Ragin' Dave's Quote of the Day, Organized Edition

Modern unions are what happens when you legalize organized crime.

Found in the comments of this post.

Here's a blast from the past for ya.

That's Johnny-friggin-CARSON up on stage with the Rat Pack.

Tailgating

So, besides the people driving and talking on cell phones, which is pretty much a country-wide phenomenon, Wisconsin drivers are some of the most aggressive tailgaters that I've ever seen.  I had one dumb bitch five feet off my ass, in a thick fog, doing 55 mph while I'm on my motorcycle.  And this is on a stretch of highway that's notorious for deer; one curve is called "Bambi Corner".  Which means that if Bambi jumps out and I have to grab brake, this dumb bitch is going right up my tailpipe.

So I kept slowing down.  She finally passed me once I got down to 45, and I'm sure she could read my lips as I spoke some words of encouragement towards her.  I give a damn if I hurt her feelings or not - there comes a certain point where it's not just tailgating.  You're risking my life with your stupid, aggressive driving.  And I really don't like having my life threatened just so you can get into the gate five seconds before me.

No, I didn't watch the Obama Speech

Why the hell should I?  It's just the same bullshit repeated ad nauseum.  I'd rather jab icepicks into my ear drums.  There ain't enough alcohol in Wisconsin for me to deal with that moronic fucking twit.

One more time

To the woman who's driving like she just sucked down a fifth of cheap vodka and got on the road....

Only she wasn't drunk, she was on her cell phone.  However, the end result on the road was the same.  And I really hope she heard half of what I was screaming at her.

Dear Jimmy Hoffa Jr.

Since you've incited your union goons and thugs to violence, it's only fair to warn you that if any of your goons and thugs attempt to attack me or my family, I will end their life by any means necessary.  It's clear from your language that you want to kill me and my family - that's the only way I can take your exhortations to "take those sons-of-bitches out".  And so if I should be attacked by a union goon, I must assume that they want to kill me, and respond in kind.

As an addition, fuck you, fuck your whore of a mother, and fuck the father you never knew because he didn't pay for the first time.  Fuck the horse you rode in on, fuck the goat that spawned it, and fuck the mountain it grazed on.  You and your union goons are a parasite on humanity, and if I ever meet you face to face you will get a small taste of your own medicine.  And I will enjoy it.  You will not.

That is all.

So this trip

To make a long story short, I was part of the color guard in Washington D.C. for an annual reunion of an infantry division that was integral to the victory in Europe.  Everybody knows about D-Day and Normandy.  If that was the hammer, then the push up from Africa and into Italy was the anvil.  So I spent the past four days as part of the color guard for about fifty veterans of the Italian Campaign.  These men did more in three or four years than I've done in my entire career.  One of the men enlisted when he was sixteen, got sent to Italy in '43, stayed through V-E day and the occupation, then came back in time to be sent to Korea, and finished his Army career with three tours in Viet Nam.  This man literally spent half of his entire career in a war zone.  It makes you feel very, very small to compare your life with theirs.

Maybe that's a good thing.

But that's where I was.  It's a lot of time marching, and standing, and marching a bit more, and standing a whole lot, and then finish with a little bit more marching.  The only time we didn't have to hold the colors was at the various memorials in D.C., as there's plenty of flags waving in the breeze.  The one bit of time I had to myself, I ran the National Mall, from the Capitol Building to the Lincoln Memorial and back.  Beautiful run.  

So I've got a few photos, and some damn good memories.  I'm hoping that I'll be able to do it again next year, but there's fewer and fewer of the veterans left.  I made sure to walk around and shake as many hands as I could before I left.  It was a humbling experience.

Back

Just got back from my TDY trip.  Report to follow tomorrow.  It was a good trip.