Flag Burning

Earlier this week the United States Senate voted 66 - 34 in support of an Amendment that would have allowed for the protection of the Flag of the United States (the Flag).

This vote was one vote short of the 67 votes required to send the Amendment (having previously passed the House) to the states for ratification.

I do not support this Amendment. Though I certainly think burning the Flag is a heinous act, it doesn't physically hurt anyone. It is strictly and solely symbolic. In my opinion, it is completely protected by the First Amendment.

I think I've written it before, but the First Amendment does not protect us from ourseleves. If Americans wants to show their true colors by burning the Flag, I say "let them". But then, don't criticize me if I can think no lower of those Americans that burned the Flag.

I regret the Republican Party trotted this issue out in this manner at this time.

For anyone needing guidance on how to properly display the Flag or discard a Flag, please go to www.usflag.org. And, if you don't want to do the research but are looking to display the Flag vertically against a flat object (wall, building, other), please know the Blue Field (the Union) remains in the upper-left as you look at the Flag.

Jeb Bush in 2008; Dems still lost on national security

Two quick letters the Globe did not publish:

Editor,

Obviously it was too much for the Boston Globe Editorial Board to acknowledge that the next President of the United States, Gov. Jeb Bush, developed and pushed the First Generation Matching Grant Program that you trumpeted in yesterday's paper and cited as a model for Massachusetts (Making College Affordable, editorial, June 21, A10). "Florida" created the Program? No, a Governor with vision, leadership skills and an extremely impressive record of accomplishment in education reform created the Program. Bush in 2008! (End of first letter.)


Editor,

Will the national Democrats ever wake up? They've had six years to draft their most recent message to the Country and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi finally shared it with the Country yesterday (Democrats to run in 'New Direction', If they win in fall, party will pursue aggressive agenda, June 15, A2).

In a twelve-point plan, the Democrats listed their national security position TENTH! THEY, the national Democrats, chose to put it tenth.

Criticize President Bush's execution of the war on terror all you want, but he has been resolute that the security of Americans is his number one priority. The softness that Democrats have on national security issues was reinforced yesterday.

Tenth? That looks just about the "same" as the national Democrats have always ranked national security. (End of second letter.)

An al Fedaban American?

This was the letter the Boston Globe thought was worthy of publishing on June 21, 2006 that addressed the barbaric torture and death of two American soldiers that were prisoners of war in Iraq:

The agony and death of the two soldiers reportedly tortured in Iraq is the responsibility of George Bush. Their blood, like that of tens of thousands of others killed in this illegal war, stains his hands. Congress lacks the courage to impeach our criminal president. Until his term ends or there is an occasion of real judgment, many more lives will be lost at his filthy hands.

Jack (Last Name Withheld)
Duxbury, MA

My quick letter in response:

Editor,

I guess, if the terrorists are going to brutally torture and then murder all their U.S. prisoners of war then they won't have to endure UN or Amnesty International delegations inspecting their prisons. What a brilliant, global, public relations move. And, no condemnation of the murders from the global media, either! Locally, The Boston Globe allowed a letter writer to assign responsibility for the murders to President Bush's "filthy hands" (letters, June 21). Another example of the terrorists' extraordinary ability to use asymmetric warfare and exploit a compliant liberal media. Absolutely brilliant. But, by all means, close Guantanamo Bay.

I suspect that while Privates Kristian Menchaca and Thomas L. Tucker were being barbarically treated the detainees at Guantanamo enjoyed three or four meals, peacefully slept in clean sheets and were allowed to quietly pray to their God. Oh, the incivility! Close that horrible, horrible place called Gitmo! (End of letter.)

Sen. John F. Kerry . . . Political Coward

Oh, my, gosh! Sen. John F. Kerry hung tough . . . for all of six days! The Great Equivocator is now calling for the removal of all U.S. troops from Iraq by July 1, 2007. Look just two posts below and notice that on June 14 the Great Equivocator was calling for surrender on December 31, 2006. In six days he moved six months. Why?, you ask. Are you ready for this? To get more support for his resolution. If you have to hunt around for the "right" date, what kind of leadership is that? Heck, submit a questionnaire to the entire Senate, compile the results and then draft the resolution . . . if all you want to do is have a resolution supported by a majority. Finding the longest line and then jumping in front of it does not make anyone a leader, well, the liberal media thinks it makes Sen. Kerry a leader.

I'd prefer my leaders to identify the best solution for any question or problem and then lobby their peers to support the best solution, but then I guess I have a strange idea of leadership.

The letter:

Editor,

The Great Equivocator, Sen. John F. Kerry, freely admits that he is pushing the date for removal of all troops from Iraq by six months for the purpose of building “support” for his cut and run resolution (Kerry extends troop withdrawal date, June 20, A2).

Okay, if Sen. Kerry honestly thinks that December 31, 2006 is the proper surrender date but is now extending it by six months to build support, how, exactly, does he ask the U.S. servicewomen and servicemen to be the last servicewomen and servicemen to die for his political cowardice? For, surely, brave women and men will die in Iraq between December 31, 2006, his original date, and July 1, 2007, his equivocation date.

Will the Senator push it another 6 months if he still does not have the votes? Will he push it again and again and again; he of so much demonstrated conviction. Or, will the Senator finally show some leadership and influence people? That’s what real leaders do. (End of letter.)

President Bush Lied?

There is no way President Bush could have possibly known Saddam Hussein DID NOT have WMD. Given this fact, the absence of a necessary pre-condition for a lie, it is impossible win an argument that President Bush "lied" about the existence of WMD.

Be a gracious winner when you confront the next liberal extremist that says, "Bush lied," with the facts and logic.

President Bush may have been wrong about the existence of WMD, but it cannot be logically argued that he lied.

The Great Equivocator . . . equivocates!

Short and sweet, please re-read my August 23, 2005 post (it's simple, it's the first entry when you click on August just to the right on this page). Then, read just the quick excerpt below from a story that appeared in yesterday's Boston Globe. Sen. Kerry stole the staff! I know, I'm ZACKlyRight again! No, I don't tire of it.

Kerry demands US troop pullout
Regrets his vote for war resolution
By Rick Klein, Globe Staff June 14, 2006

WASHINGTON -- Senator John F. Kerry is placing himself at the center of congressional action over the war in Iraq this week with a crisply worded resolution to require President Bush to withdraw almost all US troops by the end of this year.

The measure has exposed Kerry to attacks from Republicans and some Democrats, as critics rushed to tag the plan as a "cut-and-run" strategy. But it also has made him a rallying point for antiwar activists.

The sweeping resolution amounts to the senator's sharpest condemnation of the war and his broadest repudiation of his own vote to authorize force. It also stands in contrast to his handling of the war issue during his campaign for president two years ago.

"My friends, war is no excuse for its own perpetuation," Kerry said before a group of cheering liberal activists who had gathered in Washington yesterday for a "Take Back America" conference. "It is essential to acknowledge that the war itself was a mistake -- to say the simple words that contain more truth than pride. . . . It was wrong and I was wrong to vote for that Iraqi war resolution."

It was a concise distillation of principles that Kerry, the Massachusetts Democrat, did not produce in the presidential campaign, during which his language on Iraq prompted attacks from the Bush campaign that he was weak and inconsistent.

His effort to spell out his views on the war in the clearest possible terms now appears to be partly an attempt to remake his image for a possible second run for the presidency . . . . (End of excerpt.)

Also, if you care to do a few clicks, read today's column by Ms. Joan Vennochi of the Boston Globe. It's as though she read and plagarized my August 23, 2005 post. Anyway, Ms. Vennochi has been covering the Great Equivocator much longer than I have so she should know. The path is www.boston.com, Today's Paper, Opinion. For those that don't do the simple research, I re-print just the closing few sentences, "Kerry's painful repositioning on Iraq raises some tough political questions: Is this too little, too late -- or better late than never? But the toughest question Kerry faces isn't about war, it's about credibility."

Oh, how many ignorant lemmings will follow this clown?

The Deaths at Guantanamo

Below is the June 13, 2006 lead editorial of the Boston Globe and my letter responding. Also below are two other letters that speak to the fantasy world of the left-wing extremists that the Boston Globe chooses to publish.

Deaths at Guantanamo, editorial, June 13, 2006, The Boston Globe

Guantanamo made a mockery of US claims to respect human rights before three inmates committed suicide there last weekend. The deaths have brought renewed criticism from Washington's closest ally in the fight against terrorism, Great Britain, among others. The continued detention, without charges, of hundreds of men caught mainly in the Afghan war in 2001 isolates the United States in world opinion. Many of the detainees doubtless are dangerous, but the United States should have long since used either criminal trials or military tribunals with full due process rights to determine which detainees should be held and which freed.

The 460 detainees (there were about 600 at one point) have been at Guantanamo for a period almost as long as US involvement in World War II, but just 10 have been charged with any offenses. None of the three who committed suicide had been charged. One, though he apparently didn't know it, was on schedule to be released to his homeland if an appropriate form of detention could be arranged there.

Many detainees, facing the prospect of no trial and endless separation from family and friends had attempted suicide in the past. Inmates trying to kill themselves with food strikes are fed through tubes and strapped in restraint chairs to keep them from intentionally vomiting. A policy of guard checks every two minutes had kept other inmates from succeeding at suicide until last weekend, when at least one prisoner tricked guards into thinking he was sleeping.

Instead of recognizing the three suicides as acts of hopelessness, US officials said they were ``an act of asymmetric warfare waged against us" and a ``good PR move." The graceless remarks bring further dishonor on the United States.

In 2004, the Supreme Court ruled that the Bush administration had no right to hold persons without charge at Guantanamo and without a right to challenge their detention in court, after which Congress passed a law stripping the inmates of even that right. Since then, not just British officials but Germany's chancellor, Denmark's prime minister, a UN commission, and the European Union have all called for closing Guantanamo or decried the US treatment of its inmates.

By the end of this month, a Supreme Court with new Bush appointees John G. Roberts Jr. and Samuel A. Alito Jr. is expected to rule on the case of Salim Ahmed Hamdan, whose detention was ruled by a federal district court judge to violate US and international law. The court could spare the Bush administration further shame by ruling in Hamdan's favor and pushing the United States to do what it long since should have -- resolve the cases of the detainees fairly and close Guantanamo.

The letter:

Editor,

At first, I thought you were being funny with your lead editorial of June 13, "Deaths at Guantanamo", lending sympathy to the detained terrorists at Guantanamo while at the same time mocking a U.S. general that claimed the recent suicides there were acts of "asymmetric warfare". Then, I realized you were serious. Now that's hysterical! (End of fist letter.)

Actually, not so funny as more U.S. troops will be killed because of this editorial than if the editorial wasn’t written . . . and published.

Two more letters:

Editor,

The only way Mr. Rob Stegman (letters, June 8) can stick his finger in the eye of the Bush Administration in his letter of June 8, which I repeat in its entirety here, "The arrest of the alleged terrorists in Canada should put to rest another of the Bush administration's fabricated reasons for the war in Iraq: that fighting them over there means we won't be fighting them over here. Last time I checked, Canada was over here", is if he's prepared to drop the word "alleged". (End of second letter.)

Get it? The liberal extremists can’t bring themselves to convict a terrorist before the trial but their hatred of Bush is so blinding and logic-blocking that they overlook the terrorist hasn’t been convicted just to attack the President. And the Letters Editor at the Boston Globe printed it! Dummies all around.

Editor,

Can you please provide the "google" search criteria so that I, too, can see the factual evidence that the President of the United States ever said, "mission accomplished"? Oh, you can't because the President never did say it? Well, then I guess you can continue to publish letters and cartoons that suggest he did, but then that would only negatively reflect on the intelligence of the letter writers and the cartoonists. Maybe a disclaimer should accompany all such ignorant letters and cartoons so that a reader doesn't embarrass her/himself at a dinner party, in the workplace, or other by repeating this lie as fact. (End of third letter.)

al Fedaban Americans

An inquirer from a few posts back, didn't understand. I used the phrase, my phrase, again yesterday. What's not to understand?

Smash al-Qaeda, Fedayeen Saddam (a paramilitary organization loyal to the regime of Saddam Hussein), and the Taliban together, link it to the Americans rooting against the US-led forces in the Middle East and you get al Fedaban Americans. What's not to understand?

I'm not going to list the names of the prominent al Fedaban Americans but like obscenity, I think we all know them when we see them or hear them. They can be individuals, they can be groups, they can be institutions.

Some possible indicators of those who are possible al Fedaban Americans:

They use the word "alleged" in front of every action committed by a terrorist but they assume U.S. Marines killed innocent woman and children at Haditha. They equate the U.S. Marines to Hitler's SS or suggest the U.S. Marines are worse than the terrorists. This is the most vile of all the possible indicators so I lead with it.

They repeat, almost with glee, the U.S. casualty count in the on-going war in Iraq; pretty darn vile as well, but lands second on the vile list. Oh, Munchausen by We Hate America by Proxy Syndrome as I may start calling it.

The rest are in no particular order.

They ignore that the President of the United States, the leader of the global war on terror, George W. Bush, has said over, and over, and over again that the war on terror is going to be a looonnngg one. Instead, they lament how long it actually is taking and suggest the President implied a quick win.

They sneer when you defend the global war on terror, the leader of the global war on terror or the U.S. Armed Forces. Yes, they sneer!

They support the troops but not the war but they have to tell you they support the troops twelve times during the conversation. This may appear inconsistent with some possible indicators above, but, yes, al Fedaban Americans come in a few shapes and sizes so the apparently conflicting possible indicators.

They make you feel like you should hide or remove your lapel American flag pin; they sneer at it when you engage them in conversation. Some actually repel as a vampire would repel at a crucifix hanging around a neck.

They promote only the hate-Bush wives, mothers, and daughters of those killed in the war. They stifle the voice of the wives, mothers and daughters of those killed in the war that support the President and the United States of America. Contrast this with a President that is constantly saying everyone is entitled to say whatever they want; he simply reminds folks that he disagrees with those rooting against America. Munchausen by We Hate America by Proxy Syndrome as I may start calling it; oh, I wrote this already; odd how this got repeated.

They have an explanation for why Sens. Kerry, Clinton and Edwards voted for the war in Iraq. They have an explanation for why Sens. Kerry, Kennedy and Clinton have voted for war funding every single time a war funding bill has come before the United States Senate. They reflexively repeat the phrase "Bush's War of Choice". Though I may subconsciously equate rabid liberals with being al Fedaban, this is my mistake as you can see by the votes of so many prominent rabid liberals.

They have an explanation for Rep. Jack Murtha's call last November to immediately bring the troops home and his vote, that same week, against bringing the troops home immediately.

They attack the U.S. Attorney General for the USA PATRIOT Act of 2001 as though the U.S. Attorney General passed the legislation. The USA PATRIOT Act passed the Senate by 98 - 1! Al Fedaban Americans despise the Act but they don't hold their U.S. Senators accountable.

They think President Bush said, "mission accomplished".

I think everyone gets the point. This is not a comprehensive list of all possible indicators; I just banged out a few of the more glaring possible indicators this morning. If you know someone that fits 2 or more of the possible indicators above, there is a chance they are al Fedaban.

If you feel I personally attacked you with this list, guess what? . . . possible candidate.

If anyone wants to add to my quick list, shoot me a comment with your possible indicator attached.

Sen. Joseph Maxwell Cleland and Sgt. Peter Damon

Sen. "Max" Cleland and Sgt. Peter Damon are American heroes. For more on Sen. Cleland, go to my post of February 12, 2006 (one of my better posts, if I dare say so). Sgt. Peter Damon lost both arms in Iraq. Sen. Cleland (Capt., Ret.) lost one arm and both legs in Vietnam.

Last week, the Boston Globe shared the story of Sgt. Peter Damon. Sgt. Damon has filed a lawsuit against liberal extremist and propagandist, Michael Moore. Apparently, Michael Moore knows more about how Sgt. Damon feels regarding the war in Iraq than the Sgt. does and Mr. Moore chose to speak for Sgt. Damon in his laughable movie, "Fahrenheit 9/11". Sgt. Damon has filed a lawsuit to correct the mischaracterization of his position; Mr. Moore, the loud-mouth, so far, has had no comment on the lawsuit. Hmmm. Really? He has nothing to say? Telling.

Anyway, in the Globe story I mention above, the Boston Globe goes out of its way to twice inform the readers that Sgt. Damon's injuries were not suffered in combat. I can find no story in the Boston Globe that informs the readers that Sen. Cleland's wounds were also not suffered in combat. To me, an injured soldier is a hero whether the wounds are suffered in combat or not. Certainly, if the wounds are suffered "in theater", as both Sen. Cleland and Sgt. Damon's were, then the distinction between how Sen. Cleland lost his limbs and how Sgt. Damon lost his is even less.

However, that's not the way the Boston Globe plays it given their extremely liberal slant on all things. As I say in my post of Feb. 12, Sen. Cleland was used by Sen. John F. Kerry and the Democratic Party in the run-up to the 2004 Presidential Election. Imagine if anyone ever cut short a Sen. Cleland introduction that talked of a "wounded and decorated Vietnam War veteran" with the quick interjection of "but his wounds were not combat related". The assault on the fact-sharer would be immense, intense, brutal . . . pick a word . . . but, I'd agree the verbal assault would be justified. Though, I still stand by my indictment of Sen. Kerry and the Democratic Party for acting as though they were embarrassed that Sen. Cleland's injuries were not combat related.

Anyway, the Boston Globe interjected that Sgt. Damon's injuries were not combat related and it seems I'm the only person offended.

The letter I submitted:

Editor,

Former U.S. Sen. Joesph Maxwell Cleland (Capt., Ret.) and Sgt. Peter Damon are American heroes (Veteran files suit over role in film, Says 'Fahrenheit' distorted his views, June 1, B1). Sen. Cleland is a triple amputee and Sgt. Damon is a double amputee. Why did the Boston Globe feel the need to twice point out that Sgt. Damon's injuries were not combat related while never pointing out that Sen. Cleland's were not combat related (Sen. Cleland picked up a hair-triggered grenade on the tarmac of a Vietnam base, the grenade then exploded in his hand; he had just returned to the base via helicopter from a combat mssion). Both suffered catastrophic personal injury "in theater". Why the different treatment? (End of letter.)

The Army Corps of Engineers and New Orleans

For those that missed it, the Army Corps of Engineers issued a report, which cost close to $20 million to produce, that concluded the faulty design and construction of New Orleans' levee system is primarily to blame for the catastrophic flooding that occurred in the wake of Category 5 Hurricane Katrina striking that city on August 29, 2005. The design and construction of the levee system began during the Johnson Administration.

So, you see, President Bush didn't cause the flooding afterall. Tell all your liberal friends.

Oh, and just as a reminder, the Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, Michael Chertoff, was in Atlanta, GA on Monday, August 29, 2005 attending a conference on the bird flu. Again, I remind people just so everyone knows exactly how seriously the Bush Administration is taking the bird flu and the possibility of a pandemic.