Ray Bradbury, the iconic science-fiction author behind such classics as The Martian Chronicles and Fahrenheit 451, has reportedly passed away at age 91.
The sci-fi and genre website i09.com is reporting that the Illinois-born Bradbury, recipient of the U.S. National Medal of Arts, passed away in his Los Angeles home Wednesday morning.
#4
And now all four of the great Sci-Fi writers of my youth are gone (Heinlein, 1907-88; Asimov, 1920-92; Clarke, 1917-2008; Bradbury, 1920-2012). Posted by Glenmore
Not all. The alleged author of 'Dreams from My Father' is still with us as I recall.
Great story of American ingenuity, one of the factors that makes the American military so well respected.
U.S.S. Barb: The Sub That Sank A Train
In 1973 an Italian submarine named Enrique Tazzoli was sold for a paltry $100,000 as scrap metal. The submarine, given to the Italian Navy in 1953, was originally the USS Barb, an incredible veteran of World War II service with a heritage that never should have passed so unnoticed into the graveyards of the metal recyclers.
The U.S.S. Barb was a pioneer, paving the way for the first submarine launched missiles and flying a battle flag unlike that of any other ship. In addition to the Medal of Honor ribbon at the top of the flag identifying the heroism of its captain, Commander Eugene "Lucky" Fluckey, the bottom border of the flag bore the image of a Japanese locomotive. The U.S.S. Barb was indeed, the submarine that "SANK A TRAIN". See bottom center of flag below:
July 18, 1945 (Patience Bay, Off the coast of Karafuto , Japan ):
It was after 4 A.M. and Commander Fluckey rubbed his eyes as he peered over the map spread before him. It was the twelfth war patrol of the Barb, the fifth under Commander Fluckey. He should have turned command over to another skipper after four patrols, but had managed to strike a deal with Admiral Lockwood to make one more trip with the men he cared for like a father, should his fourth patrol be successful. Of course, no one suspected when he had struck that deal prior to his fourth and what should have been his final war patrol on the Barb, that Commander Fluckey's success would be so great he would be awarded the Medal of Honor.
Commander Fluckey smiled as he remembered that patrol. "Lucky" Fluckey they called him. On January 8th the Barb had emerged victorious from a running two-hour night battle after sinking a large enemy ammunition ship. Two weeks later in Mamkwan Harbor he found the "mother-lode"... more than 30 enemy ships. In only 5 fathoms (30 feet) of water his crew had unleashed the sub's forward torpedoes, then turned and fired four from the stern. As he pushed the Barb to the full limit of its speed through the dangerous waters in a daring withdrawal to the open sea, he recorded eight direct hits on six enemy ships.
What could possibly be left for the Commander to accomplish who, just three months earlier had been in Washington , DC to receive the Medal of Honor? He smiled to himself as he looked again at the map showing the rail line that ran along the enemy coastline.
Now his crew was buzzing excitedly about bagging a train!
The rail line itself wouldn't be a problem. A shore patrol could go ashore under cover of darkness to plant the explosives... one of the sub's 55-pound scuttling charges. But this early morning Lucky Fluckey and his officers were puzzling over how they could blow not only the rails, but also one of the frequent trains that shuttled supplies to equip the Japanese war machine. But no matter how crazy the idea might have sounded, the Barb's skipper would not risk the lives of his men. Thus the problem... how to detonate the charge at the moment the train passed, without endangering the life of a shore party. PROBLEM?
Solutions! If you don't look for them, you'll never find them. And even then, sometimes they arrive in the most unusual fashion. Cruising slowly beneath the surface to evade the enemy plane now circling overhead, the monotony was broken with an exciting new idea: Instead of having a crewman on shore to trigger explosives to blow both rail and a passing train, why not let the train BLOW ITSELF up? Billy Hatfield was excitedly explaining how he had cracked nuts on the railroad tracks as a kid, placing the nuts between two ties so the sagging of the rail under the weight of a train would break them open. "Just like cracking walnuts," he explained. "To complete the circuit (detonating the 55-pound charge) we hook in a micro switch... between two ties. We don't set it off, the TRAIN does." Not only did Hatfield have the plan, he wanted to be part of the volunteer shore party.
The solution found, there was no shortage of volunteers; all that was needed was the proper weather... a little cloud cover to darken the moon for the mission ashore. Lucky Fluckey established his own criteria for the volunteer party:
...No married men would be included, except for Hatfield,
...The party would include members from each department,
...The opportunity would be split between regular Navy and Navy Reserve sailors,
...At least half of the men had to have been Boy Scouts, experienced in how to handle themselves in medical emergencies and in the woods.
FINALLY, "Lucky" Fluckey would lead the saboteurs himself.
When the names of the 8 selected sailors was announced it was greeted with a mixture of excitement and disappointment. Among the disappointed was Commander Fluckey who surrendered his opportunity at the insistence of his officers that "as commander he belonged with the Barb," coupled with the threat from one that "I swear I'll send a message to ComSubPac if you attempt this (joining the shore party himself)." Even a Japanese POW being held on the Barb wanted to go, promising not to try to escape!
In the meantime, there would be no more harassment of Japanese shipping or shore operations by the Barb until the train mission had been accomplished. The crew would "lay low", prepare their equipment, train, and wait for the weather.
July 22, 1945 (Patience Bay, Off the coast of Karafuto , Japan )
Patience Bay was wearing thin the patience of Commander Fluckey and his innovative crew. Everything was ready. In the four days the saboteurs had anxiously watched the skies for cloud cover, the inventive crew of the Barb had built their micro switch. When the need was proposed for a pick and shovel to bury the explosive charge and batteries, the Barb's engineers had cut up steel plates in the lower flats of an engine room, then bent and welded them to create the needed tools. The only things beyond their control were the weather.... and time. Only five days remained in the Barb's patrol.
Anxiously watching the skies, Commander Fluckey noticed plumes of cirrus clouds, then white stratus capping the mountain peaks ashore. A cloud cover was building to hide the three-quarters moon. This would be the night.
MIDNIGHT, July 23, 1945
The Barb had crept within 950 yards of the shoreline. If it was somehow seen from the shore it would probably be mistaken for a schooner or Japanese patrol boat. No one would suspect an American submarine so close to shore or in such shallow water. Slowly the small boats were lowered to the water and the 8 saboteurs began paddling toward the enemy beach. Twenty-five minutes later they pulled the boats ashore and walked on the surface of the Japanese homeland.
Stumbling through noisy waist-high grasses, crossing a highway and then into a 4-foot drainage ditch, the saboteurs made their way to the railroad tracks. Three men were posted as guards, Markuson assigned to examine a nearby water tower. The Barb's auxiliary man climbed the ladder, then stopped in shock as he realized it was an enemy lookout tower.... an OCCUPIED tower. Fortunately the Japanese sentry was peacefully sleeping and Markuson was able to quietly withdraw and warn his raiding party.
The news from Markuson caused the men digging the placement for the explosive charge to continue their work more slowly and quietly. Twenty minutes later the holes had been dug and the explosives and batteries hidden beneath fresh soil.
During planning for the mission the saboteurs had been told that, with the explosives in place, all would retreat a safe distance while Hatfield made the final connection. If the sailor who had once cracked walnuts on the railroad tracks slipped during this final, dangerous procedure, his would be the only life lost. On this night it was the only order the saboteurs refused to obey, all of them peering anxiously over Hatfield's shoulder to make sure he did it right. The men had come too far to be disappointed by a switch failure.
1:32 A.M.
Watching from the deck of the Barb, Commander Fluckey allowed himself a sigh of relief as he noticed the flashlight signal from the beach announcing the departure of the shore party. He had skillfully, and daringly, guided the Barb within 600 yards of the enemy beach. There was less than 6 feet of water beneath the sub's keel, but Fluckey wanted to be close in case trouble arose and a daring rescue of his saboteurs became necessary.
1:45 A.M.
The two boats carrying his saboteurs were only halfway back to the Barb when the sub's machine gunner yelled, "CAPTAIN! Another train coming up the tracks!" The Commander grabbed a megaphone and yelled through the night, "Paddle like the devil!", knowing full well that they wouldn't reach the Barb before the train hit the micro switch.
1:47 A.M.
The darkness was shattered by brilliant light and the roar of the explosion. The boilers of the locomotive blew, shattered pieces of the engine blowing 200 feet into the air. Behind it the cars began to accordion into each other, bursting into flame and adding to the magnificent fireworks display. Five minutes later the saboteurs were lifted to the deck by their exuberant comrades as the Barb turned to slip back to safer waters. Moving at only two knots, it would be a while before the Barb was into waters deep enough to allow it to submerge. It was a moment to savor, the culmination of teamwork, ingenuity and daring by the Commander and all his crew. "Lucky" Fluckey's voice came over the intercom. "All hands below deck not absolutely needed to maneuver the ship have permission to come topside." He didn't have to repeat the invitation. Hatches sprang open as the proud sailors of the Barb gathered on her decks to proudly watch the distant fireworks display. The Barb had "sunk" a Japanese TRAIN!
On August 2, 1945 the Barb arrived at Midway, her twelfth war patrol concluded. Meanwhile United States military commanders had pondered the prospect of an armed assault on the Japanese homeland. Military tacticians estimated such an invasion would cost more than a million American casualties. Instead of such a costly armed offensive to end the war, on August 6th the B-29 bomber Enola Gay dropped a single atomic bomb on the city of Hiroshima , Japan . A second such bomb, unleashed 4 days later on Nagasaki , Japan , caused Japan to agree to surrender terms on August 15th. On September 2, 1945 in Tokyo Harbor the documents ending the war in the Pacific were signed.
The story of the saboteurs of the U.S.S. Barb is one of those unique, little known stories of World War II. It becomes increasingly important when one realizes that the 8 sailors who blew up the train near Kashiho , Japan conducted the ONLY GROUND COMBAT OPERATION on the Japanese "homeland" of World War II. The eight saboteurs were:
They are (from left to right):
Chief Gunners Mate Paul G. Saunders, USN;
Electricians Mate 3rd Class Billy R. Hatfield, USNR;
Signalman 2nd Class Francis N. Sevei, USNR;
Ships Cook 1st Class Lawrence W. Newland, USN;
Torpedomans Mate 3rd Class Edward W. Klingesmith, USNR;
Motor Machinists Mate 2nd Class James E. Richard, USN;
Motor Machinists Mate 1st Class John Markuson, USN; and
Lieutenant William M. Walker, USNR.
Footnote: Eugene Bennett Fluckey retired from the Navy as a Rear Admiral, and wears in addition to his Medal of Honor, FOUR Navy Crosses... a record of awards unmatched by any living American. In 1992 his own history of the U.S.S. Barb was published in the award winning book, THUNDER BELOW. Over the past several years proceeds from the sale of this exciting book have been used by Admiral Fluckey to provide free reunions for the men who served him aboard the Barb, and their wives.
PS: The Admiral had graduated from the US Naval Academy in 1935 and lived to age 93, passing on in 2007.
#1
D *** NG, does this mean OPERATION PETTICOAT'S CARY GRANT'S SUB didn't sink a TRUCK - I know for a fact Carey said so!?
USS BARB = great Sub + agreat Mission.
*"At least half the Men had to have been Boy Scouts ... ..." > I gotta wonder how Commander Fluckey would've answered the post-ROE, post-THE US-IS-NOT-A-LEGAL-OR-CONSTITUTIONAL-NATION US Ninth on that one???
[An Nahar] Archaeologists in Bulgaria have unearthed two skeletons from the Middle Ages pierced through the chest with iron rods to keep them from turning into vampires, the head of the history museum said.
"These two skeletons stabbed with rods illustrate a practice which was common in some Bulgarian villages up until the first decade of the 20th century," said national history museum chief Bozhidar Dimitrov after the recent find in the Black Sea town of Sozopol.
According to pagan beliefs, people who were considered bad during their lifetimes might turn into vampires after death unless stabbed in the chest with an iron or wooden rod before being buried.
People believed the rod would also pin them down in their graves to prevent them from leaving at midnight and terrorizing the living, the historian explained.
The practice was common, Dimitrov added, saying some 100 similar burials had already been found in Bulgaria.
Posted by: Fred ||
06/06/2012 00:00 ||
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[Iran Press TV] Moroccans have taken to the streets of the northern city of Bani Bu Ayyash to protest against harsh jail sentences handed down to political activists, Press TV reports.
The protesters also demanded that the government stop arresting rights activists and release political prisoners. They say the government has used false pretexts for the arrests.
The demonstrators also called for democratic reforms in the Arab country.
Protests have been going on in the North African country since early last year. The monarch introduced some reforms earlier but Moroccans say the changes do not go far enough and that more initiatives are needed to fight corruption and bring democracy to the nation.
The country has also been facing serious economic troubles over the past few years, with high unemployment and rising levels of poverty.
Posted by: Fred ||
06/06/2012 00:00 ||
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[Tripoli Post] Following calls from rights groups to revoke a law that criminalises glorifying ousted former Libyan dictator leader Muammar Qadaffy ...whose instability was an inspiration to dictators everywhere, but whose end couldn't possibly happen to them... or any of his supporters, and/or spreading "propaganda" that insults or endangers the state, on June 14 Libya's Supreme Court has agreed to review the constitutionality of the new law.
The appealing lawyer told the court on Sunday that Law 37, which was passed by the ruling National Transitional Council last month, violated constitutional freedoms of expression.
Saleh al-Marghani said that the law is similar to a Qadaffy- era measure aimed at stifling dissent and jailing the opposition. "This law is a violation of the basic freedoms of human rights ...which are usually entirely different from personal liberty... and will help to damage freedoms in Libya. The law itself helps to glorify Qadaffy more than keep it in check. We ask the court to accept our appeal," he said.
He went on to say that the law is vague and could be used to imprison people for up 15 years just for criticising the government.
International and local rights groups say the law contradicts the Constitutional Declaration by Libya's interim leaders guaranteeing freedom of speech.
The NTC passed Law 37 on May 2 and raised public outrage among civil societies and Libyan legal experts who said the law violated the spirit of freedom of expression.
The law prescribes prison sentences for the glorification of Qadaffy as well as publishing any news "harming the February 17 revolution".
Posted by: Fred ||
06/06/2012 00:00 ||
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[An Nahar] Ex-Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak ...The former President-for-Life of Egypt, dumped by popular demand in early 2011... suffered an "emotional breakdown" in prison on Tuesday, days after he was sentenced to life over the death of protesters last year, a senior interior ministry official said.
The ailing 84-year-old's "health deteriorated while in prison," the official told Agance La Belle France Press without describing the nature of the breakdown.
"Doctors from the police hospital have been called to treat him, along with the prison doctors after he suffered an emotional breakdown" a security official said.
The former leader's lawyer, Yasser Bahr, confirmed to AFP that Mubarak "had an emotional crisis that affected his general health."
Mubarak's son, Gamal, who is in the same prison compound, has been moved to be closer to his father, the security official added.
On Saturday, Mubarak and his interior minister Habib al-Adly were sentenced to life in prison over the killing of protesters during last year's uprising that ousted him and that left some 850 people dead.
Posted by: Fred ||
06/06/2012 00:00 ||
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"Behold the "Brown perl' This is a 24 foot center console that is decorated as a Pirate ship! It is fitted with 4 deck cannons and decorated with a crew of skeletons! The ship has a head and is powered by a 140 evanrude, and is equipped with smart trim tabs. The ship is a hit with kids and adults alike! I will deliver the ship for a reasonable fee."
(Two photos at the link...)
Posted by: American Delight ||
06/06/2012 00:00 ||
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#1
A motorized Dhawan???
YYYAAAAAAAARRRR, YE DOGS, LOOKS LIKE SOMEONE DESERVES TO WALK THE PLANK.
[Iran Press TV] The Argentinean government has seized the country's biggest oil company, Yacimientos Petroliferos Fiscales (YPF), ousting the Spanish controlling shareholder, Repsol.
In the first shareholder meeting since the takeover, 16 directors of the company were appointed, with Miguel Galuccio, an Argentine veteran of the country's oil industry, as the new chief executive and chairman of the company.
In early May, Argentinean politicians approved the takeover of YPF and ratified the nationalization bill, giving President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner the green light to expropriate the 51-percent stake from Repsol.
Buenos Aires accused the Spanish company of "draining" YPF and carting off its profits instead of reinvesting them since gaining control in the 1990s. Repsol denied the accusations, pledging to fight the takeover as it has invested billions in the company over the years.
The former Spanish shareholder now owns 12 percent of the YPF, and will have just one seat at the board of directors.
Sell the shares and walk away. Never come back.
YPF was privatized in the early 1990s and the Spanish energy giant (Repsol) acquired a majority of the company's stake in 1999. Repsol has sued Argentina to recover compensatory damages that could reach more than USD 10 billion.
Posted by: Fred ||
06/06/2012 00:00 ||
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#1
can't understand why the Falkland Island residents wouldn't want to join up with Evita Jr.
Posted by: Frank G ||
06/06/2012 8:25 Comments ||
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(Note: The following are remarks delivered by President Ronald Reagan on June 6, 1984 commemorating the 40th Anniversary of the Invastion of Normandy.)
We're here to mark that day in history when the Allied armies joined in battle to reclaim this continent to liberty. For four long years, much of Europe had been under a terrible shadow. Free nations had fallen, Jews cried out in the camps, millions cried out for liberation. Europe was enslaved and the world prayed for its rescue. Here, in Normandy, the rescue began. Here, the Allies stood and fought against tyranny, in a giant undertaking unparalleled in human history.
We stand on a lonely, windswept point on the northern shore of France. The air is soft, but forty years ago at this moment, the air was dense with smoke and the cries of men, and the air was filled with the crack of rifle fire and the roar of cannon. At dawn, on the morning of the 6th of June, 1944, two hundred and twenty-five Rangers jumped off the British landing craft and ran to the bottom of these cliffs.
Their mission was one of the most difficult and daring of the invasion: to climb these sheer and desolate cliffs and take out the enemy guns. The Allies had been told that some of the mightiest of these guns were here, and they would be trained on the beaches to stop the Allied advance.
The Rangers looked up and saw the enemy soldiers at the edge of the cliffs, shooting down at them with machine guns and throwing grenades. And the American Rangers began to climb. They shot rope ladders over the face of these cliffs and began to pull themselves up. When one Ranger fell, another would take his place. When one rope was cut, a Ranger would grab another and begin his climb again. They climbed, shot back, and held their footing. Soon, one by one, the Rangers pulled themselves over the top, and in seizing the firm land at the top of these cliffs, they began to seize back the continent of Europe. Two hundred and twenty-five came here. After two days of fighting, only ninety could still bear arms.
And behind me is a memorial that symbolizes the Ranger daggers that were thrust into the top of these cliffs. And before me are the men who put them there. These are the boys of Pointe du Hoc. These are the men who took the cliffs. These are the champions who helped free a continent. And these are the heroes who helped end a war. Gentlemen, I look at you and I think of the words of Stephen Spender's poem. You are men who in your "lives fought for life and left the vivid air signed with your honor."
I think I know what you may be thinking right now -- thinking "we were just part of a bigger effort; everyone was brave that day." Well everyone was. Do you remember the story of Bill Millin of the 51st Highlanders? Forty years ago today, British troops were pinned down near a bridge, waiting desperately for help. Suddenly, they heard the sound of bagpipes, and some thought they were dreaming. Well, they weren't. They looked up and saw Bill Millin with his bagpipes, leading the reinforcements and ignoring the smack of the bullets into the ground around him.
Lord Lovat was with him -- Lord Lovat of Scotland, who calmly announced when he got to the bridge, "Sorry, I'm a few minutes late," as if he'd been delayed by a traffic jam, when in truth he'd just come from the bloody fighting on Sword Beach, which he and his men had just taken.
There was the impossible valor of the Poles, who threw themselves between the enemy and the rest of Europe as the invasion took hold; and the unsurpassed courage of the Canadians who had already seen the horrors of war on this coast. They knew what awaited them there, but they would not be deterred. And once they hit Juno Beach, they never looked back.
All of these men were part of a roll call of honor with names that spoke of a pride as bright as the colors they bore; The Royal Winnipeg Rifles, Poland's 24th Lancers, the Royal Scots' Fusiliers, the Screaming Eagles, the Yeomen of England's armored divisions, the forces of Free France, the Coast Guard's "Matchbox Fleet," and you, the American Rangers.
Forty summers have passed since the battle that you fought here. You were young the day you took these cliffs; some of you were hardly more than boys, with the deepest joys of life before you. Yet you risked everything here. Why? Why did you do it? What impelled you to put aside the instinct for self-preservation and risk your lives to take these cliffs? What inspired all the men of the armies that met here? We look at you, and somehow we know the answer. It was faith and belief. It was loyalty and love.
The men of Normandy had faith that what they were doing was right, faith that they fought for all humanity, faith that a just God would grant them mercy on this beachhead, or on the next. It was the deep knowledge -- and pray God we have not lost it -- that there is a profound moral difference between the use of force for liberation and the use of force for conquest. You were here to liberate, not to conquer, and so you and those others did not doubt your cause. And you were right not to doubt.
You all knew that some things are worth dying for. One's country is worth dying for, and democracy is worth dying for, because it's the most deeply honorable form of government ever devised by man. All of you loved liberty. All of you were willing to fight tyranny, and you knew the people of your countries were behind you.
The Americans who fought here that morning knew word of the invasion was spreading through the darkness back home. They fought -- or felt in their hearts, though they couldn't know in fact, that in Georgia they were filling the churches at 4:00 am. In Kansas they were kneeling on their porches and praying. And in Philadelphia they were ringing the Liberty Bell.
Something else helped the men of D-day; their rock-hard belief that Providence would have a great hand in the events that would unfold here; that God was an ally in this great cause. And so, the night before the invasion, when Colonel Wolverton asked his parachute troops to kneel with him in prayer, he told them: "Do not bow your heads, but look up so you can see God and ask His blessing in what we're about to do." Also, that night, General Matthew Ridgway on his cot, listening in the darkness for the promise God made to Joshua: "I will not fail thee nor forsake thee."
These are the things that impelled them; these are the things that shaped the unity of the Allies.
When the war was over, there were lives to be rebuilt and governments to be returned to the people. There were nations to be reborn. Above all, there was a new peace to be assured. These were huge and daunting tasks. But the Allies summoned strength from the faith, belief, loyalty, and love of those who fell here. They rebuilt a new Europe together. There was first a great reconciliation among those who had been enemies, all of whom had suffered so greatly. The United States did its part, creating the Marshall Plan to help rebuild our allies and our former enemies. The Marshall Plan led to the Atlantic alliance -- a great alliance that serves to this day as our shield for freedom, for prosperity, and for peace.
In spite of our great efforts and successes, not all that followed the end of the war was happy or planned. Some liberated countries were lost. The great sadness of this loss echoes down to our own time in the streets of Warsaw, Prague, and East Berlin. The Soviet troops that came to the center of this continent did not leave when peace came. They're still there, uninvited, unwanted, unyielding, almost forty years after the war. Because of this, allied forces still stand on this continent. Today, as forty years ago, our armies are here for only one purpose: to protect and defend democracy. The only territories we hold are memorials like this one and graveyards where our heroes rest.
We in America have learned bitter lessons from two world wars. It is better to be here ready to protect the peace, than to take blind shelter across the sea, rushing to respond only after freedom is lost. We've learned that isolationism never was and never will be an acceptable response to tyrannical governments with an expansionist intent. But we try always to be prepared for peace, prepared to deter aggression, prepared to negotiate the reduction of arms, and yes, prepared to reach out again in the spirit of reconciliation. In truth, there is no reconciliation we would welcome more than a reconciliation with the Soviet Union, so, together, we can lessen the risks of war, now and forever.
It's fitting to remember here the great losses also suffered by the Russian people during World War II. Twenty million perished, a terrible price that testifies to all the world the necessity of ending war. I tell you from my heart that we in the United States do not want war. We want to wipe from the face of the earth the terrible weapons that man now has in his hands. And I tell you, we are ready to seize that beachhead. We look for some sign from the Soviet Union that they are willing to move forward, that they share our desire and love for peace, and that they will give up the ways of conquest. There must be a changing there that will allow us to turn our hope into action.
We will pray forever that someday that changing will come. But for now, particularly today, it is good and fitting to renew our commitment to each other, to our freedom, and to the alliance that protects it.
We're bound today by what bound us 40 years ago, the same loyalties, traditions, and beliefs. We're bound by reality. The strength of America's allies is vital to the United States, and the American security guarantee is essential to the continued freedom of Europe's democracies. We were with you then; we're with you now. Your hopes are our hopes, and your destiny is our destiny.
Here, in this place where the West held together, let us make a vow to our dead. Let us show them by our actions that we understand what they died for. Let our actions say to them the words for which Matthew Ridgway listened: "I will not fail thee nor forsake thee."
Strengthened by their courage and heartened by their value [valor] and borne by their memory, let us continue to stand for the ideals for which they lived and died.
#1
Strengthened by their courage and heartened by their value [valor] and borne by their memory, let us continue to stand for the ideals for which they lived and died.
Thanks for posting this Beavis. These were ordinary men performing extraordinary acts of courage and bravery.
#3
When I wrote the date on my time sheet this morning, D-Day is the first thing I thought of.
Thanks to all the brave soldiers, sailors, and airmen who saved us.
Posted by: Barbara ||
06/06/2012 12:29 Comments ||
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#4
Every year about this time I read either Band of Brothers or Citizen Soldiers by Ambrose.
We send fine young men off to war. We had fine young men in Korea, Viet Nam, Kuwait, Iraq, and Afghanistan. Don't let the idiot press kid you, our soldiers, right now, are some of the finest I have ever seen. I wish I could have commanded a company of them.
When you watch the first twenty minutes of Saving Private Ryan, you wonder how in the hell we ever got off that beach. Omaha was horrible.
I was honored to go to Texas A&M, Earl Rudder, who lead the Rangers at Pointe Du Hoc, was our President. He had a bulldog named Ranger that we all thought looked more like Earl than Earl. Fine man and I am proud he signed my diploma.
Posted by: Bill Clinton ||
06/06/2012 23:29 Comments ||
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I don't like it either, but it was war, not Tiddlywinks. And we finished it in three years and everyone got on with their lives rather than suffered for the next twenty years before declaring victory and walking away leaving things undecided. It bugs me that we could have easily taken care of their houses for them in the meanwhile rather than giving them a week to sell, and we could have put them on their feet better after the war was over, but I don't know the details. Maybe we should get the Japanese government to apologize for making us do what we had to do. Makes about as much sense.
The Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors is expected to vote Wednesday on repealing a resolution made seven decades ago supporting the internment of Japanese Americans shortly after Japan's Pearl Harbor attacks, which led the United States to enter World War II.
"Seventy years ago, the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors voted itself onto the wrong side of history," Los Angeles County Supervisor Mark Ridley-Thomas said in a statement in which he announced he'll introduce the motion Wednesday to repeal the board's action.
The board voted unanimously to endorse President Franklin D. Roosevelt's Executive Order 9066 in February 1942 that put 120,000 Japanese Americans, about a third from Los Angeles County, in internment camps for up to three years, Ridley-Thomas said.
The board said it was difficult "if not impossible to distinguish between loyal and disloyal Japanese aliens."
Ridley-Thomas said his motion "will seek to address a historic wrong."
Actor George Takei, who played Mr. Sulu on the television series "Star Trek," is expected to be among those testifying in support of the motion and recalling his experience as a boy taken from his Los Angeles home and placed in horse stalls at the Santa Anita racetrack.
Takei and his family were then sent to internment camps in Rohwer, Arkansas, and Tule Lake, California.
#1
Harsh and probably unwarranted in most cases, yet somewhat humane treatment as opposed to how the Japanese treated their Chinese, Korean and Filipino subjects.
Posted by: Mullah Richard ||
06/06/2012 9:45 Comments ||
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#2
A number of folks profitted from the property theft. Id be more impressed with LA if they found a way to publicize who did and by how much. I suspect a lot of them were strong Democrat supporters which is why nobody has so far taken that step.
#3
Of course 'new' information gleaned from the declassification of the pre-war and WWII Japanese diplomatic traffic in the 90s won't get the volume of attention that the original act did. Whether the Japanese consulate personnel were just telling their bosses what they wanted to hear or that there was some truth to their reports is up to interpretation. What was not up for interpretation was that the people responsible for security didn't have the luxury to play political correctness with 90 percent of all the nation's aircraft production in the LA or Seattle area based upon those intercepts.
#9
My mother was a child of 11 at the time, and living with her family in Pasadena, California. Her very best friend was a Japanese-American girl her age, who was the daughter of a nursery-gardener who was one of my grandfather's suppliers. (Grandfather being the head gardener for one of those enormous estates.)And my mother's friend and her family were interned first at the old Santa Anita racetrack in Altadena. My grandfather took her to visit with her friend; they could talk to each other across the barbed wire fence around the internment center.
My grandfather stored all of the property that they couldn't take with them in his garage for the duration. There was another retail nursery-gardener, an Anglo - who bought the nursery and the house that they had to sell, but he paid them a very fair market price for it, which apparently was quite unusual.
They worked for him when they came back, after the war.
Just for grins and giggles, I'd also like to know who benefitted from the forced sales of property. I've also rather cynically been amused at how the print media these days so solemly get up and decry the public hysteria on the west coast that led to the demands for the Japanese to be interned - when the Hearst newspapers in 1942 took a leading role in whipping up the anti-Japanese hysteria in the first place!
My mother has always said that she was rather glad that her friend and her family were interned, because then they were protected by armed guards. She said that after Pearl Harbor, and the fall of the Phillipines, she heard so much ugly talk about what ought to be done about the US-resident Japanese. They didn't tend to live all clustered together - no Chinatown-type district, back then. Most of the Japanese-Americans she knew lived out on little truck farms, or scattered thru suburbia. She says there very likely would have been mob action, and random attacks on Japanese during 1942 and 1943. People were frightened, and very, very angry; it always astonished and shocked her, the ugly things that people said in public - in front of her and other children!
[Dawn] With sensational media reports making the rounds about four women having been killed in Kohistan ...a backwoods district of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa distinguished by being even more rustic than is the norm among the local Pashtuns.... after videos were leaked of them dancing with two men during wedding festivities, the Supreme Court took suo motu ...a legal term, from the Latin. Roughly translated it means I saw what you did, you bastard... notice of the case on Monday and ordered the officials concerned to provide more information about the issue.
Right now the tragedy is marred with uncertainty as reports create confusion over whether the news about the murders having taken place on May 30 is correct.
Therefore, when a three-judge bench comprising Chief Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry, Justice Jawwad S. Khwaja and Justice Khilji Arif Hussain sat down to hear the case, the chief justice's first question to Attorney General Irfan Qadir was that if the four women had indeed been murdered.
The chief justice observed that such an act would be a direct violation of Article 9 (right to life) and Article 14 (right to dignity) of the Constitution. He said he wondered how a jirga could have taken such a decision when "we have held jirgas unconstitutional and illegal".
The court is already seized with a petition of the National Commission for the Status of Women (NCSW) which asks for jirgas to be declared illegal because it is a parallel and unregulated justice system.
In March, the court had ordered provincial chief ministers, secretaries and inspectors general of police to ensure that the practice of exchanging girls and women to settle disputes through jirga was stopped.
Ms Riffat Butt, legal expert at the NCSW, said: "The previous orders of the court against jirgas were specifically with regard to anti-women practices like Vani and Swara i.e. they addressed the outcomes.
"We are making the case that jirgas should be completely declared illegal; if jirgas are not held at all such sorts of decisions cannot be taken. And at many different occasions different courts in their orders have declared that jirgas are against constitutional norms."
In this context, the case of Kohistan women killings becomes especially relevant to the Supreme Court hearing of the NCSW petition which will be held on Wednesday -- the day the attorney general is required to interview and produce the four
women before the court since Hazara division officials have denied the killing or the fact that a jirga had ever been held to take a decision about the fate of the women.
The chief justice also ordered Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa ... formerly NWFP, still Terrorism Central... Chief Secretary Ghulam Dastgir, the Hazara regional commissioner and Kohistan DPO to submit comprehensive reports on the issue by June 6. The hearing will be crucial in determining truth
about the incident.
However, facts are stubborn; statistics are more pliable... if it turns out that the jirga had taken a decision to kill the women and men this would certainly strengthen the case of NCSW for banning jirgas throughout the country.
"Whether the women have been killed or not, the fact that a jirga has taken such a decision shows that such incidents are not only happening regularly, but they are also taking extreme forms. This is a fundamental violation of human rights One man's rights are another man's existential threat. and the federal and provincial governments need to make legislations on the issue," Riffat Butt said.
Posted by: Fred ||
06/06/2012 00:00 ||
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[Dawn] Elders and holy mans of Pales village in Kohistan ...a backwoods district of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa distinguished by being even more rustic than is the norm among the local Pashtuns.... district on Monday denied the alleged killing of five women on a jirga decree over singing and dancing along with men in a marriage function, and told an official fact-finding mission that all the women shown in a mobile phone video were alive and in safe hands.A section of the media had earlier reported the killing of the said women on May 30 amid denial by the Hazara division administration.
Earlier in the day, the mission comprising Hazara commissioner Khalid Khan Umerzai, DIG Dr Mohammad Naeem, Kohistan DCO Aqaal Badshah and DPO Abdul Majid Afridi flew to Bechbala Gadar area on directives of Interior Minister Rehman Malik Pak politician, current Interior Minister under the Gilani administration. Malik is a former Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) intelligence officer who rose to head the FIA during Benazir Bhutto's second tenure. He later joined the Pak Peoples Party and was chief security officer to Bhutto. Malik was tossed from his FIA job in 1998 after documenting the breath-taking corruption of the Sharif family. By unhappy coincidence Nawaz Sharif became PM at just that moment and Malik moved to London one step ahead of the button men. "The women, who are reported to have been killed on the decree of a jirga, are alive and as per the accounts of local elders and families of the said women, no one can kill them on the basis of a suspicious video," DCO Kohistan Aqaal Badshah told news hounds here.
Mr Badshah said two brothers of Mohammad Afzal, who had 'broken' the news of the women's killing, were also incarcerated Youse'll never take me alive coppers!... [BANG!]... Ow!... I quit! "Besides recording the statements of the family members, Learned Elders of Islam (holy mans) and elders, we also searched for new graves but found nothing in support of the claim of Mohammad Afzal about the killing of five women to media on Sunday," he said.
Mr Badshah quoted female members of the said women's families as appealing to the media not to disgrace them by airing the dancing video on TV channels.
He also quoted a holy man as saying that neither women nor men seen in the video were labeled as perverted and hence, no question of killing them arose.
A source close to the fact-finding mission said elders and holy mans made it clear to the mission that they could extend whatever surety was required under the law to confirm that women were alive but they (women) couldn't be produced in
front of ghair mehram (non-relatives) in line with local traditions.
He said police had incarcerated Youse'll never take me alive coppers!... [BANG!]... Ow!... I quit! Gulnazray and Binyasir, who were also seen in the video, from Allai area before shifting them to Kohistan.
Police on Sunday lodged FIR against them under section 509, 505, 292 of Pakistain Penal Code and 18-Motion Picture Ordinance.
Also in the day, Chief Justice of Pakistain Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry took a suo motu ...a legal term, from the Latin. Roughly translated it means I saw what you did, you bastard... notice of the alleged killing of women and asked the district administration to produce the women on June 6 before him.
Mohammad Afzal and Shahzaday, who had allegedly made the video on mobile phone, and then transferred to others, were still on the lam and police were raiding at
different places in Hazara to apprehend them.
District police officer of Kohistan Abdul Majid Afridi had said once Mohammad Afzal, his brothers and Shahzady were incarcerated Youse'll never take me alive coppers!... [BANG!]... Ow!... I quit! , then the truth about the jirga decree and the killings would be out.
Posted by: Fred ||
06/06/2012 00:00 ||
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And head chopping
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