430. Tell my children about Sept. 11^th and don’t forget.

I’ve already told Parker, who was 6 at the time, about the heinous acts of the terrorists on September 11^th. Emma is too young right now but she will be told in good time. The second part of this ‘to do’ is to never forget. So I’d like to take this space today, on September 11^th, to remember with prayer those who lost their lives on that day. I’d also like to thank those who GAVE their lives to save others on that day including those on that Pennsylvania flight who took down the plane and reminded those abroad what Americans were made of.

Although today is a day to remember it is also a day to steel ourselves with resolve against future threats.

We shall never forget.

We shall never forget.

We shall never forget.

Let us always be prepared, so that we may always be free.

--- Ronald Reagan

As a way remembering, do you remember where you were on Sept. 11th 2001?

I was working in Memphis, TN and watched as the second plane hit the towers in the conference room of Syncor International. I had worked the midnight shift and was about to get off of work at 8am when the secretary received a phone call that caused us to tune in. I was thinking it was just a pilot error like the one that hit the Empire State Building in the 40s until I saw the second plane hit. I remember being worried because I was supposed to spend the night in Memphis that night and I was worried the Memphis bridge might be next on the list of terrorist targets.

Say what you will about George Bush but I respect his response and the fact that we haven't had another episode like that.

The new Pentagon 9/11 memorial that lights up the path the plane took when it hit the Pentagon. It will never be closed to the public.

An Open Letter to All Those Americans Intending on Voting

In a recent Pew Research Center poll released last week, Americans trust John McCain’s “good judgement in a crisis” over Obama’s by 51 to 36 percent.

Perhaps Americans are better judges of character than I thought.

Here is a quick list of reasons Obama can’t be trusted.

He changed his positions on:

Iraq War

Withdraw the troops immediately from Iraq

Withdraw them in 2009

Withdraw them when advisors say it’s safe.

NAFTA

Would consistently oppose NAFTA

Wouldn’t unilaterally oppose NAFTA

“Didn’t mean his promise to renegotiate the treaty of NAFTA”

FISA

“Would support a filibuster of any bill that includes retroactive immunity for telecommunications companies” in regards to FISA (Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act)

Supported the FISA compromise granting the companies amnesty.

Campaign Finance Reform

“Dedicated to saving public financing of presidential campaigns.”

“The public financing of presidential elections is broken.”

Gun Control

"Obama has always expressed a belief that the Second Amendment guarantees a private right to bear arms."

"Obama believes the D.C. handgun ban is constitutional."

Mr. Obama supported a ban on handguns in 1996

In 1998, he backed a ban on the sale of all semiautomatic guns (a ban that would encompass the vast majority of guns sold in the U.S.)

He served on the board of the Joyce Foundation, probably the largest private funder of anti-gun and pro-ban groups and research in the country.

Mr. Obama's recent comments to Rick Warren, pastor of the evangelical Saddleback Church, showed he opposed nominating those members of the Supreme Court who voted that the Second Amendment is an individual right.

Abortion

Obama feels minors should not be required to get parental consent or notify their parents.

“Depends on how young — possibly for extremely young teens, i.e., 12- or 13-year-olds.”

“I would oppose any legislation that does not include a bypass provision for minors who have been victims of, or have reason to fear, physical or sexual abuse,”

“As a parent, Obama believes that young women, if they become pregnant, should talk to their parents before considering an abortion. But he realizes not all girls can turn to their mother or father in times of trouble, and in those instances, we should want these girls to seek the advice of trusted adults — an aunt, a grandmother, a pastor,”

Death Penalty

Obama does not support capital punishment according to a presidential campaign questionnaire.

A fact sheet provided by his campaign flatly denies Obama ever held those views, asserting he “consistently supported the death penalty for certain crimes but backed a moratorium until problems were fixed.”

As an Illinois senator, he led an effort to reform the death penalty laws.

Gay Marriage

“The issue should be left up to each state.”

He supports extending "fully equal rights and benefits to same-sex couples under both state and federal law."

“I oppose same-sex marriage but each state should make it’s own decision.”

Social Security Taxes

The cap will be raised to $250,000/year.

The cap will stay at $102,000/yr

The cap will be lowered to $97,500/yr

Negotiating with Rogue Nations

He would meet with Iran with no preconditions.

I would not meet with Iran without preconditions

And how about his judgment on friends and advisors?

Rev. Jeremiah Wright (Obvious racist and pastor of Obama’s church)

Father Michael Pfleger (Believer in the words of Louis Farakan)

William Ayers (Known unrepentant terrorist)

Tony Rezko (Illinois political fix it man convicted of bribery and responsible for buying Obama’s house for him)

How about his penchant for blaming his employees for everything?

(taken from John R. Lott Jr. web site http://johnrlott.blogspot.com/)

-- Among the better known examples, an aide, Austan Goolsbee, told Canadians that Obama didn’t mean his promise made right before the crucial Ohio primary that he would renegotiate NAFTA. Obama disavowed Goolsbee’s claim and said that he had misstated Obama’s position, and Goolsbee denied claims by the Canadians.

-- A 1996 candidate questionnaire form that was answered stating that Obama supported a ban on handguns was explained as a staffer’s mistake. A statement to the Chicago Tribune last fall claiming that Obama supported the DC gun ban was dismissed as a staffer’s mistake.

-- In a 2004 questionnaire, Obama refrained from criticizing Yasir Arafat or strongly supporting Israel’s security force. As ABC noted: “Mr. Obama blamed a staff member for the oversight.”

-- Obama was asked this year about funding he got for the University of Chicago while his wife, Michelle, worked there. He claimed that someone on his staff had handled it because neither he nor his wife would have allowed his office to benefit his wife’s work.

-- When the Tony Rezko corruption questions emerged, Obama claimed that he had never done anything to advance Rezko’s business interests. Then a letter Obama signed was discovered supporting a Rezko project to city and state housing officials. Obama said that he wasn’t aware of the letter and he said that staff had mishandled it. When answers to questions about how much money Rezko had raised for Obama campaigns proved to be much too low, the mistake was again blamed on staff.

-- When Sarah Palin’s vice presidential nomination was announced, Obama’s campaign immediately issued a statement that reporters described as "ripping” into her. A few hours later, after the initial public reaction, Obama first supported and then backed away from the statement, saying that his campaign had misrepresented his views.

-- Tim Russert confronted Obama at a Democratic Presidential debate in January about Obama’s campaign claiming that the Clintons were “stoking racial tensions.” Yet again, Obama blamed his "overzealous” staff.

The list goes on, but these cases seem to leave only two options: Either Obama is dishonest and these mistakes were not really mistakes, or he is a very poor judge of people.

Since Obama points to his campaign as proof that he has more executive experience than Palin, these problems also raise questions about how efficiently he runs things. If his own staff keeps on making mistakes in misrepresenting what Obama believes, can Obama clearly tell staff what policies he wants them to implement if he becomes president.

How about his ability to exercise executive power?

In August, ads ran on TV discussing Obama’s relationship to Ayers. His campaign DEMANDED that the Department of Justice investigate the group behind the ads. Really? The Dept. of Justice? If he’s willing to do this over a political ad, think of how he’ll use his power in the white house.

This information, no matter who you plan to vote for, should be eye opening.

I won’t tell you who to vote for, but I beg you to NOT vote for Obama.

Train's Great Western Adventure Travel Blog Part IV

Day 4 –Denver, CO to Rapid City, SD 6/28/08 Total milage to this point: 1740 miles

We arose early to pack and leave Denver. We met Scott and Carmen at 7:30 a.m. at their apartment and got on the road to Rapid City, SD. We stopped at McDonald’s for Scott to get some breakfast and me to use the bathroom before we hit the road.

On the way out of the city, I made the mistake of listening to the woman on the GPS who gave me the instructions to exit about 1/10^th of a second too late. Scott called me as he watched me head toward Colorado Springs to tell me I went the wrong way.

After 5 minutes of driving through “the Denver that never was”, we were back on the road to Wyoming.

It was going to be a long day, as Google estimates driving time to be about 7 hours.

We caught up with and passed Carmen and Scott as they pulled over multiple times because their dog got carsick. Scott had to stop at one of those ‘trucker’ showers to clean up. Yuck.

So we stopped at the Wyoming welcome center to wait on them and take pictures. It was just before this we saw our first herd of buffalo on the side of the road. Plenty of antelope too!

Lots of open plain to look at and we passed through Cheyenne, I think the smallest state capitol in the west. We did see the Air Force Base where they have all the missiles at though…pretty cool.

We stopped at a Burger King in Wyoming to eat which was...pretty much like any other Burger King.

We drove about 7 hours and made one right turn. Pretty open space.

We arrived at the Crazy Horse memorial first and stopped and toured the site for around an hour. It’s privately owned and funded, which I didn’t know, as they refuse to sell to the government. The tour included a 20 minute movie and lots of museum pieces. Parker wanted a piece of the mountain to take home so Carmen donated some change and got him one. Just what I needed to carry 5000miles across the country…a piece of granite.

We drove on the Cosmos mystery Cabin area because we had some time to kill and Jennifer had been there as a kid and had fond memories of it. We drove by Mount Rushmore to get there and took an initial “picture from the road”. Cosmos was fun and Parker really got into it volunteering for several demonstrations. “I survived it!” was the catch phrase.

We went back into Keystone to eat at Ariba Mexican restaurant which was pretty good but Emma was voicing her discontent the whole time and it was hard to enjoy it.

From there, we hurried down to Mt. Rushmore where we had just enough time to run through the gift shop and change a diaper before watching the lighting ceremony from 8-9 p.m. It started with a film about the four presidents and a talk by a park ranger. The sun was down so it got pretty cold pretty fast. Emma was throwing a fit by now and Jen had to walk up to the observatory part to avoid the screams disturbing everyone around us. She came back after 20 minutes or so when she fell asleep. At the end of the night after the lighting ceremony, Scott got called up on stage along with all veterans to thank them for their service. It was very moving.

After it was over, Parker ran back to the gift shop to get his latest obsession, “bobbleheads”…(Thanks Scott.).

It was getting late at this point and we had a 30 minute drive back to Rapid City to our hotel. We wound up getting to the America’s Best Value Inn in Rapid City around 11pm.

It was a good day.

Republished from the "Whatever Happened to Randolph Scott?" Blog:

The recent revival of the Flash Gordon franchise on the Sci-Fi channel (read a review here) has sparked interest in the 1980 film adaptation of the same name.

The Star of that film faded into relative obscurity after many pronounced it the worst movie that year.

I loved it.

So here, in my roundabout tribute way, the focus of the first entry into “Whatever happened to Randolph Scott?” is the actor who played Flash, Sam J. Jones.

Sam J. Jones is a Chicago born actor and should be commended for his service to his country as a marine and his many humanitarian awards.

The failure of the critics to see the brilliance of this campy movie led to Sam winning the Razzie that year for worst actor but countered quickly the next year by winning Best New Actor from the Academy of Science Fiction, Fantasy, and Horror.

But, alas, the damage was done and Sam would spend his career playing bit roles in TV shows and B movies.

His notable appearances include one-shots on the A-team, Hardcastle and McCormick, Hunter, and Riptide.

Before the Flash Gordon fiasco, he also appeared in ‘10’ with Bo Derek.

He has been a very prolific artist and currently he is still working having just finished production on his latest film, Revamped.

We can say that Sam is alive and well and we wish him continued success.

Miss America?

Yes, she is.

Last March in this blog, I railed against many of the things I was disgusted with about this

country. I even titled one entry: “Miss America? I do.”

I was so fed up with the liberal media controlling our thoughts and wishes, and so fed up with it working, that I was ready to move to another country if Hilary was elected.

Well, after last night, I have to apologize. I had given up. Or almost given up. I had lost the faith. I had even thought momentarily of not voting. Something I used to proselytize to others about the civic duties of voting. I used to channel Robert Heinlen from Starship Troopers about the ‘rights’ of citizenship.

But alas, all it took was a woman to make things right. After watching the speeches last night on TV at the Republican National Convention, I swelled with pride at John McCain’s stories of torture and imprisonment, and I finally found a woman with an idealogical point of view that I would be proud to vote for.

I was a member of the Straight Talk Express for a short while back in 2000 and I still receive emails from the campaign. But to tell the truth, I had lost interest in him because he wasn’t conservative enough for me.

The full story of his capture and torture last night made me pause and throw my support behind him just because of his character.

Just a blog to fulfill my monthly duties and let you McCain-Palin supporters know … I’m BACK!

P.S. Doesn't Sarah Palin look like Sabine Ehrenfeld, the Overstock.com spokesmodel?