Memorial Day Posting to Come

I have been watching the issues surrounding what is going on with Israel and the putative Palestinian state. Anyone who has read this blog and my analysis of Russian President Vladimir Putin (the link provided should reference much of what I've written, but a search may turn up more) and noted the recent news of his intent to return to the Russian presidency should be able to see that I have some foreign policy acumen.

So on Memorial Day, I intend to finally put down my thoughts in another of those unreadably long posts on this subject. I hope you find it interesting and insightful.

On the other side of things, I hope to find some nice stories about the heroes of our military that we honor on Memorial Day each year to share with you. Make sure you have a hot dog. Someone died for the freedom to grind up random meats into an unnatural shape so that you could grill it beyond having to taste it in freedom! That and much more. God bless.

My Alma Mater

Well, it seems not all college students are liberal morons. A graduate student at LSU had announced he'd be burning an American flag today. When he showed up to the parade ground to do so, he was "welcomed" by a throng of students who stopped the event from occurring. The student, Benjamin Hass, was burning the flag to honor Isaac Eslava, another student, who stole a flag from the War Memorial and burned it, apparently in protest of the killing of Usama bin Laden. He was arrested for having stolen the flag.

I'm all for free speech and I'll defend the right of a person to burn the flag in protest, even though I find it disgusting. But sometimes, free speech is also about winning the argument. My LSU bretheren made me proud today.

Please Watch the Video in the Link

There is a square in Berlin, at the center of the square is a Plexiglas window which looks down into an underground library painted all in white. There are no books on the shelves. The plaque refers to German poet Heinrich Heine's quote "Where they burn books, at the end they also burn people" (loose translation). The plaque and memorial sit in the middle of the square made famous in "Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade" (sad that a movie is the relevant reference, rather than the fact we should all know this from history classes) where the Nazi's had a book burning party early in the days of the burgeoning hatred. Heine's quote proved prophetic. I've been to that square and I've been to that square, and I've been to a concentration camp outside of Mainz. When I say Hitler was evil, it isn't lip service to some abstract, societally acceptable concept. I cried seeing those places, seeing the bullet holes in buildings still evident in much of East Germany, the lines on the streets where the Berlin Wall once stood. I am blessed to never have felt the persecution that the Jews have, or to have been asked to make the sacrifice that many did to topple the Nazis. What I do know is that we are losing the values of freedom when a) we aspire to ban books, and b) the choice includes the results of this little experiment.

Most of what I write on here has at least some aspect of sarcasm and making light of serious evens. This just scares me. Hitler is more appropriate than Glenn Beck, Sarah Palin, and Ayn Rand?

Classless

President Barack Obama is headed for another vacation, returning to Chicago for Memorial Day weekend. It's his second since the Deep Horizon rig went deep. Now I think I've said it before, and I will say it again; I'm not going to begrudge the President for taking vacation. It's not your average job and I highly doubt there is such a think as a vacation that doesn't still involve significant work.

No, my problem is that our President felt it was more important to escape to Chicago rather than participate in ceremonies honoring the men and women who have sacrificied their lives in the service of our country. He is making time to help fundraise for Senator Barbara Boxer (D. Cali.), who has shown her personal lack of respect for the military. The Drudge Report is also reporting that the President will luckily make it back in time for the Paul McCartney concert. What kind of message does this send to our troops? What kind of message does this send to anyone?

Postponed

Due to unforeseen circumstances (i.e. the more research I do, the more I want to write on it), the Israel post must wait until tomorrow. Happy Memorial Day and God bless and keep this nation.

The Andrew Sheppard Memorial Thought Police

In April, the House passed the Matthew Sheppard Act along a party line vote. The Act allows the federal government to prosecute crimes committed because of sexual orientation, amongst other things. You may remember Matthew Sheppard as the young man killed for being gay, though a 20/20 report later cast some doubt on whether or not that was the motive. So be careful to only rob and murder straight white males from here on out. That was you can stay in state court, the federal government doesn't care if you kill them.

Stay Classy, Paul!

Sir (yes, for some reason England knighted a communist for his ability to perform music) Paul McCartney, who was more important to the President's schedule than the traditional laying of the wreath at Arlington cemetary on Memorial Day, decided to take the opportunity of receiving an award from the Library of Congress to bash former President George W. Bush. McCartney said it was nice after the last eight years to have a President who knows what a library is. McCartney is apparently unaware that, as he is not an American citizen, he does not have a President. Intellectual giant that McCartney is, he appears to be unaware that President Bush is married to a librarian or that he was the first President to have held an Master's Degree in Business Administration from Harvard. I'm no fan of President Bush's domestic policies with regard to the unmitigated spending, but I don't doubt for a second that the man is more intelligent than he often appears when speaking publicly. Guess he should have used a teleprompter at all times like the consumate orator President Obama, who screws up every time he improvs a line. Anyone remember him trying to justify government health care by telling the audience how the U.S. Post is failing while FedEx and UPS are profitting? The left really needs to get over itself.