Every now and then I get melancholy and tire of political discourse (read BS), election diatribe, mean-spirited liberals slamming my vote choice, and of course my mean-spirited slams against “her,” which is certainly well-deserved, and think about my cats. Yes, this ole, worn-out, retired, (and yes tired), Infantry Marine, and my bride of 30 years raise cats. Not just plain old vanilla, house cats, but the gorgeous, intelligent, hypoallergenic, immigrant from Russia. So named for its homeland where it roams free in the harshest of climes – Siberia.

Siberians are smart, possessed of a dog-like personality by meeting you at the door and to welcome you from a day at work. Their jumping ability allows them to negotiate places ordinary cats just dream about. For example the photo of our Nadeah resting on the valance begs the question, “How’d she get there?” Well, she’s a Siberian!

Starting at 0130, our Zhaklin finished around 0430 this past Friday morning giving birth to three magnificent creatures,  How anyone can watch the birthing of life followed by the natural tendencies to search for the nipple while Mom cleans them and helps them in their search and not belief there is a God is beyond me.

But then I digress, as one may well imagine, I take a lot of heat from my fellow Marines, about this gruff old Marine raising pussy cats. But I guess I deserve it. I get lots of attachments to emails about cats. Received one the other day that is the funniest to date. Each time I watch it I darn near roll out of the chair with laughter. Take a peek and see what you think.

Beforehand though here is a picture of Zhaklin with her new offspring.

May have to copy and paste:

http://www.chonday.com/Videos/cathormovij4

Originally posted 2016-09-24 16:20:05.

Don’t always agree with everything Wid Bill says, but sometimes, he hits the nail right square on the head and drives it home.

September 11th From Now On

Originally posted 2016-09-24 11:38:47.

why this fellow needs to find a new job, for he sure is screwing up the one he currently has, or is he. Maybe, just maybe, he’s following orders and doing just what he was put there to do. Who knows? You will not believe this this, trust me!

Secretary Jeh Johnson oversees the third largest Cabinet department and leads our nation’s efforts to secure our country from terrorism to natural disasters.

More than 800 immigrants mistakenly granted citizenship

By ALICIA A. CALDWELL | September 19, 2016 | 5:15 PM EDT

WASHINGTON (AP) — The U.S. government has mistakenly granted citizenship to at least 858 immigrants from countries of concern to national security or with high rates of immigration fraud who had pending deportation orders, according to an internal Homeland Security audit released Monday.

The Homeland Security Department’s inspector general found that the immigrants used different names or birth dates to apply for citizenship with U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services and such discrepancies weren’t caught because their fingerprints were missing from government databases.

DHS said in an emailed statement that an initial review of these cases suggest that some of the individuals may have ultimately qualified for citizenship, and that the lack of digital fingerprint records does not necessarily mean they committed fraud.

The report does not identify any of the immigrants by name, but Inspector General John Roth’s auditors said they were all from “special interest countries” — those that present a national security concern for the United States — or neighboring countries with high rates of immigration fraud. The report did not identify those countries.

DHS said the findings reflect what has long been a problem for immigration officials — old paper-based records containing fingerprint information that can’t be searched electronically. DHS says immigration officials are in the process of uploading these files and that officials will review “every file” identified as a case of possible fraud.

Roth’s report said fingerprints are missing from federal databases for as many as 315,000 immigrants with final deportation orders or who are fugitive criminals. Immigration and Customs Enforcement has not reviewed about 148,000 of those immigrants’ files to add fingerprints to the digital record.

The gap was created because older, paper records were never added to fingerprint databases created by both the now-defunct Immigration and Naturalization Service and the FBI in the 1990s. ICE, the DHS agency responsible for finding and deporting immigrants living in the country illegally, didn’t consistently add digital fingerprint records of immigrants whom agents encountered until 2010.

The government has known about the information gap and its impact on naturalization decisions since at least 2008 when a Customs and Border Protection official identified 206 immigrants who used a different name or other biographical information to gain citizenship or other immigration benefits, though few cases have been investigated.

Roth’s report said federal prosecutors have accepted two criminal cases that led to the immigrants being stripped of their citizenship. But prosecutors declined another 26 cases. ICE is investigating 32 other cases after closing 90 investigations.

ICE officials told auditors that the agency hadn’t pursued many of these cases in the past because federal prosecutors “generally did not accept immigration benefits fraud cases.” ICE said the Justice Department has now agreed to focus on cases involving people who have acquired security clearances, jobs of public trust or other security credentials.

Several members of Congress criticized the Obama administration Monday in the wake of Roth’s report, though the report suggests that the gaps extend several years earlier than the Obama administration.

Chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee Michael McCaul said ICE should quickly investigate all of the cases at issue and ensure that all immigration fingerprint records are digitized in short order.

Mistakenly awarding citizenship to someone ordered deported can have serious consequences because U.S. citizens can typically apply for and receive security clearances or take security-sensitive jobs.

At least three of the immigrants-turned-citizens were able to acquire aviation or transportation worker credentials, granting them access to secure areas in airports or maritime facilities and vessels. Their credentials were revoked after they were identified as having been granted citizenship improperly, Roth said in his report.

A fourth person is now a law enforcement officer.

Roth recommended that all of the outstanding cases be reviewed and fingerprints in those cases be added to the government’s database and that immigration enforcement officials create a system to evaluate each of the cases of immigrants who were improperly granted citizenship. DHS officials agreed with the recommendations and said the agency is working to implement the changes.

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Originally posted 2016-09-20 10:59:50.

The US Military – A Fish Rotting from the Head

I wish Mr. Starmann would really open up and not mince words or hold back. LOL

Ray Starmann served as an army intelligence officer in Germany during the last days of the Cold War. He is also a veteran of the Gulf War. Ray also wrote the Hallmark original movie, “Generation Gap” with Sean King.

The US Military – A Fish Rotting from the Head

By Ray Starmann

The US military is a fish rotting from the head; a politically correct, feminized, decrepit, nearly bankrupt force that is one step away from complete obliteration on the land, on the seas and in the air.  The military is decaying by the hour. Veterans know it, the troops know it, the military’s senior leaders know it, yet they do nothing as the floor gives way underneath them.  As long as we favor civilian leadership (per the Constitution) the Military top bass will have to play politics (LM)

From our commander-in-chief, to the Secretary of Defense, the secretaries of each service branch, the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the admirals and generals, the US military is being led by a combination of leftists, feminists, selfish careerists and all around lackeys and yes men. Only compliant four-stars are picked for the top jobs (LM)

The current crop of senior leadership in the US Armed Forces has either green lighted, watched or turned away in embarrassment as every form of budgetary cut, equipment shortage, dimwitted national security directive and social engineering policy is hammered into the military like a thousand nails in a wooden coffin.

We now have a military where Marine Corps planes don’t have spare parts, where Navy ships are decrepit and Naval air assets have less range than the planes Bush 41 flew in WWII; where Armor officers can’t run a tank range; where breastfeeding soldiers express milk in the field; where the slightest non-PC comment gets you a ticket to unemployed obamaland; where male ROTC cadets parade around in red high heels to express empathy for rape victims; where women are want to serve in the Navy SEALs and the US Army’s Delta Force; where fantasy and delusion have become standard operating procedures.

An example of the moral relativism wafting through the Pentagon like Sarin nerve gas are the comments made by General Mark Milley, the Army Chief of Staff, who sports Ranger and Special Forces tabs and who once served in the famous 5th Special Force Group. Milley told the nation and the world that women will serve in direct ground combat units and furthermore, he has no problem with young American girls being subject to a draft that could ultimately send them into direct ground combat units, aka the infantry.

We’re all supposed to nod in a semi catatonic state as a man who wore the famed Green Beret spouts out this absolute nonsense with a poker face. Unless Milley has become some kind of bleeding heart liberal, I doubt he believes anything he has said. What Milley does believe in is the greater good of Milley, just like Dempsey believed in the greater good of Dempsey.

And, look where that’s got us.

What’s in it for you General Milley, the Chairman of the JCS once General Joe pops smoke? What’s the price today for selling out America’s women to mass slaughter on a distant battlefield?

Tis the season of moral cowardice at the Pentagon and it’s quite reminiscent of the Vietnam era, when political perfumed princes (great image) skulked through the hallways of the Pentagon like mastodons; admirals and generals who cared more about their careers than about the troops and the nation they had sworn to serve.

Some point out that the military is subordinate to civilian authority. (I just did) They need to remain silent. (no thanks) I’ll say it again. Someone with a lot of stars on their shoulders is going to have to fall on their sword and resign. (that’s the spirit) When they do, they need to hold a press conference and tell the nation how a combination of the Obama White House and willing minions are demolishing the military by the hour. (now, who is first?)

But, this will never happen, mark my words.

A more realistic option is this:

The US military must be gutted from the top down by a President Trump. A President Trump must fire the Secretary of Defense, the secretaries of each service branch, the entire JCS and every admiral and general until he gets to a point where he’s cleaned out the perfumed princes, feather merchants, and narcissistic careerists who have run roughshod over the military in order to pursue their own goals.

The US Army was on the verge of self-destructing in the post- Vietnam years of the early and mid 1970’s. What saved it from imploding were the field grade officers and some tough and truthful general officers who maintained Army traditions and who rebuilt it from the bottom up; men like Dick Cavazos, Carl Vuono, Shy Meyer, Paul “Butch” Funk, Norman Schwarkopf and Fred Franks.

In 1974, the Army’s problems were at the bottom, not the top. The Army had soldiers who were thugs, gang bangers, druggies and race baiters. Race riots were common and officers were afraid to walk into a barracks without being armed.

The troublemakers were discharged, the new volunteer Army began to slowly attract motivated and better educated soldiers and with the election of Ronald Reagan money flooded into the lean green machine; resulting in new equipment like the M1 tank and funds for endless training at places like Hohenfels in Bavaria and on major NATO exercises like REFORGER. (I got to lead a dozen USNR war-gamers to Germany for that one – fun in 93 – Kaiserslaughten)

By 1990, the US Army was a magnificently trained and equipped fighting force. The men responsible for the military’s ascent were the senior leaders who had seen the military savaged by political generals and admirals.

General Fred Franks, an amputee, who rose to lead the VII Corps to victory in the Gulf War is a symbol for everything the Army’s senior leadership once stood for and doesn’t today; devotion to duty, honesty, moral courage and most importantly, putting the troops always above personal ambition.

During the Gulf War, a soldier in Third Armored Division noticed that General Franks looked very worried as he spoke to young soldiers. The soldier told General Franks, “Don’t worry General, we trust you.”

How many soldiers can say the same thing about their senior leadership today?

A young adult who enlists in the military must know that their leaders care more about them than their careers and retirement benefits and investment portfolios.

Wanted: US military senior leadership with honesty and moral courage. Apply here.

Originally posted 2016-09-19 15:01:49.

First of all, I find it interesting that this NFL logo, is plastered over our flag. How disturbing is that?

I do not know the author. I am sure he and I were within shouting distances many times throughout our careers. I could not have put on paper my frustrations with the society within which we live any better than he  did. Told only the way a Marine could do it. Up front and pulled punches.I am not done with the NFL. Oh, I’ll watch a game or two, but only when my team is playing  so I can make a list of the sponsors, whom I will immediately begin boycotting. Money talks folks You want to get the NFL’s attention, don’t buy any product that sponsors an NFL game. Then the companies withdraw their sponsorship, the broadcasting companies can’t sell their airtime, so they stop showing or cut back on games.T rust me it works.

That freak show they put on at last years’ Super Bowl was a sickening, anti-American society, racist piece of pathetic garbage I have ever seen. The world watched as we made fools of ourselves during a freaking football game. It would be laughable if it weren’t such a disgraceful snapshot of our America.

Commissioner,

I’ve been a season pass holder at Yankee Stadium, Yale Bowl and Giants Stadium.

I missed the ’90-’91 season because I was with a battalion of Marines in Desert Storm. 14 of my wonderful Marines returned home with the American Flag draped across their lifeless bodies. My last conversation with one of them, Sgt Garrett Mongrella, was about how our Giants were going to the Super Bowl. He never got to see it.

Many friends, Marines, and Special Forces Soldiers who worked with or for me through the years returned home with the American Flag draped over their coffins.

Now I watch multi-millionaire athletes who never did anything in their lives but play a game, disrespect what brave Americans fought and died for. They are essentially spitting in the faces and on the graves of real men, men who have actually done something for this country beside playing with a ball and believing they’re something special! They’re not! My Marines and Soldiers were!

You are complicit in this!

You’ll fine players for large and small infractions but you lack the moral courage and respect for our nation and the fallen to put an immediate stop to this. Yes, I know, it’s their 1st Amendment right to behave in such a despicable manner. What would happen if they came out and disrespected you or the refs publicly?

I observed a player getting a personal foul for twerking in the end zone after scoring.  I guess that’s much worse than disrespecting the flag and our National Anthem. Hmmmmm, isn’t it his 1st Amendment right to express himself like an idiot in the end zone?

Why is taunting not allowed yet taunting America is OK?   You fine players for wearing 9-11 commemorative shoes yet you allow scum on the sidelines to sit, kneel or pump their pathetic fist in the air. They are so deprived with their multi-million dollar contracts for playing a freaking game! You condone it all by your refusal to act. You’re just as bad and disgusting as they are. I hope Americans boycott any sponsor who supports that rabble you call the NFL. I hope they turn off the TV when any team that allowed this disrespect to occur, without consequence, on the sidelines. I applaud  those who have not.

Legends and heroes do NOT wear shoulder pads. They wear body armor and carry rifles.
They make minimum wage and spend months and years away from their families. They don’t do it for an hour on Sunday. They do it  24/7 often with lead, not footballs, coming in their direction. They watch their brothers carted off in pieces not on a gurney to get their knee iced. They don’t even have ice! Many don’t have legs or arms.

Some wear blue and risk their lives daily on the streets of America. They wear fire helmets and go upstairs into the fire rather than down to safety.   On 9-11, hundreds vanished. They are the heroes.

I hope that your high paid protesting pretty boys and you look in that mirror when you shave tomorrow and see what you really are, legends in your own minds. You need to hit the road and take those worms with you!

Time to change the channel.

Col Jeffrey A Powers USMC (Ret)

Originally posted 2016-09-16 17:03:11.