All posts by Jim

Left HS before report cards came out. Enlisted in the Marines for four years. By the time those years were over, I was hooked - they had me for life. Spent nearly ten years as enlisted. Received a Silver Star, Bronze Star w/V, Purple Heart as a Sgt during first RVN tour. Upon returning to the State's received a combat commission to 2Lt. Retired after 36 total years as a Colonel. Book follows my career, but is more about the heroes with whom I served, the great mentors I had, and the leadership principles they instilled in me.

Lord Help Us

I received an email this morning from a reliable source that contained an article allegedly written by one Dave Ramsey. I replied to the email asking if I could have Dave’s original email because I wanted to contact him. I don’t know if this is the same Dave Ramsey that I knew back in 1965 when he was a fresh-caught 2dLt. out of TBS. The Dave I know graciously wrote the Foreword for my book. I was his first plt sgt in Co B, Schools Demonstration Troops (SDT) at Quantico, VA, in 1965. Dave retired as a Col, USMCR. It may not be the same Dave Ramsey. It could be the Dave Ramsey from Ramsey Solutions, but it doesn’t matter.

Dave says it all. I’m certain any one of us on here could have written it exactly as he did. We live in a strange, upside-down, aggravating, dangerous, and frustrating world. I am of the opinion that our country is on the brink of total disaster, much moreso than many countries throughout the world. To even consider that there are countries that are doing very well today, while we slowly crumble. Sadly, we have no one to blame but ourselves.  And it appears the only thing we can do about it is await the second coming of the Lord.

Here’s Dave’s article:

“This morning, I realized that everything is about to change. No matter how I vote, no matter what I say, lives are never going to be the same. I have been confused by the hostility of family and friends. I look at people I have known all my life, so hate-filled that they agree with opinions they would never express as their own. I think that I may well have entered the Twilight Zone. You can’t justify this insanity. We have become a nation that has lost its collective sense of direction. We see other countries going Socialist and collapsing, but it seems like a great plan to us. Somehow, it’s un-American for the census to count how many Americans are in America. People who say there is no such thing as gender are demanding a female President. Universities that advocate equality discriminate against Asian-Americans in favor of African-Americans. Some people are held responsible for things that happened before they were born, while others are not held responsible for their actions at present.    Criminals are caught-and-released to hurt more people, but stopping them is bad because it’s a violation of THEIR rights. People who have never owned slaves should pay slavery reparations to people who have never been slaves.After legislating gender, if a dude pretends to be a woman, you are required to pretend with him. It was cool for Joe Biden to “blackmail” the President of Ukraine, but it’s an impeachable offense if Donald Trump inquires about it. People who have never been to college should pay the debts of college students who took out huge loans for their degrees. Immigrants with tuberculosis and polio are welcome, but you’d better be able to prove your dog is vaccinated. Irish doctors and German engineers who want to immigrate to the US must go through a rigorous vetting process, but any illiterate gang-bangers who jump the southern fence are welcomed. Five billion dollars for border security is too expensive, but $1.5 trillion for “free” health care is not. If you cheat to get into college, you go to prison, but if you cheat to get into the country, you go to college for free. And, pointing out all this hypocrisy somehow makes us “racists”! Nothing makes sense anymore, no values, no morals, no civility, and people were dying of a Chinese virus, but it was racist to refer to it as Chinese, even though it began in China. We are clearly living in an upside-down world where right is wrong and wrong is right, where moral is immoral and immoral is moral, where good is evil and evil is good, where killing murderers is wrong, but killing innocent babies is right. Wake up, America. The great unsinkable ship Titanic America has hit an iceberg, is taking on water, and sinking fast.”

Dave Ramsey

Thank you, Dave, wherever you are, my friend. God Bless!

Colin Kaepernick

ColinOne of my frequent readers queried me asking if I was going to sit out the news of this scumbag’s actions? I thought about it and decided this piece of garbage does not deserve any more news coverage than he is getting. So, having said that I will only add, look at what team he is playing for, a sanctuary city that hosts some of the craziest politicians known to the country. I never left my heart in there, so I have no reason to return. Oh, and BTW scratch the 49=ers from my TV listings. Nuff said!

Originally posted 2016-08-30 11:05:57.

Still Alive

Hi Gang,

I know it’s been quite some time ago that I posted on my blog. Have no excuse except to blame it on age. Having just hit the 85 mark two weeks ago, I’ve been busy responding to 100’s of emails, messages, and phone calls from, literally, all over the globe.  What impressed me so much was how some remembered my birthday after all these years. Seriously, some of the brothers and sisters I received well-wishes from I have not heard from since five years ago, when I turned 80. What an absolute joy it is to realize the closeness we share as Marines. It is a bond that never goes away.

Anyway, I digress. My real purpose in coming onto the site this morning is to extend a very sincere Happy New Year to everyone. Can you believe it is 2026? Where did 2025 go? It seemed to simply zoom by.  I was actually awake and watched the ball drop in Times Square on the TV. I can’t remember the last time I did that. It has to be well over 10, maybe even 15 years ago. And when they played Olde Lang Syne, my eyes watered as they always have. And I said a prayer to my Lord, thanking him for allowing me to meet another year on the green side of the grass.

So, HAPPY NEW YEAR FRIENDS, RELATIVES, AND BROTHER AND SISTER MARINES. May God bless you and keep you safe. I love all of you!!

Semper Fi,

Jim

Abstract immigrants in an Abstract World..

 

A superb piece by a well-respected, knowledgeable intellect who deserves to be read.

Sowell1

Why would a country with the world’s largest Jewish population, outside of Israel, admit large numbers of immigrants from countries where hatred of Jews has been taught to their people from earliest childhood? This question is ultimately not about Muslims and Jews. It is about discussing immigrants in the abstract, rather than in terms of the specific concrete realities of particular immigrants in particular circumstances at a particular time and place — that time being now and that place being the United States of America.

A hundred years ago, when immigration from other parts of the world was a major issue, there was a government study which provided voluminous statistics on how immigrants from various countries performed in American society — economically, educationally and in terms of social pathology. Today, it would not be considered right — that is, not politically correct — even to ask such questions about immigrants, especially if immigrants were broken down by country of origin. Despite some among the intelligentsia who like to refer to the past as “earlier and simpler times,” it is we today who are so simple-minded as to discuss immigrants as if they were just abstract people in an abstract world, to whom we could apply our abstract principles.

Yet there are immigrants from some countries who swell the welfare rolls, while immigrants from some other countries almost never go on welfare. Immigrants from some countries are highly educated — more so than most Americans — while immigrants from other countries have little education and few skills. So much of what is said about immigration today simply lumps very different immigrants together, and even lumps very different circumstances together. Insipid statements about how “we are all descendants of immigrants” blithely ignore the fact that millions of Americans are descendants of legal immigrants who were not allowed into the country until they met medical and other criteria.

Today people flood across the border with whatever diseases they bring, and are dispersed to various communities around the country by the federal government, without even a notice to local authorities as to what history of diseases, or crimes, these immigrants bring — much less what risks of terrorism they bring. Such high-handedness is neither incidental nor accidental. It is part of a much wider pattern, extending beyond immigration, and extending beyond the United States to many European countries, where narrow elites imagine themselves so superior to the rest of us that it is both their right and their duty to impose their notions on us.

Many of these elites seem to see themselves as citizens of the world, and to regard national borders as unfortunate relics of the benighted past. If people within those borders are so much better off than other people outside those borders, then to such elites it is only a matter of fairness or “social justice” to let the outsiders in, to get a share of our windfall gain. However lovely this vision may seem, and however much it flatters those who embrace it, admitting immigrants is an irreversible decision, regardless of how it turns out. Any problems, or even disasters, that particular immigrants may cause are unlikely to be caused within the gated communities or other upscale enclaves where the elites live.

However much educational standards or behavioral standards may suffer in schools when immigrant children from a poorer background flood in, that is not likely to affect the elite’s children in pricey private schools. European countries have gone much further down this road, and their elites have been even more immune to hard facts about the disasters they have created. Rapes of women on the streets of Germany by male refugees from the Middle East have been ignored or downplayed by authorities. Recurrent terrorist attacks across Europe from the same source have not caused any reconsideration of “hate speech” laws that can be invoked against anyone who warns of the dangers. American elites who say that we should learn from other countries almost always mean that we should imitate what they have done. But what we need to learn most of all is not to repeat their mistakes.

Thomas Sowell

Originally posted 2016-08-30 10:46:29.

Sons of Bleach

Col AndyAnother  dandy from Colonel Andy, to which I am unable to add.

 

 

http://acoloneloftruth.blogspot.com/2016/08/son-of-bleach.html

Originally posted 2016-08-28 15:09:11.