This is a repost. Have a great weekend, and don't forget to remember those who gave all in order that we may have the freedom to have a great weekend.
Memorial Day, originally called Decoration Day, is a day of remembrance for those who have died in our nation's service.
Memorial Day was officially proclaimed on 5 May 1868 by General John Logan, national commander of the Grand Army of the Republic, in his General Order No. 11, and was first observed on 30 May 1868, when flowers were placed on the graves of Union and Confederate soldiers at Arlington National Cemetery. The first state to officially recognize the holiday was New York in 1873. By 1890 it was recognized by all of the northern states. The South refused to acknowledge the day, honoring their dead on separate days until after World War I (when the holiday changed from honoring just those who died fighting in the Civil War to honoring Americans who died fighting in any war).
It is now celebrated in almost every State on the last Monday in May (passed by Congress with the National Holiday Act of 1971 to ensure a three day weekend for Federal holidays), though several southern states have an additional separate day for honoring the Confederate war dead: January 19 in Texas, April 26 in Alabama, Florida, Georgia, and Mississippi; May 10 in South Carolina; and June 3 (Jefferson Davis' birthday) in Louisiana and Tennessee.
There are many stories as to its actual beginnings, with over two dozen cities and towns laying claim to being the birthplace of Memorial Day. There is also evidence that organized women's groups in the South were decorating graves before the end of the Civil War. A hymn published in 1867, "Kneel Where Our Loves are Sleeping" by Nella L. Sweet carried the dedication "To The Ladies of the South who are Decorating the Graves of the Confederate Dead".
While Waterloo N.Y. was officially declared the birthplace of Memorial Day by President Lyndon Johnson in May 1966, it's difficult to prove conclusively the origins of the day. It is more likely that it had many separate beginnings; each of those towns and every planned or spontaneous gathering of people to honor the war dead in the 1860's tapped into the general human need to honor our dead, each contributed honorably to the growing movement that culminated in Gen Logan giving his official proclamation in 1868.
It is not important who was the very first, what is important is that Memorial Day was established. Memorial Day is not about division. It is about reconciliation; it is about coming together to honor those who gave their all.
Source
Memorial Day 2008 is this Monday, May 26th.
This is a really nice tribute video for those who gave all. It runs 6 minutes.
TY Flopping Aces
Plus, visit MM's site for more great stuff.
Sunday, May 25, 2008
Decoration Day
Saturday, May 24, 2008
Michael Yon; 'Unbelievable' Progress in Iraq; & msm Silence
Or maybe the word is leaking out. So says AP over at HA (video, too).
The problem with the coverage is that it takes spectacular gains, like the Iraqi army rolling onto Mookie’s home turf in Sadr City, to break through the media narrative while even minor setbacks, which fit the narrative, are easily assimilated and thus coverage-worthy. How many spectacular gains will it take, I wonder, before the narrative itself starts to change?
Uh, don't hold your breath on the that last answer, AP.
~Michael's new book, 'Moment of Truth in Iraq', can be purchased from Barnes & Noble by clicking here. Autographed copies by clicking here.
Michaelyon-online.com
Cartoonist Will Elder died last week
Leapin' lizards!
I completely missed his obituary, and a subsequent web search has turned up not much.
Mad Magazine pioneer and Little Annie Fanny co-creator Will Elder, died May 15th at the age of 86. The funeral took place on Sunday, May 19th, in New Jersey. I have no specifics on the cause of death. (but, when one is 86 years old, what would you think?)
Will Elder was a brilliant cartoonist with a unique 'exaggerated realism' to his 'toons. During the 1950's, 60's & 70's, his witty drawings and zany humor delighted readers of MAD magazine for years - and also those who pretended to read Playboy.
Elder was inducted into the Comic Book Hall of Fame in 2003.
More lifetime info can be found here along with a great 2003 interview plus early pictures and cartoons. His wiki entry is here.
No octopus for Detroit fans
Next thing you know, they'll ban hockey at an ice fight...
You can buy an octopus next week at Wholey's Fish Market in Pittsburgh -- unless you're wearing Detroit Red Wings gear or otherwise let slip that you're visiting from Michigan for the game (as in Stanley Cup Playoffs).
If that means checking ID and listening for customers with Midwestern accents, that's what owner Dan Wholey is willing to do.
Wowser. They take their hockey seriously in Pittsburgh.
The Detroit octopus-throwing tradition started in the 1950s, to symbolize the eight wins needed at the time to win the Stanley Cup.
Uh huh. You ever smell raw octopus? Ever try to wash the stink off your skin? So who started this Detroit octopus toss tradition?
$1.6 billion tax break for trial lawyers
That's billion, with a 'B'.
It's a bill in the House of Representatives right now. H.R. 6049. GW threatens to veto it. Good for him!
Remember folks, trial parasites lawyers overwhelmingly vote democrat and contribute to democrat causes, so it's no wonder that their buds on the Hill reward them with slop from the public trough.
U.N. distributes condomns to Burmese cyclone survivors
Yup. Horrific natural disasters leaving violent mass destruction & thousands of dead, bloated bodies in its wake gives me a woody, too.
Unfreekin' believable.
Friday, May 23, 2008
The grades are posted: School choice works!
Those who say vouchers won't improve public education are dead wrong. Across the country, school choice programs are getting results and winning the support of voters.
Think about that over this summer, before next fall, when you have to send your most precious commodity ~your child~ back to those russian roulette centers of gangs, pervert teachers, shootings, amoral indoctrination and political agitprop: gub'mint schools.
gee...I wonder when the state troopers will swarm in to remove ~en masse~ all those at risk children?
Greg Forster has more.
Have a great weekend, and don't forget to remember those who gave all in order that we may have the freedom to have a great weekend.
French court rules 'al-dura' can be called hoax
This ruling is a long over-due reversal of a libel judgment handed down in 2006.
The French Court of Appeals issued a ruling today favoring an activist who claims the purported shooting death of a 12-year-old Palestinian boy – used to spark the "Al Aqsa intifada," or uprising – was a hoax.
The court overturned a lower court decision against Jewish activist Philippe Karsenty, who had been convicted of libeling a French state-owned television channel and its Jerusalem correspondent, Charles Enderlin, the Jerusalem Post reported. Karsenty contended France 2 knowingly misled the world about the event in the Gaza Strip in September 2000.
The video of an apparently horrific firefight in which a 12 year old boy & his father were shot has been the subject of controversy for eight years. There is much evidence to conclude that the entire incident had been staged as propaganda to damn the Israeli Defense Forces.
In a similar vein, click here for an excellent video of the 2006 fauxtography scandal which shows how pervasive this anti-jewish bigotry & pro-philistine propaganda
Secret agent cat
The name's Furball.
Hackupa Furball.
In Spycraft, the authors describe many clever animal-assisted devices, from the dead-rat dead-drop pouch to the "acoustic kitty," a cat with a remote listening system embedded in its body. And what's this about the 1 million bats the CIA's precursor, the OSS, were gonna use to firebomb Tokyo during WWII?
More troop reductions in Iraq by fall
Gen. David Petraeus, the top U.S. commander in Iraq, said that he will recommend further troop reductions in Iraq by fall.
Nothing succeeds like success!
Court rules Texas had 'no right' to confiscate polygamist's children
Let me say from the outset my belief that if a crime has been committed, then the individual perverts should be hunted down, strung up by their small berries, and gutted like the rotten fish that they are. But this broad, 'round up the usual suspects', concentration camp sweep is not the way things should be done in this nation. We seem to have a short memory. I'm just glad that, finally, someone remembered the fourth & fifth amendments to the U.S. constitution.
The 3rd Court of Appeals in Austin, in response to motions from 41 sect mothers, ruled that Child Protective Services did not present enough evidence at an April hearing to show that the children were in immediate danger of abuse, which would have justified keeping them in state custody. The court said Judge Barbara Walther abused her discretion in failing to return the children to their families.
The 3rd Court of Appeals in Austin gave Walther 10 days to comply and release from state custody the children, who are scattered across the state in temporary foster homes.
Texas Child Protective Services claimed that 450+ children were at risk of abuse at the cult's West Texas compound which was raided back in early April, 2008. The 3rd Court of Appeals found that the polygamist sect's belief system, by itself, did not place the children in danger of abuse.
"Evidence that children raised in this particular environment may someday have their physical health and safety threatened is not evidence that the danger is imminent enough to warrant invoking the extreme measure of immediate removal," the court said.
The court said the state failed to show that any more than five of the teenage girls were being sexually abused, and offered no evidence of sexual or physical abuse against the other children. Half the youngsters taken from the ranch were 5 or younger. Only a few dozen are teenage girls.
The court also said the state was wrong to consider the entire ranch as a single household and to seize all the children because some parents in the home might be abusers.
Heck, if that criteria was allowed to stand, troopers could invade most any housing project or gub'mint school in the nation!
I've said it before, once all this smoke clears, the state will have only one, maybe two solid cases that will result in a guilty verdict against the perverts.
Plus, there's some very loud concerns being raised by mental health professionals about the methods employed by Texas' child protective services in this case.
"I have worked in Domestic Violence/Sexual Abuse programming for over 20 years and have never seen women and children treated this poorly, not to mention their civil rights being disregarded in this manner," one wrote.
Until now, those concerns have fallen on deaf ears.
TY Chris Stigall
Missouri congressman wants ban on pasticized cadavers
A bill has been introduced into the House of representatives by Republican Rep. Todd Akin, and requires that such cadavers be donated from only within the United States.
I wrote about a similar topic back in February - the traveling, plasticized cadaver show populated with dead bodies of dubious origins. China is the main source of these plasticized cadavers. There is credible evidence that the former owners of these bodies were prisoners, or accident victims, and in no condition or position to give permission to be entered into such a freak show.
The subject now has the attention of congress. A prospect that's usually a cause for alarm, so hopefully these congress critters won't muck it up too badly.
The legislation was introduced April 2 and is pending in the House Ways and Means Committee. It has about 20 co-sponsors.
Thursday, May 22, 2008
The Great One harpoons vile, over-paid talking head
This is a recent audio of Mark Levin as he scorches the loon toon leftist rants of the wicked herr uberman, and his seditious puppet masters at msnbzzzz.
9 minutes well spent.
'Che' stinks up Cannes
"Krykee! What's that vile stench?!"
"Oh. That's just the latest 2 part, 5 hour long, odious ode to a mass murdering sociopath by director Steven Soderbergh."
"Mass murdering sociopath? You mean that 'che turd', which so many ignorant, marxist loving tools pay capitalists to print his image on their over-priced, sweatshop produced clothes, in total hypocrisy to what they think this mass murdering sociopath stood for?"
"Yup."
"Looks like many of those Cannes movie goers walked out of that 2 part, 5 hour long, odious ode to a mass murdering sociopath, never to return."
"Yup. His vile stench was so bad that 30% didn't even come back from intermission."
"Gee. There might be hope for this over priced tres chic crowd afterall."
"Go figure."
Decoration Day
Memorial Day, originally called Decoration Day, is a day of remembrance for those who have died in our nation's service.
Memorial Day was officially proclaimed on 5 May 1868 by General John Logan, national commander of the Grand Army of the Republic, in his General Order No. 11, and was first observed on 30 May 1868, when flowers were placed on the graves of Union and Confederate soldiers at Arlington National Cemetery. The first state to officially recognize the holiday was New York in 1873. By 1890 it was recognized by all of the northern states. The South refused to acknowledge the day, honoring their dead on separate days until after World War I (when the holiday changed from honoring just those who died fighting in the Civil War to honoring Americans who died fighting in any war).
It is now celebrated in almost every State on the last Monday in May (passed by Congress with the National Holiday Act of 1971 to ensure a three day weekend for Federal holidays), though several southern states have an additional separate day for honoring the Confederate war dead: January 19 in Texas, April 26 in Alabama, Florida, Georgia, and Mississippi; May 10 in South Carolina; and June 3 (Jefferson Davis' birthday) in Louisiana and Tennessee.There are many stories as to its actual beginnings, with over two dozen cities and towns laying claim to being the birthplace of Memorial Day. There is also evidence that organized women's groups in the South were decorating graves before the end of the Civil War. A hymn published in 1867, "Kneel Where Our Loves are Sleeping" by Nella L. Sweet carried the dedication "To The Ladies of the South who are Decorating the Graves of the Confederate Dead".
While Waterloo N.Y. was officially declared the birthplace of Memorial Day by President Lyndon Johnson in May 1966, it's difficult to prove conclusively the origins of the day. It is more likely that it had many separate beginnings; each of those towns and every planned or spontaneous gathering of people to honor the war dead in the 1860's tapped into the general human need to honor our dead, each contributed honorably to the growing movement that culminated in Gen Logan giving his official proclamation in 1868.
It is not important who was the very first, what is important is that Memorial Day was established. Memorial Day is not about division. It is about reconciliation; it is about coming together to honor those who gave their all.
Source
Memorial Day 2008 is this Monday, May 26th.
This is a really nice tribute video for those who gave all. It runs 6 minutes.
TY Flopping Aces
It's all over but the shouting?
Clinton campaigns as attention wanders elsewhere. (video)
Clinton Desperate to Count Votes, Compares Fla. Primary to Zimbabwe. (no joke!)
Clinton threatens convention delegate fight.
Surber says, 'Not so fast.' The math favors billary, not the obamanator.
Pass the popcorn, please.
Illegal immigration & identity theft is hand-in-glove
True, there's not a one-to-one correlation, but there is definitely a causal relationship.
This article from the City Journal concludes that " Identity theft in America goes hand and hand with illegal immigration."
In 2007, one third of all consumer complaints received by the FTC were for identity theft. Most of these complaints were from illegal immigrant 'gateway' states - Arizona, California, and Texas, as well as Florida and Nevada.
Seeking access to jobs, credit, and driver’s licenses, many undocumented aliens are using the personal data of real Americans on forged documents. The immigrants’ identity theft has become so pervasive that the need to combat it is “a disturbing front in the war against illegal immigration,” according to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
Since 2002, identity theft complaints to the FTC have increased by 60%! Identity theft is big business, and much of it is controlled by the latino gangs throughout the southwest U.S. of A.
Obamanator Delegate Arrested For Spying At Gitmo
Back in 2003. Tried to smuggle secret documents out of this paradise resort for terrorists. Claims he was tortured too.
Court marshal charges against him were dropped out of national security concerns if this thing went to trial. He was also charged w/ adultery & keeping porn on govt. computers.
One more far-left lunar nutjob for the obamantor. How much more of this paint by numbers pic we gotta fill in for you people?
GP has more on this moonbat.
"If we don't win, you cheated!"
TAHBYCSIFH looks way down the road to November, and gives a heads-up to the pant load hissy fit the tantric BDS infants will throw if 'Maverick', and not the obamanator, is enthroned as chief executive.
TAHBYCSIFH says msnbzzzzz is already starting the "If we don't win, you cheated!" cry.
Just another reason why the brilliant architects of this government wisely chose not to have a constitutional right to vote for POTUS.
and something our 'democracy' has tried mightily since the jacksonian days to tear apart into anarchy. RE: chicago in 1968 & denver in 2008. Mark my words.
Missouri Car Dealer offers gas or gun w/ purchase
Both are worth about $250.00. The gun might come in handy if you run out of gas in Mid Town.
TY KC Crime Scene
Wednesday, May 21, 2008
It's not electric
but it might fry some flesh, or maybe get you a darwin award nomination.
Pulse jet-powered bike kit selling on ebay. $650 (American).
No. Really. I don't want one.
Speaking of Joe Lieberman...
He has a piece in the WSJ this afternoon.
In it, Lieberman asks how did the democrat party of Roosevelt, Truman, & Kennedy become the morally bankrupt, intellectually vacuous, and globally relativistic American hating, socialists tool pool that it is today?
~Of course, I blame gub'mint schools, but rede what Sen. Lieberman has to say.
Don't be evil
Oh, wait. We're talking about googlag, the information repository for murderous fascists and brutal dictators worldwide.
Googlag owns youtube (googlag also owns blogger - the host of this blog - an irony not lost on moi). Youtube is a popular repository for murderous agitprop videos made by terrorists (like as hezbollah & al-qaeda) to champion their nasty brand of 'philosophy'.
So much so, that here in the blog-o-sphere, youtube has earned the derisive moniker 'allahtube' - to more accurately describe the content on that site (you know....American soldiers getting shot or blown up; Jews being murdered; children being brainwashed for suicide missions; good clean family stuff...).
Youtube's perverse & dubious distinction has attracted the attention of none other than Sen. Joe Lieberman(I-Conn).
In a letter Lieberman sent Monday, he asked Google to “immediately remove content produced by Islamist terrorist organizations from YouTube.”
“Islamist terrorist organizations use YouTube to disseminate their propaganda, enlist followers, and provide weapons training — activities that are all essential to terrorist activity,” Lieberman wrote.
We're at war, you know, and American companies should not facilitate the enemy in killing American soldiers.
But googlag refused Sen. Lieberman's request. Claimed that such a request would 'trample free speech rights', and that
Apparently, for the obtuse, relativistic twits at googlag's corporate office, the U.S. constitution affords protection to jihadists engage in killing American soldiers. I guess those same obtuse, relativistic twits at googlag's corporate office never put down their starbucks long enough to realize who, exactly, it is that risks their life and limb to defend that constitution.
I wonder how they'll feel after the FBI, Justice & Treasury come knocking on their obtuse, relativistic twit door? But, judging from GW's 8 year long limp piddle toward not dealing with seditious actions, I wouldn't hold my breath.
How about you? Would you like to affect a change now, and strike a blow against the murderous scum posting their vile agitprop on allahtube?Good! Click this icon. ------->
It's effective. It's empowering, and it's free! Do it. Do it now!
Yesterday in History
My alarm clock broke, too.
Tuesday, May 20, was the 141st day of 2008. There are 225 days left in the year.
Today's Highlight in History:
One hundred years ago, on May 20, 1908, actor James Stewart was born in Indiana, Pa.
(Check out TCM on cable this week for a bunch o' Jimmy's classic movies. - LB1901)
*In 1506, explorer Christopher Columbus died in Spain.
*Apparently, not much happened on this day for the next 350 years.
*In 1861, North Carolina voted to secede from the Union.
*In 1902, the United States ended a three-year military presence in Cuba as the Republic of Cuba was established under its first elected president, Tomas Estrada Palma.
*Ten years ago: The government unveiled the design for the new $20 bill, featuring a larger and slightly off-center portrait of Andrew Jackson. In Beverly Hills, Calif., Hollywood royalty bid farewell to Frank Sinatra, who had died almost a week earlier at age 82, in a private, invitation-only funeral.
Today's Birthdays: Actor James McEachin is 78. Actor Anthony Zerbe is 72. Actor David Proval is 66. Singer Joe Cocker is 64. Singer-actress Cher is 62. Actor-comedian Dave Thomas is 59. Musician Warren Cann is 56. Actor Dean Butler is 52. Ron Reagan is 50. Rock musician Jane Wiedlin (The Go-Go's) is 50. Actor Bronson Pinchot is 49. Singer Susan Cowsill is 49. Actor John Billingsley is 48. Actor Tony Goldwyn is 48. Singer Nick Heyward is 47. TV personality Ted Allen is 43. Actress Mindy Cohn is 42. Rock musician Tom Gorman (Belly) is 42. Actress Gina Ravera is 42. Actor Timothy Olyphant is 40. Rapper Busta Rhymes is 36. Actor Matt Czuchry is 31. Actress Angela Goethals is 31. Rhythm-and-blues singer Naturi Naughton is 24.
Thought for Today: "If I had my career over again? Maybe I'd say to myself, speed it up a little." — James Stewart, American actor (1908-1997).
Teen oral sex likely means intercourse, too
Also, show me a young woman who smokes, and I'll show you, not only an 88% chance of sex by the third date, but a 92% chance she 'swallows', too.
That's right - sex & science - another cheap web traffic post! Plus, I'll be excoriated for being so judgmental!
Contrary to popular agitprop in gub'mint schools by the 'let's sexualize everyone as early as possible crowd', teens do not use oral sex as a way to remain 'technical virgins'. In fact, this study by the Guttmacher Institute concludes that teens who do oral are already doing vaginal and anal sex. And those teens determined to stay 'chaste', do none of those things.
In other words, kiddies - if you don't want to fall off the cliff, stay away from the edge.
"There's a popular perception that teens are engaging in serial oral sex as a strategy to avoid vaginal intercourse," said Rachel Jones of the Guttmacher Institute, a private, nonprofit research organization based in New York, who helped do the study. "Our research suggests that's a misperception."
A majority of the teens -- 55 percent -- said they had engaged in oral sex, which was slightly more than the 50 percent who said they had had vaginal sex. But oral sex was much more common among those who already had had intercourse...
Previous research had suggested that oral sex was increasing among teenagers as an alternative to intercourse, but those studies were based on small samples or anecdotal reports.
Don't be like Balaam.
This woman has some good advice for all young adults who want to be unique and special and worth the wait. It'll reap a lifetime of joy. Plus, STD free.
Lego mania
The obamanator's global face of cultural facism
These people scare the h3ll out of me. Why don't they scare the h3ll out of you?
We can't drive our SUVs and eat as much as we want and keep our homes on 72 degrees at all times . . . and then just expect that other countries are going to say OK. That's not leadership. That's not going to happen." - Barak Obama
"He is going to demand that you shed your cynicism . . . that you come out of your isolation, that you move out of your comfort zones. That you push yourselves to be better. And that you engage. Barack will never allow you to go back to your lives as usual, uninvolved, uninformed." - Michelle Obama
Maynard responds with, "I moved away from mommy & daddy years ago, so just leave me the h3ll alone!"