The Groundtruth from a combat veteran, backed up by independent research and historical study. Information beneficial to the Troops. And a touch of objective politics, as it relates to the subjects at hand.
This site is unabashedly Pro-American and Pro-Military however none of the views expressed here are to be considered as endorsed, proposed, or supported by the Department of Defense or any other Agency, government, public, or private. http://waronterrornews.typepad.com/
SSgt Workman is featured in the Hall of Heroes and a book review on this from Marine Till Death that read it as it was written: http://waronterrornews.typepad.com/home/2008/12/shadow-of-the-sword-by-jeremiah-workman-w-john-bruning.html
http://waronterrornews.typepad.com/home/2008/12/ssgt-jeremiah-workman-navy-cross-usmc-iraq-marion-oh.html and links to prior articles.
This is the document that clearly authorizes what the Federal government is allowed to do, what authorities and responsibilities the separate entities of the Government have. It is what Our Troops swear to defend and what our politicians and judges have sworn to uphold:
We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.
As is pointed out within that article, the US Constitution is but four (4!!!) pages of simple language setting out what America is/will be, and what it is NOT. The foundations upon which a great nation was based seem to have been shaken to the core in recent years, as the current crop of politicians seem determined to over-reach the very clear limits placed upon them within that framework. Today, from where I sit, America is under attack by those very 'servants' of the people who - as noted above - swore to uphold the Constitution.
September 17th is Constitution Day. Public Law 108-447 establishes it as so, and that 17-23 September is Constitution Week, each year. It requires that every Federal Agency provide educational and training materials on the Constitution on September 17th, and that every educational institution that receives federal funding hold an educational program on this day, each year.
The Constitution was written on 4 pages in plain English. This is the document that solely authorizes what the Federal government is allowed to do, what authorities and responsibilities the individual entities of the Government have. It is what Our Troops swear to defend and what our politicians and judges have sworn to uphold:
We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.
Article. I. Section. 1. All legislative Powers herein granted shall be vested in a Congress of the United States, which shall consist of a Senate and House of Representatives.
Much has happened in the lives of Americans since September 11, 2001, when we were attacked on our own soil.
There are many memorial sites and videos out there, each offering a fitting tribute to those people who died that day, to their families, to the survivors and to the brave men and women who turned towards the destruction to help, many of whom lost their lives also. i.e. 911 digital archive and this special page from my good friend Steve aka "Snakecharmer .
I would ask that people take time to stop and reflect on where this country would be today if not for those who ran into the buildings, towards the flames, towards the airplane cockpits, who deployed overseas seeking those who attacked us.
Remember also that we still have men and women who were there helping that day and for days afterwards that are still serving in our Armed Forces right this very minute.
The worst thing (in my mind) would be to forget those sacrifices that were made, those lives that were unexpectedly taken that day.
Please take a moment today to stop and honor those who gave their all, their families, members of our Armed Forces, our firefighters, EMT's, police officers and citizens who stepped up that day. Whether you choose to spend a moment in silence, offer a pray, hoist a drink to them, it matters not, just REMEMBER!!!!!
Two years AFTER American Troops were pulled out of Viet Nam, on April 30th 1975, Saigon fell. Author George J Veith shows what happened between the "end" of the war, and the defeat of South Viet Nam.
He exposes that falsehoods of the major myths. He details the realities. And he provides the evidence to back it up.
The Marines' Memorial Association in San Francisco, CA offers hotels rooms (at discounted rates to members) and regularly hosts authors of military books at its facility there.
History is wrought with examples of subjects of a government rebelling against their ruling tyrant, whether King, Emperor, Czar, Caesar, Ayatollah, or Secretary-General of the Politburo. When the tyrant, the dictator grows too overbearing, too oppressive, or too stingy with the goods, the serfs rebel. They rebel not against the rule of kings, but against the oppression of the current king. They cry out, not for freedom, but instead for an easing of their suffering.
The American War for Independence was different. The People fought for Citizenship, for Rights, for Liberty itself. They established the US Constitution, and guaranteed the Individual Rights of Citizens, in the Bill of Rights, given by God, not government, as proclaimed in the Declaration of Independence.
What is the difference? The serfs are demanding the tyrant end his oppression, that he allow them a bit more food, or benefits, while Citizens refuse to allow the government to intrude in their Rights, which are equal to the leader of the government.
Many would pick and choose when they support one or another of the enumerated God-Given Rights, specifically protected in the Bill of Rights, but would deny others their other Rights, when they find them less appealling, or when denial of Rights is deemed expedient. The MSM is particularly frought with hypocritical claims to rights beyond those enumerated, while arguing against the Rights (2nd) of others.
The Boston Bombings provide the most recent example. A 1st year law school dropout could successfully prosecute the case. The evidence is overwhelming, and yet terrorism is not a charge, nor is murder. The excuse is that prosecutors are hedging their bets. They are saying it's not as open and shut a case as everyone that watched the news would note. They are claiming that by not charging the terrorist, now, with murder, they reserve the "right" of the government to charge him later. They point out that McVeigh was also not charged with terrorism, as if that is a reasonable fact. It is a fact, but it is wrong that he was not charged with terrorism, unless the US law defining terrorism as a crime was not yet written. In 1995, and now, my position was that McVeigh should have been tried by a Court Martial, with charges including Treason. He wanted to claim he was a Soldier, and he did in fact have time remaining on his Individual Ready Reserve contract. He should have faced a firing squad, of Soldiers.
In a much more difficult case, McVeigh was convicted for the murder of a handful of Federal Agents. There was no video of him placing the bomb. He was not caught red-handed throwing bombs. LE got lucky that his ideological idiocy convinced him to speed down a highway in a car with no license plate, and a pistol showing under his shirt. Still, he almost was released on the weapons charges. LE got lucky in 1995, because his ideologies told him that the Sheriff's Deputy that pulled him over was a "legitimate" authority figure.
He was not convicted for murdering dozens of kids, or other civilian employees of the government, or senior citizens at the Social Security Admin office. The Janet Reno "Justice" Department and Clinton Administration, had hedged its bets. It did not charge McVeigh with all the murders, because it wanted to reserve "its right" to put him on trial a 2nd time, if the first trial didn't convict him. McVeigh was put in the express line for executions, but his buddy and partner in the act of terrorism is still in the prison system. His buddy only got Life in Prison, and to date, no other prisoner has convicted him to death.
The Bill of Rights says the government has ONE chance to prove your guilt in a crime. It doesn't get to keep trying until it finds a jury that will agree with them. It doesn't get to keep you in jail, or keep you away from a source of income for years, while it keeps trying. It doesn't get to charge you with using an explosive now, and then the effects of that explosive later. It gets ONE chance, and you are presumed innocent, until they do. The jury on the other hand, can convict you of killing the Federal Agents, while finding you "not guilty" of killing the nurse killed by a piece of falling debris hours later.
The Boston Bombing case may very well demonstrate a need for "Immigration Reform," in a way Congress isn't currently discussing, but like it or not, Tsarnaev attained US Citizenship on 9/11/2012. He DOES have Rights, until and unless his citizenship is revoked. He IS an Islamist Terrorist, and it should not be difficult to prove that he perjured himself, under oath, when he swore loyalty to the US and the US Constitution, while acting as an agent of the enemy in attacking American civilians. We DO need to look at the means to prevent such enemies from attaining the shield of US Citizenship, but at the moment, we have an Islamist Terrorist who holds US Citizenship, that should be facing charges of terrorism, treason, murder, and more.
It may be politically expedient, and even popular, to keep putting him on trial, until the warranted death penalty is attained, but it would undermine the Rights of Every American Citizen, if we endorse that. Instead, we should charge him with everything we can in the Boston Bombing case. Throw the book at him. Prove it all. Give him 10 death penalties. The police shootouts may be a separate case, but the two explosions at the finish line of the Boston Marathon, and ALL the effects, as well as ALL of the charges from it, are ONE event, and one trial. Terrorism is a Federal charge, because it is an attack on the Nation, on the US Constitution, not just the individuals in the city of the attack.
If we wish to remain, or re-attain, Our position as Citizens, of Equal Rights to the man that presides over OUR govenrment, not serfs, subject to the dictates of the man who Rules our people, we MUST stand up for the Rights of Our Fellow Citizens, even when we find them despicable examples of evil that should have their lives snuffed out. If we wish remain, or re-attain, Liberty, we MUST protect each of the Rights enumerated in the Bill of Rights, and we must send Representatives to Congress who uphold their oath to the Constitution, rather than those that pander to the lobbyists that pay their way to maintain their power of office. And at this point, I'd almost say that being a lawyer should be an automatic preclusion to office. Let lawyers argue the law in court, but they lack the ability to write in clear, concise, coherent language.
The terrorists have not "ended" their war, no matter how badly the politicians want to claim the war is over. There is only one way that one side of a war can end it, of their own accord; surrender. There is only one basic goal that must be recognized to win a war; War must take the necessary steps to remove the enemy's will to fight. It appears that the enemy is closer to that goal, despite their heavier losses, than are we.
"There is only way you can be guaranteed peace, and you can have it in a second. That is to surrender." Ronald Reagan, decades before he became President, during the era that politicians were purporting that cutting Our Defenses, and talking the enemy to death was the "right path." Negotiations in weakness did not end the Cold War, and it has not ended the Terrorists' War on Us. Reagan's buildup of Military Strength did bring the Cold War to an end.
While politicians and police slap each other on the back for their "successes" in Boston, they also continue with their calls to cut defense, and to militarize the police. One resident in the search area described the situation as a "police state." And indeed, one of the goals of terrorism is to induce the government to tighten its grip on civilians, while simultaneously demonstrating the lack of effectiveness of the "security blanket" of the government, until the civilians are fed up. The police cannot protect you. That is not their job. Their job is to arrest criminals that have already committed the crimes.
While the first 7 seven years of the War on Terrorism saw a few modest intrusions on our lives, the last 5 of "Overseas Contingency Operations" have seen (TSA) state sponsored sexual assaults and pornographic xrays at the airports, a government which deems your 3 month old email as theirs to read without a warrant, and require new cell phones to update their location to within a few yards.
"Mr Obama and his intelligence community know the threat from al-Qaeda affiliates, but have chosen to downplay it to the US public." Peter Foster, UK Telegraph
The Administration's policies are not one of ignorance, not anymore. They are policies of stubborn partisanship, and party platform to change the very nature of the US Military, from one prepared for war, to one that is utilized only as part of a coalition in peace-keeping operations. Bill Clinton and Eric Shinseki openly espoused that fundamental shift in the 90's, when the world believed we had entered a new era of peace, but the fact of Islamist Terrorism has hampered this Administration from being as straightforward about its goals. It couches the shift in saying that we will pin our defenses on allies given our best equipment, while stripping our own ranks of its Troops and latest equipment.
Islamist terrorists are not just Al-Qaeda. Indeed, islamism is not just terrorism. Islamist terrorists include Hamas, Hezbollah, al-Quds Force (Iran), Boko Haram, al-Shabab, and many, many others. Yet, partisan supporters of the politician in chief would have us believe that various regional commands of Al-Qaeda aren't even part of Al-Qaeda. While at times they proclaim the core element of the former headquarters of Al-Qaeda in Afghanistan and Pakistan has been defeated, they deny that Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, Al-Qaeda in Iraq, or Al-Qaeda in the Islamic West (Maghreb) are the same organization. And yet, reports continue to point out that Al-Qaeda is still active in Afghanistan, and still strong in Pakistan.
Josef Biden has stated both that the Taliban have always been the enemy, and that they are not the enemy, but the Taliban are some of the most fundamental of Islamists, and some of the most atrocious of terrorists, superceded perhaps by the Chechens, in the department of atrociousness.
Islamism is stronger now than it has ever been. It has grown and spread and taken over governments in the last 3 years, through "Arab Spring." The battle lines which had shrunk in 2008, have expanded greatly since 2010. Mubarrak had "contained" Islamists in Egypt for decades. Bashir had pulled back from open support of Islamist terrorists in the Sudan, when he saw the 2001 results in Afghanistan. His final efforts in Darfur were finally ended. Saudi Arabia had quieted and Yemen was slowed. The tide in Iraq had shifted.
Today, Islamism rules Egypt, Tunisia, Iran, and is fighting for Somalia, Yemen, Nigeria, Mali, and Libya. Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iraq, and Turkey are trending towards, not away from Islamism. And while political Islamism espouses the use of tyranny, rather than openly supporting terrorism, to achieve its goal of establishing the caliphate, of conversion of ALL to Islam, it remains diametrically opposed to Freedom, and the Rights of Citizenship, of Human Rights themselves.
The brutality of Islamists towards religious freedom can be seen in the imprisonment (and death penalties in many cases) of ex-Muslims converted to Christianity in Iran, in Egypt, and in Pakistan. Riots have been seen in Kabul, Afghanistan, over the existence of Bibles written in Dari. All Islamism is political, though it does not all use terrorism as its means. It prefers tyranny. In fact, the goal of Islamist terrorism is to attain the reins of government, so that its tyranny can be more complete. The great migration of religiously oppressed from Tunisia, Egypt, and Somalia are testament to this. And many of those religiously oppressed, like the Bahai of Iran, are Muslims.
For the Coptic Christians in Egypt, the distinction between the fire bombs and explosives of Islamist terrorists during the Mubarrak era and the attacks of Islamist tyrannical government forces under Mosri, is the distinction of lost hope. It is the distinction of being opposed by the government to supported and enforced by the government. While Mubarrak never took the measures Bashir Assad did in wiping off the map, and face of the earth, an entire town for supporting the Islamist Muslim Brotherhood, he did keep illegal, though ineffectively suppressed, the organization which called for the brutal oppression of Human Rights.
The Boston attack should serve as a reminder that Islamist Terrorists have not "ended" the war, but so should have the Little Rock, and Fort Hood attacks. In each of these, the terrorists succeeded in killing unarmed Americans, but these are not the only reminders that the terrorists have not lost their will to fight. The panty bomber, the Times Square bomber, the Wrigley Field bomber, the Christmas Tree bomber in Seattle, and many, many more attempted attacks have been downplayed as "lone wolves" or forgotten due to the failures of the enemy to execute the attacks.
Like so many of these others, the Chechen Islamist brothers will likely be played off as "self-islamized, home grown, lone wolves," but the Islamization of those with US passports or greencards is not a new factor in this war. It has long been known that Islamists were trying (and succeeding) to convert violent criminals in our jails. Adam Gadahn, of California, was already a ranking member of Al-Qaeda on 9/11, and the "American Taliban" was captured on the battlefield in the early days of the War in Afghanistan in 2001. It was only a few years ago, that 7 gang-bangers went on a rampage in Oakland, CA in the name of Islamism, after their conversions. The government has known for a decade that the strategy of the enemy was that the first wave of terrorists would be Saudi, the second wave others, and the third stage of attacks carried out by those with US passports and green cards.
A stereo-typical terrorist cell has 4-6 members. It is purposely de-centralized. Tamleran was known to the FBI. He was reported to them by a foreign country, probably Russia, as a potential terrorist. He likely had religious leaders, and terrorist directors, at the Mosque partially paid for by governments in Massachusetts. His Islamization did not occur in a vacuum, and his Uncle has clearly stated that the attack was a dishonor to the family and to all Chechens. But the Chechens were in Afghanistan in 2001, and they are still there in 2013, in lesser numbers, but more often across the border in Pakistan.
While I will agree with Jonn, at This Aint Hell, that Obama was not directly responsible for the Boston Attacks, I must also recognize some of the points made by the UK Telegraph, that the Administration's attempts to claim the War on Terrorism is over, that Al-Qaeda is defeated, has led, partially, to the complacency of the people.
And while "Blame Bush" is overplayed, he didn't quite get it right when he only told the American people to go about their lives. In no way, should he have espoused that the people live their lives in fear, but he should have found a way to give the people a meaningful purpose in the War against Terrorists. He had the foresight to know that this war would not be over quickly, that it would take decades to win, and the humility to recognize that he must change his party platform on "nation building," but in some way, the American People needed to be engaged in the efforts, as were the People, in WWII. That doesn't mean recycling metal, and food rations, or even higher taxes, but it should mean a heightened sense of Situational Awareness.
Neither Bush nor Obama can be blamed for idiots walking around with eyes glued to their iPods, but both should have told the American People to be aware of those around them, to recognize terrorists and criminals. Instead of demonizing Warriors as PTSD afflicted for their heightened sense of awareness after having seen the evil in this world, they should have sponsored people having an awareness of what's around them. They should have reminded the Nation that being aware was not the same as being afraid, that instead that knowing their environs was an innoculation to fear.
The Office of the President, has a mandate to preside over the government, and to lead the Nation, to explain to the People "why" a war is in their interests, and how they can help win it. It is not enough for him to say I'll do what I want, what I believe, because I won the election, particularly not in these times, where we choose from the less bad choice, rather than those we truly believe prepared for the Office. It is not enough for the President to understand the importance of fighting terrorists there, so we don't see American Civilians murdered here. It is his duty to explain that "why" to the American People, so they understand it, particularly when his partisan opponents see the lack of explaination as the means to undermine him, and the Nation, for political purposes of attaining power. And not giving that "why" was Bush's failure.
The Department of Defense POW/Missing Personnel Office (DPMO) announced today that a serviceman, who was unaccounted-for from the Korean War, has been identified and will be returned to his family for burial with full military honors.
Army Lt. Col. Don C. Faith Jr. of Washington, Ind., will be buried April 17, in Arlington National Cemetery. Faith was a veteran of World War II and went on to serve in the Korean War. In late 1950, Faith's 1st Battalion, 32nd Infantry Regiment, which was attached to the 31st Regimental Combat Team (RCT), was advancing along the eastern side of the Chosin Reservoir, in North Korea. From Nov. 27 to Dec. 1, 1950, the Chinese People's Volunteer Forces (CPVF) encircled and attempted to overrun the U.S. position. During this series of attacks, Faith's commander went missing, and Faith assumed command of the 31st RCT. As the battle continued, the 31st RCT, which came to be known as "Task Force Faith," was forced to withdraw south along Route 5 to a more defensible position. During the withdrawal, Faith continuously rallied his troops, and personally led an assault on a CPVF position.
Records compiled after the battle of the Chosin Reservoir, to include eyewitness reports from survivors of the battle, indicated that Faith was seriously injured by shrapnel on Dec. 1, 1950, and subsequently died from those injuries on Dec. 2, 1950. His body was not recovered by U.S. forces at that time. Faith was posthumously awarded the Medal of Honor - the United States' highest military honor - for personal acts of exceptional valor during the battle.
In 2004, a joint U.S. and Democratic People's Republic of North Korea (D.P.R.K) team surveyed the area where Faith was last seen. His remains were located and returned to the U.S. for identification.
To identify Faith's remains, scientists from the Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command (JPAC) and the Armed Forces DNA Identification Laboratory (AFDIL) used circumstantial evidence, compiled by DPMO and JPAC researchers, and forensic identification tools, such as dental comparison. They also used mitochondrial DNA - which matched Faith's brother.
Today, more than 7,900 Americans remain unaccounted for from the Korean War. Using modern technology, identifications continue to be made from remains that were previously turned over by North Korean officials or recovered from North Korea by American teams.
On March 29th, 1973, the last US Troops left Viet Nam, officially ending a war that was not considered a war. The official dates of the war to this day are not the same as the dates that the war was fought. The war began under Dwight Eisenhower and expanded under JFK.
The perception, falsely, remains that Our Troops lost. They did not. The politicians gave up, in the face of protests, initiated by our Cold War enemy. The politicians had tried to play General, hamstrung Our Troops, and failed to take the fight to the enemy for years before that.
The iconic images of the end of the war were taken 2 years later, on March April 30th, 1975, when the US Embassy in Saigon was evacuated, as Saigon fell to the Communist North. Some, many, will say that because we had US Marines at the Embassy, the war continued. Every Embassy has Marines. Their role is to protect the US soil of the Embassy, and more practically, particularly in situations like this, the US Citizens that work in the Embassy. Our Marines, on March April 30th, 1975 performed valiantly, saving as many lives as humanly and physically possible, but it was the South Vietnamese government, not the US Military that fell that day.
Our Troops fought Valorously and Honorably in Viet Nam. They did what was asked of them, and won the battles they fought. Our Nation still owes the Veterans of Viet Nam, primarily because Our Citizens maligned them, ignored them, and abused them for so long.
On this day, and every day that a Viet Nam War Veteran reveals himself, please Welcome him Home, and thank him for doing a difficult, and thankless job.
In the video above, Sergeant Major Max Beilke, US Army is shown in CBS footage. He was the last to leave Viet Nam, and became one of the first to fall in the War On Terrorism. He was killed in the Pentagon, on 9/11/2001, still serving his Nation and fellow Veterans, as a civilian.
Eleanor Roosevelt had a career on radio
that began in the 1920s and expanded while Franklin Roosevelt was
president. She had commercial sponsors but gave the money she earned at
this time to charity, such as the American Friends Service Committee.
Speaking in a personal,
conversational style, with a high pitched voice and clear, upperclass
East Coast diction, ER delivered listeners for her sponsors and proved
that she was worth large sums to advertisers. She was especially
interested in the participation of women in civic life and issues of
education and youth. Between 1933 and 1945 Eleanor Roosevelt’s White
House broadcasts addressed the challenges that depression and war posed
as well as lighter topics and commentary. After 1945 ER continued her
radio broadcasts with a focus on human rights, the Cold War, and world
peace.
Beginning in October 1941 ER gave 26 Sunday evening broadcasts sponsored by the Pan-American Coffee Bureau (eight Latin American coffee growing nations), and earned a total of $28,000. Through these broadcasts she helped to ready the American people for war. On the fateful Sunday, December 7, she changed her prepared remarks to rally her listeners behind the administration as the country entered the war. (source)
For the last year I have been saving a YouTube video
of Eleanor Roosevelt's radio address about Pearl Harbor, only to find
this week that it has been removed from the internet, and I can't find
it anywhere. However, the transcript of her December 7 radio address still exists. From the FDR Library, here's an excerpt of the original draft:
A U.S. Army analyst, charged in the largest security breach in U.S. military history, has taken the stand for the first time in a pre-trial hearing on his detention conditions.
Bradley Manning testified Thursday about restrictions he endured while in custody at an army base in Kuwait and later in Quantico, Virginia (near Washington). During his three-hour testimony, Manning complained the time he spent alone in his cell was draining. He claimed there were times he thought he was going to die.
Manning downloaded thousands of diplomatic cables and other Top Secret material onto compact discs that were sent to the anti-American website WikiLeaks. He has offered to accept responsibility for the leak by pleading guilty to reduced charges. A decision on that offer has not been made.
The defendant has said that while at Quantico he was locked up alone in a windowless cell for 23 hours a day and forced to sleep naked. The military notes the treatment was necessary because he posed a suicide risk. Manning made multiple threats of suicide, including to hang himself by his underwear waistband.
Lawyers for Manning are asking for his charges to be dropped, saying the pretrial conditions were harsh enough. Manning has claimed that he was too gay to be given a Security Clearance in the first place, much less access to classified material. Prior to Clinton's DADT policy, homosexuals were denied a security clearance or entry into the military.
Manning could spend the rest of his life in prison if found guilty.
The leaked diplomatic cables and military reports, published by WikiLeaks starting in July 2010, infuriated the international community, often providing blunt and unflattering U.S. views of world leaders' private and public lives and placing the lives of Iraqi and Afghani, as well as US Soldiers and Dipomats in danger.
U.S. officials say WikiLeaks' publication of the stolen documents put lives in danger, threatened national security and undermined U.S. efforts to work with other countries. VoA.
While Syria slaughters its own people and Cairo burns yet again, idealism reveals again, that war is to be left in the dustbins of history. Similar predictions were made in 1909, just 4 years before the first World War, and in the 1930's by Neville Chamberlain, on the eve of the Second World War. In the 90's, Clinton slashed our military with the idealism that the world would be a safer place. It ignored the rising attacks by Islamist Terrorists and declarations of war by al-Qaeda, in hopes it would just go away. It claimed terrorism was a law enforcement problem, and should be tried in court, rather than prosecuted by militaries.
Zero Ponsdorf of This Ain't Hell points out the latest prediction of the impending future world of peace. And some blame the realism of Veterans, of the fact that Sovereign Nations maintain standing Armies for self-defense, that wars continue. Evidently, some believe that if Nations will just give up the means to defend themselves, then dictatorships will stop trying to take over their land and people.
Meanwhile, in the real world, the Communist Central Party of China has selected their new set of leaders, without ANY input from their Chinese subjects and are publishing new passports with maps of claiming the territory of several Pacific Nations, from the Philipines, to India, to Korea, to Japan, and of course Taiwan.
Recent conversations with various people have reminded and re-inforced to me just how out of touch so many have become with the Foundations of the American Liberty, and the very principles of democracy and governance. Publicly and privately, I have re-iterated that if those that love the Constitution cannot convince the American People of its value, with words, no degree of rebellion will do so.
These conversations have occurred with people of various ages from tweens to 90 year olds, from self-described Communists to Constitutionalists, from those who espouse an even greater expansion of government power and taxation, to those who believe the government has a conspiracy behind every event in the news. It will never cease to amaze me that some will believe that all corporations are evil, and "the people" would be better served with complete government control, a monopoly, of the same services, rather than the personal choice between various companies that must compete for their purchases.
Nor will my astonishment cease that so many can not see the cause and effect of American jobs being moved to China because they, individually, along with so many others like them continue to purchase cheap Chinese products, rather than buying the few things still Made in America. They justify their puchase of the cheap Chinese trinkets, with their claim that they can't afford and should not pay for quality products made by their neighbors. Then they turn around and complain that "corporations" are shipping jobs overseas. They want higher wages, but fail to recognize that they are unwilling to pay for the higher wages of their neighbors, preferring the cheap prices of goods made by asian kids and Chinese political prisoners.
Some have even suggested to me, that there is no "American culture," that it has been subsumed by consumerism, and that we as a people have become superficial. In some respects, I am forced to admit their point, even as I observe some of the culture of the South sapped by the same forces, while many old traditions of the South are claimed by its opponents for consumeristic or altruistic reasons, and very different ideologies.
As a kid, my father often took us to the Farmer's Market, where we bought bushels, literally, of fresh produce, from farmers he personally knew, at prices others paid for a few cans of processed food. My mother would slave over the stove for days, thereafter, with all of us helping, canning and freezing the food we'd eat for the next year. It was decades before I realized a pressure cooker could be used for "regular cooking." We had three, and a process for streamlining the process. Today, people go to the "Farmer's Market," because it's popular to buy "organic" foods, as if the stuff you buy in the supermarket is non-organic matter. They pay inflated prices.
We almost always had our own garden as well, which produced the fresh food we put on our table, as well as contributed to the canning process. It wasn't a trendy thing to do. It was the economical and smart thing to do. It was the Southern way. And after years in the military, I remember the surprise of the taste of a garden grown tomato, versus the mass produced stuff I had been eating in the mess hall for years.
Recycling meant re-using and repairing things that today would otherwise be thrown away. New cars were a rarity, and we fixed our own cars, not to mention changed our own oil.
America does have a distinct culture, even if has been washed over by a culture of consumerism and multiculturlism. America's culture is one of Freedom, of Liberty, of personal Independence & Responsibility. It is one of doing what's necessary, and all that one can for themselves, before asking for a handout. It is a culture of helping your neighbor when he needs help, but not one of being a subject to the whims and largesse of the government, even in a crisis.
My entire life I've heard of the "responsibility" to vote and I would counter that it is a "Right" to vote, but the responsibility is to educate yourself on what and who you are voting for, or against. I believe we've gotten into the mess we have because too many voters have no idea what the politicians they put in office are doing. Too many vote solely based on the letter behind the name. Some I have encountered are still voting based on which party did what to cause the Great Depression, and which they perceive presided over its recovery. Others vote based on propaganda over things that cannot be changed by the people they are voting for. There is ZERO chance Roe v. Wade will be overturned. ZERO. There is no way a Constitutional Amendment would be passed to ban abortions, and that is the ONLY way that it could be changed.
Our Founders created an alliance of States, formed for a Common Defense. They purposely and with reason made domestic governance a State responsibility and authority, banning the Federal Government from interfering in State and Local matters. They immediately passed the Bill of Rights, protecting the People from the Government, based on the inalienable Rights granted every Individual, by "the Creator" as they had previously stated in the Declaration of Independence.
Today, we have widespread support for the suppression of Free Speech, when it supports that with which we disagree. If it's labeled "hate speech," or argues against the messianic nature of the Politician in Chief, it "should be banned." We have widespread support for punishing corporations that build their products overseas, because Americans won't pay for the inflated union wages of stuff made here.
It is time for us, as a Nation, to revisit how the American Culture created the Foundation of Freedom, why the Founders created a system in which the greatest domestic governence was held to the lowest levels, and how the Right to Vote carries with it a Responsibility to know who and what you are voting for and against.
It is that Liberty and Freedom, which created not only the Greatest Country on Earth, but also the Economic and Military Superpower we became. It allowed penniless orphans to be become the richest men in the world, and allowed the richest heirs to become paupers.
Democracy just means you get a vote in something. It doesn't in and of itself guarantee you a single Right. One needs only look at 2009 Iran, or 2012 Russia to see that a vote can have as little positive effect as urinating into the wind. When the Rights of the People to speak against a government are suppressed, and the choices of politicians limited to those the powermongers at the top choose to allow you to pick, one is not a citizen, but rather a subject of that regime. Do you think they want to live under the oppressive yoke of their tyrants? NO, but they have no means (arms) to throw off their chains of bondage.
If the American People wish to maintain their Liberties, and their Rights, and the capability to choose, then they must educate themselves on the people and ideologies of those they put in office, and not just support a letter behind a name.
A Russian human rights group says the country's leaders are using tactics against the opposition that are reminiscent of those used under Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin during the 1920s and 30s.
In a statement Tuesday, rights group Memorial condemned a growing crackdown on opponents of President Vladimir Putin that has seen a growing protest movement and two members of an anti-Kremlin all-female punk band sent to prison camps. Several opposition leaders have also been arrested and accused of plotting “mass riots.”
The rights group said the events of recent weeks show that Russian authorities intend to rely on the “language of repression” in dialogue with the opposition, including arrests, courts and camps. It said that again, as in the 1920s and 30s, methods of “fabricating” political processes are in demand.
The Kremlin has consistently maintained that it is operating "within the law" and is merely taking "action against violent, unsanctioned protests in an attempt to strengthen security and keep the public safe."
Memorial's statement comes as Russia marks the Day of Remembrance of the Victims of Political Repression. The annual remembrance day has been honored every October 30 since the 1991 collapse of the Soviet Union. It commemorates the anniversary of Stalin's so-called “Great Purge” of 1937, when millions of people were declared “enemies of the state” and sent to labor camps or executed without trial.
Events are being held across Russia Tuesday and in other former Soviet states.
Political analyst Sergei Karaganov, attending a remembrance service in Moscow, says he does not believe the situation in Russia will ever return to the extremes of the past.
“It is bad, there are — and mostly likely will be — persecutions as the country is in a difficult transitional state. But, in my view, a return to the past is impossible. This is against people's genetic structure – the elimination of 30 million people (in the Soviet period).” VoA.
Lt. Gen. John Mulholland, commander of the U.S. Army Special Operations
Command and former commander of Task Force Dagger, addresses the
audience during the dedication and unveiling ceremony for the De
Oppresso Liber statue at the Winter Garden Hall in Two World Financial
Center near Ground Zero, Nov. 11, 2011. Members of Task Force Dagger, a
Special Operations team made up Green Berets from 5th Special Forces
Group (Airborne), aircrew members from the 160th Special Operations
Aviation Regiment (Airborne), and combat controllers from Air Force
Special Operations Command; joined Vice President Joseph Biden and
business leaders and veterans support organizations to unveil the
statue.(Photo by Staff Sgt. Andrew Jacob)
NEW YORK, N.Y. - "It was as if the Jetsons had met the Flintstones,"
stated Capt. Will Summers, former Special Forces team sergeant for the
5th Special Forces Group (Airborne), as his team linked up and operated
with members of the Afghan Northern Alliance just weeks after the 9/11
attacks.
A decade later those same words would resonate throughout the Winter
Garden Hall in Two World Financial Center near Ground Zero as Vice
President Joseph Biden, standing before the Ground Zero flag, spoke to
the audience assembled for the dedication of a larger than life bronze
statue depicting those same Green Berets.
By Ken White, National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency: SPRINGFIELD, Va., Oct. 18, 2012 - Fifty years after they discovered Soviet missiles poised to strike the United States from Cuba, two intelligence officers met with hundreds of their current-day counterparts to commemorate the anniversary of the crisis that nearly brought the world to nuclear war.
Photo: National Photographic Interpretation Center imagery kept President John F. Kennedy updated on progress made by the Soviets on their missile site in Cuba. This Oct. 25, 1962, image shows all the elements necessary to launch a missile with a 1,100 nautical mile range. Analysts could tell by the tracks in the ground leading to one of the missile shelter tents that a weapon in a high state of readiness was present. The image also demonstrated the Soviets' extensive use of canvas to camouflage its weapons components and, therefore, its intentions. Photo courtesy of National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency
Dino Brugioni and Vincent DiRenzo were part of a small group from the CIA's National Photographic Interpretation Center who worked for 13 tense days in October 1962 to avert disaster. They joined author and journalist Michael Dobbs, and two current analysts, in an Oct. 15 panel discussion at the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency here.
Through reminiscences and present-day observations, the group illustrated the significance of the crisis and its continued impact on the tradecraft of imagery and geospatial analysis.
A photo interpreter, DiRenzo led the NPIC team and formed the initial conclusion about the presence of Soviet medium-range ballistic missiles in Cuba from analysis of U-2 spy plane imagery. He discussed the immediate wake of his discovery.
"Considering the severity of the identification, we figured we'd be in for a long night," DiRenzo said. He indicated that the initial assessment was not a "slam dunk," as convincing people of the true significance of the find was difficult. While DiRenzo was absolutely sure, the image did not show clearly identifiable missiles, but rather, long, canvas-covered objects that, to the layman, could be almost anything.
Charged with preparing materials on daily developments for NPIC Director Arthur C. Lundahl's briefs to the executive committee and the White House, Brugioni was instrumental in arming President John F. Kennedy with intelligence needed to navigate this perilous moment in history.
He recalled with humor how many of his briefing boards came back from the White House marked up with blue crayon from a doodling Caroline Kennedy. On a more somber note, he also relayed the fearful mood of the time.
"Black Saturday, we had gone to [defense readiness condition] 2," Brugioni said. "Fourteen hundred bombers were loaded with nuclear weapons; 50 B-52s were in the air; eight Polaris submarines were at sea; 125 [intercontinental ballistic missiles] were ready to fire; there was tactical aviation; there was 60 Thor missiles in England, 30 Jupiter missiles in Italy, and 15 Jupiters in Turkey. That morning we met with Art Lundahl and told him that all 24 pads were operational, meaning that within four to six hours, 24 missiles could be coming at the United States.
"I remember Lundahl scratching his chin, looked at me and said, 'I don't want to scare the hell out of them, but I want to make sure they understand the danger,'" Brugioni recalled.
The son of a career diplomat, Dobbs spent his formative years behind the Iron Curtain. He became a Cold War scholar after covering it as a foreign correspondent for the Washington Post. He drew a parallel between his work and intelligence analysis.
"I feel a kinship with intelligence analysts. We try to start with the evidence and proceed from the evidence to the conclusions," Dobbs said. "Our goal is to tell truth to power."
Dobbs went on to laud the efforts of the team who identified the missiles, and to praise Brugioni for his efforts since the crisis to improve public understanding of photo analysis.
"Dino has done more than anyone else to explain the art and science of photo interpretation to the broader public," he said. "He's a great educator; he's very good at explaining very complicated matters to laymen."
He also discussed how his research of the crisis, with the advantage of 50 years of hindsight, affirmed both the significance the crisis and the criticality of intelligence to policymaking. He also pointed out that 60 to 70 percent of the actionable intelligence came from NPIC during the crisis.
"This was the moment of the photo interpreter," Dobbs said. "They were able to tell [the president] when the missiles would be ready to fire."
It was probably the single biggest intelligence coup of the Cold War, he added.
Art Lundahl's son, Robert, shared his late father's connection with the president.
"Above all, my father was certainly a technologist. He was a scientist at heart; he loved technology," said the younger Lundahl. "It sounded like President Kennedy had an equal interest in technology. There was a bond there."
Beyond technology, Lundahl also shared what he believes to be the key to his father's effectiveness as an intelligence officer: exceptional communication skills.
"He was born to brief," Lundahl said. Specifically, he noted his father's ability to be credible, while adjusting to the knowledge level of his audience and using humor to diffuse tension.
NGA analyst Walter S. Trynock compared and contrasted the world of 1962 with today's environment. Communication skills remain critical for analysts, he noted, but the tools for providing geospatial intelligence are markedly different, and today's leaders are bombarded with information.
"The type of information, and the pace in which information is received by the policymaker, is constant, at all times of the day and night," Trynock said. "So the challenge is to bring out the relevancy and the 'so what' to contribute to their decision making."
Then and now, keen analysis always has been key, Dobbs said.
"Intelligence is like a huge jigsaw puzzle, and you only find a few pieces, and there are always going to be some missing pieces, but from the pieces you do find, you try to inform policymakers about the entire jigsaw puzzle," he said.
A groundbreaking Cambodian film depicting the life of a woman who lost most of her family four decades ago in the genocidal reign of the Khmer Rouge is touring the United States and stirring profound reflection and grief in Khmer-speaking audiences.
“Lost Loves,” co-written by Chhay Bora and his actress wife Kauv Sotheary, is the first feature film on the genocide by an all-Cambodian cast and crew in more than two decades. Based on the life of Chhay Bora's mother-in-law, the film focuses on the repeated loss of her loved ones, as some two million people perish under Khmer Rouge rule between 1975 and 1979.
Chhay Bora, speaking last week after a presentation in Philadelphia, described the film to VOA as a labor of love and suffering.
“All this pain and suffering, we can not keep them inside and carry the burdens with us to the ground,” he said. “I had to make this movie to recount our bitter memories and to share the suffering and history with the next generation.”
Shot in the Cambodian countryside, “Lost Loves” is described by critics as a collision of striking beauty and ghastly acts of brutality under Khmer Rouge rule. In its aftermath, Cambodians at home and abroad have by most accounts been slow to come to grips with the genocide.
The $150,000 film was screened at Philadelphia's Horace Howard Furness High School as part of a 12-city American tour that ends this week in California. School principal Daniel Peou describes the film's value to families scarred by the horrors of the genocide.
“I've seen some Cambodian children and parents who don't talk at all,” he said. The kids say their parents don't understand them. They don't know what their parents have gone through. If they see this movie, they'll know how much suffering their parents went through and what their parents had to sacrifice for them.”
The movie, which opened at a four-day film festival in Phnom Penh in late 2010, has been uniformly praised by American audiences at university screenings. At the University of Connecticut, a reviewer wrote last month that the film left spectators “speechless.”
In Long Beach, California, Cambodian performer PraCh Ly, who helped sponsor the film in the Los Angeles area, called the film “groundbreaking.”
The Cambodian Oscar Selection Committee voted unanimously last month to submit “Lost Loves” to the Academy Awards for best foreign-language film.
By Claudette Roulo, AFPS, WASHINGTON, Sept. 6, 2012 - Union Army Gen. George McClellan is a victim of history, a leading Civil War scholar told a Pentagon audience Sept. 4 on the 150th anniversary of the start of the Maryland campaign of 1862.
In a presentation for the Defense Department's historical speakers series, retired history professor Tom Clemens said McClellan, considered by many historians to be an ineffectual commander, was in fact hamstrung by political and military jealousies that ultimately led to his removal from command.
In describing the events leading up to the battle of Antietam, Clemens outlined efforts by the military and political establishment to prevent McClellan from being perceived as a hero of the Civil War.
His orders were often confusing and contradictory, Clemens said.
For example, on Aug. 3, 1862, at the same time he was ordering McClellan to retreat back to Washington, Gen. Henry Halleck wrote McClellan to tell him he soon would be put in command of the Army of Virginia. Instead, President Abraham Lincoln and Halleck give McClellan command only of the troops within the perimeter of the nation's capital. On Sept. 3, 1862, McClellan was ordered to form a field army, but the order didn't say who would command it, Clemens said.
"He's got two missions -- he's got to defend the capital, but he also has to create this field army," Clemens said. "It's clear the Confederates are crossing the river [into Maryland], ... and he begins to push troops out towards Rockville as an advance guard to essentially see where the Confederates are going." In response to this, Clemens said, Halleck reminded McClellan that he was not in command of any troops outside of Washington.
McClellan also was criticized by many, including Halleck, for moving his troops too slowly, averaging six miles a day in the Maryland campaign, Clemens said. Halleck, McClellan's replacement as Union general in chief, was even slower.
"Halleck's major claim to fame at this point in the war is that after Shiloh he had led the advance on Corinth," Clemens said, noting that Corinth was 20 miles away, and it took Halleck 30 days to march there.
In addition, McClellan, a Democrat, was seen as a threat to the Republican presidency, Clemens said.
"You've got 'radical' Republicans in the capital, and to them, McClellan is the symbol of everything they don't agree with," Clemens said. [WOTN Editor NOTE: The Republicans gained power in the 1860 elections based on votes in the Northern States. The source of Democratic party power had been in the South. There was no realistic liklihood of a Democrat resurgence with 13 states of the South not voting.]
"What are they afraid of? Losing power," he added. "What happens to McClellan's successor? What happens to victorious generals? George Washington, Andrew Jackson, William Henry Harrison, they become presidents. And these 'radical' Republicans got into office on a very narrow margin. So, do you really want to take a popular Democratic general and give him the opportunity to end the war?
On 15 April 1941, the 3rd Armored Division was born. It was unstoppable by the Germans. The only thing that prevented it from taking Berlin was orders from above to halt, allowing the Soviets to enter Berlin.
It faced down the Red Hordes of the Soviet Army for decades of the Cold War, and picked a 2nd nickname for its most famous Soldier: the Elvis Presley Division.
From 24 February 1991 to 1 March 1991, during Desert Storm, the Division destroyed hundreds of Iraqi tanks and captured 2400 Iraqi POW's. On 17 January 1992, the heaviest Armored Division in the world, rolled up its colors in Germany. On 17 October 1992, after successfully defeating multiple divisions of Saddam's Republican Guard (his best) in Desert Storm, it rolled up its colors for the last time in Frankfurt, Germany.
The 82nd Airborne Division was born on August 15th, 1942. It had served previously as a leg infantry unit, in World War I, in the "organized reserves," and had on Active Duty again since 25 March 1942, on August 15th, it became the Nation's first Airborne Division.
Jumping out of planes, trusting a few strings tied to silk to slow your fall enough, that you will be healthy enough to fight an entrenched enemy, after you hit the ground, takes a special resolve. It's not freefall parachuting, but this means to get to the battle was not the sole factor in their success on the battlefield. They trained harder. They learned more. They fought harder than other Troops. The Germans nicknamed them "Devils in Baggy Pants" while the official motto was the "All-American" Division, as they had originally been consituted with citizens of all 48 states on August 5th, 1917.
Being the best doesn't mean never losing comrades. The leg 82nd fought hard in WWI and from May to November of 1918 lost 995 Soldiers, Killed in Action, 7,082 Wounded in Action, and gained two Medals of Honor; Colonel Emory Pike, KIA 1918, and Sergeant Alvin C York, of Tennessee. SGT York's expert marksmanship had led to masses of German soldiers surrendering to him in the final weeks of World War I. It was deactivated on 27 May 1919 when it returned from the War.
Great Generals trace their history to their time in the 82nd including Omar Bradleey, Maxwell Taylor, James Gavin, Matthew Ridgway, George Van Pope, and Matthew D Query. Olympic Medalists have served in the 82nd.
The first Airborne Attack was onto Sicily on July 9th, 1943, followed shortly by parachuting into Salerno on 13 September 1943. It continued to fight in Italy until pulled and reinforced to prepare for D-Day. On the 5th and 6th of June, 1944 the 505th, 507th, and 508th Parachute Infantry Regiments of the 82nd parachuted into Normandy to free Europe. Scattered across the battlefield, it fought as small units, retaining all ground it gained in 33 days of battle that cost it 5,245 Soldiers. During WWII, 1,619 Soldiers of the 82nd were Killed in Action, 6,560 were Wounded in Action, and 332 Died of Wounds, in less than 2 years. Japan surrendered before the 82nd could be sent to finish them off.
In April 1965, the 82nd was sent to the Domincan Republic where is ended a Civil War. It would be used significantly in Viet Nam, though would not earn a combat jump there.
In 1967, it was sent to Detroit to end the race riots, which took it less than 2 days.
From the end of World War II, the 82nd Airborne was the Nation's Rapid Deployment Force. It was required to be ready to have the Division anywhere in the world in 72 hours and a Brigade in the fight in 24 hours. This kept it out of Korea as a strategic reserve against the Communist threat of World War III. It was alerted for operations in Jordan in September 1970, the Middle East in 1973 & 1980, for Zaire in 1978, and for Iran in 1979.
On 23 October 1983, along with the 1st and 2nd Battalions of 75th Ranger Regiment, it defeated the Communists on Grenada, marking the first time since World War II that Communism lost a Nation. In March of 1988, it parachuted into Honduras sending Communist Nicaraguans scurrying out of that country. In 1989, it jumped into Panama, defeating the drug lord, Manuel Noreiga.
On 8 August 1990, it became the first Troops to draw a line in the sand against Saddam Hussein's Iraqi Forces, which were threatening to invade Saudi Arabia, after having overrun Kuwait on the 2nd. It would remain on the ground until April 1991, after having provided the Northernmost and deepest penetration into Iraq of the ground war.
It was sent to end the violence in Haiti in September 1994, ready for another combat jump, the threat of which was sufficient to cause the belligerent leader to end his rule. It was called up for deployments in Bosnia and Kosovo, making its combat jump entry on 1 October 1999.
Its first deployment to Afghanistan was in June 2002 and elements of it crossed into Iraq on 21 March 2003.
The Division has earned 4 Presidential Unit Citations, a Meritorious Unit Citation, a Valorous Unit Citation, 3 French Croix de Guerre (2 with Palm), a Belgian Fourrageere, and a Dutch Military William Award. The most recent awards were for OIF 1.
The name of the anonymous U.S. Navy SEAL who penned a book about the special U.S. military team that killed terrorist leader Osama bin Ladin last year has been revealed.
U.S. media report the author is Matt Bisssonette, who retired from the Navy shortly after the operation in Pakistan that killed bin Laden.
U.S. publisher Dutton had asked news organization to withhold his identity.
The U.S. Department of Defense has said if a member of the special U.S. military team that killed bin Ladin has disclosed classified information in the book, the matter could be referred to the U.S. Department of Justice.
The CIA has also said it had not reviewed the book to ensure no classified material is revealed. Former military and intelligence personnel are required to submit any writings to their agencies before the work is published.
Dutton says the book was reviewed by a former special-operations attorney.
The book's release comes as the Obama administration is being criticized for leaking classified details about the bin Laden raid for what some say are political reasons. VoA.
The defeat of Imperial Japan & Nazi Germany may have ended the shooting wars, but it was not the end of Our Commitment, and it wasn't the end of dangers. Whole German and Japanese cities had been destroyed by allied bombs, but while we rebuilt our future allies, the Communists oppressed our future enemies.
The prognosis was bleak as the red flag of communism spread rapidly across Europe and Asia. The Cold War which began on the heels of WWII, would last until 1990. It would include the seige of Berlin, the hot wars of Korea, Viet Nam, Afghanistan, Grenada, Colombia, Nicarauga, El Salvador, and spawn the Islamist terrorists we fight now in the War On Terror. The Communist Cold War "hero" Che Gueverra would slaughter thousands of Bolivian peasants, after executing Cubans en masse.
But this video shows the first few years of the Communist rise to power.
In combat, there are no "days off." The enemy will attack at the time of his choosing, and he will choose the day he thinks you will relax your guard. On 4 July 2009, the enemy attacked, and Able Company was ready:
Remember those that put their lives on the line, so you can rest comfortably in peace.
The defeat of Imperial Japan & Nazi Germany may have ended the shooting wars, but it was not the end of Our Commitment, and it wasn't the end of dangers. Whole German and Japanese cities had been destroyed by allied bombs, but while we rebuilt our future allies, the Communists oppressed our future enemies.
The prognosis was bleak as the red flag of communism spread rapidly across Europe and Asia. The Cold War which began on the heels of WWII, would last until 1990. It would include the seige of Berlin, the hot wars of Korea, Viet Nam, Afghanistan, Grenada, Colombia, Nicarauga, El Salvador, and spawn the Islamist terrorists we fight now in the War On Terror. The Communist Cold War "hero" Che Gueverra would slaughter thousands of Bolivian peasants, after executing Cubans en masse.
But this video shows the first few years of the Communist rise to power.
Celebrate the 4th with a reading of the Declaration that created this Nation, and the celebration of Our Freedoms on this day.
The Declaration of Independence: A Transcription
IN CONGRESS, July 4, 1776.
The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America,
When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, --That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.--Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.
He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good. He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them. He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only. He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures. He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people. He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected; whereby the Legislative powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within. He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands. He has obstructed the Administration of Justice, by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary powers. He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone, for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries. He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harrass our people, and eat out their substance. He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures. He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil power. He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation: For Quartering large bodies of armed troops among us: For protecting them, by a mock Trial, from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States: For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world: For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent: For depriving us in many cases, of the benefits of Trial by Jury: For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these Colonies: For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws, and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments: For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever. He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us. He has plundered our seas, ravaged our Coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people. He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation. He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the executioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands. He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages, whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.
In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.
Nor have We been wanting in attentions to our Brittish brethren. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which, would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace Friends.
We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare, That these United Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States; that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do. And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor.
The 56 signatures on the Declaration appear in the positions indicated:
Column 1 Georgia: Button Gwinnett Lyman Hall George Walton
Column 2 North Carolina: William Hooper Joseph Hewes John Penn South Carolina: Edward Rutledge Thomas Heyward, Jr. Thomas Lynch, Jr. Arthur Middleton
Column 3 Massachusetts: John Hancock Maryland: Samuel Chase William Paca Thomas Stone Charles Carroll of Carrollton Virginia: George Wythe Richard Henry Lee Thomas Jefferson Benjamin Harrison Thomas Nelson, Jr. Francis Lightfoot Lee Carter Braxton
Column 4 Pennsylvania: Robert Morris Benjamin Rush Benjamin Franklin John Morton George Clymer James Smith George Taylor James Wilson George Ross Delaware: Caesar Rodney George Read Thomas McKean
Column 5 New York: William Floyd Philip Livingston Francis Lewis Lewis Morris New Jersey: Richard Stockton John Witherspoon Francis Hopkinson John Hart Abraham Clark
Column 6 New Hampshire: Josiah Bartlett William Whipple Massachusetts: Samuel Adams John Adams Robert Treat Paine Elbridge Gerry Rhode Island: Stephen Hopkins William Ellery Connecticut: Roger Sherman Samuel Huntington William Williams Oliver Wolcott New Hampshire: Matthew Thornton
Britain's Queen Elizabeth has engaged in an historic handshake with a former leader of the separatist group that waged a bloody decades-long fight for Northern Ireland's independence from British rule.
The handshake between the monarch and Martin McGuinness, a former leader of the Irish Republican Army-turned deputy first minister of Northern Ireland, took place Wednesday at the start of a private social event in a Belfast theater. The two were expected to exchange a public handshake after the event.
The Rock of Gibraltar has not only become a definition of permanence, it has also over the years been synonymous with UK military power.
It's name gives the Royal Marines their motto, after their role in establishing Britain's strong point at the gateway to the Mediterranean.
But like everywhere else in the defence world, the Rock is having to take its share of cutbacks.
Under a programme known as Project Euston, in five years the force deployed there from the UK will have fallen by a third and millions of pounds worth of real estate will be handed over.
By John Valceanu, AFPS, WASHINGTON, June 17, 2012 - A hundred and fifty years after Confederate Army Maj. Gen. Thomas J. "Stonewall" Jackson's Valley Campaign, a renowned Civil War historian spoke about it at the Pentagon, describing how a great success can boost a military leader's reputation to the point that it has a major impact on his future operations.
Robert K. Krick delivered a presentation June 15, titled "Stonewall Jackson's Rise to Prominence and the Shenandoah Valley Campaign," as part of a speaker series sponsored by the Historical Office within the Office of the Secretary of Defense. Krick spent four decades as a National Park Service historian and retired as the chief historian at the Fredericksburg and Spotsylvania National Military Park in Virginia. He is the author of 20 books and more than 200 articles on the American Civil War.
During the Valley Campaign, which lasted from late March until early June 1862, Jackson used speed and bold tactics that enabled him to successfully engage much more numerous Union forces and prevent them from reinforcing an offensive against the Confederate capital of Richmond, Va. Jackson drove his 17,000 men to march 646 miles in 48 days in Virginia's Shenandoah Valley, defeating Union Armies totaling more than 52,000 men in several battles.
CLEVELAND -- A somber crowd gathered in front of the traveling Vietnam War Memorial Wall in Voinovich Park for a wreath-laying ceremony during Marine Week Cleveland June 12, 2012. Although the wall lists the names of the fallen from the conflict in Vietnam, the service also commemorated those who paid the ultimate price in Iraq and Afghanistan.
A Marine Corps bugler plays taps while Lt. Gen. Steven A. Hummer, commander of Marine Corps Forces Reserve and Marine Corps Forces North, salutes alongside Gold Star family member Sandra Mendez Ruiz during the wreath-laying ceremony in front of the traveling Vietnam War Memorial Wall at Voinovich Park in Cleveland June 12, 2012. The wreath-laying ceremonies will take place daily until Marine Week ends June 17. Ruiz laid the wreath in honor of her nephew Lance Cpl. David Alberto Mendez, who was killed in Iraq six years ago, as well as every fallen Marine from wars, both past and present. "When David died, I lost David, but I gained a family."
“We’ve been out here 14 hours a day doing this and still every ceremony we do is very emotional,” said Staff Sgt. Matthew Drake, staff noncommissioned officer in charge of the Marine Week honor guard at the Vietnam War Memorial Wall.
Some would have us believe that there can never be a reason to go to war. Others portend that only a war in which we have no National Interest is one in which we should engage. And still others say we should only fight when we have an unparalled National Interest.
Some say we should never be involved in a civil war. Some say we should only be involved in peacekeeping, particularly in civil wars. Some say we should only fight after we've been attacked. And some say that attack must occur on our own soil before we should fight. And then there's the age old philosophical question: If we knew then what we know now, should we have assassinated Hitler, preventing World War II, before he took power?
Is it really war, if we only send flying robots to bomb specific mud huts? Or if only the enemy calls it war and we pretend it's just a common crime? Is it war if the enemy has a flag, and are still only fighting to get a nation, or an empire?
The decision to go to war should not be made lightly. It is a decision to have humans kill other humans, but that is sometimes the only way to save the lives of more humans. The ability to win a war rests on one fundamental principal: breaking the enemy's will to fight. There are many ways that may be accomplished, but to win a war, one must cause the enemy to choose to end the fight.
Ellen Levitsky Orkin, 92, left, and Dorothy Levitsky-Sinner, 95, sisters who served as nurses during World War II, attend a plaque dedication ceremony in their honor in Bolleville, France, June 4, 2012. Bolleville officials made the sisters honorary citizens for their work at a local hospital during the war. "We were just doing what we were told to do - our jobs," said Orkin, a former Army 1st lieutenant. Her sister was an Army 2nd lieutenant.
The Fort Carson Mounted Color Guard leads soldiers into Iron Horse Park, concluding an installation run marking the beginning of Iron Horse Week, June 4, 2012. During the five-day event, soldiers celebrated the legacy of the 4th Inf. Div. by competing..
FORT CARSON, Colo. (June 6, 2012) -- More than 10,000 Fort Carson Soldiers took to the streets, June 4, in a show of solidarity and Army tradition, officially beginning Iron Horse Week.
Maj. Gen. Joseph Anderson, 4th Infantry Division and Fort Carson commanding general, and Command Sgt. Maj. Brian Stall, senior enlisted leader, led brigade combat teams and tenant units from across post during a four-mile run, signaling the start of a week of friendly competition, unit camaraderie and esprit de corps.
"I'd ask you to enjoy it, make the most of it," Anderson said. "It's all in the spirit of competition, but it is also in the spirit of fun as we build up toward the division's 95th birthday."
John Perozzi, a D-Day veteran who served with the 82nd Airborne Division, returned to Normandy, France, this year for the 68th anniversary commemorations and to visit his fallen buddies at the Normandy American Cemetery, overlooking Omaha beach.
SAINTE-MERE-EGLISE, France (June 6, 2012) -- When Eugene Cook jumped into Normandy during the predawn hours of June 6, 1944, he landed several miles from his intended drop zone.
Alone in the dark French countryside, the young 101st Airborne Division paratrooper from Georgia assembled his rifle, got his bearings and began looking for other Americans among Normandy's hedgerows. In the days and weeks that followed, Cook took part in the now famous battles that began the liberation of France and led to Allied victory over Nazi Germany.
Cook, 87, was among the handful of World War II veterans who attended the 68th anniversary of the D-Day landings this week. U.S. service members from all the military branches took part in honoring them, something Cook said he was glad to see.
"We have to commemorate the lives of the guys we left here," Cook said. "They gave their lives for us and we should show them thanks."
USACAPOC(A) remembers D-Day - Task Force 68, which is made up of paratroopers from U.S., Germany, France, Holland, and United Kingdom, re-enacted the D-Day airborne operation on the La Fiere fields near Ste. Mere Eglise, France to commemorate the heroic acts of World War II...
NORMANDY, France (June 4, 2012) -- When U.S. paratroopers jumped onto French soil during World War II, they were greeted with gunfire and bombs. Today, 68 years later, they were met with cheers and handshakes.
Task Force 68, which is made up of U.S. service members from Fort Bragg, N.C., British, Dutch, German, and French soldiers, held a commemorative airborne operation in honor of their forefathers who landed on the shores Normandy and fought their way through Nazi infested France. Included in the task force are paratroopers from the 82nd Airborne Division, U.S. Army Civil Affairs & Psychological Operations Command (Airborne) and the 824th Quartermaster Company.
The muddy fields of La Fiere, outside of Ste. Mere Eglise, France, hosted thousands of on-lookers, June 3, to ensure that the bravery and heroic acts of World War II and D-Day are never forgotten.
Winston Churchill speech in the House of Commons on D-Day:
[...] I have also to announce to the House that during the night and the early hours of this morning the first of the series of landings in force upon the European Continent has taken place. In this case the liberating assault fell upon the coast of France. An immense armada of upwards of 4,000 ships, together with several thousand smaller craft, crossed the Channel. Massed airborne landings have been successfully effected behind the enemy lines, and landings on the beaches are proceeding at various points at the present time. The fire of the shore batteries has been largely quelled. The obstacles that were constructed in the sea have not proved so difficult as was apprehended. The Anglo-American Allies are sustained by about 11,000 firstline aircraft, which can be drawn upon as may be needed for the purposes of the battle. I cannot, of course, commit myself to any particular details. Reports are coming in in rapid succession. So far the Commanders who are engaged report that everything is proceeding according to plan. And what a plan! This vast operation is undoubtedly the most complicated and difficult that has ever taken place. It involves tides, wind, waves, visibility, both from the air and the sea standpoint, and the combined employment of land, air and sea forces in the highest degree of intimacy and in contact with conditions which could not and cannot be fully foreseen....[...]
Tens of thousands of people in Hong Kong have marked the 23rd anniversary of China's Tiananmen Square protests and the deadly government crackdown that followed.
Demonstrators held a candlelight vigil Monday, shouting “long live democracy” and “never forget June 4.”
Hundreds of demonstrators also gathered in Taiwan's capital, Taipei.
The demonstrations in Hong Kong and Taiwan were in contrast to mainland China where the anniversary has never been publicly marked. Instead, China's internet sensors blocked searches about the anniversary. They also blocked the term “Shanghai stock market” after the index fell 64.89 points and Chinese microblogs buzzed with conspiracy theories. The numbers match, in apparent coincidence, the calendar numbers for the June 4, 1989 crackdown.
DAKAR - The sentencing of former Liberian president Charles Taylor on Wednesday was heralded as an historic moment for Sierra Leone. But in neighboring Liberia, many say the justice and reconciliation process is only just beginning. As Taylor was handed a 50-year jail term, Liberian rights groups and activists were debating whether Taylor's allies and rivals should also be subject to international justice.
The sentencing of Charles Taylor for war crimes committed during Sierra Leone's conflict has sparked debate in the former leader's native Liberia.
Rolling Thunder, 2012 At the Pentagon in Arlington, Va., thousands of motorcyclists gathered to participate in the 25th "Rolling Thunder" motorcycle rally, May 27, 2012. The event is in its 25th year now. Participants from around the United States gathered at the Pentagon...
WASHINGTON (Army News Service, May 29, 2012) -- "The guy in the cage over there kind of put a knot in my stomach," said Vietnam veteran Ron Lambert.
On a grassy hill overlooking the north parking lot at the Pentagon, Lambert sat with his wife of 40 years, Eileen. In the lot below, teeming with chrome and leather, was the largest portion of an estimated 400,000 motorcyclists who would participate in the 2012 Rolling Thunder "Ride for Freedom" around the National Mall in Washington, D.C., May 27, as part of Memorial Day weekend events in the nation's capital.
The event, now in its 25th year, is meant to draw attention to service members who went missing in action and are still missing, or who were captured as prisoners of war and who have yet to be returned home.
WASHINGTON, May 28, 2012 – The Defense Department’s most senior leaders today honored Vietnam War veterans, including their own friends and mentors, in a commemoration at the Vietnam Veterans Memorial wall here they said was long overdue.
Defense Secretary Leon E. Panetta escorts 93-year-old Sarah Shay to lay a wreath in remembrance of her son, Maj. Donald Shay Jr., during a ceremony commemorating the 50th anniversary of the Vietnam War at the Vietnam Veterans Memorial wall in Washington, D.C., May 28, 2012. Maj. Shay has been missing in action from the Vietnam War for 42 years. DOD photo by U.S. Navy Petty Officer 1st Class Chad J. McNeeley
Defense Secretary Leon E. Panetta, Army Gen. Martin E. Dempsey, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and actor Tom Selleck all mentioned friends and mentors whose names are among the 58,282 etched into the black granite panels. They joined President Barack Obama in a ceremony marking the beginning of the 50th anniversary of the war.
The Vietnam War ended in April 1975 when North Vietnamese troops took the South Vietnamese capital of Saigon. While the end date is a certainty, it is a mirror of the war and the divisions it caused that Americans still disagree on when U.S. involvement in the country began.
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Go to War against the Nazis with SSG Smith of the 94th Infantry Division. Review: http://waronterrornews.typepad.com/home/2010/04/everymans-war-vet.html.html
Ace Of Spades: Why Language Matters In this article, Ace of Spades demonstrates how the writing style of "journalists" and other writers is purposely used to influence the electorate. He explains this far better than I have been able to do, but this is the foundation of why I could no longer be silent.
This is the document that clearly authorizes what the Federal government is allowed to do, what authorities and responsibilities the separate entities of the Government have. It is what Our Troops swear to defend and what our politicians and judges have sworn to uphold:
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