Wednesday, September 17, 2014
Obama Declines to Attend Memorial Dedication for Disabled Veterans: President’s decision not to attend is among first in recent history
Via LH
President Barack Obama has declined to attend a dedication ceremony in October for a new memorial honoring American veterans who have been disabled fighting for their country in wars, according to sources close to the event.
The American Veterans Disabled for Life Memorial (AVDLM), the first such memorial of its kind, is set to be dedicated during a ceremony on Oct. 5 near the National Mall in downtown Washington, D.C.
However, Obama, who was first invited to attend the event in January, will not be among those in attendance, according to a source who is familiar with the situation.
This would be among the first national memorials in recent history not to be formally accepted in person by a sitting U.S. president.
I am glad he isn't, as he would only disgrace them all.
President Barack Obama has declined to attend a dedication ceremony in October for a new memorial honoring American veterans who have been disabled fighting for their country in wars, according to sources close to the event.
The American Veterans Disabled for Life Memorial (AVDLM), the first such memorial of its kind, is set to be dedicated during a ceremony on Oct. 5 near the National Mall in downtown Washington, D.C.
However, Obama, who was first invited to attend the event in January, will not be among those in attendance, according to a source who is familiar with the situation.
This would be among the first national memorials in recent history not to be formally accepted in person by a sitting U.S. president.
More @ The Washington Free Beacon
Amnesty: You will be impacted by the Scottish vote tomorrow
A very important event is happening in Scotland tomorrow. You might not be personally or emotionally involved, but you will be impacted
Setting
aside the Scottish question, consider the impact of a huge U.S. amnesty
for illegal immigrants either dictated as planned by President Obama or
willingly agreed to by a Congressional majority.
Would
the U.S. hold together after a huge amnesty and the tsunami of new
immigration that usually follows them? With no apology whatsoever to
George W. Bush, no nation can exist very long as a mere idea, however
noble. As we should all be aware of now, ideas change. Real nations are
made up of flesh and blood people and families. They must have either a
common culture or mutually compatible cultures to endure peacefully.
Language, history, religion, and ethnicity, like it or not, are always a
factor in national unity. National loyalties are possible only if these
things are either mutually compatible or mutually sympathetic.Stable
nations are a delicate balance of families, common culture, mutual
compatibility and common understanding and sympathies.
If Scotland leaves, will Wales, and Northern Ireland remain for long?
Part
of the problem in the Middle East, is that Britain and other European
powers carved out nations that were never nations. Iraqi loyalty may
mean something to Sunni Arabs in Iraq, but it means little to Kurds,
even though they are also Sunni Muslims, and practically nothing to the
Shia Muslims on the border between eastern Iraq and Iran. Such nations
can usually be held together only by powerful autocratic leaders, and
these often become ruthless in their struggle to survive and rule.
I
hope such a disastrous amnesty can be avoided. But if it were
implemented, it would have a high probability of eventually driving the
nation apart. Here are some thoughts:
Would solid conservative states be content to stay in a union permanently dominated by the Left? An anti-Christian Left?
Would
California stay? Would other states want California to stay considering
their growing fiscal problems, radical dominated politics, and huge
electoral dominance?
Would Southern states begin to secede rather than be subjected to Obamacratic dominance?
We
are living in interesting times. I only wish our political leaders
would do their homework and try to stay several steps ahead of national
disaster.
--Michael Scruggs
=====================
The Origins and Implications of the Scottish Referendum
The idea of Scottish independence has
moved from the implausible to the very possible. Whether or not it
actually happens, the idea that the union of England and Scotland, which
has existed for more than 300 years, could be dissolved has enormous
implications in its own right, and significant implications for Europe
and even for global stability.
The United Kingdom
was the center of gravity of the international system from the end of
the Napoleonic Wars until World War II. It crafted an imperial structure
that shaped not only the international system but also the internal
political order of countries as diverse as the United States and India.
The United Kingdom devised and drove the Industrial Revolution. In many
ways, this union was a pivot of world history. To realize it might be
dissolved is startling and reveals important things about the direction
of the world.
Scotland and England are historical enemies.
More @ Stratfor
Free Scotland!
Via Red
Scotland votes on independence from the United Kingdom tomorrow. I’ll be rooting very hard for a yes vote.
The primary reason I strongly support Scottish independence is because it will serve as a beautiful illustration of how civilized unions respond when a geographic territory votes to secede. During all the debate leading up to the vote, no one has suggested that England should or will invade Scotland to keep them in the United Kingdom. A military invasion is, in fact, unthinkable.
Hmmm… How are all the neo”cons,” Straussians, Jaffaites, American nationalists, Declarationists (there is much overlap among these) and assorted other Lincoln idolaters going to explain this away? The clear demonstration that territorial secession can happen without bloodshed will serve as a stark reminder to modern day Unionists that our own bloody clash didn’t have to be that way.
Some may think this a petty and spiteful reason to support Scottish independence, but as a long time veteran of the intra-conservative internet Lincoln wars, I relish the opportunity to give the other side a great big “Uh! In ya face!”
But beyond my possible spitefulness, there are good reasons for conservatives to support ethnic independence movements, Scotland and beyond. Smaller ethnically based states represent a more authentic basis for shared governance vs. the modern nation state which is supposedly organized around some proposition or largely imagined bond, such as the largely imagined bond that says Sunnis, Shiites, Chaldeans, Kurds, etc. all belong together in some figment on a map called Iraq.
Scotland votes on independence from the United Kingdom tomorrow. I’ll be rooting very hard for a yes vote.
The primary reason I strongly support Scottish independence is because it will serve as a beautiful illustration of how civilized unions respond when a geographic territory votes to secede. During all the debate leading up to the vote, no one has suggested that England should or will invade Scotland to keep them in the United Kingdom. A military invasion is, in fact, unthinkable.
Hmmm… How are all the neo”cons,” Straussians, Jaffaites, American nationalists, Declarationists (there is much overlap among these) and assorted other Lincoln idolaters going to explain this away? The clear demonstration that territorial secession can happen without bloodshed will serve as a stark reminder to modern day Unionists that our own bloody clash didn’t have to be that way.
Some may think this a petty and spiteful reason to support Scottish independence, but as a long time veteran of the intra-conservative internet Lincoln wars, I relish the opportunity to give the other side a great big “Uh! In ya face!”
But beyond my possible spitefulness, there are good reasons for conservatives to support ethnic independence movements, Scotland and beyond. Smaller ethnically based states represent a more authentic basis for shared governance vs. the modern nation state which is supposedly organized around some proposition or largely imagined bond, such as the largely imagined bond that says Sunnis, Shiites, Chaldeans, Kurds, etc. all belong together in some figment on a map called Iraq.
More @ Intellectual Conservative
Guerrilla Warfare, Democracy, and The Fate of The Confederacy
Marcellus Jerome Clarke AKA Sue Mundy
"I believe in and die for the Confederate cause."
One of the most enduring explanations for why the Confederacy lost the
Civil War asserts that the Rebels were too democratic. First proposed
by David H. Donald as a variation on a theme by Frank L. Owsley, it
has survived, with some modification by recent scholars, as a viable
part of most multicausal explanations of Confederate defeat.
To date,
the argument has rested largely on the supposed political blunders of
the central government, in its indelicate handling of issues that
infringed on personal liberties or that injured the sensibilities of
powerful state politicians, to demonstrate the disruptive effect of
Confederate individualism. Occasional references are also made to
problems caused by the independent spirit of the Confederate soldier,
but these discussions tend to convey a greater sense of pride or
respect for this quality than rebuke.
Little has been said about how
military policy might have been influenced by an underlying tension in
Confederate society between democracy and authority, between
individualism and discipline, or between popular conceptions of the war
and the government's conduct of the war. Conscription, probably the
most divisive issue involving individual fights, cut across both social
and military lines, but another pivotal military issue eclipsed even
conscription: guerrilla warfare.
Indeed, guerrilla warfare sparked
sharp policy debates in both North and South that affected the outcome
of the war in no small way.
More @ Guerrilla Warfare Tactics
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Feds in El Paso: Rep. O’Rourke Called to Ban Contact with Judicial Watch
Via avordvet
Federal law enforcement sources in El Paso say that a United States congressman called their office to prohibit contact with Judicial Watch in the aftermath of a disturbing story confirming that Islamic terrorists are operating in the Mexican border city of Ciudad Juarez.
Sources tell JW that Beto O’Rourke, a Democrat who represents El Paso in the U.S. House of Representatives, telephoned the area offices of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) and the U.S. Border Patrol (USBP) in an effort to identify—and evidently intimidate—sources that may have been used by JW. On August 29 JW reported that the militant group Islamic State of Iraq and Greater Syria (ISIS) is working in Juarez and planning to attack the United States with car bombs or other vehicle borne improvised explosive devices (VBIED).
Federal law enforcement sources in El Paso say that a United States congressman called their office to prohibit contact with Judicial Watch in the aftermath of a disturbing story confirming that Islamic terrorists are operating in the Mexican border city of Ciudad Juarez.
Sources tell JW that Beto O’Rourke, a Democrat who represents El Paso in the U.S. House of Representatives, telephoned the area offices of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) and the U.S. Border Patrol (USBP) in an effort to identify—and evidently intimidate—sources that may have been used by JW. On August 29 JW reported that the militant group Islamic State of Iraq and Greater Syria (ISIS) is working in Juarez and planning to attack the United States with car bombs or other vehicle borne improvised explosive devices (VBIED).
More @ Judicial Watch
Abolition in the Old South
What
the South feared most with its ever-increasing black population from
1750 onward was slave revolt and massacre. Despite colonial legislature
attempts in Virginia and North Carolina to control or stop the British
and New England transatlantic slave trade which brought blacks to the
South, the Crown forbid interference with their colonial labor supply.
Bernhard Thuersam, Chairman
North Carolina War Between the States Sesquicentennial Commission
"Unsurpassed Valor, Courage and Devotion to Liberty"
"The Official Website of the North Carolina WBTS Sesquicentennial"
Abolition in the Old South:
"The
American Revolution swelled the ranks of the tiny Southern free black
population. In the years following the Revolution, the number of free
Negroes increased manyfold, so that by the end of the first decade of
the nineteenth century there were over 100,000 free Negroes in the
Southern States . . . The free Negro caste had grown from a fragment of
the colonial population to a sizable minority throughout the South.
[In]
the North, abolition met stiff opposition. In Rhode Island and
Connecticut, which had the largest proportion of Negroes in New England,
antislavery forces could enact only gradual-emancipation laws.
Pennsylvania enacted a gradual-emancipation act in 1780, but, despite of
its many Quakers, never legislated immediate abolition. Lawmakers in
New York and New Jersey, where the ratio of blacks to whites was three
times that of Pennsylvania, repeatedly rebuffed antislavery forces and
refused to enact even gradual emancipation for another twenty years.
Significantly, emancipation laws in both New York and New Jersey
compensated slaveholders for their property. Only after property rights
were satisfied were human rights secured.
In
1782, Virginia repealed its fifty-nine year-old prohibition on private
acts of manumission. Slaveholders were now free to manumit any adult
slave under forty-five by deed or will. North Carolina slaveholders
could free their slaves...for meritorious service and with the
permission of the county court. Liberalized provisions for manumissions
were extended to the new States and territories of the South. Kentucky
adopted the Virginia law in 1792, and the Missouri Territory accepted a
similar rule in 1804. Almost immediately slaveholders took advantage of
the greatly liberalized laws. Throughout the South, but especially in
the upper South, hundreds of masters freed their slaves. Although
manumission at times had nothing to do with anti-slavery principles,
equalitarian ideals motivated most manumitters in the years following
the Revolution.
Beginning
in 1792, the revolt on Saint-Domingue sent thousands of refugees
fleeing toward American shores. Most were white, but among them were
many light-skinned free people of color who had been caught on the wrong
side of the ever-changing lines of battle . . . [though Southerners]
feared the influx of brown émigrés. The States of the lower South, ever
edgy about slave rebellions, quickly barred West Indian free people of
color from entering their boundaries, and other States later followed
their lead. A mass meeting in Charleston urged the expulsion of "the
French Negroes" . . . In Savannah, nervous official barred any ship that
had touched Saint-Domingue from entering the harbor."
(Slaves Without Masters: The Free Negro in the Antebellum South, Ira Berlin, The New Press, 1974, excerpts pp. 15-36)
BS: House approves Obama request for Syria in broad bipartisan vote
Via avordvet
The House overwhelmingly voted Wednesday to grant President Obama
authority to train and arm moderate (? They chop off less heads or ?) Syrian rebels waging war against
Islamic extremists.
Despite vocal opposition from both war-weary liberals and defense hawks who feel the Syria plan should include more robust steps, majorities in both conferences voted 273-156 to back Obama’s plan to give military aid to vetted members of the Free Syrian Army.
The “yes”
vote was made up of 159 Republicans and 114 Democrats; opposition was
just as bipartisan, with 85 Democrats and 71 Republicans voting no. The
Syria language was considered as an amendment to a stopgap funding bill
to avert a government shutdown on Oct. 1.
How much more worthless can the Republicans get? I didn't even see how much we authorized.
=======================
ISIS strike deal with moderate Syrian rebels
===========================
Despite vocal opposition from both war-weary liberals and defense hawks who feel the Syria plan should include more robust steps, majorities in both conferences voted 273-156 to back Obama’s plan to give military aid to vetted members of the Free Syrian Army.
More @ The Hill
1974 Chevrolet Nickey Camaro L88 Stage III
This expertly restored 1974 Nickey Camaro Stage III possesses great significance as likely the last L88 Stage III Super Car conversion performed by Nickey Chevrolet before it closed for good in December 1973. According to Nickey Chevrolet Performance Manager Don Swiatek, the car was ordered by a customer who had seen a May 1973 Hot Rod Magazine article about a Nickey L88 Nova, but wanted the Stage III conversion done to a new Camaro, which he ordered with LT trim, power steering and power front disc brakes.
Because the complete L88 engine was no longer in production, Nickey ordered an L88 short block and completed the engine using all the correct components from the corporate parts bin, including iron open-chamber heads, 12.5:1 pistons and a Holley 4053 780 CFM 4-barrel carburetor on a low-profile LS6 intake manifold, the latter to clear the Camaro’s hood. The Stage III conversion was completed with the installation of subframe connectors and an upgraded 3.23 Positraction 10-bolt rear end.
More @ MECUM
Michelle O creates trouble for kids with cancer: 'It's a really sorry day when they kick parents out so this lady can come'
Parents are outraged because they say they’re being restricted from accompanying their sick children Wednesday to St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital because first lady Michelle Obama is visiting – and security measures prohibit both parents from escorting the little patients to medical appointments.
A woman named Angie Rouse Green posted the following message to Facebook Tuesday:
“RANT: I am LIVID!!!!!! I just got a phone call from a St Jude mom whose son is battling a brain tumor. … Tomorrow, this little boy has his MRI. The results come after. His mom was told that she cannot bring her husband with her to get the MRI results!
“Why you ask?? Well, because the first lady and her entourage will be in the hospital tomorrow for, I assume, a photo shoot and Secret Service has pretty much shut down to bare necessity our hospital.
Only one person allowed per patient, no social media in hospital, no photos in hospital, cars will be towed in garage, more than one person with patient will be turned away at the gate by Secret Service!”
More @ WND
Legislation Introduced to Eliminate ATF
Via LH
Republican Congressman Jim Sensenbrenner has introduced legislation
to eliminate the Bureau of Alcohol Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, a
federal law enforcement agency with 5000 employees.
If passed, the legislation would dissolve the duties of ATF to the FBI and DEA. From the legislation:
I guess we'd just end up with two corrupt agencies instead of three.......
If passed, the legislation would dissolve the duties of ATF to the FBI and DEA. From the legislation:
To abolish the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives, transfer
its functions relating to the Federal firearms, explosives, and arson laws, violent crime, and domestic terrorism to the Federal Bureau of Investigation, and transfer its functions relating to the Federal alcohol and tobacco smuggling laws to the Drug Enforcement Administration, and for other purposes.
More @ Townhall
NC: Dunkin' Donuts refuses to hire Commandment-keeper
The U.S. federal government is now suing a Dunkin’ Donuts franchisee after it rescinded its job offer to a Christian man solely because he wanted to keep the weekly Sabbath holy, which is one of the Ten Commandments.
Darrell Littrell of Asheville, North Carolina, is a Seventh-day Adventist who holds the belief he cannot work on the Sabbath day, which he observes from sunset on Friday until sunset on Saturday.
According to the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, “Around Dec. 15, 2012, Littrell applied for the position of a donut maker at the Citi Brands’ manufacturing facility in Arden, N.C., and was later interviewed by the company’s plant manager.
“Littrell responded that he could not start work on Friday afternoon because as part of his faith, he does not work from sunset on Friday until sunset on Saturday. The plant manager responded by revoking Littrell’s job offer.”
More @ WND
School Orders Girl to Remove ‘Virginity Rocks’ Shirt
Virginity does not rock at Ramay Junior High School in Fayetteville, Arkansas.
That’s the lesson 13-year-old Chloe Rubiano learned. Chloe is in the eighth grade. She is also a good church-going girl. So you can imagine her mom’s surprise when she got in trouble at school.
Chloe showed up at school wearing a T-shirt that reads: “Virginity Rocks.”
“It’s a positive message,” said Bambi Crozier, Chloe’s mom.
Apparently some folks at Ramay Junior High don’t understand the concept of virginity.But school officials disagreed. They said the shirt could cause a classroom disruption and contained sexual content. Apparently some folks at Ramay Junior High don’t understand the concept of virginity.
The 13-year-old, who bought the shirt at a Christian music festival, was told she had to change shirts.
“It was so bizarre,” Mrs. Crozier told me. “She had the shirt for several years at wore it a number of times to school.”
More @ Townhall
Russia: ‘Free Syrian Army No Longer Exists’; Rebels Are Coordinating With Terrorists
Russia on Tuesday accused the West of ignoring its warnings about the growing terrorist threat in Syria, and claimed that the moderate rebel front – the one the Obama administration wants to arm as part of its anti-ISIS strategy – “no longer exists.”
The remarks by Russia’s ambassador in Geneva Alexey Borodavkin came during a session of the U.N. Human Rights Council, which was discussing the most recent report by a U.N.-mandated independent commission of inquiry into the conflict.
More with video @ CNS News
East Ukraine casualties rise as rebels reject deal
Shelling in rebel-held parts of east Ukraine killed at least 12 civilians on Wednesday, as a top leader of pro-Russian rebels rejected Ukrainian legislation meant to end the unrest by granting self-rule to large swaths of the east.
The city council of Donetsk, the largest rebel stronghold, said that shelling killed two people in the city Wednesday and wounded three others. In a separate statement published online, the press center for Kiev's military campaign in the east said that at least 10 civilians in the town of Nyzhnya Krynka, 20 kilometers east of Donetsk, had been killed by shelling.
Since a cease-fire imposed on Sept. 5, the fighting in Donetsk has been primarily limited to the north of the city, where many residential neighborhoods have been caught in the crossfire of battles centered on the government-controlled airport.
On Wednesday, an AP reporter in that area of Donetsk saw the remains of what appeared to be a Grad rocket in a burned-out building. There was one body visible at the scene.
More @ Townhall
Milestone Q4 2011: The bot crossing point
In the last quarter of 2011, more iphones were sold than babies were born.
That's interesting because that is also the quarter that Siri shipped.
FYI: Apple's Siri is the first mass market bot.
In hindsight, this apparently minor observation may be considered something more important: a tombstone milestone for humanity.
It's the quarter when our future replacements on this planet began to outpace us.
This leads me to something else.
More @ Global Guerrillas
King George Days: When We Were America
Via Susan
Mostly wooded, on the Potomac River, Dahlgren Naval Proving
Ground the biggest employer, with a fair number of kids who got up at
four-thirty in the morning to help their fathers with commercial
crabbing on the river.
I beg the reader's indulgence since this is in a large sense a personal communication more than a column for all. It will resonate with many, or some, so I post it anyway.
There was nothing special about the class of 1964, or about
King George High, except for those of us who were in it. Our yearbook
looked like ten thousand others across America, portraits with acne
removed in the photo lab, the basket ball team exactly like everybody
else’s, the cheerleaders conventionally glorious, conventional
adolescent good-byes in ball-point pen—but without misspelling or bad
grammar.
We, largely rural kids of the small-town South, represented without knowing it a culture, an approach to existence, and a devastating principle: You can’t impose decency, honesty, good behavior, or responsibility. They are in the culture, or they are not. If they are, you don't need laws, police, and supervision. If they are not, laws won't much help. And this is why the US is over, at least as the country we knew.
I beg the reader's indulgence since this is in a large sense a personal communication more than a column for all. It will resonate with many, or some, so I post it anyway.
I am preparing to fly to Fredericksburg,
Virginia, for the—God almighty—fifty-year high-school reunion of King
George High School. Perhaps we all do it eventually, unless of course we
don’t. It is a curious thing, I have learned at previous reunions, to
meet after half a century people you last saw when they were seventeen.
They seem so little changed.
We, largely rural kids of the small-town South, represented without knowing it a culture, an approach to existence, and a devastating principle: You can’t impose decency, honesty, good behavior, or responsibility. They are in the culture, or they are not. If they are, you don't need laws, police, and supervision. If they are not, laws won't much help. And this is why the US is over, at least as the country we knew.
More @ Fred On Everything
Obama administration forcing new gun buyers to declare race, ethnicity
Via LH
The Obama administration quietly has been forcing new gun buyers to declare their race and ethnicity, a policy change that critics say provides little law enforcement value while creating the risk of privacy intrusions and racial profiling.
With little fanfare, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) in 2012 amended its Form 4473 — the transactional record the government requires gun purchasers and sellers to fill out when buying a firearm — to identify buyers as either Hispanic, Latino or not. Then a buyer must check his or her race: Indian, Asian, black, Pacific Islander or white.
The Obama administration quietly has been forcing new gun buyers to declare their race and ethnicity, a policy change that critics say provides little law enforcement value while creating the risk of privacy intrusions and racial profiling.
With little fanfare, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) in 2012 amended its Form 4473 — the transactional record the government requires gun purchasers and sellers to fill out when buying a firearm — to identify buyers as either Hispanic, Latino or not. Then a buyer must check his or her race: Indian, Asian, black, Pacific Islander or white.
More with video @ The Washington Times
Made my day:) NC: Little Girl Competes with Marine Cadet At Push Up Challenge
Via LH
We think of our armed forces as the fittest men and women in the world but they can still be surprised by an undiscovered talent! At a fundraiser for the Active Heroes Foundation in North Carolina on September 6, young cadets went up against onlookers in fitness challenges. Kimberly Munley, the US army sergeant who confronted the Fort Hood gunman in November 2009, met a girl who she called her new hero. This little girl was more than a match for one of the cadets at push ups, and she received plenty of cheers for her effort.
We think of our armed forces as the fittest men and women in the world but they can still be surprised by an undiscovered talent! At a fundraiser for the Active Heroes Foundation in North Carolina on September 6, young cadets went up against onlookers in fitness challenges. Kimberly Munley, the US army sergeant who confronted the Fort Hood gunman in November 2009, met a girl who she called her new hero. This little girl was more than a match for one of the cadets at push ups, and she received plenty of cheers for her effort.