so far as to create anti-Obama websites and grass roots organizations urging Hillary supporters to back Republican Presidential candidate Senator John McCain. Sources close to this rebellion by the top tier of donators say that it involves around 300 Clinton "Hillraisers" who have, individually, raised at least $100,000 each for the Clinton campaign.

The Clinton holdouts are typically most angry about what they say was the media's sexist treatment of Sen. Clinton during the campaign. And though few, if any, blame Sen. Obama directly, they fault the Illinois senator and other party leaders for what they say was failing to do enough to stop it.

Susie Tompkins Buell, a Hillraiser from San Francisco, said, "What really hurt women the most was to look back and see all this gender bias." Ms. Buell said she hasn't decided whether to vote for Sen. Obama and plans to skip the August Democratic convention.

The impact of such efforts could extend beyond the hurt feelings that typically emanate from losing campaigns. Sen. Obama has built a formidable fund-raising machine that has scooped up money from donors large and small. But his general-election bid could suffer if he fails to mobilize a group that raised tens of millions of dollars for Sen. Clinton.

I don't think the Democrats, currently under the leadership of "Screaming Howard" Dean, have been this fractured since the election of 1860. I think we can all take a look back and see how well that turned out for everyone. While I'm not willing to go so far as to predict a Civil War in my writings, one can't help but wonder, in noticing the heavy splt on the Democratic side of the aisle, what the plan is that will bring ultimate unity back in the Democatic party come convention time.

After all, Obama IS supposed to be the "Unity" candidate...

Once and Always, an American Fighting Man

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The Denver Democratic National Convention: A Logistical Nightmare in the Making

2008-07-05T16:58:00.002-05:00

How do you take a scheduled event and turn it into a fiasco before it even gets started? Perhaps the Democratic Party should write a "How-To" book on convention planning so that others can learn what NOT to do to attract donations and vendors.

The clock is ticking on the Democrats in bringing together final arrangements for the national convention in Denver. There are less than two months left for them to finalize planning and coordinate things, and yet they are facing dire straits in their efforts, despite their best intentions to the contrary.

The road to hell truly does seem to be paved with good intentions.

Despite the successful fund raising by their presumptive nominee, Barack Obama, the DNC is having problems when it comes to financing their upcoming convention. One can't help but notice the parallels between money mismanagement for the convention and for the nation. The problems the Democrats are facing in bringing the convention together range in size from very large (they are $6 million OVER budget for their renovation of the interior of the Denver Pepsi Center) to the ridiculously simple, such as attracting caterers for the Convention, due to budget problems and some very interesting food requirements that are sending prospective caterers walking away saying, in effect, "thanks for considering us, but hell no."

The convention is being organized by the Democratic National Committee, which is run by Howard Dean, with his chief of staff, the Rev. Leah D. Daughtry, leading the effort. Only in the last month has the Obama campaign been able to take over management of the convention planning with the candidate claiming the nomination, and his aides are increasingly frustrated, as the event nears, at organizers who they believe spent too freely, planned too slowly and underestimated actual costs.

The Obama campaign has dispatched 10 people to Denver to help “get a handle on the budget and make hard decisions” about what has to be done and how to move forward, said Bill Burton, a campaign spokesman.

With Democrats seeking to use the convention to move past the bitterness of their bruising primary fight, the gathering in Denver Aug. 25-28 is likely to draw intense interest as the Obama forces try to show a once-divided party rallying around the nominee. And their convention comes a week before the Minneapolis gathering of the Republicans, whose convention efforts have been much smoother.

The list of financial missteps in planning the convention under the leadership of "Screaming" Howard Dean include the rental of a number of top-end office spaces in Denver, rather than choosing less expensive spacing, and then determining that only half the space that was rented was actually needed, at a cost of $100,000 a month, and filling those offices with rented furniture and office equipment at a cost of $50,000 per month. On top of that, campaign organizers informed their potential donors that donations would not be tax deductible, causing many would-be donors to close their wallets and check books, instead of ensuring that the tax-deductible status was pending and donors would be informed when they could claim the deductions on their taxes.

The next in a long series of mis-steps is the convention's plan to be "green," a program that only three states have signed on to in expected participation. There is still controversy over how to handle protesters outside the Pepsi Center during the convention, with plans currently to locate them possibly next to the media tent (probably not the best strategic move, giving the media full and open access to all protestations).

Perhaps one of the more significant and telling of the list of faux pas made by the DNC in planning events is in regards to how to feed the mass influx of people planning to attend the convention. Given the complex and stringent requirements for the convention in regards to the food to be served, one has to wonder if planners weren't intending to "cater" to Nancy Pelosi.

And then there is the food: A 28-page contract requested by Denver organizers that caterers provide food in “at least three of the following five colors: red, green, yellow, blue/purple and white.” Garnishes could not be counted toward the colors. No fried foods would be allowed. Organic and locally grown foods were mandated, and each plate had to be 50 percent fruits and vegetables. As a result, caterers are shying away.

Despite all of this (and more), Denver DNC Committe spokeswoman Natalie Wyeth claims that the planning for the convention “is on track and we are confident that we are where we are supposed to be at this point in the game. We are exactly where we intended to be at.” The party intended to be $11 million short of the projected $40.6 million needed, a figure which does not include over-budget costs, at this point? And with no food vendors slated and under contract at this point? It would appear, given the sliding of Obama's support within the Democratic party and his string of flip-flops in recent weeks, a poorly planned and thrown together at the last minute with what's left available convention is exactly what the Democrat's do not need if they expect to gain steam for candidate Obama.

Once and Always, an American Fighting Man

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Neo-con Obama?

2008-07-04T18:56:00.000-05:00

The left is going crazy, and they're going crazy because their guy, suddenly, doesn't seem to be "their guy" any more. Given his recent changes of position on issues, Obama is coming across as a died in the wool Neo-con convert than a liberal.

Barack Obama has his base in an uproar. With his recent reversals on such key issues as FISA, campaign contributions, and the Supreme Court ruling on the Second Amendment, many on the left are, seemingly, suffering from the effects of political whiplash as they watch their candidate abandon them on the issues that the deem to be important. The most recent issue change, the war in Iraq and the withdrawal of U.S. forces, is sending the left into a near frenzy as they try to figure out what, exactly, is going on with Obama.

There is a very simple answer, and it's one that Hillary Clinton understood and tried to make work earlier than Obama; liberals don't bring in the numbers of voters that moderates do. And now Barack Obama, showing himself to be the politician rather than the statesman, has decided to give his image a makeover by attempting to come across as more appealing to a more moderate voting group.

We are not shocked when a candidate moves to the center for the general election. But Mr. Obama’s shifts are striking because he was the candidate who proposed to change the face of politics, the man of passionate convictions who did not play old political games.

There are still vital differences between Mr. Obama and Senator John McCain on issues like the war in Iraq, taxes, health care and Supreme Court nominations. We don’t want any “redefining” on these big questions. This country needs change it can believe in.

Despite evidence that the die-hards still realize the true nature of Obama, as the Marxist section of Obama's website continues to show, other left leaning supporters are not so sure. One observer says that the only question that would be raised where Obama to announce Dick Cheney as his running mate would be that of "what took you so long?" Left wing outlets have been up in arms about the seeming changes of stance, most notably Ariana Huffington (a usual), but Republicans are a bit more jaundiced of their view of the changes of the candidate of change.

Conservatives, meanwhile, led by John McCain's Republican campaign, say that the presumptive Democratic nominee's pivot shows that, for all his talk of offering a new kind of politics, he is really just another cynical politician who will say anything to get elected.

I suspect that all this worries Mr Obama not at all. The louder the Left complains, the deeper the satisfaction at Obama headquarters.

Can you remember a time in, say the past 100 years, when the American people have rejected a presidential candidate because they thought that he was insufficiently left-wing? As for conservatives, they should be cheering Mr Obama, not complaining.

Political observers should have expected this sort of softening on the issues of the hard left by Obama. Between now and November, Obama has to make himself as attractive to moderate candidates as possible without alienating his left wing base in the process. It's a tricky dance, and if the dance continues as it has this week, the left can begin to look for steel toed dance shoes. Their partner is going to continue to step on their toes on the dance floor.

The attempt at beginning a swooning of moderate voters has come across as too much, too fast, all at the same time, and with the sincerity of a porcupine attempting to court a balloon. If Obama isn't careful, the balloon is going to pop.

Perhaps it isn't rock star appeal, but rather a fatal charm behind a whiplash smile?

Once and Always, an American Fighting Man

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More Obama changes, but don't CALL them changes...

2008-07-03T18:34:00.005-05:00

It's an interesting thing to listen to a politician over time and keep a running track record of what they say on certain issues and how that position changes dependent upon their audience. In the case of Barack Obama, a full encyclopedic is forming.

All one has to do is to look on Barack Obama's campaign website to see what his plans are for our troops in Iraq. It was this stance that led to the defeat of Hillary Clinton and played a great part in his skyrocketing into position as the Democratic party front runner. The Obama plan calls for the return of our troops from Iraq within 16 months of his taking office as President.

Obama will immediately begin to remove our troops from Iraq. He will remove one to two combat brigades each month, and have all of our combat brigades out of Iraq within 16 months. Obama will make it clear that we will not build any permanent bases in Iraq. He will keep some troops in Iraq to protect our embassy and diplomats; if al Qaeda attempts to build a base within Iraq, he will keep troops in Iraq or elsewhere in the region to carry out targeted strikes on al Qaeda.

That statement is in black and white on his website as his promise that it will happen if he is elected President of the United States of America.

And in reading Obama's website, and listening to him speak, the American people must ask themselves once again, "Can Obama be trusted at his word? And if so, which word is that, exactly?" Especially in light of his latest comments regarding the war made today in Fargo, North Dakota.

“I’ve always said that the pace of withdrawal would be dictated by the safety and security of our troops and the need to maintain stability. That assessment has not changed,” he said. “And when I go to Iraq and have a chance to talk to some of the commanders on the ground, I’m sure I’ll have more information and will continue to refine my policies.”

Um, no, that is NOT what Obama has always said, as is shown by looking directly at his own website at the earlier quotation, which can be found under the heading of "Judgement You Can Trust."

Judgement you can trust.

Right...and the moon is made of green cheese, isn't it?

This can be added to a growing list of changes in position from Obama, including his changing position on the FISA issue as the possibility of a bribe lurks hidden under the surface, sort of, a little, okay pretty much in plain view for anyone who is looking at the issue beyond his other gaffes and distractions.

But according to Obama, they aren't changes at all.

“There appears to be no issue that Barack Obama is not willing to reverse himself on for the sake of political expedience,” said Alex Conant, a spokesman for the Republican National Committee. “Obama’s Iraq problem undermines the central premise of his candidacy and shows him to be a typical politician.”

You know, somewhere the has GOT to be a parody of a David Bowie song about this sort of thing...

UPDATE: John McCain welcomes Obama to "his position," while RNC members call Obama's Iraq plans a "guessing game." Actually, I think both are correct...

Once and Always, an American Fighting Man who isn't likely to be changing, any time soon...

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9 out of 10 Marxists Agree, Obama Beats the Other Brands...

2008-07-02T20:59:00.001-05:00

It's almost as if the flood gates have opened since the end of the Clinton-Obama fight for the Democratic top spot for the party. Flood gates that seem to be bringing one negative thing after another on a daily basis for Obama.

There is an old Chinese curse that goes, "may you live in interesting times." I don't know, maybe it's just because I see things from having lived my life as a political independent for so many years, but I've gotta say, I'm absolutely not amazed by this news, and if anyone is, they're either lying to themselves or in a great state of denial, OR completely ignorant of anything other than what they have been spoon fed by the dinosaur media.

It's an interesting thing in today's world. Information is literally at one's fingertips. All you have to do is sit down at a computer and go online and you can find pretty much anything you want to find out about anything. It's also another way of people networking with each other to discuss things of common interest, common causes, common beliefs, so forth and so on.

And on Barack Obama's official website, like minded Marxists, communists, and socialists are doing just that.

One popular community group on the Illinois senator's official MyObama website calls itself "Marxists/Socialists/Communists for Obama."

"This group is for self-proclaimed Marxists/Communists/Socialists for the election of Barack Obama to the Presidency. By no means is he a true Marxist, but under Karl Marx's writings we are to support the party with the best interests of the mobilization of the proletariat," states the groups charter.

"We support Barack Obama because he knows what is best for the people!" exclaims the group's online creed.

And on Obama's site, the declared Marxist, communist and socialist bloggers rant against such varied targets as Republicans, capitalism and the Fox News Channel. According to author profiles, the bloggers range from registered voters to underage high school students who state they are looking to foment revolt.

Ah yes, isn't that just what we want from a Presidential candidate? An inspiration for a Marxist revolution, as called for in another posting entitled "The Nature of the Proletariat." There are many such entries to be found along the same vein, all speaking of "The Revolution."

Just words?

There seems to be a drawing of this sort of commentary from other groups, as well, on Obama's site, with groups such as Atheists for Obama, Jedi Knights for Obama, Muslims for Obama, and even one mysterious sounding group called "The Secret" Believers for Obama.

I have a feeling that the "secret" that they're referring to has nothing to do with an antiperspirant that is strong enough for a man, but made for a woman.

And then there are the anti-Semitic postings, some of which are no longer found on the site as of this writing.

Yesterday WND reported a blog posting on Obama's official campaign site urged Americans to take action to secure the release of imprisoned terrorist fundraiser Sami Al-Arian, comparing the controversial former professor to Martin Luther King and Malcolm X.

The posting, which has been removed since publication of the story, is just a sampling of a large volume of racist, anti-Semitic and pro-Palestinian rhetoric published on the user-friendly MyObama community blog pages.

One recently removed posting claims Jews control the media. Another referred to Jews as "puppet masters" and "war criminals." Yet another posting, titled "The Israeli connection to 9/11," claimed Israeli intelligence was involved in the mega-attack and planted "false flags" to blame Arab countries.

Other MyObama posts have warned of "Judeofacists and their Neocon comrades" who "already destroyed America" and declare the "entire Congress should be overthrown by revolution for having sold America to the Israelis."

Is this the sort of "change" Obama means when he refers to it in his speeches? Is this the "hope" that he has for "unity" in the United States? Marxism?

To be fair, the Obama site does make the disclaimer that it can't regulate each and every posting that comes through on the site. But it's a question of character, and the inspiration that that character instills and brings forth from the voting public that has to be examined.

Marxism has been tried, and has failed, everywhere that it has been brought into play. The former Soviet Union is the best example of the failure of Marxist ideology, and yet there are a number of Obama supporters who would have that same sort of system installed in the United States.

They're even announcing that they want the revolution to come. And they're putting their support behind Barack Obama because they see him as one of them.

Just words?

Once and Always, an American Fighting Man

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Breaking - Body of Missing Vermont Girl Possibly Found

2008-07-02T18:08:00.002-05:00

After a week of searching and investigating, Vermont law enforcement officials believe that they have located the body of 12 year old Brooke Bennett.

Police have announced that the body, presumed to be the missing Bennett, was found on property near Crocker Road in Bethel, Vermont, near the home of Bennett's uncle Michael Jacques, who has been under investigation for the girls disappearance. The body was found around 4:45 pm EST, after which the girls parents were informed that police believed that they had found the missing girls remains. An autopsy has been scheduled to confirm the identity and cause of death.

It's been a week filled with rumors and speculations as the search for the missing girl was underway, including tales of an initiation into a sex ring, sexual abuse, rape, and now homicide. The rumors have been hard on Bennett's family during the week that the girl has been missing.

Missing poster signs hang in the windows of storefronts in downtown Randolph, where Brooke Bennett was last seen on Wednesday morning. On many, people have added the words, 'still missing.' That's because there have been rumors that the young girl was found dead yesterday in Sunset Lake in Brookfield.

"There was an issue yesterday in South Royalton that they were taking posters down," said Brooke's father, Jim Bennett. "She wasn't found dead. The rumors aren't true."

The rumor wasn't just spread by word of mouth. On the social networking Web site, Facebook, people were writing on a special "Find Brook(e) Bennett" page that the 12-year-old was dead.

Adding to the rumors are allegations of an affidavit filed in district court by a 14 year old girl who alleges that she was involved with 42 year old Michael Jacques, Bennett's uncle, in taking the girl to Jacques home for initiation into a child sex ring. The 14 year old alleges that she herself has had an ongoing sexual relationship with Jacques, and that part of Bennett's initiation into the ring was that she was to have sex with adult males.

The teenager said she understood that as part of the initiation, Brooke "would have sex with adult males," according to the affidavit in U.S. District Court.

She and Brooke watched television for a while before Jacques told her to leave and took Brooke upstairs, the teen said. The girl left the house with her boyfriend and did not see Brooke again, she said.

Bennett's stepfather, Ray Gagnon, 40, of San Antonio, Texas, was to appear in court on Wednesday on charges of destroying evidence in Bennett's disappearance. If convicted, he could face life in prison for obstructing justice.

More as this story develops.

Once and Always, an American Fighting Man

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Conservative Christians Back McCain

2008-07-02T16:51:00.002-05:00

It's been a difficult pill for them to swallow, but conservative Christian leaders have united together and decided to put their support behind John McCain.

The conservative right has long been considered a very important base for the Republican party. The advent of the McCain lead in the party has led to a hard decision for this important voting bloc. With a great number of the members of this branch of the party having put their support behind Mike Huckabee, many were highly disappointed at his withdrawal from the race, leaving a lack, to the conservative way of thinking, of a viable conservative front runner in the Republican race.

Given the option of either supporting McCain or withholding support in light of the presumed nomination of Barack Obama for the Democratic party, however, the conservative Christian leadership has met and decided to make their stand with McCain.

At a Tuesday meeting in Denver, around 100 leaders met, traveling in from around the country, to discuss and ultimately agree to support John McCain, despite their initial distrust of him as a candidate for the Presidency. With this backing finally achieved, McCain has achieved a much needed support for his bid for the White House, and has significantly improved his chances of winning come November.

"Collectively we feel that he will support and advance those moral values that we hold much greater than Obama, who in our view will decimate moral values," said Mat Staver, the chairman of Liberty Counsel, a legal advocacy group, who previously supported Mike Huckabee's candidacy.

"There are people who came through the primary with very mixed emotions of the candidate," Staver continued, noting that many in the group had been in Denver to attend a separate meeting for pastors. "This event was to put those aside."

The group included leaders like Phyllis Schlafly, the long-time leader of Eagle Forum; Steve Strang, the publisher of Charisma magazine; Phil Burress, a prominent Ohio marriage and anti-pornography activist; David Barton, the founder of WallBuilders and Donald Hodel, a former secretary of the Interior, who previously served on the board of Focus on the Family. Jim Dobson, the head of Focus and an outspoken critic of McCain, did not attend. The McCain campaign was also not directly represented at the meeting.

One attendee of the conference summed up the main reason for the decision to support McCain as being, "None of these people want to meet their maker knowing that they didn't do everything they could to keep Barack Obama from being president. You've got these two people running for president. One of them is going to become president. That's the perspective. That that's the whole discussion." The reason? Despite his claim of Christianity, the conservative Christian movement doesn't see eye - to - eye with Obama on certain key issues such as gay marriage and abortion, and find themselves, especially in recent weeks with McCain making his own stands against these issues, more in line with McCain.

Initially, there was much speculation that the religious right would sit out this election, leading to much speculation and prognosticating as to what their absence would mean both to the Republicans as well as to the Democrats. With the exit of Huckabee, a number of Christian leaders expressed their disillusionment with the Republican party. Faced with the prospect of an Obama Presidency, it seems that the disillusion was quickly replaced with resolve, a situation that bodes well for McCain.

Once and Always, an American Fighting Man

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Three Killed, Others Injured Before Terrorist Shot Dead by Israeli Soldier, Police

2008-07-02T15:24:00.001-05:00

A Palestinian bull dozer operator used his tractor as a weapon today, attacking pedestrians and vehicles in downtown Jerusalem, killing three people and injuring thirty, before being shot dead by a member of the IDF and an Israeli police officer. It's a scene that sounds like it could have come from a horror movie, but it happened on the crowded streets of downtown Jerusalem around noon Wednesday. A Palestinian resident of East Jerusalem was operating his bulldozer at a construction site, and suddenly turned his tractor into a weapon, attacking nearby pedestrians and vehicles, killing three women and injuring some thirty other people, overturning two transit buses in the process.

The driver, who reportedly had a criminal record and was the holder of an Israeli (blue) identification card, was shot dead by a SWAT officer near the old Shaare Zedek Medical Center. The terrorist was identified as 31-year-old Hossam Dawiath, a father of two from the village of Tzur Baher.

The terrorist continued on his killing spree, but a short while later a soldier and a SWAT officer jumped on top of the vehicle. The officer then shot the terrorist in the chest and leg and killed him.

The attack came with no warning; there was no indication that the man was going to go on the rampage today that took three lives. The dozer was from a nearby construction site for the Jerusalem Tram system.

I know that there are those who feel that Israel has badly mistreated the "Palestinians" in the period since the reformation of the nation of Israel. I know that there are those who believe that the nation of Israel has no right to exist in it's present incarnation simply due to the fact that Israel had not existed as a nation for nearly 2,000 years. Their claim is that Palestine has every right to oppose Israeli occupation of the region because they had secured the area and made it their own. But yet and still, there was never an established nation called Palestine. Since the diaspora of 136 AD, the region had gone without having an established governmental structure until the mass return of the Jews from around the world in the last century.

The Palestinian "problem" exists as much at the fault of the Arab nations as it does anyone else for not allowing their fellow Arabic people to do anything but live in refugee villages between nations, a position Palestinians found themselves in for the early on terrorist activities against the newly formed Israeli regime.

But Palestinian apologists won't hear any part of this, because they don't think the Israeli's should be back in their traditional homeland to begin with.

Let me take a moment to point out the hypocrisy in this mindset; I have heard the same people who will not allow for a the notion of a return for the Nation of Israel to their homeland turn around in the same conversation and demand that white Americans make apologies to blacks for slavery.

In any event, an attack upon an unarmed civilian populace is an act of cowardice, in my estimation. I sincerely hope that this isn't the beginning of a new trend of terrorist tactics to be employed by terrorist organizations.

Once and Always, an American Fighting Man

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Stepping in it with Both Feet: Wesley Clark and the Question Who is Smearing Whom?

2008-07-01T21:50:00.002-05:00

There is a long standing tradition of rivalry between the branches of military service. Each branch sees theirs as being superior to the others, and there is a lot of good natured ribbing back and forth in between. When it crosses into politics, though...

Anyone who has been in the U.S. Army among it's ground forces will tell you that aviators are looked upon as the most spoiled and pampered members of the military. While ground troops, especially infantry, armor, and engineers, slog it out in the mud and muck, through forests and jungles, in the desert heat or arctic cold, pilots generally get more cushy, comfortable rear area quarters for their time out of the cockpit.

But there is a price for such "luxury" digs for pilots. Combat pilots have some of the most intense, stressful training and duty of any members of the armed forces, special forces aside. Survival training is intense, with high-stress escape and evasion scenarios included in their training in order to prepare pilots for the worst case scenario; being shot down behind enemy lines.

That is exactly what happened to Senator John McCain in Vietnam, and an injured Lt. Commander McCain found himself in the hands of the enemy, and spent the next several years in the infamous Hanoi Hilton. And yet retired General Wesley Clark, a soldier with who made his early military career in the armored division and with political aspirations of his own, has taken it upon himself to belittle McCain's service record.

Gen. Wesley Clark, acting as a surrogate for Barack Obama’s campaign, invoked John McCain’s military service against him in one of the more personal attacks on the Republican presidential nominee this election cycle.

Clark said that McCain lacked the executive experience necessary to be president, calling him “untested and untried” on CBS’ “Face the Nation.” And in saying so, he took a few swipes at McCain’s military service.

After saying, "I certainly honor his service as a prisoner of war. He was a hero to me and to hundreds of thousands and millions of others in the armed forces, as a prisoner of war," he added that these experiences in no way qualify McCain to be president in his view:

“He has been a voice on the Senate Armed Services Committee. And he has traveled all over the world. But he hasn't held executive responsibility. That large squadron in the Navy that he commanded — that wasn't a wartime squadron,” Clark said.

“I don’t think getting in a fighter plane and getting shot down is a qualification to become president.”

And with that, the gloves came off. McCain supporters blasted Clark, with one McCain surrogate questioning Clark's own record as NATO Supreme Commander in Kosovo and his political ambitions, and McCain responding, when asked if he felt he was owed an apology, "I think it is up to Senator Obama now to not only repudiate him but to cut him loose.” This comment may serve to keep the Clark controversy alive and well for the coming days, dependent upon how Obama handles the situation as time progresses.

For Obama's part, the Senator from Illinois has denounced Clark's statements in an attempt to distance himself from the controversy stating “For those like John McCain who have endured physical torment in service to our country, no further proof of such sacrifice is necessary. And let me also add that no one should ever devalue that service, especially for the sake of a political campaign — and that goes for supporters on both sides.”

It is interesting to note that through all of this, the McCain camp, even prior to Clark's statements this weekend and his attempted clarification (i.e. backpedalling) of what he said, has yet to really pull out the mud in dealing with other candidates. McCain has taken the high road, not playing into the typical dirty tactics that typically comes with Presidential politics. In fact, McCain has been the first to denounce such tactics when they have been attempted on his behalf.

Obama, on the other hand, has already set up his own site to deal with the rumors and innuendo surrounding him personally, possibly in anticipation of the "dirty deeds" of the Republican campaign. The site has already dealt with such issues as his nationality and his religious views, issues that have plagued the Obama campaign from his rock star rise to the top of the Democratic ticket. But what of Obama's own campaign strategies as the election cycle unfolds? The campaign against fellow Democrat Hillary Clinton went into the mud on both sides, a place McCain seems stubbornly determined to stay away from. With Clark's comments regarding McCain, and Obama's seemingly less than whole-hearted denouncement of them, one has to ask, who is truly smearing whom in this campaign?

Once and Always, an American Fighting Man

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He's Man's Best Friend, Unless...

2008-07-01T18:47:00.002-05:00

It's been an age old practice for man to employ the use of dogs as co-workers for certain tasks. Military and law enforcement agencies rely on K-9 units for special needs on a daily basis, to protect and serve. Why, suddenly, are there limits for that?

Over nearly two decades of combined military and emergency services, I've come in contact with a number of working dogs and their handlers, and always have found myself walking away highly impressed. It isn't every dog that can make it into the training program to be a working dog for either the military or emergency services. The dogs are always very well cared for, well behaved, and highly intelligent animals. And I have never seen, among this group, a dirty working dog, unless they had come in from sort of field operation.

Yet and still, according to Gar Swafford's article, Muslims Hate Dogs?, Muslims consider these animals as "spiritually unclean." Does this mean that they believe horses and camels are more spiritually clean than dogs? It's an interesting situation, but it's creating certain problems for K-9 units in the British law enforcement community.

POLICE sniffer dogs trained to spot terrorists at railway stations may no longer come into contact with Muslim passengers – after complaints that it is against the suspects’ religion.

A report for the Transport Department has raised the prospect that the animals should only touch passengers’ luggage because it is considered “more acceptable”.

In the Muslim faith, dogs are deemed to be spiritually “unclean”. But banning them from touching passengers would severely restrict their ability to do their job.

The report follows trials of station security measures in the wake of the 2005 London suicide bomb attacks. In one trial, some female Muslims said the use of a body scanner was also unacceptable because it was tantamount to being forced to strip.

If this is going to be the case, and law enforcement is going to have to start limiting their security methodology in order to be "politically correct" in dealing with the Muslim community, to what lengths will this ultimately go? If dogs can not be used to sniff bombs because they are "spiritually unclean," and scanning machines can't be used because it is the equivalent of "strip searching," what comes next? An insistence that any questioning of suspects be conducted only by a Muslim interrogator?

Law enforcement already has a hard enough job as it is today, given the number of laws limiting how they can conduct themselves when apprehending a suspect. Adding further limitations upon them, such as limiting the usage of dogs trained to sniff out explosive devices, only creates a situation in which terrorists have a ready made loophole built into the system for them to utilize to continue conducting a campaign of death and destruction.

Fortunately, British law enforcement officers are savvy enough to realize this, and have announced that they will continue to utilize the K-9 patrols, and that the handlers will be "culturally sensitive."

Once and Always, a Dog Loving American Fighting Man

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The Potential Fall of Obama's South

2008-07-01T14:20:00.001-05:00

There is a lull that has hit in the political battlefield, that time between the end of the primary season and the end of the convention season. The lead candidates take the time to refocus on funding and winning votes, in some cases, votes based in myth.

During this lull period, Obama's campaign handlers are making the classic mistake made by so many Democratic campaigns in recent history; over-estimating the Southern black vote.

In the Post-Civil War South, the Democratic party was a strong entity, unified and making a firm block against the Republicans because of Abraham Lincoln. While it is true that there are a great number of those old-school yellow dog Democrats around (a term given because the saying goes "I'll vote for a yellow dog on the street before I'll vote for a damned Yankee Republican), the mindset of the South has changed, drastically, in the past few decades. Today, there are more "red states" than "blue" in the south.

Yet and still, there are myths that are still held about the Southern vote that even more experienced politicians fall prey to. A candidate with no experience is what we call "easy pickin's" for laying a trap by using these very myths against his campaign.

Two pervasive and persistent myths about racial voting in the modern South are behind the notion that Mr. Obama might win in places like Georgia, North Carolina and Mississippi.

The first myth is that African-American turnout in the South is low. Black voters are actually well represented in the Southern electorate: In the 11 states of the former Confederacy, African-Americans were 17.9 percent of the age-eligible population and 17.9 percent of actual voters in 2004, analysis of Census Bureau data shows.

And when socioeconomic status is held constant, black voters go to the polls at higher rates than white voters in the South. In other words, a 40-year-old African-American plumber making $60,000 a year is, on average, more likely to vote than a white man of similar background.

The second myth is that Democratic presidential candidates fare better in Southern states that have large numbers of African-Americans. In fact, the reverse is true, because the more blacks there are in a Southern state, the more likely the white voters are to vote Republican.

Democrats counted heavily on Mississippi in the 2004 election cycle, with Kerry losing to Bush by 20 full points, and Georgia and North Carolina by only slightly less leads. A look at the map here shows the breakdown, by state, of those states carrying Bush, and those carrying Kerry.

Virginia is perhaps the only true hope Obama has for the former Confederate states.

The demographic makeup of the electorate in Virginia is unlike that of any other state in the South. The black population in Virginia is, as a percentage, among the lowest in the region. And during the last two decades, the state has also experienced a huge influx of upscale non-Southerners, who have taken over the Washington suburbs of northern Virginia. (Florida is a perennial target for similar reasons. With a relatively small black population, a big Hispanic voting bloc and a large contingent of relocated retirees from the North, it is the least Southern of the Southern states.)

This doesn't apply to the rest of the South, however. A large part of the stratagem employed in Southern campaigning by Democrats relies heavily on the 1965 Voting Rights Act, which led to a large number of blacks to register to vote in the South, but subsequently led to a marked increase in the number of white voters registering and voting as Republicans. In other words, an exponential increase in black voter turnout in the majority of Southern states can be expected, historically, to be met by a counterbalance of an exponential increase in white voters in the same areas.

Along with this, Obama is having problems garnering white Democrat votes in other states, such as Ohio and South Dakota.

Since the end of the Civil War, there has been a saying among Southerners: "The South will rise again." It doesn't appear, however, to be likely that it will be rising for Obama.

Once and Always, an American Fighting Man

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Is the DNC afraid of it's own base? The Denver Wall is going up.

2008-06-30T17:55:00.001-05:00

In the movie "V for Vendetta," the notion that people should not fear their government; government should fear the people is a prevailing theme. Is it possible that the Democratic National Party has reached this level of fear of the people?

As mentioned in previous articles (here and here), there is a huge fracturing going on in the Democratic party, at the base level. Despite all attempts to put on a good face with the media and go on as if there are no problems, the DNC seems to have no illusions, privately, that there is brewing trouble.

And they are making efforts to ensure that that trouble doesn't interfere with the National Convention when it meets in Denver, making preparations to keep protesters as far away from the center of activities as possible.

The fence around the public demonstration zone outside the Democratic National Convention will be chicken wire or chain link, authorities revealed in U.S. District Court today.

That may allow protestors to be seen and heard by delegates going in and out of the Pepsi Center during the convention.

But the American Civil Liberties Union and several advocacy groups have filed an amended complaint to their lawsuit against the U.S. Secret Service and the city and county of Denver that says protestors and demonstrators may have their First Amendment rights violated by security restrictions.

It is perhaps telling that such precautions are being made for the DNC. Given the past two years of a Congress with a record of little to no accomplishment, the rift between Clinton and Obama supporters, and the continued tirades by anti-war protesters (despite the successes made in Iraq in the past year, to the point that the media no longer reports from Iraq), Party leaders have good reason to be concerned over an irate constituency. And with the rise of the Denver Wall, one could speculate further about the views of the DNC not only on the Second Amendment, but upon the First Amendment, as well.

Wasn't there another wall, once upon a time a few years back, that divided a city east from west?

Just a thought.

Once and Always, an American Fighting Man

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THIS is Unity?

2008-06-29T18:05:00.004-05:00

The debate on who will be the nominee for the Democratic party is over. Sound familiar? As said with another "hot" issue, anytime someone tells you something is over, bunker down. The real fighting hasn't even started yet.

It's one of the most tenuous, shakey alliances in recent political history. Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton. Two bitter rivals for the same position coming together for the sake of party unity. It's a coalition of great idea and sound concept, built on a foundation resting in quicksand.

Why?

Because a large and growing number of Hillary supporters are walking away in disgust at being forced with the prospect of Barack Obama as the nominee for the Democratic party in the November elections.

Despite the media events, the public rallies, and photo op after photo op showing a smiling Clinton and Obama greeting the assembled, things are far from well with the Democratic party base. The party is in trouble. And it's in denial about the trouble that it faces.

Unity was spared the banality of unanimity.

Carmella Lewis, with her Hillary T-shirt and Hillary placard, came all the way from Denver to make sure there would be plenty of ambiguity, duality and ferocity in Unity.

Just as Hillary was testing out the unfamiliar familiarity “Barack and me” Friday and talking about “his grace and his grit,” Carmella began loudly booing and waving her sign.

“We want Hillary!” screamed the 57-year-old retired ad saleswoman and Clinton delegate.

“It’s over, lady!” yelled some Obama supporters a few yards away.

But is it really over, at that?

Dissension in the ranks begins with the formation of such grass roots movements as PUMA and the determination of existing groups of Clinton supporters such as HireHeels.com, working as a loose confederation, called Just Say No Deal, representing a large and growing number of women voters who state that they will do whatever it takes to ensure that Barack Obama is not elected to office. These women, who supported and believed in Clinton, backing her to the end and beyond, are not ready to simply "let go" after seeing their candidate leading in popular votes but losing to a slim margin of delegates.

In actuality, I can understand their reasoning, as can, perhaps, other southerners observing the situation, better than voters in other parts of the country, for reasons of our own and a shared concept of another dream that was taken away from it's supporters.

In response mainly to PUMA, the forerunner organization spearheading the Hillary backers in self-imposed exile, Governor Ed Rendell has formed a PRO-Unity group that goes by, interestingly enough, HOUND (Hillary-Obama-United-Not-Divided). The purpose behind Rendell's group is to ensure that there IS party unity and harmony, and to work with patience and understanding to bring the PUMA women back into the fold of the Democratic Parties.

So, a group named for a type of dog is going to try to herd like wayward sheep another group named for a mountain lion...

Does anyone else see the potential for some badly chewed up hounds in this equation?

They should, because a recent press release by PUMA has declared that Rendell and his HOUNDs "are missing the point."

Online, in Washington D.C. and Nationwide - The Just Say No Deal Coalition issues the following response to Governor Ed Rendell’s counter movement HOUND (Hillary-Obama-United-Not-Divided). While we thank the governor for recognizing us as a fluid, viral, viable and ever growing movement— we PUMAs and members of the Just Say No Deal Coalition want to respectfully point out that Governor Rendell and his crew are missing the point.

In HOUND’s credo Governor Rendell states, "PUMA advocated that Hillary Clinton supporters do not vote for Barack Obama just for the sake of party unity…We believe Sen. Clinton supporters should vote for Sen. Obama because, as Hillary herself said so forcefully and poignantly in her great speech a few Saturdays ago the best way to achieve the changes she has fought so hard to bring to America, and on which she based her campaign, is to support Sen. Obama…"

The philosophy on which the Just Say No Deal Coalition was founded is plainly stated as this:
We, as millions of disaffected voters or PUMAs have banded together to form a Coalition of the unwilling. We fervently believe in Country Before Party. If political parties won't uphold core democratic principles, who will? If the voters don't hold the parties accountable, who will?
The answer, "We (PUMAs) will at all costs!"

For the veterinarians in the audience, remember, these are actually people we are talking about here. But I'm sure that local hospital emergency rooms will accept the volunteer service of your skills as trained medical professionals once the cat and dog fight begins in earnest...

In the meantime, there are other segments of the Democratic party, or individuals just in general, who don't care to see the Rock Star candidate elected to office. At least 60 Orlando municipal vehicles have suffered vandalism in recent months, with most of the graffiti messages painted onto the city vehicles, bearing such messages as "Obama smokes crack."

Unacceptable behavior regardless of one's candidate of choice.

Currently, there is no clear solution to resolve the fracture in the Democratic party. Hillary's supporters remain steadfast in their insistence that the nomination was basically stolen from her and that she, and husband Bill, were treated badly by the media, the Obama campaign, the Democratic Party as a whole.

In reading over the PUMA rebuttal to Rendell's Hounds, in which they basically tell him WHY that dog won't hunt as the party continues to implode, some are whispering in other corners, observing the situation from the outside, two words: Operation Chaos. It does make one wonder...

Once and Always, an American Fighting Man

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I Am Spartacus Hussein. Yes, Spartacus Hussein, That's Correct

2008-06-29T15:30:00.001-05:00

In a time of growing controversy over the nationality and religious beliefs of one Presidential candidate, there is a growing support movement that is showing a new trend for Obama supporters; the inclusion of the name Hussein into their names.

All apologies to the Monty Python troupe for the title. Or maybe the Python crew would appreciate it, at that.

Romeo said of Juliet, "Would a rose by any other name would smell as sweet." One has to wonder if there would have been less of a feud between the families in the Bard's play if the main characters had been Romeo Hussein Montague and Juliet Hussein Capulet. Shakespeare could have even been the first to write "Can just get along?" asked by the insertion of a character named Rodney Hussein Capulet. Or Montague. A rose by another name, after all.

There is a growing trend of late among people supporting Barack Obama to include his middle name as their own middle names. Some parents are making the discovery by finding their children's online identities at such social sites as Facebook, and are shocked to discover that the children they named at birth have adopted the Hussein moniker as well.

The result is a group of unlikely-sounding Husseins: Jewish and Catholic, Hispanic and Asian and Italian-American, from Jaime Hussein Alvarez of Washington, D.C., to Kelly Hussein Crowley of Norman, Okla., to Sarah Beth Hussein Frumkin of Chicago.

Jeff Strabone of Brooklyn now signs credit card receipts with his newly assumed middle name, while Dan O’Maley of Washington, D.C., jiggered his e-mail account so his name would appear as “D. Hussein O’Maley.” Alex Enderle made the switch online along with several other Obama volunteers from Columbus, Ohio, and now friends greet him that way in person, too.

Some supporters give their reason for this adaptation as being their outrage that some Republicans use Barack Hussein Obama's middle name as if it were what one dailykos contributor describes as "a cuss word" in an article entitled "We Are All Hussein" on his own blogsite.

Personally, I don't think Republican's would have latched onto it so quickly if the candidate formerly known as Barry H. Obama hadn't made such an issue of it himself early on in the campaign, changing his position about the use of his middle name along the way, a trend, it seems, that Obama has taken up on several other issues, as well.

One can't help but be reminded of the controversy over Hillary Clinton's maiden name being used during the 90's. Yes, I know envisioning Hillary Rodham Clinton as a maiden is a stretch, but we're talking names for a moment here. During the 90's, Hillary Clinton's usage of her maiden name was "much ado about nothing," but regardless, it led to a great deal of air time for the talking heads of the dinosaur media, to the point that Hollywood made light of it as well, by adding the name "Rodham" to the names of the members of the cast of Hot Shots Part Deux.

It just goes to show, there is nothing new under the sun.

And for the record.

I, however, am not Spartacus, neither am I Hussein.

John Cleese on the other hand...

Once and Always, an American Fighting Man

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Bill Clinton - "Obama can kiss my ass"

2008-06-28T20:33:00.002-05:00

Entering the final leg of this years election cycle, presumptive Democratic nominee Barack Obama is finding that the water is getting a little hotter in some places, and where Bill Clinton is concerned, it's downright frosty.

It has to be a hard thing for a candidate to beat another candidate by a narrow margin in a contest that a large percentage of the public is not pleased with the outcome. Presidential politics is the hardest beast of all things political in the U.S. The normal thing for a Presidential candidate is that he receives the endorsement of all other living former Presidents of his party.

That's the NORMAL thing.

This campaign season has been anything but normal, given the demographics of the Democratic party's offerings as candidates for the Oval Office. Barack Obama stands to, possibly, gain the position and become the nation's first true black President, a position that former President Bill Clinton had claimed for himself during his tenure in office.

Yes, I know, Bill Clinton is a white boy from Arkansas, but if he wants to say he's black, don't make fun of him. It just makes him worse.

The main thing that Obama faces, however, in regards to Bill Clinton, is that the candidate that he defeated in running for the Democratic spot is Bill's wife. And now he needs Bill's support as he goes into the general elections. And according to Bill, it's going to take a lot for Obama to get that support.

A whole lot.

The Telegraph has learned that the former president's rage is still so great that even loyal allies are shocked by his patronising attitude to Mr Obama, and believe that he risks damaging his own reputation by his intransigence.

A senior Democrat who worked for Mr Clinton has revealed that he recently told friends Mr Obama could "kiss my ass" in return for his support.

Ouch.

And frankly, THAT is a mental image I could have done without.

Another source close to Bill said that the former President has been keeping his distance from Obama "because he still does not believe Mr Obama can win the election." This despite the announcement of a Clinton aide last week (not from Bill Clinton himself, who was out of the country at the time) that the former President would do whatever he could to support the Obama campaign on the way into the November elections. Clinton was also absent from last weeks party unity rally, attended by wife Hillary and candidate Obama, choosing to instead attend the London celebration of the birthday of Nelson Mandela.

And then there are the Hillary supporters who absolutely will not support Obama as Democratic nominee come November.

Perhaps more telling of the mindset of Bill Clinton's frosty approach to Obama is the way Clinton feels he and wife Hillary were treated during her campaign against the Senator from Illinois. Harsh words were spoken by the Obama campaign, and there was a lot of mud-slinging done by both sides until Senator Clinton "suspended" her campaign "for the sake of party unity." It is because of this treatment that Bill still holds ill-will for Obama.

The former president and Obama have not talked, and, by all accounts, the man of the Clinton household remains hurt and resentful. Associates provide a variety of explanations for the Bill Clinton dilemma, none of them mutually exclusive.

Some say Bill Clinton not only wants Obama to reach out to him, but to also promise to lift the cloud of alleged racism -- an accusation that continues to eat at the man once dubbed the nation's "first black president." Clinton, these folks suggest, wants Obama to publicly exonerate him of the charge that he played the race card in the primaries.

Beyond that, some associates say, Bill Clinton wants Obama to reach out to him as a mentor, a guide who can lead Obama through the labyrinth of a tough presidential election. "Bill wants to be honored, to return to the role of Democratic elder statesman, and get rid of this image of him as a pol willing to do anything to win," said one associate.

Bill Clinton as a mentor for Obama. Personally, I'm not sure how that would work out for either of them; Obama already seems to have a way of his own in swooning the ladies and coming across with a rock star image, and he's already thrown his last mentor, Jeremiah Wright, under the bus. Perhaps Clinton should reconsider that aspect of his wish list for what he wants and expects from Obama.

Maybe Obama could start the fence mending process by calling Bill "sweetie..."

Once and Always, an American Fighting Man

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NRA Begins Legal Assaults against Anti-Gun Municipalities

2008-06-28T18:42:00.004-05:00

Hat Tip to Ed Morrissey at Hot Air.

With the passage of the United States Supreme Court's ruling on the Second Amendment to the Constitution, the National Rifle Association has taken their cue from Shakespeare; "Cry havoc, and let slip the dogs of war!"

As mentioned at the announcement of the landmark ruling by the Supreme Court, the NRA has set it's sights on the anti-handgun policies of Chicago.

But Chicago isn't the first stop for the NRA, nor the only stop, as they begin a campaign of legal battles to have restrictive anti-gun laws overturned and erased around the country. The city of San Fransisco finds itself "under the gun" by the NRA and others over their ban of handguns in public housing, on the basis that the ban is unconstitutional and relegates those who live in public housing to a separate class of citizenship than the rest of the citizens of the city. San Fransisco, and other cities that are suddenly finding themselves facing lawsuits, are digging in and preparing to fight, despite the Supreme Court ruling this week.

But officials here and in other cities where gun restrictions are now being challenged took a defiant stance. As the lawsuit was being filed, San Francisco officials held a news conference in the city’s hardscrabble Western Addition neighborhood to announce a series of antigun measures. Mayor Gavin Newsom said the timing was coincidental, but apt.

Mr. Newsom, who said he suspected that the rifle association might also sue to overturn a local ordinance requiring trigger-locks, challenged N.R.A. officials to come to his city and spend time in public housing developments, which he said were often overrun with weapons.

“We don’t happen to believe that it’s good public policy in public housing sites where guns and violence is the highest in our city and, for that matter, respectively, in cities across America, to say ‘Hey, come on in; let’s everybody get guns,’ ” said Mr. Newsom, a Democrat.

Obviously Mayor Newson has never heard of the town of Kennesaw, Georgia.

The San Fransisco suit, interestingly enough for a city with a reputation of ensuring the rights of it's gay citizenry, was filed by a gay man living in public housing after being denied a handgun permit for the purchase of a firearm to use in self defense from potential hate crimes. According to NRA chief executive Wayne LaPierre, denial of a certain population of the city based upon where they live, stating “It can’t be walled off by the political class. It would be the equivalent of saying you can have a right to free speech, but you can’t have a right to free speech in public housing.” The suit was filed against San Fransisco within hours of the release of the Supreme Court decision. San Fransisco virtually banned handguns within the city in 1982 when it passed ordinances in which no new handgun permits would be issued.

Officials in Chicago and New York City, two more cities that have restrictive gun laws, remain convinced that the high court ruling won't have any immediate effect on existing gun laws. Georgia's Lt. Gov. Casey Cagle, on the other hand, has asked a Republican state senator to form an exploratory committee to determine which of Georgia's state statutes are in violation of the Supreme Court ruling. Cagle, a Republican as well, is a gun ownership advocate.

A city of about 725,000, San Francisco has 12,000 residents living in public housing, all of whom are required to sign a lease that forbids a broad variety of weapons, including pistols, revolvers, rifles, shotguns, automatic rifles, BB guns, as well as nunchucks, brass knuckles and stun guns. This blanket ban was begun in 2006, and the penalty for violation of the lease is eviction.

In the case filed on Friday, an anonymous gay man said that stipulation had deprived him of “any effective means of self-defense.

In 2005, a city-wide ban was enacted, and overturned by the California State Supreme Court. Last year alone, there were 42 gun related deaths in San Fransisco, and residents of the city's public housing neighborhoods state that they hear gunshots on a daily basis, despite the ban on weapons in public housing.

When guns are outlawed, only outlaws will have guns.

Once and Always, an American Fighting Man

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"Hell Hath No Fury" on a National Level

2008-06-27T19:48:00.002-05:00

Hillary Clinton has suspended her campaign and pledged her support for likely Democratic nominee Barack Obama. Nothing, however, says her grass roots supporters have to go along with her...

William Congreve once wrote "hell hath no fury like a woman scorned. In light of recent events transpiring within the Democratic party, this quote from the play The Mourning Bride may very well be shown to be the classic understatement as the United States approaches the November general elections and the time comes to elect our next President.

Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama have announced that they will work together for party unity. After a bitter campaign, and a perceived mistreatment of Clinton by the media and the Democratic Party in general, Clinton supporters are less than thrilled to be faced with the option of candidate Obama. Some are taking their frustration and turning into activity, working at a grass roots level to work against the expected nominee for the Democratic candidacy.

Diane Mantouvalos is an anger-shaker. The night before Clinton announced the suspension of her campaign, Mantouvalos was at home in Miami checking posts on her blog and sensing a mood that went beyond disillusionment, beyond sadness, beyond "I'm upset and bummed out." As co-creator of Hireheels.com, which describes itself as "a forum of power chics for Hillary," Mantouvalos hangs out on the sassy edge of the blogosphere. Feeling more empowered than embittered, the public relations consultant wondered: "Wouldn't it be great if we could thread all of these disparate factions and form one coalition?" A brassy coalition of rebels.

On June 8, the evening after Clinton conceded the Democratic presidential contest to Barack Obama, Mantouvalos organized a conference call with some 40 bloggers, political activists and other hardened loyalists of the New York senator's, in what became "a jam session of very intense opinion" -- about the party, its leadership, its presumptive nominee, the media. Five hours later, Mantouvalos, age "north of 35," had built a new Web site, JustSayNoDeal.com, which has become a clearinghouse for the renegade forces that are now confounding Democratic Party officials and Obama campaign operatives.

While polls would suggest that most of Clinton's supporters, including a large majority of her women supporters, have now thrown their support behind Obama, perhaps doing a little more digging is in order to find the full story on how many women are displeased to be left with the prospect of Obama as the party nominee.

Another of the "rebels" who are going on the attack against Obama from the Clinton supporters is Darragh Murphy, founder of P.U.M.A, an acronym for People United Means Action. Murphy, in an interview with NECN.com, outlines her reasons for founding P.U.M.A. Receiving a whopping 35,000 hits in the first few hours of the site's existence, Murphy explains in the interview, "The immediate, ultimate goal, is to let the party/leadership know that millions and millions of us are not going to support the candidate. That we believe the nomination process was flawed beyond belief -- that it was unfair and biased."

With the loss of delegates from Michigan and Florida and that Clinton held a larger number of popular votes than Obama, it isn't hard to see why so many female Clinton supporters are up in arms against the party.

Things aren't going so well behind the scenes for funders of Clinton and Obama, either, now that the two camps have intermingled for the sake of party unity. Insiders report that there are hard feelings between the two thrust together factions; there is animosity, and yes, one of Obama's favorite emotions to bring up, bitterness.

I know this is supposed to be a marriage, but behind the scenes, it feels more like a divorce.

There's a lot of sadness and hurt between the Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton camps, with both sides fighting over money and loyalty.

Before the unity fest to began here in Unity, N.H., I was on the phone with some top Clinton supporters who attended a big gathering of major donors in Washington, D.C. last night. It was hosted by Clinton's team, and to many in attendance, it didn't feel like a reunion. It felt like the arrival of a repo man.

"Hillary was sad, even pitiful I have to say," said one of her top donors.

"It was like, this guy is coming to take my family away."

No uncomfortable public event could be complete without the inevitable loss for words, given at this event by Clinton campaign chairman Terry McAuliffe, who, with a pregnant pause, announced Clinton as "the next...speaker!" Some speculate that he was struggling not to use the word "president."

What does all of this spell for the Obama campaign at this point? The Travis Tritt song, "I Smell T-R-O-U-B-L-E" comes to mind. Obama is now dealing with a combined campaign involving members that he knows, or should know, if arrogance has not taken control of him at this point for being the presumptive nominee at this level of (in)experience in the arena of national politics, were not supportive of him but rather of Senator Clinton and are working for his campaign now for the sake of party unity, a disenfranchisement of his "rock star" status by members of the media, who have stopped portraying him as the Second Coming, and a growing number of angry women voters who are fighting against him, could things be going more wrong at this critical point in his bid for President?

Wellll, yes, actually, they could. In an op-ed for McClatchy's Washinton Bureau, Margaret Talev poses the question "Is Obama turning out to be just another politician?"

He abandoned public campaign financing after years of championing it. Backed a compromise on wiretap legislation that gives telecom companies retroactive immunity for helping the government conduct spying without warrants. Dumped his controversial pastor of two decades — then his church — after saying he could no more abandon the pastor than abandon his own grandmother.

He said he wouldn't wear the U.S. flag pin because it had become a substitute for true patriotism, then started wearing it. Ramped up his courtship of unions. Shifted from a pledge to protect working-class families from tax increases to a far more expensive promise not to raise taxes on families that earn up to $250,000 a year. Turned to longtime D.C. Democratic wise men to run his vice-presidential search and staff his foreign-policy brain trust.

Presidential candidates often tack toward the center after securing their party's nominations. But all this tactical repositioning by Obama suggests that he's a more complex, pragmatic and arguably more opportunistic politician than the fresh face of "change we can believe in" that he presented during the primary season.

And as we have seen earlier this week, he has given a continual snub to the American Muslim community backpedaled on the Second Amendment, and given the go ahead for a new television network consisting of nothing but reality shows. Um, strike that last one. The point is, Obama, now the front runner for the Democrats, is in a key position to make positive, real changes, rather than the numerous and tremendous flubs and fumbles he seems to be making as his campaign enters the last, and most difficult, leg of the election cycle.

No wonder John McCain prefers to be the underdog. He isn't having to deal with the fury of a woman scorned, multiplied exponentially across the country.

I'm just glad it ain't me for a change...

Once and Always, an American Fighting Man

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Obama, McCain, and the Second Amendment of the Constitution of the United States

2008-06-26T20:38:00.003-05:00

For at least the past 60 years, there has been a war being waged in the United States. Not with guns, but about them, and the citizen's rights to bear them. Today, the Supreme Court ruled on the side of the Constitution, and the candidates responded.

The Second Amendment to the United States Constitution:

A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.

Those are the words, in their exact form, that have been in such hot debate for the past several decades. Those are the words that have been so divisive to some, and have created such anger and hatred between the pro-gun and anti-gun camps, and yet so many people do not know the words OF the Second Amendment which they stand either for or against.

"Shall not be infringed." To quote Barack Obama, "just words?"

Our founding fathers seemed not to think so, hence the inclusion of the Second Amendment, including the wording "shall not be infringed."

Historically, the Supreme Court has stayed pretty much away from Second Amendment cases, allowing lower court rulings to take precedence and establish or abolish laws in the regions which they represent. Today, however, in the case of District of Columbia v. Heller, the Court, in a 5-4 decision, ruled that the Washington, DC, ban on handguns was unconstitutional.

1. The Second Amendment protects an individual right to possess a firearm unconnected with service in a militia, and to use that arm for traditionally lawful purposes, such as self-defense within the home. Pp. 2–53.

(a) The Amendment’s prefatory clause announces a purpose, but does not limit or expand the scope of the second part, the operative clause. The operative clause’s text and history demonstrate that it connotes an individual right to keep and bear arms. Pp. 2–22.

(b) The prefatory clause comports with the Court’s interpretation of the operative clause. The “militia” comprised all males physically capable of acting in concert for the common defense. The Antifederalists feared that the Federal Government would disarm the people in order to disable this citizens’ militia, enabling a politicized standing army or a select militia to rule. The response was to deny Congress power to abridge the ancient right of individuals to keep and bear arms, so that the ideal of a citizens’ militia would be preserved. Pp. 22–28

There has been, of course, the expected amount of jubilation from gun advocates and the anticipated weeping and gnashing of teeth of the anti-gun left. The National Rifle Association has wasted no time in gearing up to challenge, next, a similar gun ban in the city of Chicago. Other pro-Second Amendment sponsors have responded as well, including one entrepeneuring venture that offers a free handgun with the completion of a training course.

But what of the candidates, in this Presidential election year? What are the responses to this landmark decision that the banning of handguns is a violation of the Constitutional rights of the individual? The answer, of course, will depend upon which candidate you ask.

Senator John McCain of Arizona, an open-carry state, has called the decision a "landmark victory for Second Amendment freedom," and has accused opponent Senator Barack Obama of reversing himself, once again, on the issue of Second Amendment rights.

“All I can say it’s one in a long, in a long series in reversals of positions,” McCain said. “In a few days he has gone from opposing nuclear power, to not a proponent, to willing to explore. I fully anticipate -- whether it be on his pledge on public financing or his position on the Second Amendment, or any other issues -- he is changing his positions. So it's not surprising."

McCain's remarks were made at a local town-hall meeting at Xavier University. Noticeably absent was Barack Obama, whom McCain had invited to attend for debate. McCain also made another jab at Obama in a writen statement, in which he said, "Unlike the elitist view that believes Americans cling to guns out of bitterness, today's ruling recognizes that gun ownership is a fundamental right -- sacred, just as the right to free speech and assembly." Former Presidential candidate cum McCain supporter Senator Sam Brownback, in a conference call with reporters, put forward his thoughts, as well, stating, "This is either an incredible flip flop or incredible inexperience on this issue. Anybody whose been around politics in Washington D.C. knows the center of this gun ban debate is whether this is an individual right.”

So why are the Republicans accusing Obama of flip-flopping again? First, an examination of his response to today's ruling is in order.

I have always believed that the Second Amendment protects the right of individuals to bear arms, but I also identify with the need for crime-ravaged communities to save their children from the violence that plagues our streets through common-sense, effective safety measures. The Supreme Court has now endorsed that view, and while it ruled that the D.C. gun ban went too far, Justice Scalia himself acknowledged that this right is not absolute and subject to reasonable regulations enacted by local communities to keep their streets safe. Today’s ruling, the first clear statement on this issue in 127 years, will provide much-needed guidance to local jurisdictions across the country.

As President, I will uphold the constitutional rights of law-abiding gun-owners, hunters, and sportsmen. I know that what works in Chicago may not work in Cheyenne. We can work together to enact common-sense laws, like closing the gun show loophole and improving our background check system, so that guns do not fall into the hands of terrorists or criminals. Today's decision reinforces that if we act responsibly, we can both protect the constitutional right to bear arms and keep our communities and our children safe.

On the surface, it sounds great, and looks as if the Senator and Presidential hopeful has given his full support all along to the Second Amendment and the rights of gun owners. But the Republican's are quick to point out, on their website, Obama's previous statements regarding gun ownership, statements which clearly show that Obama, in his own words, is opposed to the private ownership of firearms. There is even a spot for a video from YouTube that is, mysteriously, no longer available for viewing, labeled as "mistatement" on the YouTube site. However, one doesn't have to go back very far to recall Obama's gaffe in Pennsylvania in which he called small town Americans "bitter," stating that they "cling" to religion and guns.

Obama's record is indicative of the inverse of the opinion of the American people, according to a Gallup poll released today showing that of those polled, 73% of the American people believe that it is their Constitutionally guaranteed right to own firearms.

A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.

Just words?

Perhaps it would behoove Senator Obama, who feels that the gun control laws of his home city of Chicago are so effective, to examine more closely a town hailed by gun ownership advocates as a true success story of the Second Amendment; Kennesaw, Georgia, a town in the northern suburbs of Atlanta, this past April celebrated their 25th year without a single murder. What makes Kennesaw the pride of the Second Amendment supporters? Their city ordinance requiring that every home own at least one gun:

The crime rate initially plummeted for several years after the passage of the ordinance, with the 2005 per capita crime rate actually significantly lower than it was in 1981, the year before passage of the law.

Prior to enactment of the law, Kennesaw had a population of just 5,242 but a crime rate significantly higher (4,332 per 100,000) than the national average (3,899 per 100,000). The latest statistics available – for the year 2005 – show the rate at 2,027 per 100,000. Meanwhile, the population has skyrocketed to 28,189.

By comparison, the population of Morton Grove, the first city in Illinois to adopt a gun ban for anyone other than police officers, has actually dropped slightly and stands at 22,202, according to 2005 statistics. More significantly, perhaps, the city's crime rate increased by 15.7 percent immediately after the gun ban, even though the overall crime rate in Cook County rose only 3 percent. Today, by comparison, the township's crime rate stands at 2,268 per 100,000.

This was not what some predicted.

Not what was predicted, but the results speak volumes. A lesson Senator Obama should examine closely in contrast with his own past stand on the issue of gun control.

A few more words Senator Obama should get used to hearing between now and November: "I'm the NRA, and I vote."

Once and Always, an NRA Membership Holding American Fighting Man

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John McCain: Setting his Sights from Behind

2008-06-25T13:53:00.002-05:00

It's a common misconception about old warriors that they aren't up to the grade when it comes to a down and dirty fight. The thing about old warriors is that they become old warriors by learning how to fight better than their younger opponents.

John Sidney McCain is trailing behind Barack Hussein Obama in the national polls at this moment in time, and he knows it. A new poll out Tuesday showed that the Senator from Arizona trails behind his Illinois rival by as much as 12-15 points, but McCain is far from worried. In fact, this is the spot he prefers to be in at this point in time. He likes to come in from behind.

Sen. John McCain stood up at a fundraiser late last evening at the oceanfront home of former ambassador George Argyros in Newport Beach. There were probably 80 people there. They dined on filet mignon, which cost $25,000 a couple.

McCain held his arms in that stiff bent way that he always does, a result of his nearly six years of POW imprisonment in Vietnam. The Republican nominee-to-be looked out at the guests and heI can out-campaign anyone, Republican senator John McCain said last summer and he did to win his party's presidential nomination told the truth:

"My friends," he said, "this is a tough race. We are behind. We are the underdog."

And then he uttered another truth that McCain's competitors ignore at their peril, "That's what I like to be."

Rhetoric from McCain on his position in the race? Hardly. McCain has a proven track record of applying this strategy to his campaigns and his interests, dropping off the radar for a time and letting his opponent have the spotlight, then sweeping in unexpectedly from behind to secure a win.

Precisely the strategy he employed during the Republican primaries to emerge as the front runner and presumptive nominee for the party's candidacy. Early front runners in the Republican race watches this happen, to their dismay, as they underestimated the former fighter pilot and Vietnam P.O.W. as they took the lead in the polls and fell, one after the other, to the wayside as McCain continued to climb, from behind, and overtake them, one by one. Even the expected heir of Reagan, Fred Thompson, seemingly underestimated his chances against the war veteran and found himself "gunned down" from before he could launch a successful push of his own for the lead position in the pack.

It would seem, in McCain's case, that the skills and tactics learned for being a fighter pilot have served handily in transitioning them into the arena of politics. And now those political gun sights are trained on Barack Hussein Obama.

As of June 1, the Democratic candidate had raised nearly $288 million. Now, that he's reneged on a pledge to take public funds, some think he may actually raise a half-billion dollars. Not counting millions more in parallel help from sympathetic 527 funds.

McCain has raised $110 million. Republican 527s are slow to gell, given the party's low spirits.

Looking back over the past year, McCain's record shows that this is exactly the place he works best, as the underdog. Using this spot to conduct town hall meetings, which Obama backed out of doing with the Republican, McCain is taking his message and his campaign to the grass roots level, an area the Obama camp seems to be largely ignoring. McCain is also slated for trips out of country to Mexico and Columbia to discuss trade, drug smuggling, and international terrorism, footage of which will likely be shown in ads coming this fall prior to the general elections, while Obama's footage will likely contain images of "a shirt-sleeved Obama, wading like a rock star amid his cheering throngs."

Perhaps as an unseasoned contender, Obama has not yet learned fully how to estimate his political opponents fully in a national election. Despite the insistence of the national media, his race with Senator Hillary Clinton was a close one, prior to her retiring her campaign after he achieved the necessary number of delegates for the coming Denver convention. McCain is clearly not a candidate to be dismissed when he is behind, as previous Republican front runners Rudy Giuliani and Mitt Romney can attest.

McCain was a fighter pilot, and his training as such was to get behind his enemy and take them down from behind. A lesson Obama needs to consider in approaching the November elections.

Once and Always, an American Fighting Man

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Picking Up Bill and Throwing Muslims Under the Bus

2008-06-24T22:17:00.001-05:00

Barack Hussein Obama has picked up the endorsement of former President Bill Clinton. Given the help that Bill gave Hillary's campaign, can this be good for the Obama camp, as he tosses the Muslim community under the bus while stopping to pick up Bill?

Senator John McCain can start writing his inaugural address now. There is no need to wait until the results are in in November, his win over Senator Obama has just been secured. Former President Bill Clinton has announced his endorsement of Obama, and pledges to give his support and effort to the Obama campaign.

What a difference a few (political) days makes. Several days ago Reuters reported that former President Bill Clinton smilingly — and pointedly — didn’t answer when pressed by reporters whether he’d endorse Democratic presumptive Presidential nominee Barack Obama. But things happen and change in politics.

Perhaps the Reuters report raised some eyebrows (and perhaps some voices) in Democratic party elite circles: today it was announced Bill Clinton supported Obama.

Curiously enough, however, the announcement came through Obama's spokesman rather than from the former President himself. Journalists from the Washington Post to the LA Times have speculated that Clinton is less than enthusiastic in offering support, perhaps still angry over the way the Obama campaign portrayed him and his wife, Senator Hillary Clinton, during her campaign against Obama for the Democratic nomination.

Strange bedfellows?

The move to show support for Obama by the Clintons is seen as one to reunify the Democratic party, which has shown signs of severe fracturing during the Clinton/Obama race for the party nomination. Several pro-Hillary sites are still showing their dismay at the treatment of Senator Clinton by the party, and are urging their followers and Clinton supporters everywhere to vote for Senator McCain in November.

This is not good news for the Obama, who has offered himself up as the candidate, of "hope, change, and unity." Nor does it bode well for Obama that a growing number of members of the Muslim community in America are equally disenfranchised with the candidate of hope and change.

As recently, or as long ago, depending upon your perspective, as December of last year, the Obama campaign began showing a growing trend of snubs at the Muslim community. At an event scheduled for that month, Minnesota Congressman Keith Ellison, the nation's first Muslim to be elected to Congress, was eagerly anticipating showing his support and offering his help to the Obama campaign, offering to speak on behalf of Obama at a mosque in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, the nation's oldest Muslim enclave. The trip, however, was cancelled by the Obama campaign, with the reason given of that it might stir too much controversy. Ellison is quoted afterward as having said, regarding the visit to his office by an Obama aide, "I will never forget the quote. ‘We have a very tightly wrapped message.’ ”

It would appear that this tightly wrapped message excludes the Muslim community from playing a part in Obama's appearances and campaign stops.

When Mr. Obama began his presidential campaign, Muslim Americans from California to Virginia responded with enthusiasm, seeing him as a long-awaited champion of civil liberties, religious tolerance and diplomacy in foreign affairs. But more than a year later, many say, he has not returned their embrace.

While the senator has visited churches and synagogues, he has yet to appear at a single mosque. Muslim and Arab-American organizations have tried repeatedly to arrange meetings with Mr. Obama, but officials with those groups say their invitations — unlike those of their Jewish and Christian counterparts — have been ignored. Last week, two Muslim women wearing head scarves were barred by campaign volunteers from appearing behind Mr. Obama at a rally in Detroit.

In interviews, Muslim political and civic leaders said they understood that their support for Mr. Obama could be a problem for him at a time when some Americans are deeply suspicious of Muslims. Yet those leaders nonetheless expressed disappointment and even anger at the distance that Mr. Obama has kept from them.

“This is the ‘hope campaign,’ this is the ‘change campaign,’ ” said Mr. Ellison, Democrat of Minnesota. Muslims are frustrated, he added, that “they have not been fully engaged in it.”

Hope, change, and unity.

Obama aides, of course, have denied allegations that the Senator has kept the Muslim community at arms length, pointing out television and radio messages in which Obama has reached out to Muslims, and his support in a radio spot for Indiana's Representative Andre Carson, the second Muslim to be elected to Congress, and the May meeting with the leader of a mosque in Dearborne, Michigan, which is the home to the largest population of Muslims in the United States. According to Ben Labolt, a spokesman for the Obama campaign, “Our campaign has made every attempt to bring together Americans of all races, religions and backgrounds to take on our common challenges”

Given the number of appearances that Obama has made at churches and synagogues across the country, one could speculate that this bringing together of all races and religions as one big happy family would be the equivalent of bringing the Muslim community into the family as step-children. This second-class citizen approach by the Obama campaign is fueling feelings of resentment on a daily basis. According to Safiya Ghori of the Washington office of the Muslim Public Affairs Council, "“The community feels betrayed.” Added into the mix are the strong denials by Obama that he is secretly a Muslim, which further enflames the Muslim community. According to a Pew Research Center poll, ten percent of voters believe that Obama IS secretly a Muslim no matter how strongly he denies it. A new section of Obama's site reportedly calls such claims "a smear."

Hope. Change. Unity.

Perhaps it is fitting that former President Clinton should be boarding the Obama bus at the same time that it is running over the Muslim community. President Clinton is used to a bumpy ride, and as the campaign progresses, the bumpier the ride is getting for the Senator from Illinois on his road to the November general elections. Given all the help that Senator Clinton gleaned from having her husband stumping for her, I'm sure that Bill's involvement in the Obama campaign will be precisely as productive as it was for his wife.

Just remember, for those of you who may think about getting off the bus at the next stop, to tip the driver. Senator Kennedy is a natural behind the wheel of this bus, don't you think?

Once and Always, an American Fighting Man

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ACLU Thugs Out To Stop Prayer Again

2008-06-24T18:58:00.003-05:00

Hat Tip to Stop the ACLU.

What is it about this country that we have let a group founded by admitted communists bully our liberties away from us using our own court systems against us?

Since when does the ACLU have any business in telling anyone what they can't do when it's well in accord with their Constitutional rights as citizens?

NO WHERE in the United States Constitution nor in ANY of the Amendments does it state that there is to be a separation of Church and State.

Yet and still, the jackboots of the ACLU go marching again, threatening legal action against Ohio and Wisconsin, ordering them to stop public prayers or else.

ADF advises officials in Ohio, Wisconsin
regarding constitutionality of invocations

Officials in two states threatened by anti-religious organizations

GREENFIELD, Ohio, and MADISON, Wis. — Alliance Defense Fund attorneys sent letters to public officials in two states Friday, advising leaders of both bodies regarding the constitutionality of allowing public meetings to open with prayer. Both the Greenfield City Council and the Wisconsin State Assembly have received legal threats from anti-religious organizations.

“A prayer before public meetings is one of our oldest and most cherished American traditions, and it is sad that some radical secularist groups are trying to eliminate the practice,” said ADF Senior Legal Counsel Mike Johnson. “The First Amendment allows public officials, and not the ACLU and its allies, to decide what is appropriate for acknowledging our nation’s religious history and heritage.”

Greenfield officials received a letter from the American Civil Liberties Union threatening legal action if their opening invocations are not censored or prohibited, while Wisconsin officials received a similar demand from the Freedom from Religion Foundation.

Read the rest here.

It is time that we, the majority of citizens in this country who are tired of being badgered and aggravated by a bullyish minority in this country, take a stand, and shut these America-hating communists down once and for all.

Contact your senators and congressmen today, and insist that they put forth legislation stopping funding to the ACLU and other such organizations.

Join the American Center for Law and Justice and help fight the ACLU

Once and Always, an American Fighting Man

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Heinz Mayonnaise Mess

2008-06-24T16:33:00.002-05:00

What could be more cozy that a mother preparing lunches for her family in the morning, making and packing sandwiches for the kids and dad as they run out the door to start the day? What if, though, "mother" is a guy with a New York accent, in deli garb?

Heinz corporation has withdrawn a television advertisement for its Deli Mayo and issued an apology to consumers for the content of the commercial. The reason? The ad features two men kissing at the end of the commercial, and two young children addressing one of the men as "mum." The ad was pulled after one week running in the U.K. after the Advertising Standards Authority announced that it had received complaints "that it was 'offensive' and 'inappropriate to see two men kissing'."

Other complaints include that the ad was "unsuitable to be seen by children" and that it raised the difficult problem of parents having to discuss the issue of same-sex relationships with younger viewers.

"It is our policy to listen to consumers. We recognise that some consumers raised concerns over the content of the ad and this prompted our decision to withdraw it," said Nigel Dickie, director of corporate affairs for Heinz UK.

Dickie also added that the ad was intended to be "humorous," and was meant to portray the message that having Heinz Deli Mayo was like having "your own New York deli man in your kitchen."

Evidently, viewers in the UK were not amused, and the ad was pulled after a one-week run.

Personally, I have to say, I'm not a fan of mayonnaise. Never have been. I've always been more partial to mustard. I do know, however, that there are a number of males who share my disdain for mayonnaise, and it revolves around, shall we say, psychological reasons. The very sight of mayo is far from appealing to us as something to ingest. To include a couple of gay guys into a commercial attempting to promote mayo?

I think I'll have a cheeseburger for dinner tonight, with pickles, onions, tomato, and French's golden mustard...

One has to wonder, though, if Senator John Kerry, or his wife, Theresa Heinz Kerry, have been asked for comment? If they have been, is "mum" the word?

Ponderous thoughts from,

Once and Always, an American Fighting Man

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Sex, Lies, and Denial of a Socialist Agenda

2008-06-23T12:56:00.003-05:00

Oil prices have continued to rise daily, with each rise marking a new record for high fuel prices around the world. The blame has been tossed about from one party to the next, but certain Democrats are suddenly backtracking from some of their statements.

Imagine how you would feel as a business owner if the government decided one day that it needed to nationalize your industry. Suppose, for example, that some politician, in cahoots with a group of bureaucrats, decided that, let's say, the office supply industry was so vital to the American economy that it needed to be taken over by, administered by, and controlled by the federal government.

Suddenly, a few months down the road, changes have to be made. It wasn't enough just to catch the office suppliers, now the government has discovered, after spending tireless hours of research, that it also needs to nationalize the paper industry, the ink industry, and the manufacture of paper clips and staples, because they are all vital suppliers to office supply companies and their survival is vital to the economy. A few more months pass, and the makers of the bodies for ink pens are added in, along with printer cartridge manufacturing and copy machine toner, pencils both wooden and mechanical are added in as well.

Wooden pencils come from trees, so eventually, to ensure the proper flow of pencil products, the timber industry will fall under nationalization as well, which would sub branch out into the building industry, because, as you know, the timber industry supplies the lumber industry and everyone who builds needs lumber, making it a vital part of the American economy as well and therefore in need of regulation. What holds a house together, now that we think about it? Why, that would be nails and fasteners, so naturally those industries would have to be nationalized, and subsequently there would be a nationalization of the metals industries, foundries, machine shops, leading all the way back to the raw materials mined out of the earth to create them.

Tools are used in mining, building, manufacturing, as well, which would make the manufacture of tools vital to the American economy and thus in need of Nationalization.

Need I continue, or have I adequately illustrated the snowball effect (I SO loathe the "slippery slope analogy, personally) that comes of nationalization of an industry? That business alone isn't affected, all suppliers to that industry become affected as well, over the course of time, and before you can say "supercalifragilisticexpialidocious" nationalization is becoming a national trend. And yes, I spelled that right, I googled it to make sure. I have to say, I was mightily impressed with myself.

I digress.

Last month, Congresswoman Maxine Waters demonstrated that timeless tradition of Socialists when she "outed" herself fully and publicly in calling for a nationalization of the oil industry; step 1, open mouth, step 2, insert foot, step 3, chew vigorously. Her comment did not go unnoticed by another Democrat cum Socialist, Congressman Maurice Hinchey, who chimed in this month saying practically the same thing as Waters, only without the catch of trying to stop himself from saying what he meant.

Link: sevenload.com

In light of the heavy fire that Waters and Hinchey have taken over their statements (Hinchey, doesn't that just sort of sound like a pirate name or something? AVAST, First Mate Hinchey, make ready to be underway!) the Democratic Party has sent out their spin doctors to try to patch up the sucking chest wound that has resulted from two Socialists in their ranks publicly showing their true agendas.

Thomas Fiery, a policy analyst at the libertarian Cato Institute, told Cybercast News Service that he doubts whether Waters, Hinchey or any Democrats truly support the nationalization ("socializing") of U.S. oil refineries.

"The Democrats in general do no support this idea," he said. "My guess is that neither Waters nor Hinchey really support this idea. They are ducking and covering and saying anything that might get people riled up."

Fiery added that if the federal government were to take over refineries, oil companies would profit. "The people who would be the most happy to hear about the socialization of oil refineries would be ExxonMobil, Shell, Chevron and all the oil companies because there really isn't much money to be made in refining," he said.

"Historically, there has been close to no profit in those industries at all," Fiery added.

Correct me if I'm wrong here, but hasn't everyone been complaining because Exxon has reported such staggeringly large record breaking profits per quarter? Or does Mr. Fiery know something that we don't? It is precisely because of the huge profits that Exxon and the other major oil producers are making that Democrats would be interested in nationalizing them. What, 18.9 cents per gallon of profit for doing nothing in the production of gasoline other than imposing a tax upon it isn't enough for the federal government? At 18.9 cents tax per gallon for gasoline, the federal government makes 10 cents more per gallon than the companies that make it possible for you to put it in your fuel tank and drive down the road. And the federal government plays absolutely no role in the production of gasoline.

While Mr. Fiery can go around all he wishes to spouting off how he doesn't think that Waters and Hinchey really believe in the nationalization of the oil industry, one has to wonder and ask, if they don't really believe it, why aren't they out there saying so themselves rather than relying on the Cato institute to say it for them?

Oh, and as to the sex portion of the title, I'm sure that you, the reader, have noticed that there is no mention of sex in this article whatsoever to this point. The truth is, it's been a tried and proven marketing device that sex sells. If the title caught your interest because of the sex part, then you have just proven years of psychological and marketing research correct in participating in this little experiment.

Once and Always, an American Fighting Man

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If it Doesn't Bleed, it Doesn't Lead, Give Us Dirty Laundry

2008-06-23T11:18:00.002-05:00

It wasn't so long ago that people were all up in arms protesting the war in Iraq and the staggering loss of lives that our troops have suffered (significantly less than any prior engagement that has lasted half this long). Where is the news from Iraq now?

Don Henley had a song out several years back (yes, I know I'm dating myself by using this reference, but it's applicable) concerning the media and how they approach the news. Aptly enough, the name of the song was "Dirty Laundry." In the song there are several situations that are mentioned, such as a plane crash, an operation in which the camera crew wants to film the procedure and the question is asked, "Is the head dead yet?"

In no instance is this attitude of "if it bleeds, it leads" more evident than in the coverage of the war in Iraq. When there was a significant amount of gunfire and conflict, the main stream couldn't get enough of it, to the point of fabricating stories along the way about American troops shooting up places that they hadn't opened fire on (note if you will in clicking the link that the bullets the woman is holding have never been fired, they are still in their shell casing), or about 20 headless bodies being found in a mass grave.

I can't help but wonder if the movie 8 Heads in a Duffel Bag inspired that story.

So I'm guessing that building schools, hospitals, and an infrastructure, along with police operations to mop up the pockets of insurgents that are starting to dwindle, aren't newsworthy now?

I'm guessing it isn't bleeding enough.

Getting a story on the evening news isn’t easy for any correspondent. And for reporters in Iraq and Afghanistan, it is especially hard, according to Lara Logan, the chief foreign correspondent for CBS News. So she has devised a solution when she is talking to the network.

“Generally what I say is, ‘I’m holding the armor-piercing R.P.G.,’ ” she said last week in an appearance on “The Daily Show,” referring to the initials for rocket-propelled grenade. “ ‘It’s aimed at the bureau chief, and if you don’t put my story on the air, I’m going to pull the trigger.’ ”

Ms. Logan let a sly just-kidding smile sneak through as she spoke, but her point was serious. Five years into the war in Iraq and nearly seven years into the war in Afghanistan, getting news of the conflicts onto television is harder than ever.

“If I were to watch the news that you hear here in the United States, I would just blow my brains out because it would drive me nuts,” Ms. Logan said.

It drives many of us into a state of brain damaged myopia as well

I wonder if a reporter causing a bureau chief to bleed would be bloody enough? It would create a moral dilemma for the dinosaur media, though.

"To bleed or not to bleed, that is the question."

It's a matter of money, and the dinosaur media isn't going to continue investing money in a region that doesn't have enough blood and guts coming out of it to fill the time slots for the evening news. Inside sources have indicated, on the condition of anonymity, that they are concerned that the "big three" would withdraw their organizations from Baghdad after the November elections.

It's at this point that one has to wonder why the November elections are the deciding point for the withdrawal of major media encampment in Iraq. Could this say something to a propaganda factor that the big three have been running against the current Presidential administration of George. W. Bush? It is HIS war, after all, if some pundits are to be believed. How much credibility is lost in close examination of the media and their coverage of Iraq when closely examining how much negative attention has been given to the war during the time period when our armed forces were in the process of bringing stability to the region, and the subsequent lack of information coming out of the area now that the situation is becoming more manageable. Does this show a concerted effort by the main stream media to try to discredit and bring down a sitting Republican President?

Or does there need to be more bleeding involved for them to continue that effort?

As to Lara Logan and others who have come forth, it will be interesting to see what turns their careers take in coming weeks and months.

Once and Always, an American Fighting Man

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An Open Letter to President Bill Clinton

2008-06-22T18:31:00.002-05:00

Mr. President,

We recognize that you have devoted your life to a cause and a dream, following the tenets of the Democratic party and it's teachings and virtues. However, in taking a look at the party from outside the workings of the Democratic Party, we can see, perhaps, a little more clearly than you on certain issues that are personal and close to you.

Mr. President, the Democratic Party has written you off as irrelevant, and have shown, by their choosing and pushing for the nomination and candidacy of Senator Obama, that they no longer regard you with the respect due to you as a former president.

The party has shown that they have no regards for your experience, your insight, and the wisdom that you have garnered during your tenure of eight years in the Oval Office, leading this nation through turmoils and trials, maintaining the dignity and virtue characteristic of the President of the United States of America. May I be so bold as to offer you a suggestion that would show the Democratic Party and the American people that you are not only a vital and relevent national resource? You, yourself, have seen, with the wisdom of one who has held the office, that Senator Obama has not the experience to lead this great nation. My suggestion would be this: to withhold your endorsement of Senator Obama, declare yourself as an Independent, and endorse and support Senator McCain. Can you think of a better way to ensure your continued place in history as being a man of the people, and at the same time to show the Democratic Party the error of their choice in treating Senator Clinton in such a disrespectful manner?

I implore you, Mr. President, to consider this as an option for this election cycle, leaving yourself an opening to return to the Democratic Party before the next cycle to ensure your wife gains her spot as President, as well, thus further marking you both down in our nation's history as being the first couple to have both held the office of the President.

Thank you for your time.

Once and Always, an American Fighting Man

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Endorsements from our Enemies: Why Can't Barack Obama Catch a Break from them?

2008-06-22T17:23:00.002-05:00

Presidential candidates often seek out endorsements from prominent figures not only nationally, but throughout the world, during election years. What, however, does it say for a candidate when a nation's enemies endorse a candidate?

It's a conspiracy theorists dream situation that Barack Hussein Obama finds himself facing.

The Democratic party front-runner and likely nominee in the upcoming Denver national convention has overcome the Clinton machine, rising through the ranks quickly to go from Congress into not even a full term in the Senate, into the launching position to become, possibly, the President of the United States.

His quick rise to fame and popularity is a tale straight out of the Brothers Grimm; a fairy tale ascension to power from the local to the national level, with a somewhat Messianic appeal to the public that hasn't been seen since the 1930's in Germany. Captivating audiences initially with his message of hope and change, Obama quickly soared into position to take on the "inevitable" Hillary Clinton campaign, ultimately defeating her and ending her hopes of becoming the first woman to gain the White House in the 2008 election cycle.

But at what cost to the nation does the rise of Obama bring? His campaign catch phrases, "hope and change," have done little, really, to address a hope in what, or a to address what changes that he intends for the nation, other than mentions of higher taxes and the promise to bring our combat forces home from Iraq within the first year and a half of his administration.

Perhaps, in seeking the true nature and character of the man, candidate Barack Hussein Obama, one should begin by looking at his list not of detractors, but at his list of supporters, and examine the causes they represent.

Jesse Jackson - political activist and civil rights activist. Very spotty record since the King days in his methods of promoting social and political change. Jackson has also been called a "shadow senator" from the District of Columbia.

Jane Fonda - actress and war protester who posed with North Vietnamese forces in a photo-op during the Vietnam War.

Danny Glover - actor cum political activist known for his support of Venezuelan dictator Hugo Chavez.

Bill Maher - Comedian and political commentator host of Politically Incorrect (which it is anything but), known for his anti-American and anti-Christian remarks.

Spike Lee - actor, political activist, director, known for his controversial race relations films and statements.

Mayor Douglas Wilder - Mayor of Richmond, Virginia, and former Governor of Virginia, who called for riots at the Denver DNC if Obama was not the party nominee.

And many others, listed here.

But this is just barely the tip of the iceberg in controversial figures endorsing Obama, and all of the above mentioned are Americans. What about his endorsements from overseas groups? This past week, Obama has received endorsements from two groups who have been and are stated enemies of the United States.

While Sen. Barack Obama sought to improve his relationship with the Jewish community today by meeting with leaders in Philadelphia, comments by a Hamas political adviser this weekend could potentially hurt the Democratic presidential candidate.

During an interview on WABC radio Sunday, top Hamas political adviser Ahmed Yousef said the terrorist group supports Obama’s foreign policy vision.

“We don’t mind–actually we like Mr. Obama. We hope he will (win) the election and I do believe he is like John Kennedy, great man with great principle, and he has a vision to change America to make it in a position to lead the world community but not with domination and arrogance,” Yousef said in response to a question about the group’s willingness to meet with either of the Democratic presidential candidates.

This endorsement brings back up the resignation earlier this year of Obama adviser Rob Malley over controversy surrounding his ties to Hamas. Seeking to put an end to any rumors or speculation of any links to Hamas by Obama, Malley stepped down in an attempt to shed the campaign of such speculations, speculations with have revived with the endorsement of Obama by Hamas leadership this week.

To compound the situation facing the Obama team in light of the Hamas endorsement, Obama received another dubious endorsement this week, this time coming from North Korea.

The Chosun Sinbo, the mouthpiece of North Korea’s Japanese front organization Chongryon and often for the North Korean regime itself, has announced its preference for Obama over McCain, whom it calls “a variant of Bush” and “nothing better than a scarecrow of neoconservatives,” which is a bit odd considering that the Bush Administration’s giveaway diplomacy is better for Kim Jong Il than even Clinton’s awful performance.

So what does this say of the character of candidate Obama, that he receives endorsements from at least two of our nation's enemies? Are there expectations of Obama from these endorsements, or are they merely well wishes from foreign nationals who have interests that are not in the interest of the American people? Given the record of flip-flopping that has been characteristic of Obama of late, and the support of members of the Democratic party being withheld from his campaign, could it be that there are, at this late stage of the election cycle, important issues that we, the voting public are unaware of but that are known to these groups overseas who are endorsing him? Could it be that there is information being gleaned from Barack Hussein Obama's Muslim Kenyan half-brother Malik to which we are not privy?

Whatever the answers, for some reason, two of America's enemies are interested in seeing Barack Hussein Obama elected to the office of the President. Why can't Obama catch a break in endorsements from our enemies? Perhaps it's because he doesn't deserve one...

Once and Always, an American Fighting Man

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To Drill or Not to Drill, That is the Question in Florida

2008-06-21T19:01:00.001-05:00

It wasn't but just a few years ago that if you mentioned off shore drilling to Floridians, you might be met with anything from angry glares to other means of expressing displeasure. With the price of fuel topping $4.00 a gallon, that may have changed.

After conducting a special survey in Florida this week, Rasmussen has released results that would indicate that Floridians have come around and would be largely accepting of drilling for oil off it's coasts. This could play a significant role in the outcome of the November general elections for Florida, as they were told, in the survey, that John McCain favors drilling for off shore oil reserves and his likely opponent Barack Hussein Obama is opposed to the option.

Not surprisingly, 85% of Republicans agreed with McCain’s perspective. However, Democrats were evenly divided—45% of those in Obama’s party agreed with McCain and said offshore drilling was likely to reduce the price of oil and gas. Just 48% of Democrats agree with Obama on this point. Among voters not affiliated with either major party, 51% said drilling was likely to reduce prices and 38% disagreed. These findings help explain why the Obama has responded so aggressively to challenge McCain on this issue over the past couple of days.

Rasmussen Reports will release additional national polling data on energy topics later today. Earlier polling showed strong support for offshore drilling.

McCain currently leads Obama 47% to 39% in Florida, with another 6% saying they will vote for someone else and 8% undecided. Raising the issue of off shore drilling, however, changed the percentages a bit in McCain's favor, however, to 49% for McCain, 38% for Obama, a difference of eleven percent. Not a startling gain of three percent net, but significant in the fact that the issue drew support away from Obama, rather than gaining any support for him. McCain's gains on the issue of off-shore drilling came entirely from male voters.

McCain, prior to his announcement of his support for allowing off-shore drilling, was leading Obama in Florida by as much as ten points prior to Obama's securing the lead as the Democratic prospective nominee. At that point, Obama jumped in the national polls across the board in most states. With McCain's stance on drilling, however, Obama may see a drop off in he gained ground from Hillary Clinton's withdrawal from the race. McCain is currently viewed favorably by a gain of seven percentage points from last month among Florida voters, with Obama garnering a favorability gain of only three points for the same time period.

Rasmussen will continue to conduct polling over the next couple of weeks to track any changes in opinion based upon this issue.

Once and Always, an American Fighting Man

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Training Iraqi Security Forces - With a New Twist

2008-06-20T17:21:00.004-05:00

The training of a security force for Iraq is a top priority for United States forces who are currently providing the bulk of security for the fledgling government. Having shifted to a primarily support role, training still is in the hands of the U.S.

In al-Anbar province, a program that has been successful for strengthening security forces in other provinces such as Fallujah has been employed; the training of women to supplement the existing forces already in place.

Graduates of the Sisters of Fallujah program work at any number of entry points into the city of Fallujah, doing their part to dirsupt the flow of weapons and other contraband to insurgents into the city, The next class, the Sisters of Ameriyah-Ferris, are currently training with the 3rd Battalion, 6th Marines, and are the first class to train outside of Fallujah as female security forces, with augmented support in instruction from female search teams from Combat Logistics Battalion 1, who conducted the five-day training course, held between the towns of Ameriyah and Ferris.

To thoroughly train the new Sisters to assist Iraqi Police, the Sisters studied topics such as police ethics, human rights, women’s issues, working in a terrorist environment, female searches and first aid. The Sisters also performed live-fire training with AK-47 rifles and 9mm pistols as a confidence booster. The final stage before graduation involved putting their newly learned skills to the test with on-the-job training at entry control points to Ferris Town.

“In contrast to Fallujah, which already has female search points, this will be a first for Ferris, meaning the women here are starting from scratch,” said 1st Lt. Kathryne Schilling, officer in charge of the training, who is overseeing her third class of Sisters with 3rd Bn., 6th Marines. The women were taught very basic skills since the idea of women providing security alongside all the male Iraqi Police is new to Ferris.

Personal protection is also a high priority for the Sisters; even though Amieriyah and Ferris are much smaller towns than Fallujah, the work they are doing is every bit as dangerous as their "Sisters" in Fallujah. For many, it is also their first job, and they are proud to be doing it. One Ameriyah-Ferris graduate said “I joined to help the Iraqi Police and to help my family. I’m proud to get this job. I’m proud to help the Iraqi Police. I’m going to make the city safer. I can prevent illegal passengers in the city. I’m so proud, I’m so happy.”

AL ANBAR PROVINCE, Iraq -Chief Warrant Officer 3 Charles Major, infantry weapons officer of 3rd Battalion, 6th Marine Regiment, Regimental Combat Team 1 assists a shooter during range training with the Sisters of Ameriyah/Ferris June 4. The program trains women in Iraq to work alongside their male counterparts, the Iraqi Police, at entry control points through Anbar. , Lance Cpl. Albert F. Hunt, 6/4/2008 6:40 AM

She should be happy, and proud, as well. In a region that has traditionally not been the most "forward-thinking" in the area of equal rights for women, these women are undertaking two very important steps at once. They are women who are entering into the work forces, and they are women who are undertaking some of the most dangerous work IN Iraq at the moment.

A lesson that could be learned, perhaps, on our own shores, as well, even today.

Once and Always, an American Fighting Man

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Obama - YES WE CAN, maybe, I think, what was the question?

2008-06-14T20:26:00.004-05:00

Is Barack Hussein Obama becoming the king of the flip-flop? Or is he suddenly just trying to come across as a tough guy by going into Sean Connery mode from The Untouchables?

I've never been impressed with people who will say whatever they think other people want to hear. When I was growing up and in church, I could tell a huge, huge difference between preachers who said what they thought and felt, and preachers who preached for the audience. Thus, I'm rarely impressed with politicians.

With the string of flip-flops and gaffes coming from the Obama campaign these days, it's hard to really trust him at his word for what he believes in and stands for. Not that anyone was fairly certain about that to begin with, other than that he believes in "change." We still don't know that much about the Senator from Illinois, other than that he DOES supposedly believe in "change." I believe in change, as well, get enough of it together and it can be converted into bill form...

I digress.

Barry H. is supposedly a propponent of gun control. Supposedly he believes that handguns should be heavily regulated (unconstitutional, by the way, as anyone who has ever bothered to actually READ the Constitution, particularly the Second Amendment, can tell you), and yet he is coming across with the Sean Connery line from The Untouchables in reference to McCain and the Republicans.

“If they bring a knife to the fight, we bring a gun,” Obama said in Philadelphia last night. “Because from what I understand, folks in Philly like a good brawl. I’ve seen Eagles fans.”
McCain and the RNC took on the comment in terms that will be very familiar to people who followed Clinton campaign statements last year:
“Barack Obama’s call for ‘new politics’ is officially over. In just 24 hours, Barack Obama attacked one of America’s pioneering women CEOs, rejected a series of joint bipartisan town halls, and said that if there’s a political knife fight, he’d bring a gun," McCain spokesman Tucker Bounds said, referring also to the Obama campaign's shot at Carly Fiorina's lavish pay package and role in layoffs at Hewlett-Packard.
“Why is Barack Obama so negative? In the last 24 hours, he’s completely abandoned his campaign’s call for ‘new politics,’ equating the election to a ‘brawl’ and promising to ‘bring a gun,' " said the RNC's Alex Conant.

The bi-partisan town hall meetings, by the way, set up after Obama's challenge of "any where, any time." I'm not sure that there was screaming like a little girl involved, but he did, obviously, run from them like one.

Again, I digress.

The McCain camp was quick to respond Obama's "bring a gun" comment, stating on the McCain web site, "we're having second thoughts about our proposed series of town halls."

"New politics" indeed. Obama is the product of the Chicago political machine, having been schooled and tutored to fight a dirty, ruthless campaign if necessary in order to win at all costs. Understandable, this is politics. Politics is a dirty game, and Obama seems ready and willing to dip his hands into the mud and come out slinging, keeping a bottle of hand cleaner close by in order to do a quick scrub job in order to come across as the one playing clean. The problem with that arises in having an established public record that shows exactly what positions that a politician has taken on issues, showing, as in the case of Rudy Giuliani, exactly where a candidate has been on issues as opposed to what they say while running for their current bids for higher office.

Despite his Messianic appeal early on before his own skeletons began to come rattling out of the closet, Obama is starting to come across with all the charm of nails dragging across a chalkboard. His challenges to McCain and then backing down from an open forum town hall style series of debates are indicative of a tremendous lack of intestinal fortitude. Not that McCain is a great national treasure himself, but it speaks volumes that Obama is unwilling to face him man to man in debate without the aid of prescreened questions or a teleprompter. That would indicate a lack of character, a lack of principles, and a lack of having a firm stand on anything, in my opinion.

Perhaps these are symptoms of a larger, unasked question. If Barack Obama is unable to square off without having the issues defined ahead of time, could it be that there is someone behind the scenes who controls which issues Obama will address? If so, what does that say for how he will operate should he take the Oval Office come November? Will there be some unknown, behind the scenes puppet master controlling Obama's actions as President? If so, who might that be?

Given his associations with Ayers, Wright, and the questionable connections to known terrorist sponsoring organizations, could it be that we have allowed the Democratic party to put forth a potential candidate that we really, truly, know nothing about other than that he looks good in a suit and can talk about change?

And if he does come with a gun to a knife fight, does that mean that McCain can saddle up and bring in a jet fighter?

These are the questions that must be answered before the November elections. Perhaps Lincoln Davis and Bart Gordon of Tennessee are right in withholding their super-delegate support from Obama. It may very well indeed be that the Democrats have made a huge error in judgement in allowing themselves to be overcome by "the Messiah."

McCain has put forth that electing Obama will be bringing about the second administration of Jimmy Carter. What I have to wonder is, is Jimmy Carter suddenly starting to look a little bit better to anyone else?

Once and Always, an American Fighting Man

Saudi's look to increase oil production

2008-06-14T16:55:00.003-05:00

Looking at the effects upon global economic conditions and under pressure by the U.S., Saudi Arabia is looking at increasing production of oil.

With oil reaching a record of $140 a barrell and an increased push in the search for alternative energy sources and methods, King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia is rethinking his position taken in May after meeting with President Bush concerning oil production increases.

Set to meet with oil producers and consumers in Jidda later this month, King Abdullah is expected to recommend an increase in production, hoping to stave off potential losses in the face of alternative fuel sources becoming more available.The U.S. has not been alone in pressuring for an increase in oil production, the other seven members of the G-8, France, England, Germany, Japan, Canada, Italy, and Russia, have been suggesting an increase in production as well, hoping to boost their economies.

Rising prices have shaken the world: Gas in the U.S. has reached as high as $4.43 a gallon and India, Indonesia and other Asian nations have cut fuel subsidies, creating anger and panic among drivers.

The kingdom produces about 9.45 million barrels of oil a day. The New York Times reported that the nation was considering raising that by about 500,000 barrels. Some economists believe that such a jump would cater to the West at the expense of Saudi Arabia, which has the world’s largest oil reserves.

Critics, however, object, saying that this jeopardizes Saudi oil reserves for the sake of western consumption. Others object to this line of thinking, saying that an $11 jump every day in oil prices is not in the best interest of oil producers, claiming that if it continues, interest in oil could very quickly be replaced by interest in alternative fuels. Such a situation would, in effect, cause oil producers to price themselves out of business. Some economists have speculated that an increased push for alternative fuels could hurt the economies of oil producing nations, particularly Saudi Arabia, in as soon as 10 to 15 years.

Once and Always, an American Fighting Man

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Army Strong, for 233 Years

2008-06-14T14:23:00.006-05:00

They began as a ragged bunch of farmers and businessmen who believed in an idea; a free Continental Colonial America free from English rule. Today, the United States Army celebrates it's 233rd birthday.

At the outset of the American Revolution in April of 1775, the American Colonies had no standing army. Initial confrontations with British forces were conducted by militia units in Lexington and Concord. A gathering of thousands of New England militiamen to lay siege to British troops at Boston prompted the Second Continental Congress to realize the need for a centralized command structure, and on June 14th of 1775, the Continental Army was born. The next day, George Washington was unanimously voted by the Congress to be the Commander in Chief, a position for which he refused any recompense other than reimbursement for his personal expenses.

From Bunker Hill to Baghdad, the Army, the first commissioned military organization by a congressional body in our nation, has held the standard for service and excellence in standing ready to defend our nation. And today, this oldest branch of our nation's military is an all volunteer organization of highly trained men and women who utilize a wide range of technology and equipment applied to old fashioned traditions and standards.

Take a moment today to visit the Army Birthday website, and to reflect and give a moment of thanks for the men and women who have devoted a portion of, or the entirety of, their lives to ensure that a nation and a people remain free.

233 years.

Army Strong.

Drive on!

Once and ALWAYS, and American Fighting Man (and proud Army vet)

Finding Respect for Hillary

2008-06-08T16:33:00.005-05:00

Hillary Clinton has pulled out of the primary race, leaving Barack Hussein Obama a clear path for nomination for the Democratic Party at the Denver Convention. But in the final analysis, despite the odds from the start, Hillary endures.
I've never been a fan of Hillary Clinton. From before her husband's first term in the White House, something about her just put me off.

Before you start thinking the term "misogynist," let me put you straight from the get go. It had nothing to do with the fact that she's a woman, nor the fact that she is a strong willed, determined woman. It had to do more along the lines with policy issues and political theory.

For years, I would cringe whenever I would see Hillary on television and change the channel to something more palatable.

Bill ended his second term as President, and I hoped that we had heard the last of Bill and Hillary Clinton, but that wasn't to be the case, as Hillary went on to win a senate seat in New York. And from there she went on to enter into the run for the Presidency.

If I had had hair at that point, I would have been pulling it out by the roots. I was even seriously considering and looking into how to best make a move to Mexico for the duration of her Presidency if she won the nomination and then went on to take office next January. By the time she and Obama began to emerge at the front of the pack, I had decided that it was time to leave my years standing spot as a die hard independent and declare a party, choosing to declare as a Republican. For the first time in my life, because of two candidates, I was and am affiliated with a party.

Politics has always held a strong fascination and appeal to me, however, and so I naturally had to follow the course of both the Democrat and Republican fights for the President. My own choice for candidate, Fred Thompson, entered the race late and didn't make it to the finish line. I wasn't happy about that at the time, but in retrospect, looking over the campaigns and at the nation as a whole, it wasn't the right time for Fred to come into the Presidency.

And so I continued following along, weighing things in my mind that have yet to find their way into words that can coherently be followed by others, and I noticed a few things.

First and foremost, Bill Clinton, God love him, is a narcissistic megalomaniac. A few years back, I could almost feel sorry for Bill and it was because of my feelings about Hillary that inspired that sentiment. From the reports of their screaming matches in the White House, with Hillary throwing things at Bill during arguments, her ice water reputation, and all the bad dirty business that seems to shadow Team Clinton, I couldn't stand either of them, her moreso than him.

Watching things more closely this year and with a different approach, having political science training and practical experience in my background that I didn't have at the time of Bill's bid for the White House, I could see things profoundly differently now than I saw them then.

Bill Clinton is an albatros around his wife's neck (for those of you who have never read Ryme of the Ancient Mariner, you need to check it out here. Between his philandering and his temper, he has done nothing, really to forward his wife's campaign. Generally, an appearance by Bill on Hillary's behalf tends to be like Al Gore showing up to discuss global warming (see Gore Effect). If you're running for President, you don't want anything to have a negative impact on the campaign to be coming from within your own camp. And Bill is a definite negative for Hillary. Hillary can't even have her moment to withdraw gracefully from the campaign without the negative shadow of Bill lurking in the corner.

I have to admit, I was pretty amazed at my own reversal of thinking in taking an in depth look at Hillary's candidacy. And I have to say that despite her faux pas, despite her gaffes, despite the pushing by the DNC leadership, Hillary soldiered on and stayed the course until the final numbers came in to put Obama over the top.

That speaks volumes to a strength of character that I, personally, didn't believe possible out of Hillary Clinton until I watched her continue on, despite overwhelming pressure from the media and from her own party to drop out of the race so they could hand the nomination to Barack Hussein Obama. It speaks to her belief in her cause, and while I may not necessarily agree with her on several issues of policy, I have to say, this weekend, I am sitting here highly impressed with her integrity and her endurance to continue on until the ultimate and final decision being made; that decision being Obama reaching the required number of delegates before Clinton. She has definitely, despite my differences of opinion with her on policy matters, earned my respect.

So what next for Hillary Clinton? She's already forwarded the notion that there will be another bid for the White House. That means that she definitely plans to be working on that as a goal in the future. Let's go into total analytical mode for a moment, and put forth a hypothesis. The Democratic party is in a state of transition. They don't want to admit it, but lets be honest with ourselves here, it is. So is the Republican party. There are Democrats who have supported Clinton who are on the record that they will under no circumstances support Obama, they will support McCain instead. Honestly? I don't blame them for this position, McCain does know how to work with both sides of the aisle and break the party line. McCain is in a position where he is set to reap the rewards of a splintered tree, picking up votes from Clinton, as we draw closer to the November general elections.

There is a way McCain could secure ALL of Hillary Clinton's votes, however. Obama has made it pretty clear that he won't be asking Hillary Clinton to be his running mate for the November ticket.

That doesn't, really, if the cards are played right and the hand unfolds the way that it would need to in order for it to happen, necessarily mean that Clinton couldn't be in the running for a spot as Vice President of the United States, during a time when both major political parties are on the verge of losing members to third party movements anyway...

Just a little notion than ran through mind in sitting back and contemplating things political in discussion with a friend earlier today.

I can easily believe, that there are more invisible than visible Beings in the universe. But who shall describe for us their families? and their ranks and relationships and distinguishing features and functions? What they do? where they live? The human mind has always circled around a knowledge of these things, never attaining it. I do not doubt, however, that it is sometimes beneficial to contemplate, in thought, as in a Picture, the image of a greater and better world; lest the intellect, habituated to the trivia of daily life, may contract itself too much, and wholly sink into trifles. But at the same time we must be vigilant for truth, and maintain proportion, that we may distinguish certain from uncertain, day from night.

-- T. Burnet, Archaeol. Phil. p. 68 (1692)

Once and Always, an American Fighting Man

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Arizona - Home of the Stupid Motorist Law

2008-06-07T23:35:00.004-05:00

People take their lives into their own hands every day simply by slipping behind the steering wheels of their vehicles. In Arizona, the law says that if you do something stupid, you can be forced to pay for emergency response to rescue you.

You can find them every day, in every state of the country, in every city and town of every state. They're the drivers who think that the rules don't apply to them. You'll see them crossing railroad tracks when the lights are flashing and/or the barriers are lowered, entering areas closed for road construction, any number of things.

These drivers are not only a danger to themselves, they're a danger to others on the road, and when they get into emergency situations, they become a danger to the men and women who are called out to rescue them. Anyone who has spent a significant amount of time in emergency services can tell you, the accidents and rescue operations that could have been prevented by someone simply following posted signs to stay out are the ones that get the least sympathy.

In Tuscon, Arizona, if you are found guilty of creating a rescue situation by failing to follow postings, you may just have to pay the bill for your own rescue. The name of the law, appropriately enough, is the Stupid Motorist Law.

The law was passed in 1995 and requires drivers to reimburse the state for the cost of certain rescues.

"The Stupid Motorist Law as it's commonly referred to is basically a law that says that in the event that a lower lying roadway or area is flooded, it's barricaded, and you drive around the barricade, you can be billed for that," said Joel Peterson, Risk Manager for the City of Tucson's Department of Finance; Risk Management Division.

What if there are no barricades up? "If the barricades are up, then that will make a difference; the law applies.

If the barricades are not up, the law does not apply," he said.

What if you're sitting in your car when a storm rolls in and you get trapped?

"If they're already in there, and they're stuck in traffic then, no- because the barricades would not have been up," said Peterson.

Emergency response involves hours upon hours of training and education, practice, and coordination to develop effective means of rescuing those who are in danger. Emergency personal, though trained, are literally stepping into the same situation as those they are called upon to rescue in order to pull them out of danger and bring them back to safety.

It's dangerous work, and the rescuer is often dealing with someone who is potentially in a panic by the time they reach them. The rescuer has to make sure of their own safety as well as the safety of those they are being sent in to recover. And no two incidents are ever the same, meaning the rescuer has to be able to think ahead and plan, very often, each and every move they make before they even reach the victim.

Personally, having spent ten years as a volunteer fire fighter, I think this is a great law. It's one of those laws that just makes sense. If you see a barricade that says to stay out, do the right thing, STAY OUT and keep yourself, and others, safe.

While it is true that firefighters and other rescue personnel tend to be, to a degree, adrenaline junkies, they would rather be sitting around the station house waiting for a call than to have to respond to a situation that could have been prevented if someone had simply been obeying the law.

Once and Always, an American Fighting Man

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Bill Clinton - New Rumors and Innuendo

2008-06-07T16:41:00.004-05:00

As Hillary Clinton brings her campaign for the Presidency to a close, attention turns once again back to her husband, former President Bill Clinton. And yes, it's regarding rumors of yet another affair.

Vanity Fair magazine is the center of controversy once again, this time not involving photographs of Miley Cyrus. The controversy this time stems from an article regarding an alleged affair between former President Bill Clinton and actress Gina Gershon.

The Vanity Fair article released this week suggests Clinton is out of control and “seeing a lot of women on the road.”

In the article, Todd Purdum wrote, “Over the last few years, aides have winced … at more recent high-end Hollywood dinner-party gossip that Clinton has been seen visiting with the actress Gina Gershon in California.”

Both Clinton and Gershon have admittedly denied the allegations.Denial, however, has been a keystone in the Clinton legacy, as his initial denials of an affair with then White House intern Monica Lewinski, who was merely one in a seemingly growiing list of women with whom Clinton has had "relationships" with through the years, some more than consensual, casual flings, according to some of the women Clinton has been involved with.

Eileen Wellstone, 19-year-old English woman who said Clinton sexually assaulted her after she met him at a pub near the Oxford where the future President was a student in 1969. A retired State Department employee, who asked not to be identified, confirmed that he spoke with the family of the girl and filed a report with his superiors. Clinton admitted having sex with the girl, but claimed it was consensual. The victim's family declined to pursue the case;

In 1972, a 22-year-old woman told campus police at Yale University that she was sexually assaulted by Clinton, a law student at the college. No charges were filed, but retired campus policemen contacted by Capitol Hill Blue confirmed the incident. The woman, tracked down by Capitol Hill Blue last week, confirmed the incident, but declined to discuss it further and would not give permission to use her name;

In 1974, a female student at the University of Arkansas complained that then-law school instructor Bill Clinton tried to prevent her from leaving his office during a conference. She said he groped her and forced his hand inside her blouse. She complained to her faculty advisor who confronted Clinton, but Clinton claimed the student ''came on'' to him. The student left the school shortly after the incident. Reached at her home in Texas, the former student confirmed the incident, but declined to go on the record with her account. Several former students at the University have confirmed the incident in confidential interviews and said there were other reports of Clinton attempting to force himself on female students;

(Juanita) Broaddrick, a volunteer in Clinton's gubernatorial campaign, said he raped her in 1978. Mrs. Broaddrick suffered a bruised and torn lip, which she said she suffered when Clinton bit her during the rape;

From 1978-1980, during Clinton's first term as governor of Arkansas, state troopers assigned to protect the governor were aware of at least seven complaints from women who said Clinton forced, or attempted to force, himself on them sexually. One retired state trooper said in an interview that the common joke among those assigned to protect Clinton was "who's next?". One former state trooper said other troopers would often escort women to the governor's hotel room after political events, often more than one an evening;

Carolyn Moffet, a legal secretary in Little Rock in 1979, said she met then-governor Clinton at a political fundraiser and shortly thereafter received an invitation to meet the governor in his hotel room. "I was escorted there by a state trooper. When I went in, he was sitting on a couch, wearing only an undershirt. He pointed at his penis and told me to suck it. I told him I didn't even do that for my boyfriend and he got mad, grabbed my head and shoved it into his lap. I pulled away from him and ran out of the room."

Elizabeth Ward, the Miss Arkansas who won the Miss America crown in 1982, told friends she was forced by Clinton to have sex with him shortly after she won her state crown. Last year, Ward, who is now married with the last name of Gracen (from her first marriage), told an interviewer she did have sex with Clinton but said it was consensual. Close friends of Ward, however, say she still maintains privately that Clinton forced himself on her.

Paula Corbin, an Arkansas state worker, filed a sexual harassment case against Clinton after an encounter in a Little Rock hotel room where the then-governor exposed himself and demanded oral sex. Clinton settled the case with Jones recently with an $850,000 cash payment.

Sandra Allen James, a former Washington, DC, political fundraiser says Presidential candidate-to-be Clinton invited her to his hotel room during a political trip to the nation's capital in 1991, pinned her against the wall and stuck his hand up her dress. She says she screamed loud enough for the Arkansas State Trooper stationed outside the hotel suite to bang on the door and ask if everything was all right, at which point Clinton released her and she fled the room. When she reported the incident to her boss, he advised her to keep her mouth shut if she wanted to keep working. Miss James has since married and left Washington. Reached at her home last week, the former Miss James said she later learned that other women suffered the same fate at Clinton's hands when he was in Washington during his Presidential run.

Christy Zercher, a flight attendant on Clinton's leased campaign plane in 1992, says Presidential candidate Clinton exposed himself to her, grabbed her breasts and made explicit remarks about oral sex. A video shot on board the plane by ABC News shows an obviously inebriated Clinton with his hand between another young flight attendant's legs. Zercher said later in an interview that White House attorney Bruce Lindsey tried to pressure her into not going public about the assault.

Kathleen Willey, a White House volunteer, reported that Clinton grabbed her, fondled her breast and pressed her hand against his genitals during an Oval Office meeting in November, 1993. Willey, who told her story in a 60 Minutes interview, became a target of a White House-directed smear campaign after she went public.

Does Vanity Fair have justification in standing by it's story, and are the denials of Clinton and Gershon plausible? Time will tell. Given Clinton's history, however, a line from Shakespeare does come to mind in examining this situation, "The lady doth protest too much, methinks." Typical when it comes to Bill Clinton denying allegations of an affair.

Perhaps at some point later we will know to what extent the influence of Bill had on Hillary's campaign bid for the Presidency. It is certain that the thought's of Bill Clinton being back in the White House in any capacity played some role in recent elections. Also there is the question of the influence of the Clinton machine after this election cycle with Hillary having retired her campaign in favor of Barack Hussien Obama. Speculation in some circles has been, of late, that the Clinton influence no longer has the power that it once did. There can only be speculation at this point as to why, exactly, that this is the case.

One thing is for certain, however; Gina Gershon is a name that will now, whether there was or was not an affair, be associated with Bill Clinton.

Once and Always, an American Fighting Man

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Undercover Officers are Reported to be Training with Shoe Phones...

2008-06-05T18:14:00.006-05:00

The Denver City Counsel is said to be holding meetings under the veil of the Cone of Silence. Police officers have been issued shoe phones in order to be inconspicuous when reporting in...The Golden Age of Get Smart has not only been revived for the silver screen, but it seems that there are those who think that Denver is preparing weapons that could have been created by the mind of Mel Brooks for crowd control for the upcoming Democratic National Convention. Would you believe they think there is a "poopie ray?"

As legend has it, the Brown Note is an infrasonic frequency believed to resonate through human body parts and cause a loss of bowel control. Some protesters are convinced that Denver police will amplify such low frequencies to subdue them in August.

"They'll bring out all the technologies they can get their hands on," says activist Ben Yager. "I wouldn't put anything past police in terms of crowd control."

It isn't helping that Denver officials are laughing about the rumors and cracking jokes about them. Perhaps they've finally developed that most dangerous weapon of all from the Smart franchise, the Nude Bomb.

I hope Code Pink doesn't send a delegation, if that happens to be the case...

Perhaps they've finally developed that most dangerous weapon of all from the Smart franchise, the Nude Bomb.

I hope Code Pink doesn't send a delegation, if that happens to be the case...

The Brown Note, by the way, is nothing more than yet another urban legend.

The Nude Bomb, however..........

Just a few thoughts from the road from,

Once and Always, an American Fighting Man

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On the road again...

2008-06-02T19:59:00.001-05:00

For those of you who normally read my blog, don't give up the ship!

Right now, I'm out on the road, work related, but will be adding new postings as time allows. In days to come, that should mean more time for this again, but for the next week or so my time for working on this site will be limited.

Keep checking back for more very Highly Opinionated new articles.

And thanks.

Hawk Coeur de Lion