"Never mind."
The expressed intention of Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to visit the place at which NYC’s World Trade Center Twin Towers once stood has fueled yet another grassroots movement to block his path to the site. Yesterday’s and today’s reports on the matter have a tennis game feel to them. NYC Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly’s announcement regarding the “negotiations” for the visit seemed casual, but it’s obvious that he wanted his charges—and the public--to know what was in the works. Both responded as could be expected: the NYPD refused to have anything to do with the visit and, when Ahmadinejad said that he would go to the site anyway, the public girded its loins for battle.
Today, the Iranian president seems bemused by the fuss. After all, what could the American public have against a head of state paying his respects to nineteen of the dead?
Of course we know that Ahmadinejad was just testing us, don’t we? Not the president, not the Secret Service—the latter of which is duty- and honor-bound to protect any head of state who visits these shores—but us. Ahmadinejad wanted to see whether We, the People were weak-willed enough to let a representative of a nation-state sponsor of terror get near enough to the site to pose for photos which would have been splashed across Islamist websites faster than you can say ‘propaganda.’ He wanted to see whether we would let him figuratively urinate on the ashes of our dead.
So, now he’s backing down in feigned puzzlement. The ploy seems typical of a mindset that was raised to believe in the honor-shame method of political maneuvering.
I’m sure, however, that there will be a few hundred Americans souls down at Ground Zero on Monday—just in case Ahmadinejad changes his mind. Again.
Nailed it in one.
Posted by: Tully | September 21, 2007 at 06:20 AM
Every September, I recall that is more than half a century (62 years) since I landed at Nagasaki with the 2nd Marine Division in the original occupation of Japan following World War II. This time every year, I have watched and listened to the light-hearted "peaceniks" and their light-headed symbolism-without-substance of ringing bells, flying pigeons, floating candles, and sonorous chanting and I recall again that "Peace is not a cause - it is an effect."
In July, 1945, my fellow 8th RCT Marines [I was a BARman] and I returned to Saipan following the successful conclusion of the Battle of Okinawa. We were issued new equipment and replacements joined each outfit in preparation for our coming amphibious assault on the home islands of Japan.
B-29 bombing had leveled the major cities of Japan, including Kobe, Osaka, Nagoya, Yokohama, Yokosuka, and Tokyo.
We were informed we would land three Marine divisions and six Army divisions, perhaps abreast, with large reserves following us in. It was estimated that it would cost half a million casualties to subdue the Japanese homeland.
In August, the A-bomb was dropped on Hiroshima but the Japanese government refused to surrender. Three days later a second A-bomb was dropped on the city of Nagasaki. The Imperial Japanese government finally surrendered.
Following the 1941 sneak attack on Pearl Harbor, a Japanese admiral said, "I fear all we have done is to awaken a sleeping giant..." Indeed, they had. Not surprisingly, the atomic bomb was produced by a free people functioning in a free environment. Not surprisingly because the creative process is a natural human choice-making process and inventiveness occurs most readily where choice-making opportunities abound. America!
Tamper with a giant, indeed! Tyrants, beware: Free men are nature's pit bulls of Liberty! The Japanese learned the hard way what tyrants of any generation should know: Never start a war with a free people - you never know what they may invent!
As a newly assigned member of a U.S. Marine intelligence section, I had a unique opportunity to visit many major cities of Japan, including Tokyo and Hiroshima, within weeks of their destruction. For a full year I observed the beaches, weapons, and troops we would have assaulted had the A-bombs not been dropped. Yes, it would have been very destructive for all, but especially for the people of Japan.
When we landed in Japan, for what came to be the finest and most humane occupation of a defeated enemy in recorded history, it was with great appreciation, thanksgiving, and praise for the atomic bomb team, including the aircrew of the Enola Gay. A half million American homes had been spared the Gold Star flag, including, I'm sure, my own.
Whenever I hear the apologists expressing guilt and shame for A-bombing and ending the war Japan had started (they ignore the cause-effect relation between Pearl Harbor and Nagasaki), I have noted that neither the effete critics nor the puff-adder politicians are among us in the assault landing-craft or the stinking rice paddies of their suggested alternative, "conventional" warfare. Stammering reluctance is obvious and continuous, but they do love to pontificate about the Rights that others, and the Bomb, have bought and preserved for them.
The vanities of ignorance and camouflaged cowardice abound as license for the assertion of virtuous "rights" purchased by the blood of others - those others who have borne the burden and physical expense of Rights whining apologists so casually and self-righteously claim.
At best, these fakers manifest a profound and cryptic ignorance of causal relations, myopic perception, and dull I.Q. At worst, there is a word and description in The Constitution defining those who love the enemy more than they love their own countrymen and their own posterity. Every Yankee Doodle Dandy knows what that word is.
In 1945, America was the only nation in the world with the Bomb and it behaved responsibly and respectfully. It remained so until two among us betrayed it to the Kremlin. Still, this American weapon system has been the prime deterrent to earth's latest model world- tyranny: Seventy years of Soviet collectivist definition, coercion, and domination of individual human beings.
The message is this: Trust Freedom. Remember, tyrants never learn. The restriction of Freedom is the limitation of human choice, and choice is the fulcrum-point of the creative process in human affairs. As earth's choicemaker, it is our human identity on nature's beautiful blue planet and the natural premise of man's free institutions, environments, and respectful relations with one another. Made in the image of our Creator, free men choose, create, and progress - or die.
Free men should not fear the moon-god-crowd oppressor nor choose any of his ways. Recall with a confident Job and a victorious David, "Know ye not that you are in league with the stones of the field?"
Semper Fidelis
Jim Baxter
Sgt. USMC
WW II and Korean War
Job 5:23 Proverbs 3:31 I Samuel 17:40
CHOOSE MIKE HUCKABEE ! ! !
Posted by: Jim Baxter | September 22, 2007 at 04:03 PM
Carl V. "Sam" Lamb and I served side-by-side as rifle-squad leaders; Fox Company, 'Chesty' Puller's 1st Marines, 1st Marine Division. He wrote a book about our experiences in the Korean conflict, 1950-1951. He included my remarks about an incident in which one of our people threatened to punch-out a fellow squad-leader-guideon who had black skin.
The page follows:
+ + +
THE LAST PARADE
by Carl V. "Sam" Lamb Page 296 (ref: 1951)
James Fletcher Baxter
"Sam" and I had a lot in common. We both resisted evil. After I
got out of the hospital, Big Jim Causey told of driving along
in his police cruiser and hitting a black man in his head
with his pistol. He thought it was funny how the guy sprawled
into the street. When he made this comment we were in a card
game. I didn't say anything, but then he said he was going to
kick the ____ out of Joe Goggins and I had heard enough.
I said, "If you're going to try that, you'll have to go through
me to get to him. I'm willing to give my life for a country
that values each individual. If that isn't true, I don't want
to fight for that country - but, it is true, so I'm not going
to let you rob me of the very good reason I may lose my life
tomorrow or next week. If you attack him, you attack me. I
may lose, but I guarantee I will make it very expensive for
you to get to him. Let me know what you decide."
He got up from our card game and said, "I'll have to think
about it."
I said, "Let me know. I'll be here."
He came back a little later and said, "You're right. I was
wrong." I thanked him for his manliness.
Joe Goggins came to me later and thanked me. He had wet eyes.
+ + +
9/22/07 JFB
Shortly after the above event, Jim Causey was called home for family
member medical problems. On his way back to the States, he passed
through a Naval medical facility. While there, he ran into my brother,
Sgt. Howard "Barney" Baxter, 5th Marines, who had just been sent
stateside for his Chosen Reservoir frost-bitten feet.
Causey told my brother what had happened and said "how much it
had changed his life." He said Joe and I had forgiven him and he
would "never go back to the old collective point of view." He was
really joyful because he was honestly able to forgive himself! He
became a more manly man - a good Marine - with honor.
I'm pleased the Rutgers women accepted Imus' apology. They, and
others, need to forgive. We all need to grow. Good examples are
always in short supply. God bless my Country and its Individuals.
semper fidelis
Jim Baxter
Sgt. USMC
WWII and Korean War
5th Grade Teacher - 30 wonderful years! '57- '87
vincit veritas
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
INDIVIDUAL VALUE - Gift of Y'shua JESUS
by James Fletcher Baxter
The Old World method of measuring human value was,
and still is, by the group. Whether tribe, clan,
city-state, color, ethnic, or gender, the Old
World, ancient and modern, measures by the plural
unit. Individuals had and have no value of them-
selves but only as they were and are part of a
collective.
When Y'shua Jesus died on the cross, the veil of
the Temple at the Holy of Holies parted from the
top down. The individual believer in the congrega-
tion had, for the first time, a face-to-face, one-
on-one relation with his Creator. The Creator,
Himself, had validated each individual for the
first time.Thus, the Individual became the corner-
stone for later human value measuring systems:
socio-political, philosophical, religious, educa-
tional, economic, etc., henceforth and forever.
Western Civilization, America, English Law, civil
Rights, the 'democratic' process, etc., all sprang
from that single event. (Greco-Roman 'democracies'
were 95% slave throughout their entire histories.)
Biblical principles are still today the foundation
under Western Civilization and the American way of
life.
Many social systems attempt to borrow ideas of
"democracy" without the basic premise in The Indi-
vidual. Such a system is only superficially and
temporarily 'democratic.' The cornerstone of the
democratic process is The Individual and the
cornerstone of the value of The Individual is
Y'shua Jesus! It is not possible to have one with-
out the other. There is only One Source - there is
no other.
It is additionally interesting to note that all
value measuring systems are based on the single
definitive unit of the system. Ex: Number, Time,
Distance, Weight, Heat, Money, Angle, Volume, etc.
Only humanism makes the abusive error of measuring
human value by the plural unit and attempts to
build social structures, relations, and institu-
tions thereon. Such man-made systems can only be
abusive and oppressive because in reality there
are only individual persons. Groups or collectives
are merely convenient verbalizations about indi-
viduals. They are not Reality.
I have yet to see a 'group.' All I have ever seen
are individuals.Have you ever seen a group - or is
it a verbal convenience? Reality is only in the
individual person. And, such a validation never
derived from a human source without the initiative
of the Creator. (The French Rationalists of the
18th Century favored the fruit - but rejected the
branch, tree, and root.)
Today, wherever Y'shua Jesus is rejected, the
group or collective is still the basic way of
measuring human value - and/or human non-value.
We thank the Lord God for revealing His validation
of each individual person. We thank Him for creat-
ing each person uniquely, in His image, and call-
ing each one to a courageous ascension by Y'shua
Jesus, who said, "I AM the Way..."
Praise the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and
His Son of Man, Y'shua Jesus.
Reference: Exodus 25:30,40 Hebrews 9 Matthew 27:51
Mark 15:38 Luke 23:45 KJV
vincit veritas
Jim Baxter
Q: ? "How many more Columbines and VA Techs before we 'get it?' " jfb
Collectivist 'solutions' will not solve problems caused by collectivism: Individual only.
CHOOSE MIKE HUCKABEE ! ! !
Posted by: Jim Baxter | September 22, 2007 at 04:07 PM
Awesome, Jim.
Posted by: otcconan | September 23, 2007 at 10:54 PM