Soldier of Misfortune

 

David Bax helped save 35 aid workers in a Mogadishu firefight. So why did they turn against him? 

The tip came early in the day on June 19. Islamist militants had breached the inner sanctum of the United Nations' humanitarian compound in downtown Mogadishu -- and they were trying to slaughter the relief workers inside.

It wasn't David Bax's job to respond to such an attack; the former South African soldier was hired by the U.N. simply to defuse explosives in and around the restive city.

But Bax wasn't about to sit on his hands while a massacre went down. Within 30 minutes, Bax had mobilized his convoy, consisting of Burundian soldiers, U.N. explosives specialists, and foreign security contractors, into a rescue party.

While the firefight between al-Shabab militants and Somali guards raged inside the U.N. facility, Bax led his team to the outer wall and waited for a lull in the shooting. When the pause came, they rushed into the compound and began loading the terrified U.N. survivors onto Bax's Casspir armored personnel vehicles. Once the vehicles were full, Bax's team sped off and delivered the survivors to safety at the secure U.N. compound at Mogadishu's airport. In the end, one U.N. staffer, two South African contractors, four Somali security guards, a Somali electrician, and several Somali civilians were dead. As many as seven al-Shabab fighters were also killed in the operation. Most of the fighting was carried out by Somali security guards, who suffered the largest number of casualties. While Bax's team didn't engage in the firefight, there was little doubt that he and his team had risked their lives.

But the United Nations didn't award Bax a commendation for his bravery. In fact, days after the attack, Bax, the program manager for the U.N. Mine Action Service (UNMAS) in Somalia, came under fire from some of the very people he tried to save, and his U.N. career may now be on the line.

More @ Foreign Policy

THUGOCRACY: Durbin’s Staff Sending Out Intimidating Letters About ALEC And Stand Your Ground

Via avordvet

 

Two different conservative organizations with whom we’ve got contacts have received letters from ’s office today which look an awful lot like the actions that precipitated the IRS scandal. Apparently there’s a massive fishing expedition afoot.

This came to the our buddy Kevin Kane at the Pelican Institute.

     Dear Mr. Kane,

    I write to seek information regarding your organization’s position on “stand your ground” legislation that was adopted as a national model by the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC).

    ALEC describes itself as a think tank that develops model bills for state legislators. In 2005, ALEC approved the adoption of model “stand your ground” legislation entitled the “Castle Doctrine Act.” This model legislation was based on Florida’s “stand your ground” law, and it changes the criminal law regarding self-defense and provides immunity for certain uses of deadly force.

    In years subsequent to 2005, ALEC cited the introduction and enactment of state bills based on its model “stand your ground” legislation as “ALEC’s successes.” As recently as March 2012, ALEC issued a statement defending its model “stand your ground” legislation from criticism after the killing of Trayvon Martin in Florida. On April 17, 2012, ALEC issued a press release stating that it was eliminating the task force that had initially approved the model “stand your ground” legislation.v However, ALEC has never issued a statement retracting the organization’s approval of its model “stand your ground” legislation, nor has ALEC ever issued a statement calling for any state laws based on ALEC’s model “stand your ground” legislation to be repealed.

    Although ALEC does not maintain a public list of corporate members or donors, other public documents indicate that your organization funded ALEC at some point during the period between ALEC’s adoption of model “stand your ground” legislation in 2005 and the present day. I acknowledge your organization’s right to actively participate in the debate of important political issues, regardless of your position, and I recognize that an organization’s involvement with ALEC does not necessarily mean that the organization endorses all positions taken by ALEC. Therefore I am seeking clarification whether organizations that have funded ALEC’s operations in the past currently support ALEC and the model “stand your ground” legislation.

    I ask that you please reply to this letter by answering yes or no in response to the two questions below. Please feel free to provide additional information explaining your yes or no response.

    1. Has Pelican Institute for Public Policy served as a member of ALEC or provided any funding to ALEC in 2013?

    2. Does Pelican Institute for Public Policy support the “stand your ground” legislation that was adopted as a national model and promoted by ALEC?

    Please provide a response to this letter by September 1, 2013. Note that I am sending similar letters to other organizations that have been identified as ALEC funders at some point between 2005 and today. In September, I plan to convene a hearing of the Senate Judiciary Committee Subcommittee on the Constitution, Civil Rights and Human Rights to examine “stand your ground” laws, and I intend to include the responses to my letters in the hearing record. Therefore, please know that your response will be publicly available.

    Thank you for your attention to this request. Please feel free to contact Dan Swanson or Stephanie Trifone on my staff at 202-224-2152 if you have any questions. I look forward to receiving your response.

We heard earlier today that the Center for Security Policy received a similar letter.

Kane told us that the suggestion the Pelican Institute is a funder of the American Legislative Exchange Council is a ludicrous one and wonders where Durbin, the Illinois Democrat whose reputation as a jackbooted partisan willing to sink to any level to score points for the Left is exceeded only by Harry Reid, could have gotten such an idea. Obviously Durbin or someone on his staff got hold of a sign-in sheet or two from some ALEC conferences and decided to embark on a fishing expedition.

More @ The Hay Ride

Sharpton: Blacks Don’t Commit Crimes

 

 

 

If you follow the logic of Al Sharpton, black people must live in crime-free neighborhoods. 

 

I know that news is shocking, given the statistics that prove otherwise. We are told that black communities have the highest crime rates; however, these stats are demagogued to make black people look bad.

And though there is no crime in black neighborhoods, white cops routinely visit black communities to target black people. “Stop and frisk” is applied indiscriminately, at almost 100 percent, in black neighborhoods on black people.

Then they plant drugs or guns on black people, which accounts for the disproportionate incarceration rates of blacks in the criminal justice system.

Given these heinous statistics against blacks, it makes sense then that there are no black cops in America, right?  All the cops in America must be white — white racists, in fact. Because black cops would not arrest black people — at least not real black cops.

More @ The Black Sphere

Prof kills entire family, keeps teaching job

 

Administrators at a private university in Illinois are standing by a psychology professor, despite his own admission that he shot and killed his father, mother and teenage sister in 1967.

Officials at Millikin University in Decatur, Ill., said they would allow the psychology professor, James St. James, 61, to continue teaching, according to a statement provided to Campus Reform on Tuesday.

The professor’s murderous past came to light in a story published late last month by the Georgetown Advocate, the local newspaper in the town where the killings occurred.

After tracking down and interviewing the atheist professor, reporter Ann Marie Gardner described him as “the picture of a classic hippie: casual air, long pony tail, and a Grateful Dead sticker on his aging pickup truck.”

More @ WND

Naturally, BBC Calls Dead Boston Bombing Suspect a Right Winger

   The religion of insanity.

The BBC, which is pretty close to Britain's version of MSNBC, has determined Boston bombing suspect Tamerlan Tsarnaev was simply a Muslim of convenience while his real hatred and radicalization stemmed from being a right-winger. How did the BBC determine this? By talking to Tamerlan's friends about his radicalization.

One of the brothers suspected of carrying out the Boston bombings was in possession of right-wing American literature in the run-up to the attack, BBC Panorama has learnt.

Tamerlan Tsarnaev subscribed to publications espousing white supremacy and government conspiracy theories.

He also had reading material on mass killings.

Until now the Tsarnaev brothers were widely perceived as just self-styled radical jihadists.

Panorama has spent months speaking exclusively with friends of the bombers to try to understand the roots of their radicalisation.

The Tsarnaev brothers, ethnic Chechens, spent their early years moving around a troubled region of Russia torn by a violent Islamic insurgency.

But for the last decade they lived in Cambridge, near Boston.

The brothers' friends told us Tamerlan turned against the country and became passionate about Islam after becoming frustrated when his boxing career faltered because he did not have American citizenship.

Their friends wouldn't all speak openly because they were afraid of being wrongly viewed as associated with terrorism.

Excuse me as I try not to laugh. Is the BBC really trying to argue that the Tsarnaev brothers became radical right wingers in....Cambridge? C'mon.

More @ Townhall

Ted Nugent to Race-Baiters: ‘Kiss My Black A**!’

Via WiscoDave

Rock star legend Ted Nugent had some pretty harsh words (to put it lightly) about those on the left who are using the race-card to smear him, unjustifiably labeling him as a racist, as they do all who disagree with Obama’s Marxist politics.

At about the 7:30 mark in the audio (listen below), after discussing the Democrat Party’s 50 year destruction of what was once the great City of Detroit, the “Motor City Madman” goes off on the left’s recent smear campaign against him. Listen below to Nugent’s interview with Tim Constantine, the “Voice of Reason,” of The Capitol Hill Show, which you can listen to daily on TPNN radio, LIVE from 3:00 PM to 6:00 PM ET, Monday through Friday here:  http://www.tpnn.com/radio/

TED NUGENT: Everyday I hang out with black people and they’re just like me.  They have an alarm clock, they bust their ass to be as productive as possible, they take care of themselves, they speak clearly, they show respect for themselves and others, and there is zero racism in the Ted Nugent world. Zero! There’s always been zero racism.

 So when I speak, don’t anybody tell me I can’t say things because of the color of my skin. Kiss my black ass! I will say whatever I damn well please because I screen it through an intellectual process to make sure it’s honest, accurate, and sincere, and supported by evidence. And when I listen to my son’s hip-hop and rap buddies, when I listen to my black bass player, Johnny Guettel, when I listen to my Mexican bass player Marco Mendoza, they say the exact things that I say. And no one should be afraid of speaking the truth just because some punk will call you a racist, because in your heart, you know you’re not. 

More @ TPNN

Whether We Win or Lose on Anti-gun ObamaCare is Our Choice

“Go to GunOwners.org and sign up and become a member of GOA.  It’s cheap and it’s an excellent way to stay informed on the issues with the no-compromise gun group [in] in Washington DC.” -- Talk radio host Steve Deace, June 4, 2013

Cowards can find a thousand reasons for not doing what they’re afraid to do.

After staging 38 votes to repeal the anti-gun ObamaCare law -- and having Harry Reid throw their bills in the wastebasket 38 times -- House and Senate Republicans now have a chance to force ObamaCare repeal right down Harry Reid’s throat.

The only question is whether or not they have the courage.

Gun owners have opposed ObamaCare since its inception, given that a national health database could be used by federal bureaucrats to disarm millions of law-abiding Americans.  The use of medical data has already been used to disarm gun owners in New York -- and has led to more than 150,000 military veterans losing their gun rights for ailments such as PTSD.

This law must be defunded prior to October 1, when two things happen:

* The first is that the “health care exchanges” are supposed to come on line. People -- and particularly young people -- will find out how much money they’re going to have to flush down the toilet for inflated politically correct premiums, under penalty of law.

* The second thing that happens on October 1 is that much of the federal government will “slow down” -- not shut down as has been erroneously reported -- unless a funding bill called a “Continuing Resolution,” or CR for short, is approved. For better or worse, most of the federal government will continue to operate as usual, and all “essential” discretionary functions will continue as well.

But there’s one thing that’s definitely “not essential,” and that’s ObamaCare.

In the Senate, Republican Mike Lee of Utah sent a letter to Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid on behalf of almost a dozen colleagues, stating that they will not support a Continuing Resolution that funds the implementation of the anti-gun ObamaCare law.

In the House, Rep. Steve Stockman introduced H.Res. 333 on Friday -- a resolution that, if passed, would forbid the House of Representatives from passing a CR that funds ObamaCare.

So to recap the bidding: On the very day that the American people flip their lids over this wildly unpopular ObamaCare mandate, Republicans have the opportunity to stage a showdown. And if they win, ObamaCare goes down the tubes, along with the rest of Barack Obama’s agenda.

So, given that option, why would the GOP not want to pursue it?  Just listen to what a few Republican senators have said recently:

* Senator Richard Burr (R-NC) said that using the CR to defund ObamaCare is the “dumbest thing I’ve ever heard.”

* Senator Bob Corker (R-TN) said that, “I think it’s a silly effort.”

* Senator Tom Coburn (R-OK) said this was the “dumbest idea” he had ever heard.

* And Senator Lindsey Graham (R-SC) said the effort was “a bridge too far for me.”

Despite these acts of cowardice, the American people are firmly behind Congress doing something to defang this anti-gun law.

According to a CNN poll, 73% of the American people favor repealing ObamaCare, either fully or partially (March 2012).  So given the widespread opposition to this anti-gun law, why are many GOP legislators balking at this opportunity to drive a stake through its ugly heart?

There are at least five misrepresentations that some Republicans are using to justify their cowardice on ObamaCare.  Click here to see what these misstatements are and how they can be easily answered.
ACTION: Contact your Senators and Representatives. Tell them to insist that NO Continuing Resolution to fund the government contain money for the ObamaCare individual mandate.  Take these three actions right away:

1. Click here to contact your Senators and Representatives.  Urge your Senators to sign onto the Lee letter and your Representative to sign onto the Stockman resolution (H.Res. 333).  You can also call your legislators using the Capitol Switchboard at 202-224-3121.

2. Distribute this alert to all your family, friends and co-workers and encourage them all to take action.

3. Be sure to visit your legislators in person at any Town Hall meetings they schedule this month during their August break.  You can contact their offices (at 202-224-3121) to find out when they’ll be hosting a Town Hall meeting in your area.

What Congress just did ‘will make you want to throw up’

Via Mike

 

Dated.

When the actions of the federal government succeed in riling up the normally stoic Fox News host Greta Van Susteren, you can be sure that something sinister is afoot.

And she is so ticked by the current reign of lawlessness she could just vomit!


As elected officials slipped out of town for a 5-week recess, we learned a deal was struck to exempt Congress from new higher premiums associated with ObamaCare. A move designed to avert the provision in the law which said members of Congress and their aides must be covered by plans “created” by the law or “offered through an exchange.”

The Office of Personnel Management, under heavy pressure from Capitol Hill, determined that the health care premiums of members of Congress and their aides can be subsidized by taxpayers, according to Politico.

As noted by Mediaite, Van Susteran responded in a blog post titled with all capital letters “THIS WILL MAKE YOU WANT TO THROW UP,” in which she railed against the “appalling” exemption, repeatedly expressing her “disgust” with elected officials.

“It is indecent….just WRONG,” she wrote. “So let me get this straight….they push OBAMACARE on EVERY OTHER AMERICAN except themselves. Really? Unbelievable, isn’t it?”

More @  Biz Pac Review

The Final Report of James I. Waddell of the CSS Shenandoah.

290 Foundation

 VERBATIM

The Shenandoah entered St. Georges Channel on the morning of the 5th of November, just 122 days from the Aleutian Islands, and the acting master, Irvine S. Bulloch, made an excellent landfall; he had not been able to rate the chronometers since leaving Melbourne, and could only conjecture their accuracy while she was in the Arctic Ocean, for we saw no land after leaving the Aleutian Islands until the beacon in St. Georges Channel was seen where it was looked for. We had sailed a distance of 23,000 miles without seeing land. The navigation is very beautiful when that fact is considered. I received a pilot after night, and when he was informed of the character of the steamer, he said. "I was reading but a few days ago of her being in the Arctic Ocean." I asked for American news. He said the war had gone against the South, and I directed him to take the ship into the River Mersey, that I might communicate with Her Majesty`s Government.

The quiet satisfaction of all countenances for the success in reaching a European port was unmistakeable, and I have no doubt a weight was removed from each heart, if I may be permitted to judge others by my own. I felt a great relief, because I felt I had done my duty toward the power which had placed me in that responsible position, my duty was next to those who had shared the perils and trials and privations of the cruise.

On the morning of the 6th of November, 1865, the Shenandoah steamed up the Mersey in a thick fog, under the Confederate flag, and the pilot, by my order, anchored her near H.B.M. ship of the line Donegal, commanded by Captain Paynter R.N.

Shortly after the anchored a lieutenant of the Donegal visited me to ascertain the name of the steamer and give me the official intelligence of the termination of the American war. He was very polite toward me and left me to beleive he felt a sympathy for us in our situation. The flag was then hauled down by my order at 10 a,m. on the 6th of November 1865. I addressed the communication to Her Britannic Majesty`s minister for foreign affairs. It was prepared on the night of the 5th of November, after receiving intelligence from the pilot. Of course the subject for such letter had been pondered over some days before.

 
The following day a gunboat came alongside the Shenandoah and made fast to her, customs officers took possession of her, and I relieved the officers and crew of all duty. The visit and detention of the gunboat was in consequence of an application from Mr. Adams, or his substitute, that the Shenandoah should be secured from getting to sea again. How absurd that must sound to the reader! It was intended to be an offense offered to a defeated but unconquered enemy; to men who had succeeded in disposing of the Shenandoah in a way not congenial to the Yankee nation. The ship and all on board were held by the authorities simply by far as confinement to the vessel; the only person upon whom an absolute restriction was placed was myself. 

I was informed that everybody should remain on board, and an order to that effect was given by me; but some officers and several of the crew voluntarily left the vessel with no intention to desert, which was discovered by the lieutenant commanding the gunboat, and he said pleasantly; !I don’t care if the lads do take a run on shore after night as long as I do not know about it." He then mentioned the officers who had gone on shore, and I informed him I knew nothing of it and regretted to learn that anyone had done so> "Oh," said he, “you won’t leave the vessel I know, so it don`t matter about the others going on a bit of a lark." I was several timnes invited to go on board his gunboat, but I invariably refused to leave the vessel, I would leave on only one condition, which was the surrender being received I would be at liberty to go wher I pleased; otherwise I must be taken out of her a prisoner. Captain Paynter visited me sometimes twice a day and expressed his approval of the good conduct exhibited by those who had so recently been under my command under the painful circumstance of our situation. "It is," said he "the result of discipline and confidence in your rectitude."

On the 8th of November 10 officers, 14 acting appointments, and 109 enlisted men, which constituted the Shenandoah`s crew, were unconditionally released. The customs officials inspected our baggage more in hunt of tobacco than treasure, I suppose. My baggage was very closely examined, but that proceeded more from my directions concerning itthan any desire on the part of the officials to be impertinently inquisitive. I had neither thoughts nor stores to conceal from anyone. I presented my tumblers, decanters and bedding, with a few trophies from the islands, to the wife of the lieutenant commanding, in care of whose husband I was left, as a souvenir of our acquaintance. He was a good fellow, and was faithful in the discharge of his duty. Before leaving the steamer, I transferred all captured money, as will be seen by this copy of the following receipt. 

The late officers and men of the steamer were taken to Great George Landing, Liverpool, after night at the expense of Her Majesty`s Government. I thank Captain Paynter for his kindness to me, and for the interest he showed by his manner in us. During his visits he asked many questions of me for the benefit of the admiralty.

The Shenandoah was actually cruising but eight months after the enemy`s property, during which time she made thirty-eight captures, an average of a fraction over four per month.
She released six on bond, and destroyed thirty-two.

She visited every ocean except the Antarctic Ocean.

She was the only vessel which carried the flag around the world, and she carried it six months after the overthrow of the South.

She was surrendered to the British nation on 6th November 1865.

The last gun in defense of the South was fired from her deck on 22nd of June, Arctic Ocean.
She ran a distance of 58,000 statute miles and met with no serious injury during a cruise of thirteen months.

Her anchors were on her bows for eight months.

She never lost a chase, and was second only to the celebrated Alabama. 

I claim for her officers and men a triumph over their enemies and over every obstacle, and for myself I claim having done my duty.

Gunsmithing: Free Kindle Edition

Via NC Renegade

@ Amazon

Update:  The free offer evidently expired 08/06/13