I have a very good friend that I lost touch with when I left Guam. His name is William Michael “Wild Bill” Weldon. He was born in Massachusetts today, I think in 1962, so he would be about 42 today.

I served with him in Hawai’i and Guam, and I miss him dearly. If you know a Bill Weldon, a real quiet guy who is balding, kinda round in the middle, loves comic books, he might be the guy. Please contact me. I love this guy like a brother and I miss him.

This article, Mentally Unfit for Command, brings up some interesting points.

Things like:

Remember just before the Democratic National Convention when Teresa Heinz Kerry gave the press a lecture on bringing civility back to political discourse? Of course, she blames the current incivility on those unpatriotic, treasonous, cowards George W. Bush and Dick Cheney. But when one reporter asked her the clarify one of her comments she, in typical Kerry style, denied what she had in fact said only minutes before, and then, in her typically civil way, told the reporter to “shove it.” This little episode is not merely an amusing tale; it is a microcosm of the Kerry for President campaign.

I liked this part:

BUT LET’S NOT TALK about Vietnam. Just as any mention of September 11 is “disgusting” this campaign season, unless it is used to bash the president, criticism of an opponent’s Vietnam era activity is only tasteful if done by Democrats — as when John Kerry, shortly after stating that he wasn’t going to make George Bush’s national guard service an issue, made George Bush’s national guard service an issue…

This article is a very good read, I highly suggest you follow the link above and read it.

I was pleasantly surprised to hear about this speaker at the RNC last night. Ron Silver has had several appearances on The West Wing TV show, where I thought everybody was extremely liberal. I read in an article that Republicans could not get a job on that show. Well, Ron Silver did, most notably as a Democratic consultant.

Here are his remarks from last night:

I want to thank the President and the Republican Party for holding this
event in my hometown, my father’s hometown, my grandfather’s and great
grandfather’s birthplace.
Just over 1,000 days ago, 2,605 of my neighbors were murdered at the World
Trade Center — men, women and children — as they began their day on a
brilliantly clear New York autumn morning, less than four miles from where I
am now standing.
We will never forgive. Never forget. Never excuse!
At the end of World War II, General Douglas MacArthur, Supreme Allied
Commander of the South Pacific, said:
“It is my earnest hope – indeed the hope of all mankind – that from this
solemn occasion a better world shall emerge out of the blood and carnage of
the past, a world found upon faith and understanding, a world dedicated to the
dignity of man and the fulfillment of his most cherished wish for freedom,
tolerance and justice.”
The hope he expressed then remains relevant today.
We are again engaged in a war that will define the future of humankind.
Responding to attacks on our soil, America has led a coalition of countries
against extremists who want to destroy our way of life and our values.
This is a war we did not seek.
This is a war waged against us.
This is a war to which we had to respond.
History shows that we are not imperialists . . .
but we are fighters for freedom and democracy.
Even though I am a well-recognized liberal on many issues confronting our
society today, I find it ironic that many human rights advocates and outspoken
members of my own entertainment community are often on the front lines to
protest repression, for which I applaud them but they are usually the first
ones to oppose any use of force to take care of these horrors that they
catalogue repeatedly.
Under the unwavering leadership of President Bush, the cause of freedom
and democracy is being advanced by the courageous men and women serving in our
Armed Services.
The President is doing exactly the right thing.
That is why we need this President at this time!
I am grateful for the chance to speak tonight to express my support for
our Commander-in-Chief, for our brave troops, and for the vital cause which
they have undertaken.
General Dwight Eisenhower’s statement of 60 years ago is true today . . .
“United in this determination and with unshakable faith in the cause for
which we fight, we will, with God’s help, go forward to our greatest victory.”
Thank you.

It’s nice to know that there are Republicans in TinselTown.

I used to be a Mac Guy. My first real computer was an Apple ][, and in 1985 I bought a Fat Mac. I was a Mac Guy for over 15 years, then one day the wife started buying Windows computers. Don’t look at me, I didn’t have any say in the matter.

Anyway, here’s a look at the new iMac G5. It’s so cool I wish I had the $2G’s to get one.

Check it out. The grass really is greener on the other side of the fence.

When I was at the Memphis World of Battle I took a couple of pictures of my army for you. Here you go.

This closeup is of a Dreadnought, controlled by an ancient Space Marine who is encased into a sarcophagus at the moment of death, so he can continue to serve his chapter. This guy has three weapons, a Plasma Cannon for a right arm, which spits out an area affecting bolt of plasma, a Close combat weapon on the left arm, and a hard-to-see Storm Bolter (think double .50 cal machine gun) underneath the CCW.

Here’s the whole army, about 3,250 points before I start adding in options and extras.

This is 4 squads of infantry mounted in APC’s, a squad of Terminators in a Land Raider Tank/APC, a Command squad, two squads of Devastators, an Assault squad, two Dreadnoughts, Land Speeder, and a Predator tank. I’m thinking of adding another squad of infantry, but I’m not using all of what I have now. Maybe, maybe, maybe.

The New York Times shows its Socialist stripes, Abolish the Electoral College.

What they do not know (or fail to care) is the reason why things are set up the way they are.

The United States are exactly that, 50 separate states that are united into a common cause and goal. Each state is a separate entity and is treated as such in every facet of the Constitution.

The popular vote is nothing when it comes to the Constitution. The Founding Fathers knew well the dangers of a Democracy, which is why we are a Representative Republic. Each state gathers together and determines who they want to be president, not the individual voters. This is why we occasionally have had the uncomfortable situation where a candidate loses the popular vote but wins in the Electoral College.

The States, not the People are represented in both houses of Congress. It used to be that the state legislators elected Senators until passage of the 17th Amendment.

To do away with the Electoral College is one step closer to a Democracy, which means will of the mob. If we had a true democracy (and with the Internet this becomes near reality) and I could convince 51% that it is open season on Mexicans (or blacks, or Jews, et. al.) then what kind of society would we have? Certainly not by the rule of law.

You decide, but quickly. You might be in the next open season.

I didn’t find this surprising: Yes, Virginia, There Is A Culture War.

This comes from Dr. Dean Edell. I know for two reasons, A) he is the only nationally syndicated MD on the radio, and B) I have listened to him and know he is rather Liberal.

A national syndicated radio medical-advice show host recently reported on the findings of a study on the effectiveness of group therapy in treating depression. The most interesting finding of the study, he said, was that group therapy was found to be effective for women, but not for men.

I believe this, not because of any study, but through practical experience. I have always been uneasy in group therapy sessions and I do not find them as having any value to me.

But here’s the interesting part:

I don’t know about you, but I did not find that to be a shocker. What did shock me was the conclusion the talk show host drew from this finding. Before I divulge what that was, I would ask you to consider the finding, assume its validity, and decide what should be the next step, given that depressed women benefit from group therapy and depressed men do not.

Would you conclude that

A) we should seek other ways to treat depression in men

or

B) we should teach men to share their feelings more?

Depending on your answer, I’ll bet I can guess your political leaning and your opinion on a whole host of apparently unrelated issues. (This ability to divine a person’s thoughts from one opinion is not a gift of mine, but something I have learned from Thomas Sowell’s book “Conflict of Visions.”)

What is your choice? I think mine should be obvious given my views on things, especially since I’ve been through this firsthand as well.

I’m not going to give the answer away, you’ll just have to read the article to get the answer.

These differences of opinion are repeated in matters large and small in every aspect of our social and political life. They derive from conflicting views of the human condition and they are an example of what the culture war is about. These conflicting views are what this election is about and why we are more divided than we have been perhaps since the election of 1864.

For those of you who are history deprived, 1864 was the darkest days of the Civil War, when President Lincoln was trying to get reelected. It was when the country was split into two pieces, and even the Union side was beginning to split over the cost of the war, in materials, taxes and lives. It was only through the strength, determination and sheer will that Lincoln held the Union together. We owe so much to that one man.

But I digress. Read the article to find out which side of the fence you are on.

Something about the OSCE, Foreign Observers of US Vote Threaten ‘Catastrophe,’ Group Warns.

The Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) is going to monitor our elections it seems, whether we want them to or not. And at it’s head is most certainly a person of questionable character.

[Florida Democratic Congressman Alcee] Hastings was elected July 9 as president of the division at the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) that will be charged with the task.

Hastings became Florida’s first African American U.S. District Court judge in 1979, nominated by then President Jimmy Carter. But nine years later, Hastings was impeached by the U.S. House for taking bribes from the federal bench and for perjury. The U.S. Senate subsequently convicted Hastings on the charges and removed him from office.

The Congressman is partisan, bribeable, and has no obvious morals other than self-serving ones, considering he was impeached from his bench in 1988.

And this is a man who will be a “neutral observer” of our election process? I don’t think so. Not by a long shot. President Bush could win Florida by 10,000 votes, verified three times and it is a good chance that this guy will still scream that the “election was stolen AGAIN.”

Someone should kick the OSCE right out of the country. Please do it quickly.

Here is something that should start your day off with a chuckle: The Smell of Fear.

It sums up to date the raucous uproar that is facing the Kerry campaign, including his own “527 friends” indirectly biting him in the butt.

Kerry — like every other lib — can dish it out but he can’t take it. American television has been deluged for months by the most venomous of the liberal “527″ groups, such as MoveOn.org and their ilk. There wasn’t even a “tsk tsk” from Vichy John and his boys when those 527s paid for TV ads that compared George Bush to Adolf Hitler. But now, with the Swiftees’ own 527 putting ads on TV, suddenly Kerry wants to stop any of these groups from putting any ads on TV. Well, waaaah!

I couldn’t have said it any better myself. Granted you never saw the “Bush is Hitler” ads on your TV, but that was only because they came out on the internet first. If it had been up to internal voting instead of a popularity contest, those ads would have been on every TV in America, no doubt about it. Liberals have no conscience when it comes to things like this. They never ask themselves, “Have we gone too far with this?” To them, too far is not far enough. If you have any doubt, just look at what they say and do. Look at how far they are willing to go to make their point.

This comes from this post, with the graphic of a scratched up Bush sticker. The caption reads, “A person of tolerance and diversity keyed my car.”

Well, this person keyed my blog. I submit it to you, uncut and unedited:

Bush is a puppet of the NeoCons. Like our good friends to the north said is is a moron. Everyone knows Dick Cheney is the president. Whend does the war-profiteering stop. hasn’t Cheney made enough money off of Halliburton. Why does he still get those pay checks. I know when Kerry is the next real president instead of this selected one, the 470 million dollar non-competitive contract stuff will stop. Bush and his neocons have alienated all of our allies. We are now isolated and hated by 1 billion muslims. I hope Bush and his reactionary friends and their proxy war for Israel, the theocracy, are happy that Americans can’t show their face anywhere. I hope the Bill Kirstols, Wolfowitz, Feith, Libby, Boltons, Midge Decter, Wurmser, and Ginsberg are pleased at the the way they have destroyed American power. The over 1000 Americans dead are crying out from their graves for regime change at home. What ever happened to peace. Can’t Republicans read Eli Pariser, Barney Frank, Nadler, Dean, and Soon to be president Kerry and say they are right. The Republicans and their party of the Christian Right is neither. We don’t need a theocracy here at home. Minister Ashcroft should not get his Calvin Geneva. Flush Rush, Falwell and Pat Robertson are nothing but stooges for the corporate elite. Stop the war profits. No WMD, no link Iraq and Sept 11th, and net loss of jobs shows us Americans that Bush is wrong. Please help elect Kerry and Edwards. They are the greatest team since FDR and Truman. Regime change now.

All I see in this diatribe is rhetoric, hatred and seething anger. No facts or anything. I don’t even see much sense. I had to make several leaps of faith to keep up with this poster.

My response:

John,

No disrespect, but you just proved my point. You keyed my blog, and you are from “The party of tolerance and diversity.”

You would put a man into office who can’t keep a story straight, who admits to being a war criminal, who is a TRAITOR and uses people like Kleenex.

His story on Cambodia changes daily, sometimes hourly. He can’t keep his story straight about pulling a shipmate from the water.

Senator Kerry has admitted, under oath in front of a Senate subcommittee that he performed war atrocities.

He is a traitor because he met with and gave comfort to the enemy in a time of war. He has his own section of the museum on the war in Ho Chi Minh City.

He uses people, like Max Cleland, to do his dirty work and only because of their condition. Do you honestly think Cleland has a future in a Kerry administration? So once the disabled Senator has served his purpose, he will be discarded like a used Kleenex. If he hasn’t already been done so.

This article buoyed my spirits: The Power of Good Ideas.

I think the first paragraph is hilarious:

IN 2001, a New York Times editor interviewed liberal columnist Anthony Lewis as he was retiring from the paper. One question: “Have you changed your views on socialism?” Lewis’ answer: “I’m still for it. But it doesn’t work.”

How stupid can one be? How can you be in favor of something you admit is unworkable?

The article goes on to detail all of the positive social steps taken by Mayor Giuliani during his term, such as welfare reform and broken-windows policing.

It’s nice to see positive things happening, despite all of the Liberals efforts to derail such good works.

Carry on.

From NewsMax, with links:

Joe Sandler, Zach Exley and Jim Jordan aren’t the only 527 Kerryites getting a pass from the establishment.

Most of the media gushing over the resignation of lawyer Benjamin Ginsberg from President Bush’s campaign are downplaying or refusing to report that Robert Bauer, national counsel to Sen. John Kerry’s presidential campaign, also works for the Bush-hating, pro-Kerry 527 group that calls itself America Coming Together.

Fox News Channel’s “Fox & Friends” this morning noted the extreme hypocrisy of most media on this double standard. But it’s just one more example of how Big Media ignores Kerry’s ties to leftist 527s that have spent tens of millions of dollars on ads attacking Bush, and even overlooks the links Kerry boasts about.

Republican links have been forced to resign, but the Democrat ones are holding on like ticks to a dog. The Democrats have no honor, and should be treated as such.

This article, ‘Trying to acquire Purple Hearts’, puts a necessary perspective on Senator Kerry’s Purple Hearts in more ways than one.

John Kerry has presented his Vietnam record as his major qualification to be president of the United States. It is, therefore, the duty of the American public to scrutinize that record carefully. And it is the duty of candidate John Kerry to facilitate that scrutiny. If all the senator’s claims about his four months in Vietnam are factual, it would be to his great advantage to facilitate such scrutiny.

Before we get to his record in Vietnam, however, we should examine the widespread misconception about how he got to Vietnam. The oft-repeated claim that Mr. Kerry volunteered to go to Vietnam misleads: He apparently volunteered only after the draft deferment he had applied for was turned down — thus allowing him to choose service in the Navy to avoid being drafted into the Army.

The article goes on to describe the authors bona fides, as in he was a combat surgeon in Da Nang, and his experiences in people trying to get PH’s for scratches.

He also discusses the appropriate regulations concerning PH’s, and how Senator Kerry’s first PH does not meet that standard.

I’ll let you make the call.

I just realized that I am hammering away too much at Senator Kerry and his record. Yes it’s newsworthy and all, but when concentrated into this page it seems a little obsessive, even to me.

So I’m taking the day off and I’m going to do a little Warhammer 40k shopping before I show up at my club meeting tonight.

I’m backing off the throttle a bit and hopefully I’ll come out swinging tomorrow morning.

See you then.