Monday

                     Musings and History

Quote of the day:

“Bitterness will shorten your life. It will inhibit your ability to love and be loved. It will be the casket in which you are buried.”

                                  Reverend T. D. Jakes

Here is an example of a good leader:

While an air traffic controller I was working in Pensacola, Florida. At that time the Vietnam War was underway and US Navy training was going full bore including carrier based training involving the aircraft carriers Lexington and Kitty Hawk. The sky was full of airplanes, we had the same traffic count as Miami.

The assistant chief was the person we controllers went to when we had a problem that required a change in procedures. He had a standing order...”Do not come to me with a problem without three possible solutions then I will select one of the three, after all you controller are the experts.” This man understood his limitations. The end result was that we solved our own problems and if it did not work, it wasn't his fault. He loved to go downtown to the strip joints where he was known to the dancers as “Radar”. He has since gone to that great control tower in the sky.

          This Date in History April 18

1775 On this date one of the most important events in world history occurs. During the occupation of the American colonies the English parliament handed down more and more oppressive laws and taxes upon the colonists. The colonists formed a shadow government and genuine rebellious groups to prepare to combat the English army and kick them out of the Colonies. This was not easy trick, because the British army was one of the most formidable on the planet. Earlier the Patriots had intercepted information that a regiment of British soldiers were going to Concord, Massachusetts to capture a cache of arms that the Patriots had hidden there and to capture the Patriot leaders John Hancock and John Adams thought to be in Lexington. The Patriots would need to know from which direction the British would be coming meaning were they going to cross over to Charlestown and the head toward Concord or were they going to take the more circuitous route by the Boston peninsula. The Patriots assigned that task to Paul Revere and Richard Dawes. An observer in the Old North Church steeple, the tallest structure in the town, and would signal with one lantern if he observed the British troops were going by the Boston peninsula and two lantern if they were going to cross over. Revere would go by the peninsula and Dawes would cross over and both would ride to Lexington and alert the “Minutemen” and John Adams and John Hancock that the British were coming. The “Minutemen” were essentially National Guard for the colonies. It was two lanterns and Revere and Dawes began riding toward Lexington and Concord yelling their warning. There were about 700 British troops and the Minutemen gathered 77 men. Eventually the Patriots and the British confronted each other near Lexington. The British commander ordered the Patriots to disperse and the Minutemen hesitated slightly and then somehow a shot was fired and then everyone open fire. After the smoke had cleared there were 8 dead Patriots and 30 wounded. This was the shot heard around the world. There was only one British soldier wounded but the struggle for independence for the colonies began in earnest, the Revolutionary War had begun. By the way, the British never captured Adams and Hancock.

1942 Earlier after the Japanese had raided Pearl Harbor, President Franklin Roosevelt told the American military to plan some kind of strike against Japan for no other reason than to restore American morale and confidence. The military decided that bombing Tokyo would get the job done. The tricky part was how. The nearest friendly airport was in 400 miles west in China and if the bombers departed from those bases and made their bomb run they could not get back. So the answer was to have the bombers depart from an aircraft carrier in the Pacific, make their bomb run and land in China. The only bomber had that could even come close to taking off from an aircraft carrier was the Mitchell B-25 medium bomber. So the United States Army Air Force tasked Colonel James “Jimmy” Doolittle get make this happen. Doolittle picked 16 of the best B-25 crews and sent them to Eglin AFB, Florida for training. Doolittle marked off the length of an aircraft carrier deck onto a runway and then trained the crews to get off the ground before the end. He never told them the purpose of the training until all of the crews were fully trained. The bombers were flown to the west coast and ferried to the docked aircraft carrier USS Hornet and hoisted aboard. It was determined early on that the bomber could not get off the carrier deck with a full bomb load so the were loaded with a half load. It was determined that the aircraft had to get within 500 miles of Tokyo to have a chance of making it to China. The Hornet left the west coast headed west toward Japan. On this date the Hornet spotted a Japanese vessel when they were 630 miles from Japan. The Japanese vessel was destroyed but the Commander of the Hornet ordered Doolittle and company to depart right away in case the spotted vessel got a message off. All the bombers got off the carrier and made it to Japan although not all made it to Tokyo. Tokyo was bombed and a few of the bombers made it to China, some crashed into the Yellow Sea and some crashed in Japan. But they got the job done. Only four months after the raid on Pearl Harbor the capitol of Japan was bombed by American aircraft. America was jubilant.

1521 The Catholic monk Martin Luther is on trial in Worms, Germany. He was accused of defying the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V with his writings and was threatened with torture if he did not recant. Luther asked for a day to consider. On this date Luther returned to the representative of Charles V and refused to recant stating that he would continue to preach and write what he read in the bible and not what he was told to preach and write. Needless to say, Charles V representatives were stunned knowing that if they forced Luther to preach and write what they wanted, they would be denying the bible. Luther was released. His friends knew there would be a price on Luther’s head and hustled him off to a secret castle where he interpreted the bible written in Latin into common German so the average man could read it. This was the first act of Protestantism and went a long way toward allowing the common man to think for himself about what was written in the bible, not what was interpreted for them by the church.

Born today:

1947 US actor James Wood. He said “I would not walk across the street and pull one of those movie executive out of the snow if they were bleeding to death. Not unless I was paid for it. None of them ever did me any favors.” Damn James, bitterness kills.

1963 US comic Conan O’Brien. He said “I read where archaeologists uncovered the graves of fifty of Ramesses II children...fifty children, y'all! I want to know who decided to name a condom after this guy.” It was the same guy that named a condom after a group of people that took in a wooden horse and were destroyed because of it.

Died today:

1955 German physicist Albert Einstein. He said “The significant problems we face cannot be solved by the same level of thinking that created them.” Think on that, y'all.

       Thanks for listening I can hardly wait until tomorrow

Friday

                       Musings and History

Quote of the day:

“Go confidently in the direction of your dreams. Live the life that you have imagined.”

                                   Henry David Thoreau

I recently had lunch at Jerry's Drive-In over in Pensacola. It is no longer a drive-in, it is just a local diner but it has an interesting history. It was founded right after WWII (about 1946) by two brothers who were just passing through. That makes it about 70 years old. The brother have long since passed but the aura of this place still exists. It has been acknowledged by Congress.

At one time they had a server that was in her 80's. I asked her why she was still working She said that the Pensacola Senior Citizens Center takes a bus load of them to Biloxi, Miss. once a month to let them fool around in the Casinos. They get there about 9:00a and the bus leaves coming back at 4:00p. She said that she likes to gamble and she worked about 20 hours a week to get some gambling money.

The weird part is about 200 yards away the original site of the Spanish settlement of 1559 was discovered. No one knew exactly where it was until a sharp eyed explored found some pottery shards, an occasional clay pipe stem and decorative beads that are without a doubt of Spanish design on a site behind Jerry's. The settlement did not survive because of the Indian's (Muskogeon) harassment along with a hurricane that came and destroyed the site along with wrecking all but one supply ship that had recently arrived. After this the site was abandoned.

The first European settlement in the United States was Pensacola (1559), the first permanent European settlement is St. Augustine (1565).

           This Date in History April 15

1783 On this date, after 8 years of blood, sweat and tears and plowing through two or three different types of government, the treaty signed by The United States and England in Paris in1782 is ratified by the United States Congress officially ending the American Revolutionary War making us an uncontested independent nation. It was a miracle y'all, it was a miracle. Great Britain ceded all lands east of the Mississippi to the US and granted US fisherman the rights to fish the fertile banks off the coast of Newfoundland. America agreed to return those lands captured by the US from the Loyalists. The United States and Great Britain were satisfied with the terms of the treaty but the western Indians damned sure were not. They fought in behalf of the British and had some of their lands ceded to the United States without compensation or consultation. The Indians did the honorable thing, they continued to fight and the Southern Indians also continued to fight the encroaching Georgians with help from the Spanish. North of the Ohio River the British continued to maintain their forts at Niagara and Detroit maintaining that the Americans had not handed back the lands previously owned by the Loyalists as specified in the Treaty of Paris in 1782. Not only that, The United States was freely trading with revolutionary France which scared the hell out of Great Britain so they openly gave supplies to those Indian tribes that were aggressive toward the United States. It took until 1795 for all of the British to leave American lands. The United States being friendly with revolutionary France paid off because in 1803 France offered to sell all of its lands in North America to the Americans for $11 million. Napoleon needed the money to continue his conquest of Europe. It was known as the Louisiana Purchase and nearly doubled the size of the United States.

1912 A couple of days earlier one of the two largest ocean liners in the world departed Southampton, England. The Titanic made a stop in Ireland and then headed for New York City across the North Atlantic. The ships designer was aboard this great ship for its maiden voyage. The Titanic was designed to be unsinkable and was the flag ship of the White Star Line.. The Titanic was designed to be the fastest ship of its kind also making the trans-Atlantic crossing in minimum time. When the ship was about half way to New York a large iceberg loomed up out of the dark sea. The Titanic was unable to maneuver out of the way with the speed it was making and on this night, this great ship struck the iceberg on its starboard side about 8 feet below the water line and ripped open 6 compartments in the hull. The ship was designed to handle only the flooding of 4 compartments. The Captain sent the ship's designer to assess the damage. The designer came back and told the Captain that, in spite of the “unsinkable” design, the ship was fatally wounded. There would be no way to stop the flooding of the hull. The Captain ordered the ship abandoned. The only problem was that there were not enough life boats and of those that were launched were only 30 to 50 percent occupied. The ship went down by the stern and broke in half as the ship approached vertical. 1,517 passengers went into the frigid waters and died. The survival time in water that cold is about four minutes. About an hour later the cargo ship Carpathian answered the Titanic S-O-S message and rescued 708 people in the life boats. The Captain of the Titanic, Edward Smith, went down with the ship. From this disaster the construction of passenger vessels and the associated safety issues were overhauled and present day ships are much safer, that is unless the ship strikes a reef like the Exxon Valdez. A ship/boat is only as safe at whoever is at the helm. In 1985 an exploration effort headed by Bob Ballard located the remains of the Titanic.

1947 On this date the color barrier in professional baseball was broken when a black man named Jackie Robinson stepped onto Ebbets Field in Brooklyn, New York. It took much courage for Jackie to agree to the contract offered by Brooklyn Dodger owner, Branch Rickey, and it took a lot of courage for Rickey to even offer it. There was a hell of a lot of prejudice in the fans of baseball against black players even in New York. Jackie proved him self on the field in several areas. His batting average was always exceptional as was his base stealing not to mention his defense. His jersey number of 42 was retired from each and every base ball team in his honor. No other player in history had ever received such an accolade.

Born today:

1452 Renaissance man Leonardo da Vinci. He said “I have learned from an early age to abjure from the use of meat, and the time will come when men such as I will look upon the murder of animals like they look at the murder of humans.”

1817 English educator Benjamin Jowett. He said “My child, you must believe in God in spite of what the clergy tells you.” Ben has his finger on the pulse of the clergy.

Died today:

1990 Swedish actress Greta Garbo. She said “Life is a wonderful thing if we just knew what to do with it.” We finally figure out to do with it late in life; that is the shame of it all.

Quotable quotes:

“A door is what a cat is consistently on the wrong side of.” Ogden Nash.                   That reminds me of Keegan the friendly cat.

Thanks for listening I can hardly wait until tomorrow

Thursday

                     Musings and History

Quote of the day:

“I am not afraid of an army of lions led by a sheep but I am afraid of an army of sheep led by a lion.”

                                      Alexander the Great

Another event during my trip to the Rogue river came to mind. At one point during one of our “drifts” my guide's wife was in the boat with me and one other fisherman along with the guide, my friend Wayne. She was in the front of the boat. In a drift the guide is in the middle of the boat standing up manipulating the oars...that's right, a drift boat is only oar powered. We were approaching an area close to a road and a lot of people were fishing from the bank. I kept seeing Wayne taking his clothes off and throwing them in front of his wife and assumed he was getting warm. Finally his wife saw his underwear come over her head and realized that Wayne was nude to entertain all the people on the bank. She turned around and yelled “What the hell are you doing, Wayne?” However, Wayne being nude and standing up and she was sitting down, her turning around facing Wayne was not to her advantage The crowd on the bank yelled and clapped in appreciation. What a trip.

                This Date in History  April 14

1865 A few months before a famous stage actor named John Wilkes Booth met with two other men and they made plans to save the Confederacy. Booth was born in Maryland in 1838 and became a vehement supporter of the Confederacy after the outbreak of hostilities. He remained in the north in spite of his opinions. When it became obvious that the Confederacy was falling apart, Booth took it upon himself to hatch a plan that would save it. His first plan was to kidnap Abraham Lincoln and take him to Richmond but Lincoln did not show up at the place he was supposed to be with Booth and six of his fellow conspirators laying in wait. Then Booth came up with another plan. He found out that Lincoln was going to attend the play “Our American Cousin” at the Ford Theatre in Washington on April 14. He called another meeting with his conspirators, Lewis Powell and George Atzeroldt. The plan was to kill Lincoln, Vice President Andrew Johnson and Secretary of State William Seward simultaneously thereby eliminating the chain of succession for the Presidency causing much turmoil in the Federal Government. At that time the third in line was the Secretary of State, now the third in line is the Speaker of the House. I suspect the reason is that the Congress wanted the chain of succession to be elected officials rather than selected officials. Anyway, Booth took Lincoln, Lewis Powell took Secretary Seward and Atzeroldt was assigned Vice-President Johnson. On this night Booth sneaked into Lincoln’s box seat at the Ford theatre and shot Lincoln point blank in the head with a .41 caliber derringer. Powell burst in on Seward and shot him and several other that were there with him. Seward was severely wounded but survived. Atzeroldt got right on top of Vice-President Johnson but lost his nerve and ran away. Booth and the others hatched this plan in the boarding house of one Mary Seuratt. Booth was killed when he was surrounded and refused to surrender. The others were publicly hanged, including Mary Seuratt who was not a conspirator but had the misfortune of owning the boarding house and the officials felt that she should have known about the conspiracy and alerted the police. The whole of the Federal government was thirsting for blood, and they got it.

1986 Earlier various United States intelligence agencies and others world-wide had discovered that Libyan President Murammar Quaddafi had been engineering acts of terrorism on non-Moslem countries. The final straw came when a United States warship was fired upon while cruising in the Gulf of Sidra in the Mediterranean. Quadddafi considered the Gulf of Sidra as Libyan waters but no one else in the world did. After this President Ronald Reagan ordered an air strike against Quaddafi. The strike consisted of 14 US Navy A-6 bombers and 18 F-111 fighter/bombers. The Intruders flew off an American aircraft carrier cruising in the Mediterranean and the F-111’s flew out their home base in England. The US Navy provided air cover for the operation. Now listen to this. The United States Air Force requested permission from France to fly from England directly to Libya across French airspace and was refused. This meant that the F-111’s had to fly down to Gibraltar, then hang a left into the Mediterranean, execute the strike and re-trace their steps back to England. This added about 3,000 miles to the mission plus one additional in-flight refueling. The French are damned fine people, aren’t they? It reminds me of the trip I took to Omaha Beach and the American cemetery there with Christian Crosses and Stars of David going to the horizon. Yes, it indeed reminds me. Anyway, the strike went off without a hitch. Our guys bombed the hell out of Quaddafi’s houses killing two of his sons and injuring many. The Libyan Air force sent up fighters, French made fighters at that, two of which were immediately shot down by our US Navy air cover and the others ran for cover. But it is very likely that the Pan-Am jumbo jet that was bombed out of the sky over Lockerbie, Scotland was engineered by Libyan agents or at least they were responsible for planting the bomb on the aircraft in Frankfort, Germany. We have a lot of enemies primarily because they are jealous of our freedom. It doesn’t come free, ya’ll, it doesn’t come free, we have to fight for it.

1988 On this date officials from the USSR, Afghanistan, the United States and Pakistan meet and arrange for the withdrawal of all USSR troops from that meat grinder called Afghanistan. Ten years before the USSR had sent in troops to support the puppet government they had set up a year before. The Russians did not count on the fierceness and combat savvy of the Afghani guerillas. They fought for ten years and the Russians did not gain a damned thing but lost over 80,000 soldiers. Hey, isn’t the United States military in Afghanistan right now?

Born today:

1866 US educator (primarily Helen Keller) Annie Sullivan. She said “The truth is not wonderful enough for the newspapers; so they enlarge upon it and invent ridiculous embellishments.” Nothing has changed, has it?

1925 US actor Rod Steiger. He said “Man is a greater miracle than any god he ever invented” Rod sounds like an atheist to me, but I know he was born Jewish.

1935 US country singer Loretta Lynn. She said “My attitude toward men who mess around is simple. If you find them, kill them.” Damn Loretta, lighten up.

1941 US baseball player Pete Rose. He said “All I want is for my case to be heard by an impractical decision-maker.” Nobody ever said that you have to have an elemental vocabulary to play baseball.

1957 US comic Richard Jeni. He said “I think that’s how Chicago got started. A bunch of people in New York said “I like the crime and poverty but it isn’t cold enough, lets move west.” I spent a week in the O’Hare airport one afternoon.

1977 US actress Sarah Michelle Gellar. She said “I don’t understand why James Bond has to be a man all the time, after Pierce Brosnan retires, why not one of us? “ Sarah, shut up.

Died today:

1951 English statesman Ernest Bevin. He said “You open that Pandora’s Box; there is no telling what Trojan horse will jump out.” Ernest, shut up.

       Thanks for listening  I can hardly wait until tomorrow

Wednesday

                    Musings and History

Quote of the day:

“I could have had class. I could have been a contender. I could have been somebody.”

             Terry Molloy/Marlon Brando On the Waterfront

It came out on Facebook Matthew McConaughey is moving to Greenville, SC and I bought...it for a while.  It was proven to me that it was just a hoax perpetrated by a very lonely person.  I should have known it was phony when I read that Bernie Sanders was moving to Irmo, SC and had bought a couple of Glock .40 caliber handguns. 

For breakfast Wednesday morning I went to a restaurant here on the beach named The Native Cafe (they have a website). It is a small place and very rustic in a marine motif. Got there about 9:00a and the place was pretty well packed. Who in the hell is off work at 9:00a on a Wednesday except retired people? I know there are quite a few retired people here on the beach but this was out of balance. Then I figured it out. There is an RV park here on the beach that is packed, that is who is coming to the Native Cafe...Yankees and Canadians.

I had scrambled eggs, hash browns, sausage, toast, coffee and water. It was pretty normal fare with no Cajun influence like others in the area. The price was a little over the top but the upside is the sausage was outstanding and I asked what kind it was and they said it was Jimmy Dean, that explains it. The coffee could walk like some I have had in Starbucks. I asked about that and they said it was Folgers made at 1 ½ strength. I only had two cups where I normally have 4 or 5. If you do the math...it is cheaper for them to make really strong coffee, charge a normal price for all you can drink and the customer not drink as much? I will be back.

Early Tuesday afternoon I went to the most important bar on the Gulf coast in the Florida panhandle, the Sandshaker Lounge on Pensacola Beach. While there a group of five ladies came in, these ladies were from Virginia Beach, Virginia. I asked them what they were doing here and one of them said they were there to visit their grand children but it was also a “girls night out”.

Still on the trip to Medford. I had a 2 hour layover on San Francisco and it was during the time of the “Moonies”. To the uninformed they were religious zealots dedicated to a Korean minister named Moon. These guys had shaved heads and wore long flowing white caftans. There were several in the SFO airport and were soliciting donations for their cause. Their method was to offer a small booklet as a gift and then expect a donation. They could not sell anything outright without a license. In front of me there was a cowboy walking down the concourse. This guy was long and lean with the big hat and boots. A Moonie approached him offering the booklet. This guy snatched the booklet and kept walking. The Moonie ran around in front of this guy and said “Sir, do you want to make a donation?” The cowboy aggressively pushed the Moonie aside making him fall to the floor and kept walking. The Moonie got up and ran over to a cop that was just a few feet away and said “Officer, did you see that?” The cop said “See what?” The Moonie said “That man knocked me down.” The cop said “What did he look like...what was the color of his eyes?” I don't think the cops wanted them in there.

This Date in History April 13

1777 On this date British General Lord Charles Cornwallis commanding a 4,000 man combined unit of British soldiers and Hessian mercenaries attack the 500 man unit of Continentals commanded by Major General Benjamin Lincoln at Bound Brook, New Jersey. The British attacked in four columns designed by the commander of the Hessians, Captain Johann Ewald Lieb Jaeger, a superior military strategist. General Lincoln had no choice but to retreat and lost most of his artillery pieces to Cornwallis who took them back to their main encampment at New Brunswick. George Washington believed in the strategic location of Bound Brook and sent Continental General Nathaniel Greene to re-occupy the town. Later on Washington changed his mind and decided that he would had a better defensible position atop the Watchung Mountains in north central New Jersey and re-established an encampment there. Continental General Henry Knox and several other Patriot Generals were impressed with the Hessian Commander Johann Ewald Lieb Jaeger and after the end of the Revolutionary War he was invited by Knox to attend West Point. He declined and ended up writing several books on military strategy including “A Treatise on Partisan Warfare” which was more or less a book on how to conduct guerrilla operations. The book was highly praised by the best military leader of that time the Prussian, Frederick the Great.

1990 In 1939 the German army invaded Poland from the west and Russia invaded Poland from the east in the spring of 1940. During the Russian invasion, they gathered up over 5,000 Polish military officers and moved them to the Katyn Forest and for reasons known only to them, massacred them all and buried them in a common grave. Later the Germans overran the Katyn Forest and drove the Russians out. The mass grave was discovered and everyone assumed it was the Germans that had committed yet another atrocity. The German army vehemently denied participation in this massacre. On this date, as a part of Glasnost Russian Premier Gorbachev admitted that it was the Russian Army that had committed the massacre at Katyn Forest, not the Germans. Since the end of World War II the relationship between the Polish Government and the new German government had been strained because the Germans refused to admit culpability for the Katyn Forest affair. After this admission, diplomacy between these two governments became more tolerable and relationship with the Russians became tense and remains so to this day.

1360 Ever since William the Conqueror, A Viking owning a huge part of France, became the King of England in 1066, every subsequent English King that was a blood kin ancestor of William felt that he had a right to the French throne and several invasions from England to France ensued. The reign of King Edward III of England was no different. A few months before he had crossed the English Channel and landed at Calais in wintertime and began plundering the countryside. The French army chose to go behind almost impenetrable defenses and let Edward have his way and then maybe he would go home which was/is typical of the French. Anyway, on this date the mother of all thunderstorms showed up over Chartres, France where Edward’s troops were camped out on open ground. A hailstorm developed and over 1,000 of Edward’s infantry and cavalry were killed by the hailstones. They do not describe that size of the hailstones but they must have been of biblical dimensions. The largest one ever recorded in the US was one in Nebraska that was the size of a volleyball. Anyway, Edward’s advisers said that it was sign from God that he was not pleased that Edward was in France. Edward agreed and ordered his army back to Calais and they got their young asses back to England. Then the French Army came crawling out from behind their embrasures and bade Edward a grateful farewell using hand signals. But that was not the end to this struggle; the final battle was in 1453. Greed knows no limits.

1866 Robert Leroy Parker was born in Beaver, Utah Territory to Mormon parents. Leroy’s parents wanted him to become a minister but Leroy decided to become bad instead. He met up with a neighbor name Bill Cassidy who taught him the ways of the gun and Leroy departed on a life of crime. After doing 15 months in a Laramie, Wyoming jail for rustling, he decided to organize gang and organize one he did and it became known at the “Wild Bunch” and he became known as “Butch Cassidy” in honor of his first mentor. He joined with Harry Longabough, better known as “The Sundance Kid” because of the number of times he had been in the Sundance, Utah jail, are legendary. There are many tales I could tell you about this gang but I will leave that to all of you to find out for yourselves. It was reported the Butch and Sundance were killed in a shootout with the Bolivian Army in an town named San Vincente but family members of the both of them say they saw them years after the shootout. It is an enduring enigma.

       Thanks for listening I can hardly wait until tomorrow

Tuesday

              Musings and History

Quote of the day:

“Carpe Diem. Sieze the day, boys. Make your lives extraordinary.”

        John Keating/Robin Williams Dead Poets Society

For Monday breakfast: Two soft scrambled eggs liberally sprinkled with regular Tabasco, one biscuit opened and covered with tomato gravy also sprinkled with Tabasco, split and grilled kielbasa and lots of strong coffee. Tomato gravy at the Coffee Cup restaurant in Pensacola is regular milk gravy with Rotel tomatoes, thyme, one spice I could not identify and a hint of Cayenne...it has the perfect wake-up bite for your palate.

Someone asked me why I put Tabasco on everything. It is because when I was stationed in Alaska in the USAF on occasion fresh eggs were not available and they served us powdered eggs. This concoction is not palatable unless something is added...I chose Tabasco and have been addicted ever since. I only use the traditional Tabasco like the Good Lord intended, that other stuff is a scam.

I recently told y'all about a trip from Greenville, SC to Medford, Or. The trip took me from Greenville to Houston to San Francisco and then to Medford. On the trip from Houston to San Francisco the plane was a Lockheed 1011 and I was in the the jump seat which is right behind the pilot but about a foot higher. I could see everything that was happening. There was a window right beside me that curled down under...I could see the ground directly under the aircraft...that was a little disconcerting. The pilot asked for and got permission to fly a route that would allow the passengers to see the Grand Canyon even though we were at 32,000 feet. Even then I could see the spectacular layering in that geological wonder. It was an extraordinary experience.

This Date in History April 12

1864 Two years earlier the United States infantry had captured Fort Pillow, a Confederate stronghold on the Mississippi River. The Union occupation forces numbered about 500 of which over 250 were black. On this date, CSA General Nathan Bedford Forrest and his 1,500 man cavalry encircled the Fort and demanded its surrender. The surrender offer was refused and Forrest ordered an attack. It was not much of a fight and was over in a matter on minutes with the Federal garrison being reduced by 2/3’s and the Confederates taking control of the Fort. Later on an investigation was made by the US army with testimony by the survivors. Most of the survivors testified that the black soldiers were not allowed to surrender and were shot almost to a man with their hands in the air. This testimony was denied by the Confederates present at the Battle and this controversy continues to this day.

1770 Earlier the British Chancellor of the Exchequer, Lord Townshend, imposed a tax on nearly everything coming into the colonies from paint to tea. This outrage was known as the Townshend Act. Not only that, he told the head of the Admiralty to enforce that tax collection by force of arms if necessary. Well, there was almost an immediate hell-raising from the colonists, as you might suspect. In fact, they started yelling “Taxation without representation” and murmurs of war abounded. The colonists were pissed that they could be taxed by Great Britain at will when there was no one in Parliament to represent their interests. The resistance to this hated law became so hot that on this date Parliament trashed the whole thing. It did not help though, war came anyway.

1633 Earlier two of the finest minds on the planet, Galileo and Copernicus had determined that the earth was indeed in orbit around the Sun and had published their findings. After the invention of the telescope and the improvements made by Galileo, the heavens were opened up and it became obvious to both Copernicus and Galileo that the Earth was indeed orbiting the Sun. One of the facts that convinced both Copernicus and Galileo was that the planet Venus went through phases like the moon. The only way that could happen was if Venus was in orbit around the sun. Galileo had been warned about his then revolutionary thoughts even though great thinkers had known that the sun was the center of the “universe” for centuries but kept quiet because of the threat of inquisition by the Catholics. On this date, Galileo was convicted of “heresy” for opposing the Pope’s view of the Universe, all the facts and observations with a telescope be damned. He was condemned to exile in his estate in Tuscany and made to promise that he would not teach anymore “heresy”. There were writings and calculations that were smuggled out but one of the most brilliant minds ever to exist was smothered by religion. By the way, the Catholic Church finally admitted their error....300 years later.

1858 Earlier the Mormons in Utah had attacked a wagon train full of immigrants passing through. They had recruited some Ute Indians to help. The Utes were responsible for the killing of the women and the Mormons would take care of the men. The Mormons stopped the wagon train and told the leader that if the men would surrender their weapons the Mormons would escort them over into Idaho. After the men delivered their weapons the Mormons and the Utes opened fire and killed all but a few children. When news of this massacre reached President James Buchanan, he contacted the Mormon Governor and asked what he was going to do about this atrocity. All Buchanan got from the Governor was dancing around so on this date he sent Alfred Cummings, a non-Mormon, to be Governor and backed him up with a US Cavalry unit commanded by a no nonsense hard-ass and the perpetrators of the massacre were rounded up a put on trial. It would not have done for me to have been the judge at those trials.

1908 On this date a fire broke out in Chelsea, Massachusetts, a suburb of Boston, at the Boston Blacking Company. This company made glue that was used on shoe soles. After the fire got started the winds suddenly increased to over 50 MPH and the fire was out of control soon thereafter and headed toward the gigantic Standard Oil refinery. The Chelsea neighborhood was primarily one of immigrant Russian Jews and 12 were killed and 85 missing. The fire left 17,000 homeless. The wind died when the fire was just yards from the refinery and the Boston FD was able to extinguish it.

Born today:

1947 US novelist Tom Clancy. When asked the difference between truth and fiction he said “That is easy, fiction has to make sense.” The author of “Patriot Games” and other great novels is one of my favorites.

1981 US heavyweight boxing champion Joe Louis. When asked if he was afraid to fight German heavyweight champion Max Schmmeling he said “Scared, yeah I am scared. I am scared I might kill him.”

1989 US revolutionary Abbie Hoffman. He said “The first thing you have to do as a revolutionary is get away with it.”

       Thanks for listening   I can hardly wait until tomorrow

Monday

Musings and History

Quote of the day:

                                     “Get busy living or get busy dying.”

                                          Stephen King

                           (quoted in Shawshank Redemption)

We all need to read this occasionally. It tells you what your federal government is capable of. It is a little long but it will be worth your while.

                        Ruby Ridge

This is the story of Randy Weaver and his family who lived in a very remote area of the Idaho Panhandle. This event took place in the summer of 1992 and there is a lot more detail to this story than I am going to tell you, but you will have a good picture of what happened.

Randy and Vicki Weaver was an outspoken couple trying to survive in the backwoods of Idaho. After several lost jobs and a failed Amway franchise, they became convinced that a group called the Zionist Occupation Government was about to launch an all-out war on its own citizens. So they gathered up $5,000 and bought a 20 acre plot of land in the hinterland of Idaho to escape the expected turmoil that they saw on the horizon. They built a small cabin out of scrap lumber on Caribou Ridge, near Ruby Creek. The closest town of Bonners Ferry was eight miles away. It was the news media that named it Ruby Ridge.

There was a white supremacist outfit in the area called the Aryan Nation. Randy and Vicki were not members but they shared many of the beliefs with this group and attended the Aryan Nation Church on occasion. They home schooled their kids and had signs on their property saying “White Power is Supreme” and “Bow down to Yahweh”. To those of you who do not know who Yahweh is, it is the early Hebrew term for God as stated in the Old Testament.

In 1986 Randy attended the World Congress of Aryan Nations in Hayden Lake, Idaho, their headquarters. In all Randy attended three different functions at Hayden Lake. Later on Randy said “I am not a white supremacist but I am a white separatist. I was born white, I can’t help that. If I had been born black I probably be affiliated with Louis Farrakhan’s group, but as it is, I don’t belong to anything. I do not believe I am superior to anyone but I do believe I have the right to be with the people of my choice.”

The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms had been really anxious to get some eyes and ears in on the Aryan Nation and they saw Randy Weaver as the perfect mole. At the 1986 World Congress Randy befriended a 245 pound biker named Gus Magisono. Only Gus wasn’t a biker, he was an undercover ATF informant named Kenneth Faderley. Three years later “Gus” asked Randy to sell him two sawed off shotguns and Randy agreed. The deal was consummated but the barrels of the shotguns were within the legal length but the stock was 3/8” shorter than the legal limit making Randy a violator of federal law. Later there was a point of dispute as to who shortened the stocks 3/8” shorter than the law allowed. As you might suspect it was a set-up by the ATF. In June of 1990 the AFT confronted Randy with the shotgun violations and said if he would become a mole in the Aryan Nation he could avoid hard time in a federal prison. This was nothing but extortion and entrapment. Randy refused and immediately went to the buddies at the Aryan Nation and told them what happened. This really teed off the ATF because it put the Nation on alert for any new people and blew the cover for good old “Gus” thereby destroying three years of surveillance by the ATF. The ATF and the FBI decided that they would make an example of Randy for refusing to do their bidding and the harassment began.

In January of 1991 Randy and Vicki stopped to help a stranded motorist that just happened to be an ATF agent and Randy was arrested on the sawed off shotgun charge and jailed. The next morning he was brought before a federal judge. During the hearing the judge said that the only thing that would probably happen to Randy was that he would have to pay the government’s court costs. Randy had no money and realized he would probably end up losing his beloved cabin on 20 acres on Caribou Ridge. A trial date was set.

Rather than hire an attorney, Randy and Vicki began a letter writing campaign against the FBI and the ATF. In one letter to the U.S. Attorneys Office in Boise, Vicki wrote in part “A man cannot have two masters, Yahweh is our lawgiver and we will obey Him and no others.” She sent another letter to yet another U.S. Attorney saying in part …”The stench of your lawless government has reached Heaven, the abode of Yahweh. Whether we live or whether we die, we will not bend to your evil commandments.” I don’t know about all of that, but I really like Vicki’s phrasing.

Randy failed to appear in court on February 20, 1991 because the summons the Weavers received in January said the court date was March 30, not February. Federal judge Ryan declared this a “typo” and non-the-less declared Randy a fugitive from justice and issued a warrant for his arrest in spite of the Probation Officers testimony that the summons he sent to Randy had the wrong appearance date on it. Are you mad yet? This was clearly the Federal Government sending a signal that they were going to get their revenge for Randy blowing their surveillance of the Aryan Nation and intended it to be a warning to others to not buck the FBI/ATF. When the Weaver family found out that Randy was now a fugitive from justice, they had to assume that the ATF meant to assassinate him. After this, Randy never left the cabin and his family was rarely seen.

On March 18, 1991, Deputy Ronald Evans asked the help of the US Marshal’s service Special Operations Group, a voluntary

organization that primarily dealt with dangerous situations and hostage rescue. The collective group determined that it would take many days and nights of surveillance to determine Randy’s action and determine if he ever left the cabin if only for short while so they could serve the warrant. The Justice Department under the tutelage of Attorney General Janet Reno put the heat on to get this thing over so the SOG called in a psychiatrist to make a determination about what the Weaver family do if pressed. This yahoo, without interviewing any member of the Weavers, determined that every member of the family would fight to the death to protect Randy. Somehow, it was determined that the Weavers were heavily armed and the property was heavily fortified to repel an assault. All of this was bull crap, of course, all the Weavers had was a few hunting rifles and handguns but it gave the ATF/FBI an excuse to use deadly force if they felt like it.

On September 28, 1991 a seven man team from the SOG was sent to assist in the arrest of Randy. However upon arrival, the team determined that the information they had received that the SOG moved on was inaccurate and they believed the warrant could not be served without the danger of personal injury. They also determined that Vicki was pregnant and in her final months. Previously, Deputy US Marshal Cluff and Everett Hofmeister, Weaver’s appointed council, told Randy’s friend Rodney Willey that if Randy surrendered the failure to appear charge might be dismissed they also said that the sentence on the weapons charge would be minimal because he did not have a criminal record. Willey came back from a visit with the Weavers and said that Randy said he would not surrender because it was HIS rights being violated.

A series of surrender demands went back and forth between ATF and Randy for several months all of which were refused. The final refusal coming from Randy when he wrote, in part “Why should I believe you now when this all started when you lied to me in the past and sent an informant (Gus) to entrap me and then extort me?” And finally he said “I don’t have to prove my innocence as you indicate.” Then yet another US Attorney named Howen showed up and demanded that all surrender demands must go through the court appointed attorney not to Weaver directly and in addition there would be no negotiations before his surrender, only afterward. Well, I don’t know who this jackass thought he was but it put Randy into a corner with no way out. A severe winter and heavy snows stopped any further communications for a while.

The Department of Justice (Janet Reno) called and told the law enforcement people to bring this fiasco to a conclusion that they had spent way too much money for such a minor infraction. So, knowing that Randy Weaver was an ex-Green Beret, they planned for a military type assault. That’s right folks; Randy had served his country in Nam as an elite soldier. Two agents in camouflage bearing automatic weapons began to sneak up the hill toward the cabin. They didn’t count on Striker, Randy’s dog who began raising hell way before they got near the cabin. Randy’s friend Kevin Harris and Randy’s 14 year old son Sam left the cabin, rifles in hand, to see what was happening with Striker. The two agents began a retreat into the woods and set up a defensive position with Striker hot on their tail, Kevin and Sam not far behind. Then one of the agents shot and killed Striker and when Sam saw it he yelled “You shot Striker, you son-of-a bitch” and opened fire. The agents returned fire killing Sam. Then Kevin, who was in the lead, retreated toward the cabin and he found Sam’s body then Harris turned and shot and killed Marshal William Degan. At no time did the agents identify themselves as law enforcement officers. The next day an ATF sniper shot and wounded Randy while he and Kevin were outside trying the retrieve Sam’s body. Randy and Kevin ran back toward the cabin with Vicki holding the door open for them. Vicki had her 10 month old child in her arms also. The sniper, Lon Horiuchi, fired at Kevin and missed hitting Vicki in the head, killing her and the fetus instantly.

Eventually swarms of agents surrounded the cabin and a 10 day siege ensued. Not only that, hundreds of protesters surrounded the entire area raising almighty hell. The ATF called upon Randy’s commanding officer in Nam to come and talk with him. So James “Bo” Gritz had a long talk with Randy and persuaded him to surrender and allow the judicial system to do its work. Randy was charged with an array of charges including murder even though he had not fired a shot. Randy had as his attorney the famous defense attorney Gerry “Cowboy” Spence. Spence was able to get all the charges dropped except for the “failure to appear” charge, if you can believe that, and he was sentenced to 18 months minus time already served and fined $10,000 meaning he went to jail for three months. His buddy Kevin Harris, who had actually killed marshal Degan, was not charged.

By the way, the day the trial started there was a huge fire at the Branch Davidian compound near Waco, Texas killing 78 men, woman and children attended by members of the ATF and FBI, Janet Reno commanding. The surviving members of the Weaver family filed a wrongful death law suit and were awarded $3.1 million. Think on this. Three people and one fetus dead, millions of tax payer’s dollars spent because Randy had refused to neither be a mole nor be extorted. I do not think anything like this could happen today. But perhaps I am being naïve...maybe it could.

                               Justice is fragile…protect it

Friday

                       Musings and History

Quote of the day:

Soon after the settling of Saint Augustine, Fl. in 1565 the first tourist arrived and said:

“It is a lot better than this in Rochester.”

                        Anonymous

Some of you may not know that I have a website, here it is:

bigalsdailyhistory.blogspot.com

One day I will discontinue the e-mail and only service the website.

A long while ago I was invited to go to Medford, Oregon to meet with an old friend who was a guide on the Rogue river in the summer and an elk hunting guide in the Cascades fall and winter. He wanted to take me salmon fishing on the Rogue. I was an air traffic controller then and we got two free airline trips a year. I used one of them to fly from Greenville, SC to Medford. My friend was rough and ready, y'all. He was about 6'-2” and weighed about 230. He always had his trusty Bowie knife and various sidearms of a variety of calibers strapped to his waist, long hair and a full beard...he also used the hell out of pot. We went out on an overnight trip (sleeping in tents that had been erected deep in the woods). We fished out of drift boats in some of the most arboreal waters I have ever seen. We were after Pacific salmon but did not catch any...but we caught the hell out of Steelhead trout. Some of them were 8 pounds or more. My friend considered the trip a bust but I enjoyed every minute. My friend is no longer with us but as far as I am concerned he was the model for a professional hunter and fisherman, pot not withstanding. By the way, a Steelhead is actually a rainbow trout that developed the ability to travel out to sea and return like the salmon.

This Date in History April 8

563BC On this date the Gautuma Buddha is born. He was actually born as Prince Siddhartha with his father being the King of the Sakya people in northeast India. At the age of 29 the Prince chose to seek peace and serenity. There was confusion and arguing about when the Buddha was actually born then a book called Tripitaka was found and eventually became to be known as the authentic documentary of the life and discourses of Buddha. This book established the date of birth of the Buddha in the mid sixth century BC and 563BC became the accepted date. Buddha’s father tried to keep him isolated away from any religion but the young prince had his chariot driver take him for ride around the countryside. He saw sick and poor people and did not know what to make of it and had to ask his chariot driver who those people were. Then he saw a monk walking down the road with the look of serenity across his face among all of this sickness and poverty. It was then that he decided to eliminate all of his worldly good and seek the ultimate nirvana. The Buddha withdrew into himself and examined every aspect of him and peace and serenity, and at the age 35 he determined the four great truths. They are 1. Existence is suffering 2. Suffering is caused by human craving 3. There is a cessation to suffering called Nirvana. 4. Nirvana can be achieved in this , or another life by following an “eightfold path” and that is having the right views, the right resolve, the right speech, the right action, the right livelihood, the right effort, the right mindfulness and finally the right concentration. The Buddha traveled the roads and back roads preaching his aesthetics. Eventually he gained a large following and today the Buddhist religion has 350 million followers. Buddha died at the age of 80 leaving a legacy that is older than Christianity.

1864 I have described the Red River campaign in previous lessons. A recap is that the Union decided to depart the newly captured city of New Orleans, send a substantial army up the west bank of the Mississippi River, accompanied by several river war ships. Upon reaching the Red River, The Union army was to continue to follow the Red River on into Texas with the ships close aboard. The problem was that the army was being shadowed by a substantial Confederate army. The Union Army was commanded by the inept General Nathaniel Banks. Banks was confronted by an impenetrable swamp and moved away from the river and went inland out from under the umbrella of the river boat artillery. The Confederate army was commanded by General Richard Taylor. On this date Taylor determined that Bank’s army was out of range of the river boats, he launched a surprise attack near the town of Mansfield, Louisiana. Bank’s troops were routed and headed back toward the Big Easy with Taylor’s howling Confederates hot on the trail. Finally Banks received reinforcements and Taylor’s advance was halted. But Banks was unnerved and continued on back down the river leaving the poor riverboats to the mercy of swarms of snipers on both river banks. Eventually Banks and his troops and the river boats were safe in New Orleans. Banks was relieved of duty and little is known of him after that.

1945 Earlier when Hitler had first come to power, a young Lutheran theologian named Dietrich Bonhoeffer was teaching at Berlin University. Dietrich was not enamored with the rantings of the Nazis and continued to tell everyone from the pulpit that the Nazis were calling it one thing but it really was a dictatorship they were trying to establish. Well, the Nazis could not sit still for that and arrested this man of the cloth and threw him in jail, crime unknown. This did not slow Dietrich down and he preached to the inmates in jail. Eventually, Dietrich was finally thrown into the concentration camp at Flossenburg. He continued with his attacks on the Nazis until he was so weak that he could no longer stand and on this day, he was hanged, again crime unknown. Four days later this concentration camp was liberated by the allies. Bonhoeffer’s last words were “This is the end for me, but the beginning of life.” What an enormous display of courage and dedication to his belief.

Born today:

563BC Spiritual leader Gautama Buddha. He said “The Buddhas do not tell you the way; it is for you to swelter the task.”

1898 English writer Sir Cecil Bowra. When asked about his “plain” wife Sir Cecil said “My dear fellow, ugly men can’t be choosers”

1905 US actress Ilka Chase. When talking with another actress the other actress said “I read your book, who wrote it for you?” Ilka responded with “I am glad you liked it, who read it to you.”

1919 Former first lady Betty Ford. She said “My makeup was not smeared, my hair was not disheveled and I never finished off a bottle, how could I be an alcoholic?” It’s easy, Betty, as you know.

Died today:

1835 German philosopher Baron Wilhelm Humboldt. He said “The government is at its best when it is unnecessary.” Yes indeed.

1973 Spanish artist Pablo Picasso. He said “Computers are useless, they only give you answers.” Think on that, y'all

1981 US Army General Omar Bradley. He said “The world has achieved brilliance without conscience. Ours is a world of nuclear giants and ethical infants.” It is scary, ain’t it?

Thanks for listening I can hardly wait until tomorrow