An Ominous Sign

Last week, as hundreds of armed citizens gathered around armed forces recruiting centers around the country to protect them after a terrorist attack, they were betrayed by the high command of Obama's Department of Defense.  The U.S. DOD ordered that the troops being guarded by civilians treat their civilian guards as "security risks" and to call the police to have them removed.

This order gives a stunning insight into the thinking of the flag rank officers Obama has collected around him.  The fact that they are more afraid of legally armed U.S. citizens than Muslim terrorists should serve as a warning call to every American citizen.  The U.S. military high command has been corrupted and co-opted by the Muslims in places of influence in the Obama administration.

This has been a long time coming.  Soon after his election, Obama began purging the officer corps of anyone who would not slavishly obey his destructive policies concerning the military.  At one point, he actually fired a high ranking military commander in the field who was trying to get aid to U.S. forces under fire in Benghazi.  This type of policy decision has been repeated again and again under this administration.  The lives of the troops matter little to them so long as their carefully nurtured dialogue of deception is not disturbed.  And now, the U.S. high command has become a willing instrument in this deception.

In the months following the Tiananmen Square uprising in China, I had the privilege of interviewing a Chinese couple that managed to escape.  One of their greatest surprises and disappointments was that the Chinese People's Army had actually fired upon their own people.  The People's Army was previously held in high esteem by the Chinese People.  They sincerely believed that it would never do harm to them.  They continued to believe that until People's Army forces opened fire on pro-democracy demonstrators and literally crushed hundreds of them under the tracks of their tanks.

We Americans have had our own Tiananmen Square warning but have largely ignored it.  After

Hurricane Katrina, troops of Oklahoma's own 45th Brigade went house to house in New Orleans and seized the legally owned weapons of private citizens in the middle of a civil catastrophe when they were needed most.  That lesson should not lost upon the American people. Soldiers will trust their superiors to give them lawful orders and will obey them when issued. Any time the American people are determined to be a "domestic enemy" those orders must be disobeyed.  If the officer corps of the U.S. military does not have a good understanding of the rights of citizens under the constitution and a life or death, career ending commitment to protecting them against "all enemies foreign and domestic" then they are nothing more than the administration's private political enforcement tool .... literally political thugs in uniform.

The U.S. Armed Forces, particularly at the command level, have been so politicized under this administration that it may be too late to restore the institution of the flag officer corps as it currently exists.  Under the next administration, it may be time to start over.  That evolution would begin by firing every politicized flag rank officer who had survived under Obama and replacing them with experienced officers who were purged by him.  That evolution would continue by purging the military academies of the corrosive politically correct influences that have seized control of them under this administration and replacing them with officer instructors who are more concerned with teaching future leaders how to win wars than implementing gay and feminist theory into the military culture.

The leadership of the U.S. Armed Forces have lost their way and are in danger of becoming a threat to the people they serve.  Historically, the U.S. Armed Forces have been apolitical, serving administrations of differing political identity equally.  However, like so much in American culture, Obama has fundamentally transformed that and turned the U.S. Armed Forces into another political branch just like that found in Banana Republics and third world hell holes.  And because of that, the next administration is going to have to let the careers of those flag officers who allowed this to happen on their watch die by the same political sword that they lived and were promoted by in the current administration.

An Apology to Nathan Bedford Forrest

Soon, the bodies of Confederate General Nathan Bedford Forrest and his wife are likely to be disinterred from their resting place of over a hundred years.  Nobody knows where they will rest after that since Confederate blood apparently taints the soil wherever it lies in the minds of the screaming mob that is erasing American culture as quickly as they can convince spineless politicians to appease them.

I owe the General an apology for two reasons.  The first is corporate.  Forrest and his wife deserve to left in peace and we as a people are responsible for allowing the political leadership of our nation to accrue to forces with no understanding of or respect for traditional American culture.

The second reason is more personal.  For decades, I believed the stories that Nathan Bedford Forrest ordered the execution of a group of negro soldiers at the battle of Ft. Pillow.  I use the term negro to be historically accurate since that is the way they are described in the contemporary accounts and that word is not a perjorative, just a descriptor of their race the same as caucasian or oriental.

After the dust up about where the good General and his wife's bones would reside, I decided to read the original accounts of the Battle of Ft. Pillow and the subsequent investigation.  They tell a far different story than the history books relate.

The Battle of Ft. Pillow was particularly fierce.  The Union garrison at Ft. Pillow was manned largely by turncoat southerners and negro troops both of whom feared retribution from the southern troops they were opposing.  When the bumbling Union commander's situation was hopeless he was offered the opportunity to surrender and refused.  The Union garrison decided to fight to the death under the rule of no quarter.  And that is exactly what happened. The situation was investigated by none other than President Abraham Lincoln.  General Forrest and his officers were cleared. 

Later historians concluded Secretary of War Stanton had been successful in his aims with publicizing the battle. Stanton’s thirst for power was legendary in Washington and President Andrew Johnson would later fire him for similar type tactics, which led to Stanton virtually organizing the Presidential impeachment trial of President Johnson in Congress.

"What happened at Fort Pillow was no different than what happened at a dozen other battles under Union generals," said military historian Dr. Brian Wills, "Some soldiers in that kind of environment are going to get ‘out of hand’ and the military record is replete with prosecutions of such men. Gen. Forrest was a strict disciplinarian and consistently prosecuted men in his command for such actions as those alleged at Fort Pillow. Why that particular battle drew national attention has more to do with a Presidential campaign that was going badly for Lincoln and a Secretary of War wanting to hold onto power. Gen. Sherman later acknowledged that what happened at Fort Pillow was one of those unfortunate consequences of war and Forrest could not be personally held responsible for it." (Tennessee History Online - http://www.tennesseehistory.com/class/Pillow.htm)

Gen. Nathan Bedford Forrest was a brave and brilliant commander who delivered multiple stunning defeats to the often numerically superior Union forces.  He was a hard charging, hard fighting, hard living man to be feared.  But, I am now convinced that he was not a murderer at the Battle of Ft. Pillow.  His activities after the war are are still in question but given what I have learned from actually reading the first hand accounts instead of accepting the popular version of events, I am inclined to give him the benefit of the doubt until I learn otherwise from reliable evidence.

History is written by the winners and in history books written by the winners the truth is often displaced by the politically expedient.

Link to first hand accounts of the Battle of Ft. Pillow

A more likely version of The Battle of Ft. Pillow

Turncoats ....

So, the Confederate battle flag is coming down in South Carolina. It can no longer even fly over the cemeteries where Confederate dead are buried or over the battlefields where they fought and died. Even the United States Congress has gotten involved, cravenly kowtowing to the politically correct mob mentality that is forcing white guilt upon our society with threats of mob violence. We are told that we must be ashamed of our ancestors.

I do have a civil war veteran ancestor that I am ashamed of. He was a Yankee. I wouldn't be ashamed of him if he, a southerner by birth, had fought for the north for reasons of conscience. But he didn't. I have verified this family story from more than one source now and every time I hear it I am sickened.

It would seem that this shameful ancestor of mine realized that he was going to have to declare a side in the war. He sat down and talked it over with his wife. They concluded that the north was going to win, that things would go bad for southerners when they lost and that financial gain would be realized by those who had chosen the winning side.

So, my detested ancestor left his home and traveled to northern occupied territory where he enlisted in the Union army.  He was not a front line soldier like my Confederate ancestors. He was assigned to a military government unit that policed captured southern cities. He literally forced Yankee rule upon his own people at the point of a gun. 

I could never understand why this branch of my family was proud of this man or why they would repeat the story of his self serving decision. He was always presented by that branch of the family as a smart businessman who knew how to pick a winner.

There is no shame attached to fighting for a losing cause if you fought with honor.  Most Confederate soldiers owned no slaves nor wanted any.  They fought because their homeland had been invaded.  They fought to protect their homes and families.  They fought out of a sense of community and brotherhood. They fought valiantly and died bravely.  There is no reason to be ashamed of these men.

But, there is a reason to be ashamed of people like my detested ancestor and those like him today who are ready to throw heritage and honor under the bus to momentarily appease a screaming mob intent upon destroying the entire American culture.  I have nothing but disgust for these people.  

Heroin In Our Neighborhood

We've endured a lot in this neighborhood.  Prostitution, theft, vandalism, murders, child sex offenders, the mentally ill and of course, meth.  But, last week brought us a new danger .... heroin.

Around lunch time a few days ago, Sheila noticed a fire engine parked in front of a neighbor's house.  Within moments, EMSA followed.  The lady of the house came out in tears and stood in our front lawn as events proceeded.

They had found their young adult daughter slumped over a pile of laundry.  Her face was blue, she wasn't breathing and there was a syringe nearby.  After they got the girl breathing again, a quick search revealed a small quantity of black tar heroin, syringes, a spoon and a lighter. Pure heroin is usually adulterate or "cut" in drug terms to reduce its deadly strength and increase profits.  In this case, the drug appeared to be almost completely pure and showed no sign of the grainy or playdoh texture consistent with being cut with lactose or baby formula.  It is a good bet that this girl was dealing close to the source and either didn't know what she had or somebody wanted her dead because the heroin she shot into her vein was obviously extremely powerful.

The police took forever to respond and didn't make a report or an arrest when they finally did arrive since they didn't see the drugs in the young woman's possession.  The timing of their arrival also conveniently assured there would be no bothersome paperwork or court appearances over one nearly OD'd hype.  In law enforcement eyes, it was just another throw away case involving a throw away person not worth the time and attention of the system.

Black tar heroin is produced in Mexico and Latin America and is distributed by the drug cartels. These are the same people who line overpasses with severed heads and kill cops that cannot be bribed on both sides of the border. Black tar heroin is a terrible drug that is almost instantly addictive and usually ends in the death of the user either by overdose, complications such as necrotizing conditions of the skin and underlying tissue, organ failure or needle transmissible diseases such as HIV and hepatitis.  Heroin is the death knell for a drug user, the end of the pharmaceutical line that often begins with marijuana and moves on through pills and meth.  Heroin is the last stop and heroin addicts are truly the living dead.

But, heroin is also the death knell for a neighborhood.  Where you find heroin you find heroin

dealers.  Somewhere in our neighborhood, some of the most dangerous people on earth are making very good money selling slow death in little plastic bags.  And, they are the type of people who will kill anyone that gets in their way.

We have a lot of new people in the neighborhood.  Some of them are Mexicans.  Many if not most are here illegally.  Most are nice people.  But, without an immigration policy to find out who is actually entering the country, the very social problems the nice folks  fled in Mexico will follow them here and it won't be long before our cities are as dangerous and corrupt as theirs.

The Hooker

On my way to lunch, I noticed a hooker working the corner of Admiral and Sheridan.  She wasn't the typical Admiral hooker.  She was well dressed and well groomed.  The hookers that work Admiral Boulevard and Eleventh Street can usually be read like an open book. Addiction, mental illness or just a really tough, often abusive, home life are usually evident at a glance.  This gal had none of that.  She appeared far too normal to be hooking.

She attracted attention from a distance because she appeared to be nude.  But then on closer examination, she still attracted attention because she was actually a pretty good looking middle aged woman.  She wore a light tan, snug fitting, lightly patterned, silk sheath dress that started about halfway down her cleavage leaving her arms and shoulders bare and ended about halfway between her knees and her derriere showing off some pretty fair legs.  A pair of 50's style, open toed, mid heel slide sandals completed her outfit. That's all she wore apparently because the dress was tight enough and sheer enough that anything underneath would have shown.  She wore her dark frosted blonde hair in a stylish short cut and her makeup was good. Her figure was far from girlish but her curves were in all of the right places.

As I drove through the stoplight, I wondered what in the world drove that woman to that street corner on a weekday afternoon.  It's dangerous.  That corner is frequented by Mexicans looking for company.  The girls are frequently beaten and abused.  This woman, even if she decided to sell herself, could have easily worked a high class bar or one of the hotels in a better neighborhood. Older Johns sometimes look for or even prefer someone closer to their own age.

Maybe she was literally a desperate housewife, turning tricks to bring extra money into the house. Maybe she was stranded in one the local hotels and needed to make traveling money.  Maybe she had experienced a bad run of luck at one of the casinos.  Maybe she was into kinky sex.  Who knows?

There are as many stories on a city street as there are people but I'll bet her story would have been an interesting one.