The country-club set of the Republican Party is like an animal one sees in the zoo that is half alligator and half sabre-tooth mink. Part of them are all soft and fluffy, and
part of them are so immune to outside influence it is like they have alligators skin that can resist a shotgun blast. Then they intermarry among themselves, growing longer and finer mink fur and harder and tougher alligator hide. Men and women alike.
They talk about a big tent and a non-regional party....but they do not want anyone in the party who has dirty fingernails. They certainly do not want anyone in leadership positions who think that outreach to minorities is something like trying to sell our reasonable positions to everyone equally, no matter the age, race, religion, or whatever of the potential voter.
But, invariably, the RINO wants to take a Democrat Socialist programme and scale it back by 15% and call it a "conservative alternative". Why, the Republican Party is the party of frugality and responsible spending, don't you know!? Of course, that is why spending has gone up and deficits have exploded....with National Socialist Democrat Workers' Party and/or the Grand Old Party in charge, together, or apart.
Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, annual deficits, Tick Tock-Tick Tock
$18,000,000,000,000 and soon to be $20,000,000,000,000. By the year 2018, the national debt will total 63,000 dollars for every man, woman, and child in the nation. Fewer than 90,000,000 people are paying taxes in excess of what they consume. That means that the 50% of the adult and employed and proprietor class, each one, owes over 240,000 American dollars to Pocahontas Warren and (Sir Edmund)Hillary. If married, the couple owes nearly one-half million, besides their other debt obligations. If they have two children, then for the moment, they owe almost $1,000,000 dollars as a family....just to cover the national governmental debt. Nearly 80 per cent of the debt has been built up by entitlement spending, not wars. The spending for Social Security is, and staggeringly so, apart from the unfunded liability. As is Medicare. And ditto Medicaid, aka in government talk "The Bottomless Pit" and the "Inevitable Pendulum" that present us with what appears now a vertical, insurmountable brick wall surrounded by a bottomless moat.
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William Kristol noted conservative analyst and pundit
Bill Kristol is the quintessential "reasonable conservative Republican". His flag does not say, "Don't Tread on Me" or "Come and Take It". Were he to have a flag it would say, "After all, if we just compromise a little bit and get most of what we want then the ship will fall of the edge of the Earth the day after to-morrow, instead of this afternoon."To wit:
"If Republicans also spoke more about a broader agenda for the future which would include, for example, replacing Obamacare and rebuilding our defenses, I'd feel even more confident. Things may be falling apart so fast for the Obama Administration that such efforts won't be necessary for victory in 2014. But Republicans won't be able to coast to victory in 2016, though. They'll need to earn it".....Bill Kristol. Succinct, to-the-point, and very professional. But there is just one little Pamper in the parking lot. Replacing Obamacare? Replacing Obamacare?
A rough way to leave town
We should take Obamacare, and after tarring and feathering the poseur who rammed it through the testosterone-challenged Congress (and I mean mainly Democrats) we should mount Barry Soetoro on a papier mache' 10 foot rail, made entirely of reconstituted 3,000 page Obamacare Bills, hardened to support a fool such as Barry and the weight of the tar and feathers he will carry, along with Miss Dietary Wonder-Woman Extraordinaire and conduct him and her to the Potomac where they can begin their one-rail cruise to Cuba.
When the RINOs smugly say that we, the right wing crazies and the unwashed who did not graduate from Southern Methodist University, or Columbia, or Harvard, or at least from the University of Texas or Texas A & M, and who are not members of the Mandibular and Vertebrae Society, are the real Republicans in Name Only (RINOs) because we do not know how to compromise and be nice. But we repeat. We have, through compromise, a lost three generations of the black race in America, where fully half or more have been led into the way of wickedness and sloth and crime due to the patronage of liberals buying votes and Republicans trying to be "fair". We have much of our private industry grovelling for fair and foul financial relations with the Exchequer of the Republic, and farmers raising corn, not for hogs and people, but to feed motorcars.
We have FEMA, we have home financing gone wild, we have Veteran's Affairs playing shell games on the backs of veterans, and we could go on and on about the creep and crawl of the central government into every aspect of our lives. We have a government financed by half of the population and bled by parasitic crony capitalists and slothful slugs pseudo-citizens who only bring their digestive and reproductive tracts to the nation's table. No More Compromise with national socialist elitists!!
And we shall leave it at that, Mr. Kristol. I still respect you although you think of us as your inferior. I know that we are not, because at least we know that one plus one is two, and that three minus two is one. That is the way we must approach our budgeting for the central government starting to-day. No more innovative accounting and New Math for Politicians.
If you feel the way the title states the issue, your "ridiculous" assumption is actually backed up by one simple and demonstrable fact. Obama, Valerie Jarrett, and all the "close people" and (Sir Edmund)Hillary, are all Jew-haters extraordinaire, and they helped engineer the fall of Mubarak. Obama's half-brother, and best man and assistant officiant at his wedding with Princess Food Patrol, is a member of the Muslim Brotherhood and a chaplain-advisor to Morsi, the thug who engineered the "election" of the Muslim Brotherhood to power in Egypt and who served, thankfully briefly, as President of Egypt.
These facts are basic and irrefutable. When the Muslim Brotherhood had power briefly, Egyptians were astounded that the Brotherhood even began the open abuse of Copts, as an official policy, and they began suggesting, not whether or not, but when would be the best time to destroy the Pyramids of Giza, the Sphinx, and the monuments of Luxor...etc. etc.
When the military intervened (thankfully for the Jews and the Egyptians both....who happen to have fairly good relations with each other)....Obama and even a few shallow thinking right-wingers declared that we had to suspend military aid because the Army had overthrown "democracy". In terms of freedom of the religions, commerce, hanging around, being a homosexual, talking to foreigners, giving or taking blood due to operations or accidents, however, it was a gain for civilisation. Something much closer to normalcy became possible again.
OBAMA IS BOTH AN ISLAMIC AND MARXIST AGENT AT THE SAME TIME. IT SEEMS SELF-CONTRADICTIVE AND IMPOSSIBLE, BUT EVERYTHING ABOUT THIS PRESIDENCY HAS BEEN ILLEGAL, IMPOSSIBLE, AND TOTALLY DETRIMENTAL TO THE CONCEPT OF AMERICANISM. And, operatives from the Muslim Brotherhood have had many more visits to the White House and its inner sanctum, than Bibi Netanyahu and his posse.
The thing that allows him to be pro-Muslim and pro-communist at the same time is his deep and abiding hatred for America and Americans. To think that Obama is the least, and lowest member of the movement. George Soros, the Annenberg Foundation, the SEIU, and certain other well known groups control every step Obama takes, and every move he makes. He is the proverbial empty suit.....Manchurian robot...Mr. Nowhere man.
The drive to make all things efficient, to the pleasure of a few, and to the consternation of many troubles this observer. Mussolini made the trains run on time, we have heard that admonition many times. But the idea of having some Wizard of Oz, hiding midst the veils and curtains, pulling levers and pushing buttons to first acquit his own pleasure and allocation....is troubling to the point of equivalency to the abolition of the 2nd Amendment and/or the 1st Amendment. Just an observation from El Gringo Viejo. We have always said that we preferred effectiveness to efficiency. It is a Confederate condition....local control...local control...local control. We can fix our own failures and moral defects, ourselves. Please review this material from our Friends in extreme Central Texas....or somewhere else.
The Standing Buddha, outside of Kuala Lumpur. Perhaps my friends are at this fabled place.
I’m writing to you from inside an electromagnetic field … and it’s probably robbing me of my health. Above me on the second floor are a modem, a wireless router, a laptop computer and a Roku box. Next to me is a cellphone, desktop computer with two WIFI cards, two monitors, a wireless keyboard and mouse, a multi-function printer system with WIFI capability, and a laptop computer.
The amount of gigahertz radio frequencies flowing around and through me at any given moment is billions of times more than the eight hertz that naturally register in the human body. And it has me worried. Chronic exposure to radiation in those radio frequencies could be making us ill. It may be causing headaches, dizziness, facial irritation and sleep disturbances. In fact, a 2012 report from the BioInitiative Working Group linked exposure to more serious conditions, including cancer, a weakened immune system and even Alzheimer’s disease.
That by itself is worrisome, but thanks to the government, there's more. Welcome, smart meters. The feds are pushing hard for them. Smart meters are a new meter that keeps track of your energy usage and transmits it wirelessly to your utility company. Its radio frequency registers In the gigahertz. In other words: It’s probably hazardous to your health.
Perhaps this is them, gad-abouting in the Cabos, deep sea fishing, and eating scallop sushi. Or wait! Maybe that's them over there getting out to go into the Dairy Queen right here in extreme Central Texas!!!
Unfortunately, it’s probably hazardous to your liberty, as well. Just think about it: It will broadcast your detailed energy habits and data to your utility company. The meters can also be controlled remotely. So if, someone, somewhere, decides you're consuming too much energy, it's possible for them to adjust it. I don't know about you, but that sounds like a gross violation of my privacy and rights.
Smart meters are merely the first step toward an integrated smart grid. The Federal Smart Grid Task Force, one of the powers behind smart meters, is likely to follow with mandates on retrofitting home appliances in ways that increase radiation exposure in your home, while monitoring your day-to-day habits. Can you guess who's on that Federal Smart Grid Task Force? According to energy.gov, it “includes experts from the departments of Agriculture, Commerce, Defense, Homeland Security, and State; the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC); the Environmental Protection Agency; and the Federal Communications Commission.”
Makes your skin crawl, doesn’t it?
According to the U.S. Department of Energy, a smart grid means “automation technology that lets the utility adjust and control each individual device or millions of devices from a central location.” Translation: It means greater centralization, which means reduced quality and the increased potential for government's presence in your home.
ANOTHER ASSOCIATED PRESS RELEASE WITHOUT COPYRIGHT DISCLAIMER. WE BRING IT TO THE OROG COMMUNITY DUE TO THE FACT THAT IT APPROACHES 99 PER CENT ACCURACY! The reason these people are being stopped now is because it began to become very obvious that many of the people moving north out of Central America are actually the criminal element. The press tells us that all these poor, innocent refugees are fleeing danger, abuse, and violence. The fact is, about a third of those moving to the north will commit multiple crimes in Mexico, brutalise and extort the common viajero (traveller), and then join up with his/her gang in the appropriate community in the United States. Once there, those criminal types will begin to join in with the activities of his/her gang, raping, killing, doing arson, armed and strong arm robberies, home invasions, and extortion just like they did back home. Drug dealing goes without saying.
SAN RAMON, Chiapas, Mexico – The lumbering freight train known as "The Beast," a key part of the route for migrants heading north to the United States, rolled to an abrupt, unscheduled stop in the black of midnight.
Mexican federal police and immigration agents had waited silently in the brush alongside for at least hour, visible only by the glint of their powerful flashlights. As the train stopped, the area was suddenly flooded with spotlights as agents pounced from both sides of the track, scaling ladders to the tops of the freight cars and shouting: "Federal police! Give up! You're surrounded! Come down carefully!"
About a dozen men, some literally spitting with anger and desperation, were firmly led off the track, an agent's hand on the back of their necks neck, and taken to waiting vans for processing and deportation. Agents helped a lone female migrant clambering over a coupling between cars to reach their van, telling her "Walk carefully, don't fall."
"Don't touch me," she snarled.
The scene early Friday would have been unheard of in Mexico during the decades in which Central American migrants were allowed to freely hop freight trains to reach the U.S. border. But the raid is part of a crackdown that has sharply reduced the number of women and children trying to make their way to the United States, where they turn themselves into the U.S. Border Patrol — an exodus that caused what U.S. leaders call a crisis at the border.
Fewer than 15 migrants were detained Friday on a train that once carried 600 to 1,000 migrants at a time. It seemed — at least temporarily — like the end of an era for the train the migrants dubbed "La Bestia" because of all the travelers who had been maimed or killed trying to hitch a ride.
But the migrants, fleeing unemployment, violence and poverty in their home countries, have been only temporarily deterred by past strategies. Some already have devised ways to avoid capture under the new crackdown. One lone migrant escaped Friday's raid by lying flat on the roof of the last freight car and managing to stay aboard as the train pulled out.
Police said the most experienced border crossers wait near the back of the 50-car train, where they have more time to react when it stops.
They know it's hard for police to patrol the entire length of the train.
We place below a bit of photogravure and a regional Mexican newspaper article that shows, while Arriaga, Chiapas is not a very rich place, by world standards it is a pretty nice little corner of the world. The article deals with the establishment of an "Italian Coffe Shop" in Arriaga, and the Chamber of Commerce, complete with Miss Arriaga in her day formal, traditional Chiapaneca dress with lace and frill, and the obligatory skirt with scenes that reflect noteworthy buildings, archaeological sites, and other Arriagan landmarks.
The "designer" coffee shop (adjacent to coffee growing farms) is part of a shopping centre anchored by a Soriana grocery and department store along with other upper-middle and even glitzy occupants. Arriaga, while not a stop on the "World Tour" for many people, is a Cabecera Municipal (county seat), and therefore attracts hundreds of people per day into town to do local government business. Such business is increasingly important in Mexico as duties of registry and taxation and archives are steadily being passed down to more local authority by the central government. The article celebrates the recent opening of the new highway (toll road) between Tapachula on the Guatemalan border all along the coastal route to Tehuantepec in the State of Oaxaca. The train parallels that coastal route, and then turns sharply to the northeast, through the "Tehuantepec Pass" connecting the Pacific to the Atlantic Basin roughly near the Minatitlan - Acayucan area in Vera Cruz State. Most people would abandon the train, however, in Tehuantepec.
These are a mix of "all-stops" and "semi-direct" busses available in the "middle of nowhere" Chiapas, arriving and leaving every 10 to 15 minutes or so. The 1st class SD to Mexico City will set the passenger back about 29 USD (400 miles). The 2nd Class to Acayucan will be about 14 USD, (240 miles). Young French and Euros use the 2nd class de rigueur. Even old curmudgeons can be found on the 1st class (very few stops) with frequency. They (the busses) are very survivable to even pleasant.
One of the problems they have been having is that the "refugees" from Central America who arrive on the freight train's first stop have stormed over the city at each opportunity to relieve themselves in various ways, all injurious to the public sensibility and health standards. The "refugees" are also frequently violent and extortive, roughing pedestrians up, shaking down small businesses, and generally threatening the public tranquillity. It is because a third of the "refugees" are the same people that the "refugees" are trying to escape. Arriaga is rural and agriculturally based, along with some advanced fishing, since the County is bounded by the Pacific on its west side. Citrus, coffee at higher elevations, and melons, kiwi, chilies, and certain vegetables take advantage of the 400 days per year growing season. Unlike the north of Mexico where Caucasian bloodlines are plentiful, in this area the people are mainly Indian (65%) or Mestizo (30%) with a small, urban white cohort. By the way, "coffe" is the spelling of the store's trademark.
This is what the train looked like before Obama and now, after the Mexican authorities have once again begun cracking down on the violation of their own sovereignty and the public's safety.
This is what the train looked like once the news had percolated for about two months in Central America that Obama was giving home, hearth, food, and amnesty to children and "victims" of exploitation and crime.
En Cintalapa se pronóstico un establecimiento de este tipo con servicio de 24 horas en la cabecera municipal, exactamente con la llegada de Soriana y Coppel.Algunos hasta señalaron el sitio en el que se ubicarÃa, pero todo quedó en comentarios ciudadanos, porque a la fecha esto no ha sido una realidad para los cintalapanecos.
The Italian Coffe en Arriaga comparte instalaciones con una estación de servicio de gasolinerÃa en la carretera Arriaga-Tonalá, aproximadamente a dos kilómetros del poblado Calera.
Sin embargo, muchos habitantes de Arriaga y Tonalá llegan hasta ese lugar para poder degustar de sus productos, que en el área urbana de ambas ciudades no es fácil encontrar.
Two oddities about all of this...beyond Barry Soetoro....is that local authorities have always been resistant to enforcing any vagrancy laws or anything similar, really, when it comes to dealing with the train moochers. For one, there is reason to be afraid of them. The local police in these areas are for breaking up fights between drunks, not confronting Mara Salvatruchas who would like nothing better than a selfie with some Sergeant Garcia's head included in the picture....detached. Discretion, seriously, has been the better part of valour. But another thing is that, in truth, the local police do not have jurisdiction within the right-of-way of the "ferrovia" (railway). The train jefes use their own investigators and private security to handle such matters. In other public areas, things can be quirky as well. Like in a wreck on the open highway, only a Federal Highway Police trooper can move or do anything, even if an auto is blocking an important bridge and can be moved easily. Local police, firemen, civilians, etc. cannot do anything...save for very certain persons...the Presidente Municipal of the Municipio (County) or the Alcalde (mayor) of the nearest ciudad (city) can, with discretion, move damaged vehicles by his/her order. A military commissioned or non-commissioned officer can, as well, cause by his/her hand, the removal of an impediment in the case of serious interruption of vehicular commerce. With all these other oddities covered, we move to the second oddity, and that is the nature of the Mexican, and the very representative conduct of the President of Mexico in that hypocritical vein, to notice that the wave of underclass, parasitical people washing across Mexico as victims, are actually parasites, damaging the interests of all Mexicans, of all classes, and of all legal pursuits. Now they act, as they have, sporadically in the past. But, at the same time, they are completely comfortable in demanding that Mexicans have more consideration given them in terms of allowance to stay in a country illegally than the Mexican Government and Constitution allow anyone else, including your humble servant to do the same. I will say that the pro forma of legalising one's visit, or stay, and /or permanent or semi-permanent residence in Mexico is fraught with little difficulty or expense. BUT IT IS STILL REQUIRED. AND BEING SO REASONABLE, IT GIVES THE MEXICANS EVERY JUSTIFICATION TO BOOT SOMEONE OUT FOR ANY REASON THEY DEEM TO BE ACCEPTABLE TO THEM. And at frequent times, they do. Among the conditions required by The Law are proving that you do not need to work for a living, especially if applying for a work permit, and, if residing on your rents, that one must have a minimum of 1,200 dollars income per month without lifting a thumb or a finger, in terms of anything remunerative. They allow an owned home to count for 750 USD/month as a displacement of income. Also, no voting, no campaigning, and pay your real estate taxes, if applicable. One trade off? No inheritance taxes are charged any person living or dead. Not the survivors, not the dead people, no one. Another trade-off? It is a mystical thing that cannot be defined....the food, the civilities, the position one has as an old curmudgeon and foreign eccentric....among the urbane and rustic both...they treat such people as somewhat afflicted lesser Saints of the Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church....or something like that. It's Mexico.
We were in a tete-a-tete the other day on that ghastly Facebook with a high-school chum, and it was suggested that my nickname should be"Curmudgy"....but we'll let that one ferment, ruminate, and distill for a bit.
This submission comes from our Secret Agents in Extreme Central Texas. _______________________________________________________________
US Army Piper Cubs on the Navy's smallest aircraft carriers
The story of the seasick US Army Piper Cubs on the Navy's smallest aircraft carriers
During World War 2, like most red-blooded Americans, the Piper J-3 Cub was called to serve in the military. Classified as the L-4 by the Army but most commonly called "Grasshoppers," more than 4900 were used to help spot and correct the fall of artillery shells over enemy lines and otherwise help coordinate troops. Well, it turned out that the Army needed these planes in some pretty inaccessible places, and that's where the Navy came in.
The Problem?
During the first part of World War 2, the Allies were on the defense, falling back and able to use their local airfields to house and feed their planes of all types. Then in 1943, the tide soon turned as the Allied forces in the Pacific, starting at Guadalcanal, as well as in the European theater, with the invasion of Sicily, started taking the war to the Germans, Japanese, and Italians.
It was in these invasions, however, that the Army soon realized that their fleet of small, fixed wing L-4 Pipers and L-5 Stinsons were out of service until airfields could be captured or built in these new areas. This put the generals on the ground blind and reliant on long-range reconnaissance aircraft and Navy planes to provide their eyes. However, there soon became a fix for this in place.
The Solution?
In late 1943, an Army Transportation Corps Captain by the name of James H Brodie was busy with a solution. Stationed in New Orleans and detailed to work supervising the loading of cargo ships with war materials, he sketched out a design for a boom and line system with a release that could hold a small aircraft fitted with a corresponding hook along the top of the wing roots.
With the boom, a small plane (Cub!) could be lifted into the air, then the engine worked up, and, when rpms were high enough to be reasonably sure of lift, released to fly away. To land, the system worked in reverse, capturing a passing hook-equipped Grasshopper by wire and allowing it to spin down.
course, we all know that the Cub is a tail-dragger and to make that three point landing pilots pull the stick into their belly. However, doing this on the hook just north of that 38-ish knot stall speed took some getting used too. And if the stick was pressed forward at the stall, but not on the hook, then the pilot is going to eat dirt. So don't try this at home, kids! The Brodie System was invented during World War II. A pilot could take off or land with the aircraft hooked to a trolley that ran along a cable. On landing, the trolley provided braking for a smooth stop. The cable and trolley could be rigged on very short jungle fields, or even on ships. This picture shows how a light aircraft could take off or land on a ship using the cable. Image Credit: National Air and Space Museum, Smithsonian Institution NASM-9A001183
In this picture, a Piper L-4, engine running, is ready for take-off while suspended from its cable. Image Credit: National Air and Space Museum, Smithsonian Institution Image Number: SI83-16835
This meant that by using Brodie's system, a Cub or even a larger Stinson could be launched and recovered in a very small area, without a landing strip, allowing it to operate from a clearing, a small field, or even the deck of a medium-sized ship.
Use
The Navy had by early 1944, several hundred ships they classified as "Landing Ship, Tank." These purpose-built vessels were built to carry several hundred tons of cargo, as well as vehicles and up to 160 or so soldiers or marines into combat, landing them on the beach where giant doors would open up and spit them out on to the sand.
The Navy built so many of these ships, so fast, that they didn't even bother to name them although they were some 328-feet long and crewed by a 7 officers and 104 sailors. As such, they just had numbers, such as USS LST-16, etc.
Big blue had enough of these LSTs around that they agreed to allow the Army to use a few of them in 1944 as tiny aircraft carriers. While L4s and L5s had flown off big deck Navy carriers earlier in the war, the Navy really didn't like Army planes on their flattops, so the arrangement worked out nicely.
The idea would be that 6-10 small Cubs or Stinsons would be loaded on an LST, modified with a 220' x 16' flight deck. From the top of this tiny ersatz carrier, they would take to the sky over an invasion beach, scout out enemy locations, and call artillery strikes in on said bad guys. Once the GIs moved inland and acquired access to more real estate, especially airfields, the grasshoppers could leave their LST behind and relocate to drier accommodations.
One ship, LST-906 was ready for the invasion of southern France in September 1944, Operation Dragoon.
"Here is the photo of LST-906 with Capt. Alfred "Dutch" Schultz as pilot of 'Janey' the L4B Piper Cub artillery spotting plane. This information comes from Dutch Schultz's book "Janey: A Little Plane in a Big War". Dutch was the Pilot of the plane that my Dad flew in and took pictures for the 3rd Division. I met him last year and he remembered my Dad from more than 55 years ago. The Seabees converted the LST-906 into a homemade aircraft carrier, which was used in the Invasion of Southern France at St. Tropez." Image credit: Rich Heller, Webmaster The Society of the 3rd Infantry Division, U.S. Army
USS LST-906, with US Army Air Force L-4 Grasshopper on her flight deck being prepared for take-off. Note additional L-4 type aircraft stowed alongside the deck. How would you like to take off on that flight deck? Talk about get it right the first time. Image credit: US Army Signal Corps photo.
USS LST-16 underway in the Mediterranean area. Note the USAAF L-4 Grasshopper on the 220ft x 16ft flight deck ready for take-off. US Navy photo from "Aircraft Carriers" by Norman Polmar.
Although some 25 "L-Bird carriers" were to be created from the teaming of Navy LST's and Army L-4s and L-5s, just eight ships received the conversion. This included USS LST-16, USS LST-337, USS LST-386, USS LST-525, LST-776, and USS LST-906. Not all of these did so and not all of these used the Brodie system.
On some ships, the Grasshoppers would take off once and land ashore at a location that had been captured and designated. While this was not ideal, it did get the small planes ashore and ready to operate rather than land them in boxes and reassemble them on the ground.
One early ship, USS LST-386, had only a small 210x10 deck with a 1-foot stepboard around it and no Brodie system, and was the first of the "L-Bird carriers" to see operational service.
They proved themselves off Italy, France, the Philippines and later, Okinawa and Iwo Jima.
Moreover, we thank them for their sea-going service as the Army's unsung fleet of carrier-based airplanes.
