BENGHAZI…AND OTHER MYSTERIES

 BENGHAZI…AND OTHER MYSTERIES.

            We are days away from the third anniversary of the Benghazi slaughter of our Ambassador and three other brave men.   You know their names, so I don’t need to identify them, except to ask a couple of questions.   When the bodies were recovered from Libya, was an autopsy done, and if so, do we know what the results were?   When the Muslim-in-chief and the then-Secretary of State stood and watched the remains being unloaded and then taken away, did anyone point to them and say this was your fault?   Since we know now, and probably early on, that there were many pleas for a strengthening of the security around the building, why were those pleas ignored?  How is it that, even knowing what we know now, which isn’t the whole truth by any means, no one has been indicted, tried and incarcerated for that slaughter?   Will Mrs. Clinton, who is now a private citizen, be allowed to dictate the terms of her testimony before the panel headed up by Representative Gowdy, who has said that she will stay until she answers all the questions?   What part did Mrs. Clinton’s aide, Huma Abedin, play in this event?   Will she be called to testify and can she plead the Fifth Amendment, as I suspect Mrs. Clinton will do?

            The technology that existed in 1937, when Amelia Earhart disappeared and became one of the great aviation mysteries, could not rival the technology that we have today…but we still don’t know what happened to that Malaysian aircraft that disappeared on 8 March 2014, with 239 people(passengers and crew) aboard.   No trace of the plane from 1937, even using today’s technology, and no trace of MH 370 either.

Many theories have been floated, some sound logical and some are just sound, period.

My prediction is that MH 370 is not going to be found, and neither is Ms Earhart’s aircraft.

            December 7, 1941…a day that will live in infamy, said President Roosevelt.   In the years since, so many books, movies and theories have been put out that you literally could fill a library with just that subject.   Everything from the goof-up of the Japanese to forgetting about the difference in time from Tokyo to Washington, to the so-called “third attack” that never took place.   The mysteries abound about Pearl Harbor, and you can take your pick, once again, of which theory you wish to attach any credence to, because they range from the “secret” to the early-warnings.   Senior officers were disciplined, messages got lost, even the positioning of ships-of-the-line came under question.  Oh, there was, and still is, many avenues to pursue that one could spend a lifetime doing just that and still not come up with the one and only definitive answer.

            The Six Day War was fought between June 5 and 10, 1967 by Israel and the neighboring states of Egypt (known at the time as the United Arab Republic), Jordan, and Syria.  It came about because Israel had been recognized as a sovereign nation, and that irked the Arab nations around it.  Relations between Israel and its neighbors had never fully normalized following the 1948 Arab–Israeli War, and in the period leading up to June 1967 tensions became dangerously heightened. As a result, following the mobilization of Egyptian forces along the Israeli border in the Sinai Peninsula, Israel launched a series of preemptive airstrikes against Egyptian airfields on June 5.   The mystery comes in at this point.   Where did the aircraft that Israel used, come from?

How was it that this tiny nation, just born, could muster an armed force that could defeat some of the most powerful armies in that part of the world?   According to research, Israel lost about one thousand troops while the combined Arab forces lost about twenty thousand.

            We couldn’t close this out without a maritime mystery and one of the best is the mystery of the Mary Celeste.  The Mary Celeste was an American merchant brigantine that was discovered on December 4, 1872, off the Azores Islands, sailing with no one on board and with her lifeboat missing. When found by the Canadian brigantine Dei Gratia, Mary Celeste was in a disheveled but seaworthy condition, under partial sail; the last log entry was ten days earlier. She had left New York for Genoa a month previously, and was well provisioned. Her cargo of denatured alcohol was apparently undisturbed, as were the captain's and crew's personal belongings. None of those who had been on board were seen or heard from again.   Many theories, again, have been put forth about this mystery, even going so far as to include a Dracula-like person aboard, or space aliens plucking the crew from the lifeboat and taking them up “to the mothership”

            So, there you go.   If you look into these mysteries you may even come up with a theory that no one else has thought of…but I doubt it.

           

REALITY BITES…AND IT HURTS.

  REALITY BITES…AND IT HURTS.

            Let me start by saying that when it comes to being a handyman around the house, the skills are still there…but, using the most recent fix-it job as an example, reality bit me in the you-know-what.   Here’s what happened.  Our kitchen light was flickering and sometimes wouldn’t light at all, which is an indication that something was wrong with the fluorescent tubes.  Taking the trusty step-ladder out of its hiding place, and bring the tools I knew would be used, I got up on the ladder and began removing the fixture.   Reality set in immediately and the arthritis in my knees told me that five minutes was the limit on the ladder.  Up and down, doing one little bit of the job at a time, including going to the hardware store and getting a new fixture, then up and down on the ladder again.   What really should have been about an hour job took me about six hours over the course of two days.

            Going over some old articles that might be used one day, this one popped up.  It said that the Department of Homeland Security lost track of some six thousand foreign nationals of “heightened concern” and Peter Edge, who is a big-wig there, made the brilliant observation that “some of them could be here to do us harm”.   That was from September 2^nd last year and it’s a pretty good bet that we haven’t had much success in finding those six thousand…plus how many others have poured in.  Our Muslim-in-chief, Barack Hussein Obama(love those American names) not only lets them come in through a Swiss cheese-like Southern border, he’s actually importing them from around the world!   Reality, and logic, says that we have an increasingly large population of foreigners in this country that mean to do us harm.

            Every year, around the time that the Navy celebrates its birthday, the question posed to me is “are you going?”   I’d really like to, and it would be a doubly nice thing to be able to go in my uniform.   Unfortunately, reality bites again.   About the only thing I might fit into would be my hat…and there are some that say my head has gotten so big even that might not fit!   The last Navy Ball that I went to was somewhere in the early 1990’s and the uniform could still be squeezed into.   Class reunions are the same situation except that there’s fewer and fewer of us there…now, THAT’S reality.

            One of my passions are(is?) hats.  Caps of all types, ranging from the old “newsboy” type to the all-purpose sport cap(which we used to call a baseball hat), adorn a hat rack in my hallway.  From the 1940’s there’s a fedora and a pork-pie hat and, would you believe that there’s no place that could be found that will block a hat?

Oh sure, they’ll sell you one, but try to get one blocked…not a chance.  There’s a cowboy hat, not a Stetson, but a nice one nevertheless, and there’s even a DI hat, and perhaps you’d call it a Smokey-the-bear hat.  About the only cap that I wear with any regularity is the one that says “US Navy Retired” and I figure they pay me to wear that.   If it should come to pass that I win the Lottery big time, and the occasion arises to wear a top hat, it would have to be one of those collapsible types…but that’s not likely to occur, because the reality is that chances of winning the lottery big-time are about one in fourteen million.

            When you get to be old, like me, the reality of mortality really bites…and that’s by way of passing along a tip.   If you’ve lost a loved one you’ve probably said to yourself, “if I could only hear his/her voice once more”…and you can make that happen.

Find a program on your computer that will allow you to record your voice, or use an old fashioned tape recorder and tell stories, read poems, tell them about your favorite movies or books.   Through the years people pick up on certain phrases and they may not know that it comes from a famous book or poem…but if you’ve read that poem or quoted that passage from the book, complete with the title and author, you’ve probably solved a mystery or two and, who knows, you might even raise their culture level a bit.

            There hasn’t been a time in my memory that the world hasn’t been in danger from one thing or another and, so far, we’ve muddled through it.   True, the dangers now are more frequent and more deadly in their consequences, but we’ll muddle through it, I’m sure.   Many of us of a certain age can remember the “duck and cover” drills in school…when the reality was that the entire building would be blown away, with us in it.  Yeah, reality bites but you can try to bite back.   Give it your best, always, no matter what.

THIS AND THAT…

THIS AND THAT…

            It’s being floated as a possibility that the detainees at Guantanamo Bay prison may be sent to prisons in America.  Let’s look at this logically.   First, these prisoners, and that’s what they are, are among the worst of the worst.   Were they, somehow, to be released into whatever society would take them, it wouldn’t be too long before they would be either on the battlefield, or planning battles against our military and our allies.

Oh, speaking of that…do we really have any allies left?   I digress.  Second, once on sovereign American soil, even though they were in prisons, these die-hard terrorists would begin converting their fellow prisoners and, if you didn’t already know it, that’s where a lot of converts to Islam come from.   Third, and this is what scares the you-know-what out of me and lots of others…some do-gooder in the DOJ might figure out a way to hold a civil trial for these men and they might actually free some of them!  That is simply not acceptable and if we had a true leader in the Oval Office, the prisoners would have had trials long ago, most likely found guilty and executed…which would be my choice…but we don’t have a leader, we have another Muslim in the White House.

            Planned Parenthood…now there’s an interesting group.   The name actually is a misnomer in my book because they really don’t seem to care about parenthood at all.   What does interest them the most are abortions and selling body parts, or so it would seem.  Now, as for abortions, I don’t think I’ll ever have one, being of the wrong gender, so my voice on that should be mute.  Selling body parts…that’s a different story altogether and it begs the question of why they are using body parts from allegedly “living” babies, when it was just last year or so that stem cells from laboratories were being touted as being able to reproduce any body part?   It’s a mystery to this old fogey.

            Gay marriage.   What’s the big deal?   I’m a heterosexual but if I was a gay person would that really be anyone’s business but my own?   Does a gay couple getting married in Massachusetts, as an example, strike fear into the hearts of people in Colorado?   If Joe Blow wanted to marry his dog, or a tree, or his car…does it really affect the security of the nation?   I think not.   Where the line might be drawn would be if close family members married each other, because of the supposed(and I’m not sure about this) mental problems that might ensue.   Personally, I served with gay guys in the Navy, and they weren’t “flamers”…they went about doing their job the same as everyone else, and what they did ashore was their business.

            There’s a lot of chatter on the internet about a coming financial crisis…that the US dollar will be replaced on the world market as the “go-to” currency.   If that occurs, this current administration could be the cause of it through dumb negotiations with folks that used to be our friends, the decimation of our manufacturing industries, and the downright throat-cutting of our coal industries.   As the currency crisis grows nearer, the commercials on TV for gold and silver get more frequent.  Think about it, if the dollar is not going to be worth anything, or very little, doesn’t inflation follow right behind that?  Think of the Weimar Republic in Germany, where you brought a wheelbarrow full of money to buy a loaf of bread…or so I’m told.   Logically, at least to me, once inflation sets in, can anarchy be far behind?   I don’t think so.   My investments in precious metals would be in brass and lead.

            A few words now about Jade Helm…you remember that, don’t you?   It’s been called the largest military exercise inside the United States since World War 2.   We’re told that it’s purely symbolic, that the nation should be prepared.  Ok, we’re preparing, but for what?   The way Jade Helm is set up it seems as though they are preparing for urban warfare in this country.   A recent article that I saw said that elements of Jade Helm  Martial Law Forces Are Completely Occupying Every Corner of America, and there will be more to come on this as it becomes available.   How is it that Americans are more interested in the NFL draft, or the latest goings-on in Hollywood than they are in the security of the country?   Oh, wait…America has been lulled into this trance-like state by the administration telling everyone that we’re more loved, more secure, and more prosperous than before it came into power.  Folks, that’s hogwash, and you know it.

            Recently, Seattle, enacted a law that calls for a nickel’s tax on every round of ammunition sold.  This same law requires that a lost, strayed, or stolen gun must be reported within 24 hours.   So, looking at this logically, by putting more constraints on legal gun ownership they expect gun violence to diminish…is that right?   Anyone that thinks like this should take a look at Detroit, Chicago or our nation’s capital where gun laws are very strict, but the murder rate with firearms is higher than average.   An armed populace is less likely to be taken over by a dictator…remember that.

    Larry Usoff, US Navy Retired    www.AirHumanityRadio.net  

LET’S TALK ABOUT HEROES.

LET’S TALK ABOUT HEROES.

            Several of my heroes were presidents, a few were military people and a couple were politicians.   The common denominator was that they were all dyed-in-the-wool Americans.   Today, the United States is being led down the primrose path by a lawless administration, aided and abetted by a rubber-stamp Congress.  The American public, in general, and in a small majority, thinks that whatever this administration does, is alright with them.   They proved that when they elected and then re-elected a man they knew virtually nothing about…the man I call the Prince of Darkness. 

            What would some of my heroes have done, or said, if they were around today?

Teddy Roosevelt said this, “The first requisite of a good citizen in this republic of ours is that he shall be able and willing to pull his own weight.”   With the largest amount of people ever on some sort of government subsistence, that statement does not apply, but it should.   He also said, “The things that will destroy America are prosperity-at-any-price, peace-at-any-price, safety-first instead of duty-first, the love of soft living, and the get-rich-quick theory of life.”   The way Lurch, aka Kerry, has gone about ceding little bits and big parts of our freedoms to Iran, the United Nations and ISIS should be a wakeup call…perhaps a call to arms for the American people, but it doesn’t appear that it is.

            Perhaps the greatest strategist to come out of World War 2 was George S. Patton, at least when it came to tank operations.   He took the measure of the German army and found them an equal…but the American troops were a bit more than equal.

He said, “Battle is the most magnificent competition in which a human being can indulge. It brings out all that is best; it removes all that is base. All men are afraid in battle. The coward is the one who lets his fear overcome his sense of duty. Duty is the essence of manhood.”   Bowe Bergdahl was a coward, a deserter, a traitor, but the Muslim-in-chief welcomed his parents at the White House as if he were a conquering hero…which he certainly was not.   The Navy officer, Timothy White, who fired at the terrorist in Chattanooga is a hero, but he’s being charged with shooting a weapon on Federal property.   What sort of upside-down logic is that?  If you can offer resistance to the enemy you should.  Period.   Patton also said, “We herd sheep, we drive cattle, we lead people. Lead me, follow me, or get out of my way.”

            Andrew Jackson, hero and the seventh President of the United States had this to say, “I weep for the liberty of my country when I see at this early day of its successful experiment that corruption has been imputed to many members of the House of Representatives, and the rights of the people have been bartered for promises of office.”   Not much seems to have changed since “Stonewall” uttered those words.   As a matter of fact, it just appears to have gotten much worse.   Ambassadorships are bought by contributions to a political campaign as opposed to a person who might actually have contributed some knowledge and expertise to that post.   Politicians appear to have as their main interest their re-election rather than truly representing the people that put them in office.   Jackson also said, “The planter, the farmer, the mechanic, and the laborer... form the great body of the people of the United States, they are the bone and sinew of the country men who love liberty and desire nothing but equal rights and equal laws.”   Look around.   Are we still a nation of equal rights and laws?   We have a Supreme Court that is supposed to be impartial…but is it?   This is what Jackson said about that, “All the rights secured to the citizens under the Constitution are worth nothing, and a mere bubble, except guaranteed to them by an independent and virtuous Judiciary.”

            More recently in history, JFK said this, “Let us not seek the Republican answer or the Democratic answer, but the right answer. Let us not seek to fix the blame for the past. Let us accept our own responsibility for the future.”   Wake up America, we are being sliced and diced into neat little groupings that can be manipulated one against the other.   As concerns freedom he said this, “The cost of freedom is always high, but Americans have always paid it. And one path we shall never choose, and that is the path of surrender, or submission.”   If you have to think about that, you are not living in the present because surrender or submission is, in my opinion, a very real option if this administration has its way.   It’s a very simple question to ask yourself…if America does not lead the world, if America disappears, if America surrenders…what will the world be like?

            Finally, we must consider Islam truthfully.   Certainly to some their martyrs are heroes, but we in the Western world, we who treasure life more than death, think otherwise.   Everything I need to know about Islam I learned on September 11, 2001.

    Larry Usoff, US Navy Retired     www.AirHumanityRadio.net

The Time Is Getting Short

            My friends, the time is getting short…for a lot of things.   There’s the time that the Muslim-in-chief has in office…the run-up to the next Presidential election and, I’m afraid, the time left for the United States to remain a free country.   Wow…what’s that you say?   Are you crazy, have you gone bonkers?  Where do you get these crazy ideas?

The answers to all of those, and more, is in the news.   No, not that pap the so-called mainstream media is feeding you…they’re so far behind the curve they’re still angry about Bush!   Wake up America…George W. Bush has been out of office going on 7 years and you’re still piling on him?   Oh sure, he made mistakes, but they were done partially on information that was wrong, partially on a matter of some sort of revenge, and even so, he didn’t overtly do things to ruin the country…but this guy is doing just that.

            Barack Hussein Obama…now there’s three names that just conjure up a picture of an all-American kid, don’t they?   If he was born in any part of the United States, he certainly hasn’t lived the American Experience.   I have called him the Prince of Darkness because very nearly everything that we ought to know about him has been sealed off, never to be seen, even with court orders.   If you were late a day bringing back a video, Blockbusters would be right there, on the phone, in your e-mail, or snail-mail…but they knew all about you.   Got a credit card?   My guess is that you gave them more information than Obama has given any journalist.   Got a driver’s license?   Again, the motor vehicle folks know more about you than the public does about him.

            What power he wields!   He makes law, by passing Congress…and they let him get away with it.   He interprets law, deciding which parts he will follow and which he won’t, and they let him get away with it.   He says the United States Constitution is too restrictive for him to do whatever he wants, and that is exactly why, and how, it was written the way it was…so that we wouldn’t wind up with another king.   The system of checks and balances was supposed to prevent a dictatorship from being formed…but Congress is cowed into submission and damn few people are speaking up about it.   Of what value is a Constitution if no one pays any attention to it?   The Bill Of Rights is equally meaningless because this anti-American, delusional, incompetent, pays no mind to them…and Congress just rubber-stamps almost everything.   Doesn’t anyone have enough backbone to just call him an out-and-out liar?

            Before this one, Jimmy Carter was considered the worst ever…but he was an American.   He served in the United States Navy.   He worked for Habitat, and may still be doing that.   His thinking may be a bit loony now and then, but he lived the American Experience and knew how this country worked because he had worked in it.   Carter ran a business.   He was a peanut farmer, which is probably a big jump up from being a community organizer.   Looking back, I worked in the Carter campaign in my hometown.   I put out signs and made phone calls because I believed in the man.   The Prince Of Darkness only stirs feelings of dread in me.   Never, in my wildest dreams, would I have imagined that we would have a leader that was deliberately destroying our nation!   In that moment of truth when Barack Hussein Obama told the audience that he would “fundamentally transform” America, we should have asked, “Into what?”   We have become a laughing-stock, politically, economically and, worst of all, militarily.

            Barack Hussein Obama has, as one of my listeners put it, the common sense of table salt.   A good military lawyer could probably find enough charges up to and including treason, to remove him from office…by a military coup if necessary.  Oh, and if you didn’t know, that is in the Declaration Of Independence, and you can look it up.   We, as Americans, got rid of the king in 1776, so why would we want one now?   Look around.   How many foreign nationals, from who-knows-where, are in your city now?  In a pinch who are they going to follow?   People that want to send them back to whatever hellhole they came from, or the people that got them here, and give them all sorts of freebies?   People pour in through our open border on the southern part of the country and you just know that not all of them are looking for work.   Some of them are looking to get lost in America until it’s time to strike.

            “I could have ended the war in a month. I could have made North Vietnam look like a mud puddle.   You've got to forget about this civilian. Whenever you drop bombs, you're going to hit civilians.”   That was Barry Goldwater speaking about Vietnam, but if we had a real President, he could say that about ISIS now.   Wake up America, your

country needs you…desperately.

            Larry Usoff, US Navy Retired     www.AirHumanityRadio.net