Photo Time

I've been avoiding politics quite a bit this weekend, just because I don't feel like having my blood pressure spike through the roof. So, here's a little set of photos that I took on Ft. Lewis, WA. I enjoy taking sets of photos of the same thing from different perspectives, and one night the fog was so thick that you could cut it with a knife. It did interesting things with the streetlights behind the trees.

So, we have a close up. 346KB


Stepping back. 391KB


Stepping farther back. 356KB


With that, I'm off for the rest of the day. Have a great weekend!

The Decline Begins

I think Australia will soon find out that once you elect a power-hungry nanny-statist into office, you're going to have a hard time kicking him out.

In the meantime, enjoy all those extra laws, extra taxes, and extra bullshit.

Calling all artists

Michelle Malkin is having a contest! Heh. I might just see what I can whip up.

Have I mentioned how awesome my wife is lately?

Yesterday the Ragin' Mrs. put out a spread that defies any general description.

Duck with garlic, cranberry and chipotle dressing.
Duck with garlic, orange and cranberry dressing.
Home cured ham.
Homemade sourdough-rosemary rolls.
Mashed potatoes.
Candied yams.
Green bean casserole.
Appetizers of every variety. Different kinds of olives, peppers, a cheese tray, smoked salmon, the works.
Home made Pumpkin-pecan pie.
Home made spiced carrot cake with white chocolate.

All put out of a kitchen the size of a small closet. I don't think the English language contains the words to describe just how well I ate yesterday, or how MUCH. We had some friends over and we all had to unbutton our pants when we were done.

Yes, my wife rocks.

Happy Thanksgiving

I hope every one of you readers have a great holiday with friends and family.

And pray for those Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen, Coastguardsmen and Marines who are celebrating Thanksgiving far away from their families.

AAR

That's After Action Review for those who aren't in the Army. The funeral detail went well as far as my section was concerned. I was able to get enough practice in for my team to be able to perform.

I'll say nothing about the other section.

I didn't want to post on this

Because quite honestly, if I posted on this, I would go onto a rant about how every MFCS in congress needs to be tarred, feathered, and run out of town on a rail.

They do. You know they do. Congress is nothing more than a chamber full of people who are stealing the oxygen that actual humans need to live.

Photo Time

Since I'm going to be busy with a Funeral Detail today.....


This is shot of the cathedral in Panama City, right outside our hotel. Panama was the first Funeral Detail I ever performed.

It's 346KB if you want to download it.

Another Sad Detail

I have another funeral detail tomorrow. Not a KIA, but someone who died of cancer in the States.

Still, it's never a pleasant detail. Death is death, and grief is grief, no matter how it comes or how it plays out.

There's a lot going on, and I may end up with an Article 15 if the worthless assholes down here don't get their shit together. I've said it before - a funeral is for the family. Yes, we want to honor the dead. Yes, we want to show our respect. But the dead doesn't really care; he's DEAD. We could give him a 21 gun salute or dump him into the ocean, and it doesn't matter to the dead.

But to the FAMILY........ well now, there's a different story.

I've never turned down a funeral detail. Period, end of story. Someone from HQ calls me and says "Dave, we need someone for a funeral detail" and I say "Yes." I wish I could say the same for the rest of the so-called "solders" on this piece of shit island. There are too many people in this command who call themselves a Non-Commissioned Officer, but in reality are nothing more than a pay grade. They're not Sergeants or Staff Sergeants, they're an E-5 or an E-6.

Any NCO's will probably know what I mean.

But that's a story for another day. As for me, I'm going to bed. See you all later, providing that I don't break my foot off in the ass of some idiotic, whiny, sniveling, spineless, greedy, worthless festering pus-bubble that dares call himself a "Soldier".

Tomorrow's Republican trophy wives

And the pictures, they'll burn, of the slacker (D)emocrats they used to date.

My favorite trophy wife? Jeri Thompson of course.

The (D)emocrat's Mexifada

There is a common theme that has emerged amongst the posts on my blog this week. See if it leaps out at you too.

CNN MassDerbate

Doug Ross:All six of CNN's "undecided voters" were Democratic operatives

A Democratic Party bigwig

An antiwar activist

A Union official

An Islamic leader

A Harry Reid staffer

A radical Chicano separatist

In other words... a representative sample of the (D)emocrat party.

By "radical Chicano separatist" he means:

"my name is George R. Ambriz, former student of Western New Mexico University, more importantly, a former M.E.Ch.A. President... we worked in sync... with the local and state Democratic Party to inform many people about the importance of voting..."

MEChA is a race-based supremacist organization... kinda like the KKK, or La Raza

These are race-based activist groups the (D)emocrat party have embraced as preferential constituencies to the extent they will showcase their claims of 'victimhood' in staged "debates" of the "issues". If you are outraged by that consider the obvious next step of criminalizing the exposure of the haters:

Orwell was an Englishman

Iain Murray notes that when viewers complained about broadcasts that showed video of a hate-spewing Islamo-fascist Imam the authorities investigated the network that dared broadcast that video.

Criminalization that includes the John Doe lawsuits against the whistleblowers baited by the flying Imams stage play as well as:

The Libel Tourist

In a now infamous case of "libel tourism" Cambridge University Press not only capitulated to a lawsuit by pulping copies of Alms for Jihad (a book about the funding of terrorism), but even called on American libraries to withdraw and destroy their own copies of the book.

Only in the UK? Sorry, No. The tactics are already in use here:

Oregon exports 'Red Shirt' trainees

Oregon's gov't union operatives have trained, aided and abetted voter-blockers in Oklahoma and other states.

These "voter-blockers" were stopping signature gathering on voter initiatives to remove race-based preferences. Watch the video to see real "Brown Shirt" tactics in their developmental stage.

Then consider the MainStreamMedia's propaganda campaign to create the false perception that there are victims at risk:

AP lies to advance the agenda : Hate crimes rose 8 percent in 2006

The fact that far less then 1/1000 criminal events could be described, by the victims, as a "hate crime", does not make them a "hate crime". Additionally the infrequency of such 'rare' events undermines any trend analysis even if you did use the same "reporting agencies" from year to year.

...

Your chances of winning the lottery are greater then being a victim of a "hate crime" in America... unless it's self-inflicted to "raise-awareness"

Then consider the hypocrisy of the faux-victim Tawana Brawley, who like the Jena-6 and the false accuser of the Duke La Crosse players, who all were in fact committing a racially biased 'hate crime' while demanding preferential treatment as hate-crime victims.

But just when you thought the (D)emocrats couldn't provide any more material aid to the race-baiting agenda you read this:

¿Habla Español?

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has moved to kill an amendment that would protect employers from federal lawsuits for requiring their workers to speak English. Among the employers targeted by such lawsuits: the Salvation Army.

Now do you believe that (D)emocrats want Illegals to provide the votes Americans Won't!

Ugly Clinton Rising

Hillary(D) is an activist for illegal aliens... just google how many times she has spoken before the racist organization La Raza, NCLR, (which tranlates as 'The Race'), whose motto is:

"For La Raza todo. Fuera de La Raza nada"

(For The Race everything. Outside The Race, nothing)

Did you really think it stopped with drivers licenses for illegals?

My point? The common theme?

Are you one of the preferential 'victim class'... or their intended target?

I don't care what color, or what religion, or sex or creed etc etc anyone is... I, and my family, even qualify for a number of these preferential groups. I just don't happen to be a racial supremacist.

The risks? Besides diversion of our tax-dollars against our will to racially defined preference groups?

CIA/FBI agent Jihad Jane

Richard Spencer:

An espionage case has come to light in Detroit that has a little of everything: besides espionage, there’s an illegal immigration angle, a Keystone Kops angle, and even involvement of major presidential candidates. It would make a great movie -- if this kind of thing doesn’t kill us first.

Debbie Schlussel:

Prouty's lawbreaking was eventually exposed because of ongoing investigations of her brother-in-law, indicted Hezbollah financier Talal Chahine (to whom she is accused of disclosing classified information on three Hezbollah-related investigations that involve him).

Richard Spencer:

Several weeks ago I wrote about La Shish, a restaurant chain owned by Talal Chahine, who has fled the country to escape indictment for evading taxes and sending the restaurant money to Hizballah (to the tune of $20 million). La Shish was one of the sponsors of the Arab American Institute’s recent conference, where Democratic presidential candidates Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama and John Edwards addressed the crowd via video, while Bill Richardson, Dennis Kucinich and Republican candidate Ron Paul attended in person.
The candidates were falling all over themselves to condemn “racial profiling” -- anti-terror efforts be damned -- and grovel for the Arab vote. Did they know that one of the conference’s principal sponsors was under indictment for funding a terrorist group?

So do you really believe

"There's no relationship between immigration and terrorism." -- a spokeswoman for the National Council of La Raza after 9/11

Cross Posted at DANEgerus

What a flaming crock

Of bovine fecal matter! This editor of the Seattle times just oozes with arrogance and idiocy combined. There's no one quote that I can pluck out to show what a worthless, smegma oozing pustule this creep really is, the whole thing really needs to be read. But the gist of the piece is this:

Newspapers are the bastion of truth, and blogs are just rumour-mongers. It's not the journalist's fault that newspapers are falling in circulation and losing money. It's all the fault of someone else.

I suppose that the massive over-hyping of Abu Ghraib and the silence on any positive news coming out of Iraq aren't any reason why newspapers are having problems. Nope, that couldn't be it.

I suppose the massive political bias in newsrooms that is transferred to the newspapers can't be to blame. Nope, nah, that couldn't be it.

I suppose the partisan editorials passed off as "news" aren't the reason either.

I suppose the peddling of rumours, half-truths and outright lies as "fact" and "news" don't have anything to do with it? Nah, of course not!

Newspapers are struggling because they have stopped reporting the actual events and now function as a mouthpiece for the various leftist points of view in this country. In short, they're not newspapers at all, but propaganda organs. And I refuse to pay to read someone's propaganda. The only section I pick up from a newspaper is the Sports section. Everything else can go to hell.

Photo Time

Germany, as seen from the back of a C-17 Globemaster.


482KB, if you want to download it.

There are none so blind

As those who refuse to see. Instapundit links to the Boston Globe, who's headline is "Effectiveness of D.C. gun ban still a mystery."

It's not a mystery. IT IS A COMPLETE AND UTTER FAILURE FROM TOP TO BOTTOM! After thirty years of high crime rates, including rape, murder, theft, burglary, and other assorted violent crimes, you would think that sane, rational people would look at the ban and figure out that BANNING FIREARMS DOES NOT WORK!

Unfortunately, those who would ban firearms are neither sane nor logical. Otherwise they would have already figured it out, instead of having to be reminded on a daily basis.

My wishfull thinking

Powerline has obtained a copy of a letter sent out by Sanford University law professors, who are trying to prevent the military from sending JAG recruiters to their campus. You can go read the whole thing. I am always amazed by people who are so well educated being such complete morons.

My wishful thinking comes in when I read this reply. I don't know if anyone will ever send that reply back to the dumb-assed idiots at Stanford, but I really, really, REALLY wish that some law student would.

Grief

A man and his dog were walking along a road. The man was enjoying the scenery, when it suddenly occurred to him that he was dead. He remembered dying, and that the dog walking beside him had been dead for years. He wondered where the road was leading them.

After a while, they came to a high, white stone wall along one side of the road. It looked like fine marble.

At the top of a long hill, it was broken by a tall arch that glowed in the sunlight. When he was standing before it he saw a magnificent gate in the arch that looked like Mother of Pearl, and the street that led to the gate looked like pure gold.

He and the dog walked toward the gate, and as he got closer, he saw a man at a desk to one side.
When he was close enough, he called out, "Excuse me, where are we?"

"This is Heaven, sir," the man answered.

"Wow! Would you happen to have some water?" the man asked.

"Of course, sir. Come right in, and I'll have some ice water brought right up." The man gestured, and the gate began to open.

"Can my friend," gesturing toward his dog, "come in, too?" the traveler asked.

"I'm sorry, sir, but we don't accept pets."

The man thought a moment and then turned back toward the road and continued the way he had been going with his dog. After another long walk, and at the top of another long hill, he came to a dirt road which led through a farm gate that looked as if it had never been closed. There was no fence. As he approached the gate, he saw a man inside, leaning against a tree and reading a book.

"Excuse me!" he called to the reader. "Do you have any water?"

"Yeah, sure, there's a pump over there". The man pointed to a place that couldn't be seen from outside the gate. "Come on in."

"How about my friend here?" the traveler gestured to the dog.

"There should be a bowl by the pump." They went through the gate, and sure enough, there was an old fashioned hand pump with a bowl beside it.

The traveler filled the bowl and took a long drink himself, then he gave some to the dog. When they were full, he and the dog walked back toward the man who was standing by the tree waiting for them.

"What do you call this place?" the traveler asked.

"This is Heaven," was the answer.

"Well, that's confusing," the traveler said. "The man down the road said that was Heaven, too."

"Oh, you mean the place with the gold street and pearly gates? Nope. That's Hell."

"Doesn't it make you mad for them to use your name like that?"

"No. I can see how you might think so, but we're just happy that they screen out the folks who'll leave their best friends behind."

Digger will be waiting for you when you get there, Rachel. I truly do believe that.

National Ammo Day

You know the deal, folks. Go out and buy 100 rounds of ammunition from a local gun dealer. Support those who support the 2nd Amendment!

And since it's Sunday

Here's a photo of a cathedral in Helena, Montana. I had climbed to the top of Mt. Helena, and when I looked down at the town it was the first building to catch my eye.

So I photographed it. 817KB, if you want to download it.

Ragin' Dave's Quote of the Day

From Rodger Schlong

Some years ago, on a lazy Sunday afternoon, I was watching C-Span. Gus Hall, the late American Communist Party Boss was giving a speech to a bunch of empty chairs. That was followed by Dick Gerhardt speaking to some other group. It was quite uncanny (and why I remember it) that the two gentlemen made nearly identical points, using nearly identical language. Things have only gone downhill for Democrats since then. Socialists? Maybe, but a socialist is only a communist without a gun.

I am SO stealing that.