June 15th and Tyrants

On this day, in 1215, King John of England agreed to pave the path to constitutional monarchy. The Magna Carta ensured that the king (and his descendents, in perpetuity) would be bound by laws, and that it would his job to uphold the rights of the nobles and freemen who forced him into the pact.

This is significant because in our country, there is a challenge to individual freedoms in the name of communal values. The King was seen as the embodiment of his community - soil and blood. When he spoke, England spoke. In our country, the elected government is seen as the voice of the people. If the government is not doing it's job (i.e., limiting its power to the constitutionally prescribed work and defending the individual liberties of the people), we dissolve into power-hungry focus groups - all trying to out-vote our out-appoint one another.

Similarly today, a tyrant named Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is being challenged to hear the voice of his people. It's clear that some sort of election rigging occurred in order for him to declare a landslide victory.

Christians, I urge you to pray for a peaceful resolution to this crisis. We in America have been lulled into thinking that a vote makes democracy. It doesn't...it is able to make ochlocracy, but a democracy can only be realized when there is a true concern for individual liberties on the part of both the powers and the people. Liberty means freedom to succeed and freedom to fail.

May the people of Iran receive justice and liberty, which is their birthright as bearers of the imago dei.

May Americans revitalize their liberties, for which our forefathers bled and died (and sweated and toiled).

Give Her Four Stars

This has been in the works since July, but it was made official on Friday.

Congratulations to General Ann E. Dunwoody on becoming the first woman promoted to four star general. Have an excellent 10 years in grade.

And may you never see five stars.

Obama and co-Kaine

VA Governor and Democratic VP hopeful Tim Kaine credit's Obama's "tough words" and "smart approach" with Russia agreeing to a ceasefire, according to ABC News Senior Correspondent, Jake Trapper.

Somebody get that guy's nose some powder. (No...not the blow Senator Obama toyed around with to ease the pain of being a biracial kid.)

Here's what Obama said:

"Now is the time for Georgia and Russia to show restraint, and to avoid an escalation to full scale war... All sides should enter into direct talks on behalf of stability in Georgia" (8/8/08)

Notice who he starts off condemning? Yeah, Obama. Restraint is so necessary when your country is being invaded by a foreign aggressor. Those Georgians wouldn't be in this mess if they didn't insist on fending off invaders. Heck...Obama doesn't even think we should do that.

His second try shows that Georgia's ability to fend for itself is not wanted, but instead more centralized UN directed forces as peacekeepers:

"The current escalation of military conflict resulted in part from the lack of a neutral and effective peacekeeping force operating under an appropriate UN mandate. Russia cannot play a constructive role as peacekeeper." (08/09/08)

He goes on to reiterate something he's saying for the first time (check that 8/8/08 post again and see if he asked Russia to back down - or just "show restraint" - same as he asked Georgia).

I reiterate my call for Russia to stop its bombing campaign, to stop flights of Russian aircraft in Georgian airspace, and to withdraw its ground forces from Georgia. (08/09/08)

His third time around finally ends up blaming the Russian aggressors, but do notice how he starts things off:

"No matter how this conflict started, Russia has escalated it well beyond the dispute over South Ossetia and invaded another country. Russia has escalated its military campaign through strategic bombing and the movement of its ground forces into the heart of Georgia. There is no possible justification for these attacks.

"I reiterate my call for Russia to stop its bombing campaign, to stop flights of Russian aircraft in Georgian airspace, and to withdraw its ground forces from Georgia." (08/11/08)

It took Obama three tries to get to some form of real censure of Russia. McCain got it right the first time. In fact, Obama picked up his language. Here's what McCain said immediately upon learning of the debacle.

"Today, news reports indicate that Russian military forces crossed an internationally-recognized border into the sovereign territory of Georgia. Russia should immediately and unconditionally cease its military operations and withdraw all forces from sovereign Georgian territory. What is most critical now is to avoid further confrontation between Russian and Georgian military forces." (08/08/08)

If Obama is elected, it will be this kind of rookie inexperience that costs us big in the coming four years. Dick Morris is doing a fantastic job of reminding us just how much this looks like 70 years ago.

Peace-loving Iran at it again

Iran is now sabre-rattling about its "newest weapon" for strikes at sea. Some people want to say that Iran is a peace-loving country (and I'm sure her people are), and that the nuclear facilities they hid from the world for nearly two decades are for peaceful energy purposes (in a country with enough oil and natural gas to see it through the next century or more, given steady growth). I find that naive, based on the escalation of tensions - largely on the part of Iran - in the region.

And I'm sure the current ramp-up in weapons testing and chest-beating is just part of its face-saving, non-violent, peaceful attempts at proclaiming their sovereignty and cultural distinctiveness...right? Give me a break!

The sooner this threat is unmasked and declawed, the better it will be for her own people and for the world. Pray that it can be done peacefully, without resort to open warfare. Their government has ready made plain their plans.

Those Sunny Beaches

Maybe it's just me, but the 2008 Presidential campaign is starting to look more and more like a bad day at the beach in Florida: shuffling white guys past their prime and cheap new flip-flops.

For those who paid the price

Sixty-seven years ago, on this day, over 3,300 American men (boys, really) paid for the liberty of peoples they'd never met (not only France or Europe, but us). They stormed into the jaws of hell, and kept going because so much was riding on their shoulders. I have been privileged to know men of that generation - boys and men who laid down their birthright as citizens to pursue their life and their happiness. They put down their briefcases, school satchels, footballs, hammers, hoes, and dreams - placing them on indefinite (and for so many, permanent) hiatus - in order to secure the blessings of liberty for them and their posterity. So thank you Fred, Art, Jim, Ed, Dick, Howard, and so many others for letting me breathe free.

If you know a veteran of that war, do them a kindness today. Mow a lawn, buy some groceries, sweep a driveway. Don't wait...we won't have them with us much longer. They will soon be with that Band of Brothers that didn't come home.It doesn't have to be much - and next to what they did, it will be less than nothing. But I guarantee you that they'll thank you as though you've done them a great service. Why? Because they understood liberty and fought so that we would not be serfs - and they understand that the freedom they bought for us was freedom to both fail and succeed in this life, apart from a government's watchful eye. (Remember, they defeated National Socialism - and many of them continued the fight against communism.)

Today, America's finest citizens are still doing the same. Like those of the "great generation", they refuse to take their freedoms lightly - and they won't stand idly by while the freedoms of others are trampled. My prayer for them is the same as FDR offered for our boys so many years ago.

Almighty God, our sons, pride of our nation, this day have set upon a mighty endeavor, a struggle to preserve our republic our religion and our civilization, and to set free a suffering humanity. Lead them straight and true; give strength to their arms, stoutness to their hearts, steadfastness in their faith. They will need Thy blessings their road will be long and hard, for the enemy is strong he may hurl back our forces success may not come with rushing speed, but we shall return again and again. And we know that by Thy grace and by the righteousness of our cause, our sons will triumph.

They will be sore tried by night and by day, without rest until the victory is won. The darkness will be rent by noise and flame, men's souls will be shaken with the violence's of war. For these men are lately drawn from the ways of peace. They fight not for the lust of conquest, they fight to end conquest. They fight to liberate, they fight to let justice arise, and tolerance and goodwill among all Thy people. They yearn but for the end of battle, for their return to the haven of home. Some will never return, embrace these, Father, and receive them Thy heroic servants into thy kingdom.

And for us at home, fathers, mothers, children, wives sisters and brothers of brave men overseas, whose thoughts and prayers are ever with them. Help us, almighty God, to rededicate ourselves with renewed faith in Thee in this hour of great sacrifice.

Many people have urged that I call the nation into a single day of special prayer. But because the road is long, and the desire is great, I ask that our people devote themselves in a continuance of prayer. As we rise to each new day, and again when each day is spent, let words of prayer be on our lips, invoking Thy help to our efforts. Give us strength too, strength in our daily task, redouble the contributions we make in the physical and material support of our armed forces. And let our harts be stout, to wait out the long travail, forbear sorrows that may come, to impart our courage unto our sons where so ever they may be.

And, oh Lord, give us faith; give us faith in Thee, faith in our sons, faith in each other, faith in our united crusade. Let not the keenness of our spirit ever be dulled. Let not the impact of temporary events, of temporal matters, of fleeting moments, let not these deter us in our unconquerable purpose.

With Thy blessing we shall prevail over the unholy forces of our enemy. Help us to conquer the apostles of greed and racial arrogances. Lead us to a saving of our country, and with our sister nations into a world unity that will spell a sure peace. A peace invulnerable to the schemings of unworthy men, and a peace which will let all men live in freedom, reaping the just rewards of their honest toil.

Thy will be done, almighty God. Amen.

Click here to listen to him pray it. Then thank God that the ACLU of that day still understood that a citizen who holds office doesn't lose his 1st Amendment rights the moment he accepts US dollars for his job. We will not forget what you did for us.

Well . . . some people will, but then again, that type has a habit of forgetting people that make sacrifices on their behalf.

Histrionic Historians Hate Herbert's Heir

The History News Network has reported the findings of an "unscientific poll" of "professional historians" to conclude that George W. Bush is the worst president ever. Now I know that W isn't troubled. Unlike some presidents (or candidates) he's never taken his marching orders from opinion polls (unscientific or otherwise). Word on the street is he gets his orders from either Ole' Scratch hisself or the military industrial cabal.

Anyway, there're plenty of good reasons not to even report this "fact finding mission" not the least of which are as follows:

1. Academia is glutted with post-hippie anti-war PhDs...people who kept re-upping their matriculation to avoid working and or war. It's not that I'm for war - especially not this war. However, it's important to keep in view that the most formative years of many of these folk's lives were spent in protesting Vietnam and Bush just gets their vinegar in a tussle in ways that other presidents have. (PS, it's not about deaths of American soldiers since nearly as many died under Clinton - during "peacetime"!)
   
2. Academia has long had a left-leaning bias, especially in the humanities and social sciences. One national survey of more than 1,000 profs shows that Democrats outnumber Republicans by at least 7 to 1 in the social sciences and humanities. (Aren't these the guys that whine incessantly about underrepresentation in important sectors of life? What - it's okay to look different, so long as we all think alike?)
   
3. Most importantly: this isn't the work of historians. Historians have to have the passage of time in order to see how certain policies worked themselves out in the political and economic and social ramifications. That takes time - something that they don't have yet. Give us twenty or thirty years and then ask the question.*

If I want a prognosticator, I'll talk to a political scientist or my stock broker. If I want history, I'll have to look backwards. Unfortunately, the judgment of history isn't likely to be available to us for at least 25 years.

* I take the same issue with those who laud Reagan as the greatest president of all time. While he was truly great and enjoyed enormous bi-partisan popularity, I still don't think enough time has passed for us to see him in comparison to other universally-acknowledged "greats".

BEAT TO THE PUNCH. H/T Aric

Guns, Guts, Glory, and Government

Keep an eye on the upcoming SCOTUS decision in DC vs. Heller. It's going to decide whether the US Constitution grants rights to individuals, or only collectively. It's also going to decide whether any subordinate judicatory can abridge those rights.

The issues involved are much bigger than the 2nd Amendment right to bear arms. But the longer I live, the more I see that our 1st Amendment rights - all of our rights - are based on our ability to thwart those who would take those rights away from us without just cause. Frankly, I'd rather have a government afraid of its citizenry than the obverse.

The Cost of Being Offensive

The accidental shape of this US Navy building is going to cost the US Tax Payer $600K to fix.



Can we all agree that a military which freed hundreds of thousands of Jews from Nazi death camps and continues to shield Israel is not antisemitic? I wish some sensible leaders of Jewish communities (as well as others that suffered atrocities at the hands of the Nazis) would rise up and say that the US military owes no one an apology for this.

By the way, where's the Patriot Act when we need it to prevent satellite fly-overs of our military establishments?