Friday, October 27, 2006

Trash is Trash, Except . . .

While the news media is trying hard to keep the explicit IMs of Representative Mark Foley on the front pages, it is also trying hard not to know about or print the explicit passages written in books to far more people by Senatorial candidate James Webb in Florida.

Foley is an R and Webb is a D. Maybe that is the difference.


Sunday, October 15, 2006

Benedict Arnold and His Descendants

One of several families who arrived by boat to establish Rhode Island Colony was the William Arnold clan. He had several children. I am descended from three of those children, but not from the fourth. The fourth son was named Benedict Arnold. No doubt he was a fine man, but it was his grandson or great-grandson who was the infamous traitor to his new country.

It was a pleasure to find that I was not a descendant of the Benedict Arnold clan. But he has plenty descendants in spirit if not in blood. Look at Hanoi Jane Fonda. Benedict just wanted power and position while Jane wanted to enforce her superior wisdom on us. It must have taken a monumental sense of self-importance to betray her country as she did.

Some think Jane Fonda got away with it—that is, was not tried for treason. But she did not get away with it at all. It is true that she did not go to prison, but look at how the general public remembers her. Few would want to be remembered that way.

After researching a book and writing 150 pages of it, I am even more aware of traitors in our midst. I am also aware of how the meanings of words have changed. My book is about the way civilians lived and contributed to the war effort during WWII. During those four years of strife when as many as a thousand military men died during a training mission with no battle going on, the American public put its head down and plugged away toward victory, one day at a time.

A few labor union leaders were the malefactors at home during WWII. They were willing to cripple the war effort just to satisfy their own selfish desires. Some of them were Communist and others were just short-sighted. But for the most part we all worked together to defeat not one, but two enemies.

Yes, Presidents Roosevelt and Truman had their detractors in America, but the Axis enemies had no reason to think a change in leadership here would result in a reduction in force of our troops at the battlefield.

Nowadays, the word “patriotic” has changed to mean an action that will weaken our country publicly. Our enemies can see what is going on. They know they can affect our elections because one party has told them so. The stated enemies of our country know they have allies in this land. These allies will shut down our intelligence operations, will open our borders, and will pull out our troops, if they get control of our government. That is called patriotism today but would have been called treachery during WWII years ago. I was there. I remember.

The simple fact is that dissention here results in a stiffening of resolve for our enemies in the Mideast. It kills our young men and women in uniform.

Benedict Arnold wanted power and position. Today, opposers to the protection of American citizens want no less. If they can convince enough Americans to vote their way, they will get their power back; but who will look out for the safety of our citizens?

It won’t be the Benedict Arnolds and the Jane Fondas of the country, the Dainty Americans with no will and no plan.

Thursday, October 05, 2006

Speaker Denny Hastert

I see by the newspaper that Speaker of the House Denny Hastert is in trouble. Not because he did something, but because he didn’t do something—fast enough.

Did Mr. Hastert fail to kill Usama binLaden?

Did Mr. Hastert play sex games with a young page girl in his office while on duty?

Did Mr. Hastert lie to a Grand Jury?

Did Mr. Hastert store ninety thousand dollars of marked money in his refrigerator?

Did Mr. Hastert proclaim that gay men were pedophiles?

Did Mr. Hastert loose a child rapist on the public?

He didn’t do any of the above, but they were done by people of the opposite party. There was no outcry.

What did Mr. Hastert do? He failed to expel a Congressman fast enough. The Congressman wrote nasty text messages which Mr. Hastert did not know about. There was no physical damage to another person as a result of Mr. Hastert’s lack of fast action.

Yet, from the outcry of those who either ignored or protected people who were involved in the dastardly deeds listed above, is enormous. The outrage they suppressed when obvious crimes were committed by Democrats has now been found.

It is good to let it out. I did not know the mainstream media had any outrage in their systems at all. They have held it in for so many years that I thought it had atrophied.

And now I understand. Outrage can appear only when it is directed at Republicans.

Understanding always helps.


Monday, October 02, 2006

Gold Stars and Dainty Americans


It was not very long after the WWII began that lists of names began to appear in the newspaper. These were the names of the local young people who had given everything they had for their country, the ones who were killed by the enemy, or were killed by accident or friendly fire. Every day for four years more names were listed.

Small banners began appearing in windows of houses. A broad red trim surrounded a white field with at least one star in the middle. A blue star indicated that a member of the family was in the military. A gold star signified that the family in that house had lost a son or a husband or a father (later, it could have been a daughter) in the war. The flags may have turned yellow from exposure to the sun, but they were seldom removed.

In a way, the gold star flags were a comfort to those who also had lost family. The flags made the statement, “You are not alone.” They were also reminders that this particular family had “given until it hurt” to the war effort and until you did at least that much, you should not complain. In every city across the country houses had windows with flags, lots of flags and lots of gold stars. The silence of mourning civilians bore testimony to their dedication to freedom and liberty. They make the whiners and complainers of the present era seem ridiculously small by comparison.

Perhaps this is indeed, the era of the dainty American.