Victor Davis Hanson is one of my favourite historians. The following is a list of some videos of the man himself in intellectual action.
On Pat Buchanan's WWII historical revision book
On the Peleponnesian War
Conversations with History at Berkley (yes Berkley...)
War in a classical context
Sunday, April 26, 2009
The Great Depression - An Alternative view
Source: The Right Nation
By Howie Rich
History is written by many people, but those who write government school textbooks tend to hold disproportionate sway.Sadly, their vision of America – which has driven conventional wisdom and popular opinion for decades – is built on many myths.The biggest myth of them all?
That capitalism and our free market system caused the Great Depression – and that only a massive expansion of the federal government saved America from permanent economic ruin.Nothing could be further from the truth – and yet as the true history of government meddling repeats itself all around us (with the direst of consequences for future generations), America seems incapable of learning from these mistakes for the simple reason that no one has ever taught them how destructive interventionism has been in the past and present.
Over a decade ago, Lawrence Reed of the Mackinac Center – a Michigan-based research and educational institute – penned an important analysis of the Great Depression.
Written at the height of the dot-com boom (and shortly after President Bill Clinton told us that “the era of big government is over”) Reed’s treatise breaks the Depression down into sections and analyzes the cause and effect associated with each new development.His conclusion? It’s a complete reversal of the textbook myth, an unflinchingly-candid, meticulously-documented proof that “government intervention worsened (the Depression) and kept the economy in a stupor for over a decade.”
“The calamity that began in 1929 lasted at least three times longer than any of the country’s previous depressions because the government compounded its initial errors with a series of additional and harmful interventions,” Reed writes.Anyone who follows things like money supply and interest rate adjustments knows that the Federal Reserve’s policies in the months leading up to the Great Crash of 1928 courted disaster.But it was the effect of government interventionism after the crash that did the real damage – which given the unprecedented $13 trillion intervention currently underway in our country should send shivers up and down every American’s spine.Perhaps most importantly, Reed’s paper shatters once and for all the myth that President Herbert Hoover was the laissez-faire capitalist recalled by American textbooks.
For starters, Hoover’s administration – with Congressional support – dramatically increased government spending from 16.4 percent to 21.5 of GNP in one year. Hoover also signed a foolhardy tariff that crippled trade, as well as the largest tax hike in American history in the spring if 1932.On top of that, during Hoover’s tenure the Federal Reserve imposed the biggest interest rate increase in its history.High tariffs, huge subsidies, deflationary monetary policy, tax increases – does that sound like a laissez-faire capitalist to you?
Ironically, Franklin Delano Roosevelt – whose New Deal policies were later revealed to have been taken straight out of Hoover’s playbook – won election by blasting his predecessor as “reckless and extravagant,” and presiding over “the greatest spending administration in peacetime in all of history.”Roosevelt, the “limited government” advocate, even bemoaned Hoover’s desire to “center control of everything in Washington.”Obviously, Roosevelt flip-flopped after he was elected and put Hoover’s interventionist approach on steroids – much as President Barack Obama has done with the failed bailout mentality of his predecessor.The reality, though, is that none of these leaders differ all that much in their ideological approach to recession.Now the question is this – does the big government approach work?Absolutely not.
Prior to the Great Depression, no American recession had lasted longer than four years. Most were over in two. The Great Depression dragged on for nearly twelve years, however, with unemployment reaching as high as 25% at one point. And just as it is doing now, government over-taxed and over-regulated the economy the whole way through, starving it of desperately needed capital while consolidating frightening levels of power in Washington.But that’s not the story told by government textbooks – just as it’s not the story that’s being told today by the America’s mainstream media.Politicians are relying on big government’s myth to make – and promote – some of the most monumentally foolhardy economic decisions in our nation’s history.
Frankly, it’s past time that we started telling the truth about our past – and applying common sense to the future.
By Howie Rich
History is written by many people, but those who write government school textbooks tend to hold disproportionate sway.Sadly, their vision of America – which has driven conventional wisdom and popular opinion for decades – is built on many myths.The biggest myth of them all?
That capitalism and our free market system caused the Great Depression – and that only a massive expansion of the federal government saved America from permanent economic ruin.Nothing could be further from the truth – and yet as the true history of government meddling repeats itself all around us (with the direst of consequences for future generations), America seems incapable of learning from these mistakes for the simple reason that no one has ever taught them how destructive interventionism has been in the past and present.
Over a decade ago, Lawrence Reed of the Mackinac Center – a Michigan-based research and educational institute – penned an important analysis of the Great Depression.
Written at the height of the dot-com boom (and shortly after President Bill Clinton told us that “the era of big government is over”) Reed’s treatise breaks the Depression down into sections and analyzes the cause and effect associated with each new development.His conclusion? It’s a complete reversal of the textbook myth, an unflinchingly-candid, meticulously-documented proof that “government intervention worsened (the Depression) and kept the economy in a stupor for over a decade.”
“The calamity that began in 1929 lasted at least three times longer than any of the country’s previous depressions because the government compounded its initial errors with a series of additional and harmful interventions,” Reed writes.Anyone who follows things like money supply and interest rate adjustments knows that the Federal Reserve’s policies in the months leading up to the Great Crash of 1928 courted disaster.But it was the effect of government interventionism after the crash that did the real damage – which given the unprecedented $13 trillion intervention currently underway in our country should send shivers up and down every American’s spine.Perhaps most importantly, Reed’s paper shatters once and for all the myth that President Herbert Hoover was the laissez-faire capitalist recalled by American textbooks.
For starters, Hoover’s administration – with Congressional support – dramatically increased government spending from 16.4 percent to 21.5 of GNP in one year. Hoover also signed a foolhardy tariff that crippled trade, as well as the largest tax hike in American history in the spring if 1932.On top of that, during Hoover’s tenure the Federal Reserve imposed the biggest interest rate increase in its history.High tariffs, huge subsidies, deflationary monetary policy, tax increases – does that sound like a laissez-faire capitalist to you?
Ironically, Franklin Delano Roosevelt – whose New Deal policies were later revealed to have been taken straight out of Hoover’s playbook – won election by blasting his predecessor as “reckless and extravagant,” and presiding over “the greatest spending administration in peacetime in all of history.”Roosevelt, the “limited government” advocate, even bemoaned Hoover’s desire to “center control of everything in Washington.”Obviously, Roosevelt flip-flopped after he was elected and put Hoover’s interventionist approach on steroids – much as President Barack Obama has done with the failed bailout mentality of his predecessor.The reality, though, is that none of these leaders differ all that much in their ideological approach to recession.Now the question is this – does the big government approach work?Absolutely not.
Prior to the Great Depression, no American recession had lasted longer than four years. Most were over in two. The Great Depression dragged on for nearly twelve years, however, with unemployment reaching as high as 25% at one point. And just as it is doing now, government over-taxed and over-regulated the economy the whole way through, starving it of desperately needed capital while consolidating frightening levels of power in Washington.But that’s not the story told by government textbooks – just as it’s not the story that’s being told today by the America’s mainstream media.Politicians are relying on big government’s myth to make – and promote – some of the most monumentally foolhardy economic decisions in our nation’s history.
Frankly, it’s past time that we started telling the truth about our past – and applying common sense to the future.
Sunday, April 12, 2009
Arab Israeli Conflict - forgotten facts
Source: Steve Shamark
The term "Palestinian" is itself a masterful twisting of history. To portray themselves as indigenous, Arab settlers adopted the name of an ancient Mediterranean tribe, the Philistines ("Invaders" in Hebrew), that disappeared almost 3000 years ago. The connection between this tribe and modern day Arabs is nil. Romans, in order to conceal their shame and anger with rebellious regions, changed the references to Judea and Samaria by naming them Palestine.
1. Nationhood and Jerusalem - Israel became a nation in the 14th century B.C.E. Two thousand years before the rise of Islam.
2. Since 1272 B.C.E. the Jews have had dominion over the land for up to 1,000 years with a continuous Jewish presence in the land for the past 3,300 years.
3. The only Arab dominion since the Arab invasion and conquest in 635 C.E. lasted no more than 22 years.
4. King David founded the city of Jerusalem. Mohammed never came to Jerusalem.
5. For over 3,000 years, Jerusalem has been the Jewish capital. Jerusalem has never been the capital of any Arab or Muslim entity. Even when the Jordanians occupied Jerusalem, they never sought to make it their capital and Arab leaders did not come to visit.
6. Jerusalem is mentioned over 700 times in Tanach, the Jewish Holy Scriptures. Jerusalem is not mentioned once in the Koran.
7. Jews pray facing Jerusalem. Muslims pray facing Mecca (often with their backs toward Jerusalem).
8. In 1854, according to a report in the New York Tribune, Jews constituted two-thirds of the population of that holy city. (The source: A journalist on assignment in the Middle East that year for the Tribune. His name was Karl Marx. Yes, that Karl Marx.)
9. In 1867, Mark Twain took a tour of Palestine. This is how he described that land: "A desolate country whose soil is rich enough but is given over wholly to weeds. A silent, mournful expanse. We never saw a human".
10. In 1882, official Ottoman Turk census figures showed that, in the entire Land of Israel, there were only 141 000 Muslims, both Arab and non-Arab.
11. A travel guide to Palestine and Syria was published in 1906 by Karl Baedeker; The book estimated the total population of Jerusalem at 60,000, of whom 7,000 were Muslims, 13,000 were Christians and 40,000 were Jews.
12. As the Jews came and drained the swamps and made the deserts bloom, Arabs followed. They came for jobs, for prosperity, for freedom. And, they came in large numbers.
13. In 1922, with what was widely acknowledged as the illegal separation of Trans-Jordan, the Jews were forbidden to settle on almost 77 per cent of the Palestine, while Arab settlement went unrestricted and encouraged by British mandatory authority.
14. Prior to the Second World War Mojli Amin, a member of the Arab Defense Committee for Palestine, proposed the idea "that all the Arabs of Palestine will leave and be divided up amongst the neighboring Arab countries. In exchange for this, all the Jews living in Arab countries will leave and come to Palestine."
15. Did you know that Saudi Arabia was not created until 1913, Lebanon until 1920? Iraq did not exist as a nation until 1932, Syria until 1941; the borders of Jordan were established in 1946 and Kuwait in 1961. Any of these nations that would say Israel is only a recent arrival would have to deny their own rights as recent arrivals as well. They did not exist as countries. They were all under the control of the Turks. Over 80 per cent of the original British Mandate land was given to Arabs without population transfer of Arabs from the land designated for Jews.
16. In 1947, the Jewish state huddled on 18 per cent of the original British Mandate land. The Jews accepted it gratefully. The Arabs rejected it with a vengeance and seven Arab states immediately declared war against Israel.
17. In 1948, the Arab refugees were encouraged to leave Israel by Arab leaders promising to purge the land of Jews. Most of them left in fear of being killed by their own Arab brothers as traitors.
18. Some 850,000 Jewish refugees were forced to flee from Arab countries, due to Arab brutality, persecution and pogroms.
19. The number of Arab refugees who left Israel in 1948 is claimed to be around 630,000 (where did they get this number?). Based on population census, estimated number of Arabs who left Israel was around 460,000. They were ordered to leave by Arab leaders at the time.
20. From 1948 till 1967 Arabs made no attempt to create a Palestinian state. Under Jordanian rule, Jewish holy sites were desecrated, 58 synagogues in Jerusalem were destroyed and the Jews and Christians were denied access to places of worship. Under Israeli rule, all Muslim and Christian sites have been preserved and made accessible to people of all faiths.
21. Arabs began identifying themselves as part of a Palestinian people in 1964 only, on the initiative of Egyptian-born Yasser Arafat. The idea became popular Arab propaganda tool after Israel re-captured Judea, Samaria and Gaza in the defensive 6-Day War of 1967.
22. Out of the 100,000,000 refugees since World War II, Arab-Palestinians are the only refugee group in the world that has never been absorbed or integrated into their own peoples' lands. Jewish refugees were completely absorbed into Israel.
23. Arab refugees INTENTIONALLY were not absorbed or integrated by the rich Arab oil states that control 99.9 per cent of the Middle East landmass. They are kept as virtual prisoners by the Arab power brokers with misplaced hatred for Jews and Western democracy.
24. There is only one Jewish state. There are 60 Muslim countries, including 22 Arab nations.
25. The PLO's Charter still calls for the destruction of the State of Israel.
26. Pan-Arabism or the doctrine of Muslim Caliphate declares that all land that used to belong to Muslims must be returned to them. Thus, Spain, for example, must eventually be re-conquered.
The term "Palestinian" is itself a masterful twisting of history. To portray themselves as indigenous, Arab settlers adopted the name of an ancient Mediterranean tribe, the Philistines ("Invaders" in Hebrew), that disappeared almost 3000 years ago. The connection between this tribe and modern day Arabs is nil. Romans, in order to conceal their shame and anger with rebellious regions, changed the references to Judea and Samaria by naming them Palestine.
1. Nationhood and Jerusalem - Israel became a nation in the 14th century B.C.E. Two thousand years before the rise of Islam.
2. Since 1272 B.C.E. the Jews have had dominion over the land for up to 1,000 years with a continuous Jewish presence in the land for the past 3,300 years.
3. The only Arab dominion since the Arab invasion and conquest in 635 C.E. lasted no more than 22 years.
4. King David founded the city of Jerusalem. Mohammed never came to Jerusalem.
5. For over 3,000 years, Jerusalem has been the Jewish capital. Jerusalem has never been the capital of any Arab or Muslim entity. Even when the Jordanians occupied Jerusalem, they never sought to make it their capital and Arab leaders did not come to visit.
6. Jerusalem is mentioned over 700 times in Tanach, the Jewish Holy Scriptures. Jerusalem is not mentioned once in the Koran.
7. Jews pray facing Jerusalem. Muslims pray facing Mecca (often with their backs toward Jerusalem).
8. In 1854, according to a report in the New York Tribune, Jews constituted two-thirds of the population of that holy city. (The source: A journalist on assignment in the Middle East that year for the Tribune. His name was Karl Marx. Yes, that Karl Marx.)
9. In 1867, Mark Twain took a tour of Palestine. This is how he described that land: "A desolate country whose soil is rich enough but is given over wholly to weeds. A silent, mournful expanse. We never saw a human".
10. In 1882, official Ottoman Turk census figures showed that, in the entire Land of Israel, there were only 141 000 Muslims, both Arab and non-Arab.
11. A travel guide to Palestine and Syria was published in 1906 by Karl Baedeker; The book estimated the total population of Jerusalem at 60,000, of whom 7,000 were Muslims, 13,000 were Christians and 40,000 were Jews.
12. As the Jews came and drained the swamps and made the deserts bloom, Arabs followed. They came for jobs, for prosperity, for freedom. And, they came in large numbers.
13. In 1922, with what was widely acknowledged as the illegal separation of Trans-Jordan, the Jews were forbidden to settle on almost 77 per cent of the Palestine, while Arab settlement went unrestricted and encouraged by British mandatory authority.
14. Prior to the Second World War Mojli Amin, a member of the Arab Defense Committee for Palestine, proposed the idea "that all the Arabs of Palestine will leave and be divided up amongst the neighboring Arab countries. In exchange for this, all the Jews living in Arab countries will leave and come to Palestine."
15. Did you know that Saudi Arabia was not created until 1913, Lebanon until 1920? Iraq did not exist as a nation until 1932, Syria until 1941; the borders of Jordan were established in 1946 and Kuwait in 1961. Any of these nations that would say Israel is only a recent arrival would have to deny their own rights as recent arrivals as well. They did not exist as countries. They were all under the control of the Turks. Over 80 per cent of the original British Mandate land was given to Arabs without population transfer of Arabs from the land designated for Jews.
16. In 1947, the Jewish state huddled on 18 per cent of the original British Mandate land. The Jews accepted it gratefully. The Arabs rejected it with a vengeance and seven Arab states immediately declared war against Israel.
17. In 1948, the Arab refugees were encouraged to leave Israel by Arab leaders promising to purge the land of Jews. Most of them left in fear of being killed by their own Arab brothers as traitors.
18. Some 850,000 Jewish refugees were forced to flee from Arab countries, due to Arab brutality, persecution and pogroms.
19. The number of Arab refugees who left Israel in 1948 is claimed to be around 630,000 (where did they get this number?). Based on population census, estimated number of Arabs who left Israel was around 460,000. They were ordered to leave by Arab leaders at the time.
20. From 1948 till 1967 Arabs made no attempt to create a Palestinian state. Under Jordanian rule, Jewish holy sites were desecrated, 58 synagogues in Jerusalem were destroyed and the Jews and Christians were denied access to places of worship. Under Israeli rule, all Muslim and Christian sites have been preserved and made accessible to people of all faiths.
21. Arabs began identifying themselves as part of a Palestinian people in 1964 only, on the initiative of Egyptian-born Yasser Arafat. The idea became popular Arab propaganda tool after Israel re-captured Judea, Samaria and Gaza in the defensive 6-Day War of 1967.
22. Out of the 100,000,000 refugees since World War II, Arab-Palestinians are the only refugee group in the world that has never been absorbed or integrated into their own peoples' lands. Jewish refugees were completely absorbed into Israel.
23. Arab refugees INTENTIONALLY were not absorbed or integrated by the rich Arab oil states that control 99.9 per cent of the Middle East landmass. They are kept as virtual prisoners by the Arab power brokers with misplaced hatred for Jews and Western democracy.
24. There is only one Jewish state. There are 60 Muslim countries, including 22 Arab nations.
25. The PLO's Charter still calls for the destruction of the State of Israel.
26. Pan-Arabism or the doctrine of Muslim Caliphate declares that all land that used to belong to Muslims must be returned to them. Thus, Spain, for example, must eventually be re-conquered.
An Eye Witness Account of the Armenian Genocide
As written by Grigoris Balakian
The German officers on their way to Palestine and the Mesopotamian front had no choice but to pass before the Bagche [Asia Minor] station [train]. All of them used offensive language with regard to the Armenians. They considered us to be engaging in intrigue, ready to strike the Turkish army from the rear, and thus traitors to the fatherland…deserving of all manner of punishment.
Although most of the Armenians living in Turkey had been deported, scattered, and martyred in the spring of 1915, a few hundred thousand survivors still perishing in the deserts to the south—wasting away to nothing. Nevertheless the German officers’ Armenophobic fury continued, and not a word of compassion was heard from their lips. On the contrary, they justified the Ittihad government, saying, “You Armenians deserve your punishment. Any state would have punished rebellious subjects who took up arms to realize national hopes by the destruction of the country.”
When we objected, asking if other states would dare to massacre women and children, along with men, and annihilate an entire race on account of a few guilty people, they replied: “Yes, it’s true that the punishment was a bit severe, but you must realize that during such chaotic and frightful days of war as these, it was difficult to find the time and means to separate the guilty from the innocent.” This was also the merciless answer of the chief executioners—Talaat, Enver, Behaeddin Shakir, Nazim—and their Ittihad camarilla.
The German officers pretended ignorance of the widespread slaughter of more than a million innocent Armenians, irrespective of sex and age, and referred only to deaths by starvation and the adversities of travel during the deportations. Thus they exonerated the Turkish government, saying that its inability to provide for hundreds of thousands of deportees in a disorganized land like Asia Minor was not surprising. Meanwhile Turkish government officials prevented the starving refugees from receiving bread distributed by the Austrians and Swiss, stating, “Orders have come from Constantinople not to give any assistance. We cannot allow either bread or medicine to be given. The supreme order is to annihilate this evil race. How dare you rescue them from death?” The German officers would often speak of us as Christian Jews and as blood sucking usurers of the Turkish people.
What a falsification of the wretched realities prevailing in Asia Minor, and what a reversal of roles! Yes indeed, there was an oppressor. Either the Germans were consciously distorting the facts and roles, or the Turks had really convinced them that the Turks were the victims and the Armenians were criminals. How appropriate it is to recall here this pair of Turkish sayings: “The clever thief has the master of the house hanged” and “The one who steals the minaret prepares its sheath in advance, of course.”
Many German officers had no qualms about turning over to the Turkish authorities Armenian youths who had sought refuge with them; they knew full well that they were delivering them to their executioners. If an Armenian merely spoke negatively about a German—be he the emperor or [Baron] von der Goltz Pasha [a German military aide to the Ottoman Empire], or the average German—or dared to criticize German indifference toward the Armenian massacres, he was immediately arrested and turned over to the nearest Turkish military or police authority. And if the Germans found a certain Armenian particularly irritating, they pinned the label of spy on him.
Mistaking me for an Austrian, a few German officers boasted of having turned over several Armenians to the Turkish police, adding with a laugh, “Only the Turks know how to talk to the Armenians.”
The German officers on their way to Palestine and the Mesopotamian front had no choice but to pass before the Bagche [Asia Minor] station [train]. All of them used offensive language with regard to the Armenians. They considered us to be engaging in intrigue, ready to strike the Turkish army from the rear, and thus traitors to the fatherland…deserving of all manner of punishment.
Although most of the Armenians living in Turkey had been deported, scattered, and martyred in the spring of 1915, a few hundred thousand survivors still perishing in the deserts to the south—wasting away to nothing. Nevertheless the German officers’ Armenophobic fury continued, and not a word of compassion was heard from their lips. On the contrary, they justified the Ittihad government, saying, “You Armenians deserve your punishment. Any state would have punished rebellious subjects who took up arms to realize national hopes by the destruction of the country.”
When we objected, asking if other states would dare to massacre women and children, along with men, and annihilate an entire race on account of a few guilty people, they replied: “Yes, it’s true that the punishment was a bit severe, but you must realize that during such chaotic and frightful days of war as these, it was difficult to find the time and means to separate the guilty from the innocent.” This was also the merciless answer of the chief executioners—Talaat, Enver, Behaeddin Shakir, Nazim—and their Ittihad camarilla.
The German officers pretended ignorance of the widespread slaughter of more than a million innocent Armenians, irrespective of sex and age, and referred only to deaths by starvation and the adversities of travel during the deportations. Thus they exonerated the Turkish government, saying that its inability to provide for hundreds of thousands of deportees in a disorganized land like Asia Minor was not surprising. Meanwhile Turkish government officials prevented the starving refugees from receiving bread distributed by the Austrians and Swiss, stating, “Orders have come from Constantinople not to give any assistance. We cannot allow either bread or medicine to be given. The supreme order is to annihilate this evil race. How dare you rescue them from death?” The German officers would often speak of us as Christian Jews and as blood sucking usurers of the Turkish people.
What a falsification of the wretched realities prevailing in Asia Minor, and what a reversal of roles! Yes indeed, there was an oppressor. Either the Germans were consciously distorting the facts and roles, or the Turks had really convinced them that the Turks were the victims and the Armenians were criminals. How appropriate it is to recall here this pair of Turkish sayings: “The clever thief has the master of the house hanged” and “The one who steals the minaret prepares its sheath in advance, of course.”
Many German officers had no qualms about turning over to the Turkish authorities Armenian youths who had sought refuge with them; they knew full well that they were delivering them to their executioners. If an Armenian merely spoke negatively about a German—be he the emperor or [Baron] von der Goltz Pasha [a German military aide to the Ottoman Empire], or the average German—or dared to criticize German indifference toward the Armenian massacres, he was immediately arrested and turned over to the nearest Turkish military or police authority. And if the Germans found a certain Armenian particularly irritating, they pinned the label of spy on him.
Mistaking me for an Austrian, a few German officers boasted of having turned over several Armenians to the Turkish police, adding with a laugh, “Only the Turks know how to talk to the Armenians.”
Bias in the Movie Kingdom of Heaven
Taken from Zombie Times
The Controversy Begins The controversy over this film was first revealed in this eye-opening article in the British newspaper The Telegraph in January of 2004. In it, highly respected historians are quoted as saying the film is "complete fiction" and "panders to Osama bin Laden":
Sir Ridley Scott, the Oscar-nominated director, was savaged by senior British academics last night over his forthcoming film which they say "distorts" the history of the Crusades to portray Arabs in a favourable light.
The £75 million film, which stars Orlando Bloom, Jeremy Irons and Liam Neeson, is described by the makers as being "historically accurate" and designed to be "a fascinating history lesson". Academics, however - including Professor Jonathan Riley-Smith, Britain's leading authority on the Crusades - attacked the plot of Kingdom of Heaven, describing it as "rubbish", "ridiculous", "complete fiction" and "dangerous to Arab relations". The film, which began shooting last week in Spain, is set in the time of King Baldwin IV (1161-1185), leading up to the Battle of Hattin in 1187 when Saladin conquered Jerusalem for the Muslims.
The script depicts Baldwin's brother-in-law, Guy de Lusignan, who succeeds him as King of Jerusalem, as "the arch-villain". A further group, "the Brotherhood of Muslims, Jews and Christians", is introduced, promoting an image of cross-faith kinship. "They were working together," the film's spokesman said. "It was a strong bond until the Knights Templar caused friction between them." The Knights Templar, the warrior monks, are portrayed as "the baddies" while Saladin, the Muslim leader, is a "a hero of the piece", Sir Ridley's spokesman said. "At the end of our picture, our heroes defend the Muslims, which was historically correct." Prof Riley-Smith, who is Dixie Professor of Ecclesiastical History at Cambridge University, said the plot was "complete and utter nonsense".
He said that it relied on the romanticised view of the Crusades propagated by Sir Walter Scott in his book The Talisman, published in 1825 and now discredited by academics. "It sounds absolute balls. It's rubbish. It's not historically accurate at all. They refer to The Talisman, which depicts the Muslims as sophisticated and civilised, and the Crusaders are all brutes and barbarians. It has nothing to do with reality." Prof Riley-Smith added: "...There was never a confraternity of Muslims, Jews and Christians.
That is utter nonsense." Dr Jonathan Philips, a lecturer in history at London University and author of The Fourth Crusade and the Sack of Constantinople...said: "The Templars as 'baddies' is only sustainable from the Muslim perspective..." Dr Philips said that by venerating Saladin, who was largely ignored by Arab history until he was reinvented by romantic historians in the 19th century, Sir Ridley was following both Saddam Hussein and Hafez Assad, the former Syrian dictator. Both leaders commissioned huge portraits and statues of Saladin, who was actually a Kurd, to bolster Arab Muslim pride. Prof Riley-Smith added that Sir Ridley's efforts were misguided and pandered to Islamic fundamentalism. "It's Osama bin Laden's version of history. It will fuel the Islamic fundamentalists." ...Sir Ridley's spokesman said that the film portrays the Arabs in a positive light. "It's trying to be fair and we hope that the Muslim world sees the rectification of history."...
This article was noted briefly in the blogosphere (most notably on Dhimmi Watch, and a short but funny parody of the script by Blogger Ben Kepple, who tossed a Buddhist into Scott's "nonsensical" religious Rainbow Coalition), but the film was still a year and a half away from release at that point, so there was otherwise little comment in the media.
Dor the rest go to: http://www.zombietime.com/kingdom_of_heaven/
The Controversy Begins The controversy over this film was first revealed in this eye-opening article in the British newspaper The Telegraph in January of 2004. In it, highly respected historians are quoted as saying the film is "complete fiction" and "panders to Osama bin Laden":
Sir Ridley Scott, the Oscar-nominated director, was savaged by senior British academics last night over his forthcoming film which they say "distorts" the history of the Crusades to portray Arabs in a favourable light.
The £75 million film, which stars Orlando Bloom, Jeremy Irons and Liam Neeson, is described by the makers as being "historically accurate" and designed to be "a fascinating history lesson". Academics, however - including Professor Jonathan Riley-Smith, Britain's leading authority on the Crusades - attacked the plot of Kingdom of Heaven, describing it as "rubbish", "ridiculous", "complete fiction" and "dangerous to Arab relations". The film, which began shooting last week in Spain, is set in the time of King Baldwin IV (1161-1185), leading up to the Battle of Hattin in 1187 when Saladin conquered Jerusalem for the Muslims.
The script depicts Baldwin's brother-in-law, Guy de Lusignan, who succeeds him as King of Jerusalem, as "the arch-villain". A further group, "the Brotherhood of Muslims, Jews and Christians", is introduced, promoting an image of cross-faith kinship. "They were working together," the film's spokesman said. "It was a strong bond until the Knights Templar caused friction between them." The Knights Templar, the warrior monks, are portrayed as "the baddies" while Saladin, the Muslim leader, is a "a hero of the piece", Sir Ridley's spokesman said. "At the end of our picture, our heroes defend the Muslims, which was historically correct." Prof Riley-Smith, who is Dixie Professor of Ecclesiastical History at Cambridge University, said the plot was "complete and utter nonsense".
He said that it relied on the romanticised view of the Crusades propagated by Sir Walter Scott in his book The Talisman, published in 1825 and now discredited by academics. "It sounds absolute balls. It's rubbish. It's not historically accurate at all. They refer to The Talisman, which depicts the Muslims as sophisticated and civilised, and the Crusaders are all brutes and barbarians. It has nothing to do with reality." Prof Riley-Smith added: "...There was never a confraternity of Muslims, Jews and Christians.
That is utter nonsense." Dr Jonathan Philips, a lecturer in history at London University and author of The Fourth Crusade and the Sack of Constantinople...said: "The Templars as 'baddies' is only sustainable from the Muslim perspective..." Dr Philips said that by venerating Saladin, who was largely ignored by Arab history until he was reinvented by romantic historians in the 19th century, Sir Ridley was following both Saddam Hussein and Hafez Assad, the former Syrian dictator. Both leaders commissioned huge portraits and statues of Saladin, who was actually a Kurd, to bolster Arab Muslim pride. Prof Riley-Smith added that Sir Ridley's efforts were misguided and pandered to Islamic fundamentalism. "It's Osama bin Laden's version of history. It will fuel the Islamic fundamentalists." ...Sir Ridley's spokesman said that the film portrays the Arabs in a positive light. "It's trying to be fair and we hope that the Muslim world sees the rectification of history."...
This article was noted briefly in the blogosphere (most notably on Dhimmi Watch, and a short but funny parody of the script by Blogger Ben Kepple, who tossed a Buddhist into Scott's "nonsensical" religious Rainbow Coalition), but the film was still a year and a half away from release at that point, so there was otherwise little comment in the media.
Dor the rest go to: http://www.zombietime.com/kingdom_of_heaven/
Monday, March 2, 2009
Top Forty Chemists of All-Time
Just my Opinion....
1.Dmitri Mendeleyev - Russian - Devised the Periodic table of elements. Predicted that several more elements would be discovered.
2.Antoine Lavoisier - French - Showed that air is a mixture of oxygen and nitrogen. Disproved the old Theory of phlogiston and determined the nature of combustion. Lavoisier wrote the first modern book on chemistry and explained the law of conservation of matter.
3.Henry Cavendish - English - Showed that water could be produced from two gases. Discovered hydrogen.
4. Amedeo Avogadro - Italian - First to distinguish molecules from atoms. Developed Avogadro's Constant (The number of particles of a substance in a mole). Studied the effect of combining volumes.
5. Jons Jakob Berzelius - Swedish - Developed the symbols for many of the chemicals. Calculated the atomic weights accurately of many of them and discovered Selenium, Silicon and Thorium.
6. John Dalton - English - Developed an atomic theory of matter and explained the laws of partial pressure.
7. Robert Boyle - Irish - Studied gases and showed how Pressure and volume at constant mass were indirectly proportional to one another.
8. Joseph-Louis Gay-Lussac and Jacques Charles - Both French - Studied gases. Showed that gas volume at constant pressure increases with Temperature.
9. Friederich Wöhler - German - Father of Organic Chemistry. He was the first chemist to synthesize an organic compound, Urea.
10. Carl Scheele - Swedish - Co-discover of oxygen with Joseph Priestley. Also discovered chlorine, manganese and molybdenum.
11. Marie Curie - Polish - Isolated radioactive elements radium and polonium.
12. Josiah Gibbs - American - Founder of Chemical Thermodynamics.
13. Jacobus van't Hoff - Dutch - Thermodynamicist. He was one of the earlier chemists to speak about the 3-D nature of molecules.
14. Frederick Sanger - English - Biochemist. Revealed the Amino sequence for insulin. Worked out methods for determining the molecular structure of nucleic acids. Two time Nobel Prize winner.
15. Humphry Davy - English - Showed the connection between electrochemistry and the elements. Discovered the elements Potassium, Sodium, Barium, Calcium and Magnesium amongst others.
16. Joseph Priestley - English - Oxygen co-discoverer. See Scheele.
17. Henri Le Chatelier - French - Developed principle that every change in a stable chemical equilibrium will result in a shift in the direction of the equilibrium to reduce the effects of the change.
18. Frederick Soddy - English - Introduced the isotope theory of elements.
19. Svante Arrhenius - Sweden - Established modern electrochemistry.
20. Germain Hess - Swiss/Russian - Introduced Hess's Law for determining the heat of reactions.
21.Wilhelm Ostwald - Latvian - Discovered Dilution law. Invented process to make nitric acid by oxidizing ammonia. He also developed a theory of colour.
22. Daniel Rutherford - Scottish - Discoverer of Nitrogen.
23. Friederich Kekulé - German - Organic Chemist. Described the ring structure of benzene.
24. Stanislao Cannizzaro - Italian - Established the use of Atomic weights in Chemical formulas and calculations.
25. Linus Pauling - American - Applied Quantum Theory to determine Chemical Structure (especially of proteins). Showed how electrons effect the formation of molecules.
26. Johannes Brønsted - Danish and Thomas Lowry - English - Independently introduced the Brønsted - Lowry definition of an acid as something that donates a proton and a base as something that accepts a proton.
27. Leo Baekland - Belgian/American - Father of the Plastics Industry.
28. William Ramsay - Scottish - Co-discovered Argon with Lord Rayleigh. Was first to identify, helium, neon, krypton and xenon.
29. Henri Moissan - French - Isolated fluorine. Invented the electric furnace. Discovered carborundum and produced artificial diamonds in a laboratory.
30. Theodore Richards - American - Performed extensive work on atomic weights to reveal the existence of isotopes.
31. Dorothy Hodgkin - English - Crystallographer. Used x-ray crystallography to reveal the structure of such molecules as penicillin and insulin.
32. Thomas Graham - Scottish - Developed Graham's Law of Diffusion. Founder of Colloidal Chemistry.
33. Fritz Haber - German - Invented the process to make ammonia from nitrogen in the air. Known as the Haber process. Invention allowed Germany to continue making explosives after World War I ban in spite of the blockade on the importation of nitrates.
34. Irving Langmuir - American. High Temperature chemist. Work lead to the development of the tungsten lamp. Also studied gases. Research in this field would have practical implications with respect to the use of atomic hydrogen in welding torches.
35. Peter Debye - Dutch - Worked as well on molecular structure. Pioneered x-ray powder photography.
36. Harold Urey - American - Isolated Heavy water and discovered deuterium.
37. Paul Flory - American - Leading figure in the field of Polymerization. Studied properties of plastics, ribbers and fibers.
38. William Perkin - English - Chemist noted for his work on dyes. Invented mauve.
39. George Washington Carver - American - Agricultural chemist. Research involved the synthesis of products from peanuts, sweet potatoes and soybeans.
40. François Raoult - French - Developed law which relates vapor pressure of a solution to the number of molecules of solute dissolved in it.
1.Dmitri Mendeleyev - Russian - Devised the Periodic table of elements. Predicted that several more elements would be discovered.
2.Antoine Lavoisier - French - Showed that air is a mixture of oxygen and nitrogen. Disproved the old Theory of phlogiston and determined the nature of combustion. Lavoisier wrote the first modern book on chemistry and explained the law of conservation of matter.
3.Henry Cavendish - English - Showed that water could be produced from two gases. Discovered hydrogen.
4. Amedeo Avogadro - Italian - First to distinguish molecules from atoms. Developed Avogadro's Constant (The number of particles of a substance in a mole). Studied the effect of combining volumes.
5. Jons Jakob Berzelius - Swedish - Developed the symbols for many of the chemicals. Calculated the atomic weights accurately of many of them and discovered Selenium, Silicon and Thorium.
6. John Dalton - English - Developed an atomic theory of matter and explained the laws of partial pressure.
7. Robert Boyle - Irish - Studied gases and showed how Pressure and volume at constant mass were indirectly proportional to one another.
8. Joseph-Louis Gay-Lussac and Jacques Charles - Both French - Studied gases. Showed that gas volume at constant pressure increases with Temperature.
9. Friederich Wöhler - German - Father of Organic Chemistry. He was the first chemist to synthesize an organic compound, Urea.
10. Carl Scheele - Swedish - Co-discover of oxygen with Joseph Priestley. Also discovered chlorine, manganese and molybdenum.
11. Marie Curie - Polish - Isolated radioactive elements radium and polonium.
12. Josiah Gibbs - American - Founder of Chemical Thermodynamics.
13. Jacobus van't Hoff - Dutch - Thermodynamicist. He was one of the earlier chemists to speak about the 3-D nature of molecules.
14. Frederick Sanger - English - Biochemist. Revealed the Amino sequence for insulin. Worked out methods for determining the molecular structure of nucleic acids. Two time Nobel Prize winner.
15. Humphry Davy - English - Showed the connection between electrochemistry and the elements. Discovered the elements Potassium, Sodium, Barium, Calcium and Magnesium amongst others.
16. Joseph Priestley - English - Oxygen co-discoverer. See Scheele.
17. Henri Le Chatelier - French - Developed principle that every change in a stable chemical equilibrium will result in a shift in the direction of the equilibrium to reduce the effects of the change.
18. Frederick Soddy - English - Introduced the isotope theory of elements.
19. Svante Arrhenius - Sweden - Established modern electrochemistry.
20. Germain Hess - Swiss/Russian - Introduced Hess's Law for determining the heat of reactions.
21.Wilhelm Ostwald - Latvian - Discovered Dilution law. Invented process to make nitric acid by oxidizing ammonia. He also developed a theory of colour.
22. Daniel Rutherford - Scottish - Discoverer of Nitrogen.
23. Friederich Kekulé - German - Organic Chemist. Described the ring structure of benzene.
24. Stanislao Cannizzaro - Italian - Established the use of Atomic weights in Chemical formulas and calculations.
25. Linus Pauling - American - Applied Quantum Theory to determine Chemical Structure (especially of proteins). Showed how electrons effect the formation of molecules.
26. Johannes Brønsted - Danish and Thomas Lowry - English - Independently introduced the Brønsted - Lowry definition of an acid as something that donates a proton and a base as something that accepts a proton.
27. Leo Baekland - Belgian/American - Father of the Plastics Industry.
28. William Ramsay - Scottish - Co-discovered Argon with Lord Rayleigh. Was first to identify, helium, neon, krypton and xenon.
29. Henri Moissan - French - Isolated fluorine. Invented the electric furnace. Discovered carborundum and produced artificial diamonds in a laboratory.
30. Theodore Richards - American - Performed extensive work on atomic weights to reveal the existence of isotopes.
31. Dorothy Hodgkin - English - Crystallographer. Used x-ray crystallography to reveal the structure of such molecules as penicillin and insulin.
32. Thomas Graham - Scottish - Developed Graham's Law of Diffusion. Founder of Colloidal Chemistry.
33. Fritz Haber - German - Invented the process to make ammonia from nitrogen in the air. Known as the Haber process. Invention allowed Germany to continue making explosives after World War I ban in spite of the blockade on the importation of nitrates.
34. Irving Langmuir - American. High Temperature chemist. Work lead to the development of the tungsten lamp. Also studied gases. Research in this field would have practical implications with respect to the use of atomic hydrogen in welding torches.
35. Peter Debye - Dutch - Worked as well on molecular structure. Pioneered x-ray powder photography.
36. Harold Urey - American - Isolated Heavy water and discovered deuterium.
37. Paul Flory - American - Leading figure in the field of Polymerization. Studied properties of plastics, ribbers and fibers.
38. William Perkin - English - Chemist noted for his work on dyes. Invented mauve.
39. George Washington Carver - American - Agricultural chemist. Research involved the synthesis of products from peanuts, sweet potatoes and soybeans.
40. François Raoult - French - Developed law which relates vapor pressure of a solution to the number of molecules of solute dissolved in it.
Saturday, February 21, 2009
Honouring Cuba's Heroes
Author: Humberto Fontova
Source: http://brookesnews.com/091602castrocemetry.html
You'll often find people with itchy noses and red-rimmed eyes ambling amidst the long rows of white crosses at Miami’s Tamiami Park on Coral Way and 107 Avenue. It's a mini-Arlington cemetery called the Cuban Memorial, and it stands in honor of the tens of thousands of murder victims of Fidel Castro and Che Guevara. It is a tribute, too, to those who fell while trying to free Cuba from the barbarism that the two imposed with their Soviet overlords while America’s "best and brightest" dithered, bumbled and finally betrayed the Cuban people. The tombs are symbolic. Most of the bodies still lie in mass graves.
Some of these Cuban Memorial's visitors will be kneeling, others walking slowly, looking for a name. You may remember a similar scene from the opening frames of Saving Private Ryan. Many clutch rosaries. Many of the ladies will be pressing their faces into the breast of a relative who drove them there, a relative who wraps his arms around her spastically heaving shoulders. Try as he might not to cry himself, he usually finds that the sobs wracking his mother, grandmother or aunt are contagious. Yet he's often too young to remember the face of his martyred uncle, father or cousin — the name they just recognized on the white cross. "Fusilado" — firing squad execution — it says below it.
There are 14,000 crosses in all, symbolizing those executed on the orders of the man being swamped and feted by U.S. trade delegations from Louisiana to Nebraska to Maine. Even many of the older men walking among these crosses will be red-eyed, choked up. No denying it, we Cubans are an emotional people and not ashamed to show it, at the proper time.
The elderly lady still holds a tissue to her eyes and nose as they wait to cross the street after leaving the memorial. Her red-eyed grandson still has his arm around her. She told him about how his freedom-fighter grandfather yelled "Viva Cuba Libre!" and "Viva Cristo Rey!" the instant before the volley shattered his body. They cross the street slowly, silently, and run into a dreadlocked youth coming out of a music store. His T-shirt sports the face of her husband's cowardly executioner, Che Guevara. They turn their heads in rage toward the store window. Well, there's the murderer's face again, on a huge poster, $19.95 it says at the bottom, right next to the inscription "Fight Oppression!" You, friends, tell me how she might feel.
Another woman will go home after placing flowers under her father's cross — a father she never knew. "Killed in action, Bay of Pigs, April 18th, 1961" reads the inscription on his cross. She was 2 at the time. "We will not be evacuated!" yelled her father's commander into his radio that day, as 41,000 Red Troops and swarms of Stalin tanks closed the ring on her father and his 1,400 utterly abandoned Band of Brothers. "The Best and Brightest" all had important social engagements that day.
"We came here to Fight!" her father's commander kept yelling at the enraged and heartsick CIA man offering to evacuate them from the doomed beachhead. "Let it end here!" was his last yell, barely audible over the deafening blasts from the storm of Soviet artillery. Her 23-year-old father — an accountant in Cuba a year before, a dish washer in a Miami Hotel only two months before, and now grim-faced, thirst-crazed and delirious after three days of continuous ground combat — heard the order from his commander: "No Retreat! We Stand and Fight!" and rammed in his last clip. By then he'd long realized he'd never see his daughter's graduation.
His ammo expended, he fell among the bodies of 100 of his comrades, after mauling his communist enemies to the score of 20 to one. "Wimps! Yes, Wimps!" the woman hears Michael Moore label her father and his Band of Brothers in one of America's best-selling books. "Crybabies too!" Again, friends, you tell me how she might feel.
Castro murdered her relatives, shattered her family and plunged a nation — which had double Japan's per capita income in 1958, plus net immigration from Europe — into a pesthole that repels even half-starved Haitians. He jailed, tortured and murdered more political prisoners than pre-war Hitler, and about 20 times as many as Mussolini. He asked, pleaded and finally tried to cajole Soviet premier Nikita Khrushchev, the “Butcher of Budapest,” into a nuclear strike against America. Failing there, he tried to blow up Macy's, Gimbel's, Bloomingdales and Grand Central Station with more TNT than used by the Madrid subway terrorists.
Yet Fidel Castro is still hailed as "One Helluva Guy" by Ted Turner; as "Very likable, a man I regard as a friend!" by George McGovern; and "Way Too Cool!" by Bonnie Raitt, among dozens upon dozens of other accolades by dozens of other liberal scoundrels and imbeciles. Today the U.S. is his biggest food supplier.
Tens of thousands of Cubans (and dozens of Americans) fought him. "We were fighting for Cuba's freedom as well as America's defense. To call us mercenaries is a grave insult," says Alabama Air Guard officer Albert Persons about his and his Alabama comrades' heroism during the battle of The Bay of Pigs. The Kennedy administration might abandon our comrades out, they snorted. We sure as hell won't.
It was more than bluster, too. Four U.S. volunteers — Pete Ray, Riley Shamburger, Leo Barker and Wade Grey — suited up, gunned the engines and joined the fight. These were Southern boys, not pampered Ivy Leaguers, so there was no navel-gazing. They had archaic notions of right and wrong, of honor and loyalty, of who America's enemies really are. Their Cuban comrades — men they'd trained and befriended — were being slaughtered on that beachhead. Knowing their lumbering B-26s were sitting ducks for Castro's unmolested jets and Sea Furies, all four Alabama air guard volunteers flew over the doomed beachhead to lend support to their betrayed brothers in arms.
All four were shot down. All four have their names in a place of honor next to their Cuban comrades on The Bay of Pigs Memorial, plus streets named after them in Little Havana, plus their crosses at the Cuban Memorial. When Doug MacArthur waded ashore on Leyte, he grabbed a radio: "People of the Philippines: I have returned. By the grace of Almighty God our forces stand again on Philippine soil – soil consecrated in the blood of our two peoples." Cuban soil was similarly consecrated.
"My hatred of Bolshevism and Bolsheviks is not founded on their silly system of economics or their absurd doctrine of an impossible equality," wrote Winston Churchill. "It arises from the bloody and devastating terrorism which they practice in every land into which they have broken, and by which alone their criminal regime can be maintained." Sir Winston Churchill did not lose a single family member or close friend to that "bloody and devastating terrorism."
Yet to this day his every utterance and note is revered as an exemplar of judiciousness and heroism. But let a Cuban-American who lost half his family to Communist firing squads and prisons express the identical sentiment and he's promptly denounced by liberals as a "screaming, irrational hothead!" "Disgusting!" spat Bryant Gumbel while watching Cuban-American demonstrators in front of Elian Gonzalez's uncle's house six years ago.
Some very dedicated and selfless folks are holding a memorial service, including a Mass and vigil at the Cuban Memorial in Miami's Tamiami Park this weekend. The service is open to the public. Attend and you'll be surrounded by a sea of crosses, many heroes and heroines, along with their surviving friends and kin. If ever a group merited a memorial service, it's those here honored. Even if you're not related to any of these folks, even if their story is new to you, attend and you'll honor heroes who fought America's most rabid enemy — and for good measure poke a sharp finger into the eye of the establishment Left.
Source: http://brookesnews.com/091602castrocemetry.html
You'll often find people with itchy noses and red-rimmed eyes ambling amidst the long rows of white crosses at Miami’s Tamiami Park on Coral Way and 107 Avenue. It's a mini-Arlington cemetery called the Cuban Memorial, and it stands in honor of the tens of thousands of murder victims of Fidel Castro and Che Guevara. It is a tribute, too, to those who fell while trying to free Cuba from the barbarism that the two imposed with their Soviet overlords while America’s "best and brightest" dithered, bumbled and finally betrayed the Cuban people. The tombs are symbolic. Most of the bodies still lie in mass graves.
Some of these Cuban Memorial's visitors will be kneeling, others walking slowly, looking for a name. You may remember a similar scene from the opening frames of Saving Private Ryan. Many clutch rosaries. Many of the ladies will be pressing their faces into the breast of a relative who drove them there, a relative who wraps his arms around her spastically heaving shoulders. Try as he might not to cry himself, he usually finds that the sobs wracking his mother, grandmother or aunt are contagious. Yet he's often too young to remember the face of his martyred uncle, father or cousin — the name they just recognized on the white cross. "Fusilado" — firing squad execution — it says below it.
There are 14,000 crosses in all, symbolizing those executed on the orders of the man being swamped and feted by U.S. trade delegations from Louisiana to Nebraska to Maine. Even many of the older men walking among these crosses will be red-eyed, choked up. No denying it, we Cubans are an emotional people and not ashamed to show it, at the proper time.
The elderly lady still holds a tissue to her eyes and nose as they wait to cross the street after leaving the memorial. Her red-eyed grandson still has his arm around her. She told him about how his freedom-fighter grandfather yelled "Viva Cuba Libre!" and "Viva Cristo Rey!" the instant before the volley shattered his body. They cross the street slowly, silently, and run into a dreadlocked youth coming out of a music store. His T-shirt sports the face of her husband's cowardly executioner, Che Guevara. They turn their heads in rage toward the store window. Well, there's the murderer's face again, on a huge poster, $19.95 it says at the bottom, right next to the inscription "Fight Oppression!" You, friends, tell me how she might feel.
Another woman will go home after placing flowers under her father's cross — a father she never knew. "Killed in action, Bay of Pigs, April 18th, 1961" reads the inscription on his cross. She was 2 at the time. "We will not be evacuated!" yelled her father's commander into his radio that day, as 41,000 Red Troops and swarms of Stalin tanks closed the ring on her father and his 1,400 utterly abandoned Band of Brothers. "The Best and Brightest" all had important social engagements that day.
"We came here to Fight!" her father's commander kept yelling at the enraged and heartsick CIA man offering to evacuate them from the doomed beachhead. "Let it end here!" was his last yell, barely audible over the deafening blasts from the storm of Soviet artillery. Her 23-year-old father — an accountant in Cuba a year before, a dish washer in a Miami Hotel only two months before, and now grim-faced, thirst-crazed and delirious after three days of continuous ground combat — heard the order from his commander: "No Retreat! We Stand and Fight!" and rammed in his last clip. By then he'd long realized he'd never see his daughter's graduation.
His ammo expended, he fell among the bodies of 100 of his comrades, after mauling his communist enemies to the score of 20 to one. "Wimps! Yes, Wimps!" the woman hears Michael Moore label her father and his Band of Brothers in one of America's best-selling books. "Crybabies too!" Again, friends, you tell me how she might feel.
Castro murdered her relatives, shattered her family and plunged a nation — which had double Japan's per capita income in 1958, plus net immigration from Europe — into a pesthole that repels even half-starved Haitians. He jailed, tortured and murdered more political prisoners than pre-war Hitler, and about 20 times as many as Mussolini. He asked, pleaded and finally tried to cajole Soviet premier Nikita Khrushchev, the “Butcher of Budapest,” into a nuclear strike against America. Failing there, he tried to blow up Macy's, Gimbel's, Bloomingdales and Grand Central Station with more TNT than used by the Madrid subway terrorists.
Yet Fidel Castro is still hailed as "One Helluva Guy" by Ted Turner; as "Very likable, a man I regard as a friend!" by George McGovern; and "Way Too Cool!" by Bonnie Raitt, among dozens upon dozens of other accolades by dozens of other liberal scoundrels and imbeciles. Today the U.S. is his biggest food supplier.
Tens of thousands of Cubans (and dozens of Americans) fought him. "We were fighting for Cuba's freedom as well as America's defense. To call us mercenaries is a grave insult," says Alabama Air Guard officer Albert Persons about his and his Alabama comrades' heroism during the battle of The Bay of Pigs. The Kennedy administration might abandon our comrades out, they snorted. We sure as hell won't.
It was more than bluster, too. Four U.S. volunteers — Pete Ray, Riley Shamburger, Leo Barker and Wade Grey — suited up, gunned the engines and joined the fight. These were Southern boys, not pampered Ivy Leaguers, so there was no navel-gazing. They had archaic notions of right and wrong, of honor and loyalty, of who America's enemies really are. Their Cuban comrades — men they'd trained and befriended — were being slaughtered on that beachhead. Knowing their lumbering B-26s were sitting ducks for Castro's unmolested jets and Sea Furies, all four Alabama air guard volunteers flew over the doomed beachhead to lend support to their betrayed brothers in arms.
All four were shot down. All four have their names in a place of honor next to their Cuban comrades on The Bay of Pigs Memorial, plus streets named after them in Little Havana, plus their crosses at the Cuban Memorial. When Doug MacArthur waded ashore on Leyte, he grabbed a radio: "People of the Philippines: I have returned. By the grace of Almighty God our forces stand again on Philippine soil – soil consecrated in the blood of our two peoples." Cuban soil was similarly consecrated.
"My hatred of Bolshevism and Bolsheviks is not founded on their silly system of economics or their absurd doctrine of an impossible equality," wrote Winston Churchill. "It arises from the bloody and devastating terrorism which they practice in every land into which they have broken, and by which alone their criminal regime can be maintained." Sir Winston Churchill did not lose a single family member or close friend to that "bloody and devastating terrorism."
Yet to this day his every utterance and note is revered as an exemplar of judiciousness and heroism. But let a Cuban-American who lost half his family to Communist firing squads and prisons express the identical sentiment and he's promptly denounced by liberals as a "screaming, irrational hothead!" "Disgusting!" spat Bryant Gumbel while watching Cuban-American demonstrators in front of Elian Gonzalez's uncle's house six years ago.
Some very dedicated and selfless folks are holding a memorial service, including a Mass and vigil at the Cuban Memorial in Miami's Tamiami Park this weekend. The service is open to the public. Attend and you'll be surrounded by a sea of crosses, many heroes and heroines, along with their surviving friends and kin. If ever a group merited a memorial service, it's those here honored. Even if you're not related to any of these folks, even if their story is new to you, attend and you'll honor heroes who fought America's most rabid enemy — and for good measure poke a sharp finger into the eye of the establishment Left.
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