Just a reminder by those who think emote that 2000 lives lost in Iraq are too many.

U.S. military deaths, from combat and other causes during World War II, numbered 407,316. But even World War II did not produce the heaviest death toll.

That distinction belongs to the U.S. Civil War -- 558,052 dead.

Given that Cindy Sheehan is a raving anti-Semite, we know that she would have been horrified at the loss of 400,000 Americans in a war that would help save Jewish lived. But I’m curious – how many dead Americans were too many in a war that had the aim of freeing black slaves and preserving the Union?

Oh, that’s right – Sheehan doesn’t think America has ever been worth dying for.

Posted by: Greg at 01:51 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 131 words, total size 1 kb.

I saw the news as i returned home from teaching my night class. Interestingly enough, I had talked about Rosa parks a couple of classes back, using her story as an example of how interest groups (such as the NAACP) can influence public policy.

The Washington post pulled its long-written obituary out of the files and ran it. It is every bit the hagiographic piece that one would expect. I was particularly struck by this analysis.

Parks said that she didn't fully realize what she was starting when she decided not to move on that Dec. 1, 1955, evening in Montgomery, Ala. It was a simple refusal, but her arrest and the resulting protests began the complex cultural struggle to legally guarantee equal rights to Americans of all races.

Within days, her arrest sparked a 380-day bus boycott, which led to a U.S. Supreme Court decision that desegregated her city's public transportation. Her arrest also triggered mass demonstrations, made the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. famous, and transformed schools, workplaces and housing.

Hers was "an individual expression of a timeless longing for human dignity and freedom," King said in his book "Stride Toward Freedom."

"She was planted there by her personal sense of dignity and self-respect. She was anchored to that seat by the accumulated indignities of days gone and the boundless aspirations of generations yet unborn."

She was the perfect test-case plaintiff, a fact that activists realized only after she had been arrested. Hardworking, polite and morally upright, Parks had long seethed over the everyday indignities of segregation, from the menial rules of bus seating and store entrances to the mortal societal endorsement of lynching and imprisonment.

She was an activist already, secretary of the local chapter of the NAACP. A member of the African Methodist Episcopal Church all her life, Parks admired the self-help philosophy of Booker T. Washington -- to a point. But even as a child, she thought accommodating segregation was the wrong philosophy. She knew that in the previous year, two other women had been arrested for the same offense, but neither was deemed right to handle the role that was sure to become one of the most controversial of the century.

I wish that the article got more at the truth -- Rosa Parks wasn't some tire woman caught up in events -- given her history of activism, she was intended to be a test case. Her arrest was not a random event, but rather a calculated one. That does not make her any less heroic, and I would argue that it actually makes her more heroic. She intentionally put herself on the line, and was not simply a pawn who let events swirl out of control around her..

Farewell, dear Rosa, rest well, and may choirs of angels sing you to your heavenly reward.

Posted by: Greg at 11:32 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 477 words, total size 3 kb.

Asia, in the form that we know it, exists because of the efforts of Douglas MacArthur. Japan is a capitalist parliamentary democracy. The Phillipines are an independent country. And South Korea? It was freed from the clutches of Imperial Japan and saved from the aggression of Communist North Korea through his efforts -- and it is now one of the most prosperous nations in the world.

But what sort of respect does MacArthur get from today's South Koreans?

For the last six months, activists have gathered around MacArthur's statue above Inchon harbor for anti-American/anti-alliance hate-fests, including violent attempts to topple the monument. The latest rally was on Sept. 11, a date plainly chosen to sting Americans.

Just four days before the 55th anniversary of the Sept. 15, 1950 landing, 4,000 anti-U.S. activists, armed with bamboo poles and metal pipes, led assaults on the statue in Inchon's Freedom Park, calling MacArthur "a war criminal who massacred numerous [Korean] civilians."

Outrageous! Actually, he was a war hero whose exertions on behalf of your people ensured your liberty to support the northern neghbors who would take that liberty from you.

Fortunately, there are some who still remember the greatness of the man.

Pro-American Koreans have spoken up, too. Indeed, 10,000 of them, including South Korean Marine vets, headed to Inchon on the 15th to guard the statue on the anniversary — at which point the protestors wimped out, pulling a no-show.

I salute those who remember the wrks of Douglas MacArthur with gratitude.

I have to agree with Peter Brookes of the Heritage Foundation when he writes

[L]last month's assault on MacArthur's statue won't be the last. At some point, the radicals may actually be able to pull down the monument, offending Korean vets and millions of Americans who have selflessly served — or serve — in South Korea to protect freedom a long way from home and family.

Tha is, indeed, the truth. That grand coalition, perhaps the only time the United Nations ever stood for freedom in the face of Communism, was made up of many brave men and women. And we in the United Sates must prevent that insult. And so I join with Brookes in supporting the removal of the statue to the Korean War Veteran's Memorial in Washington, DC.

And while we are at it, let's bring home all the young soldiers at the same time that the Old Soldier finds a place of honor in our country. After all, it is time that South Korea shoulder the full burden of the freedom that MacArthur was so instrumental in winning for them.

Posted by: Greg at 01:52 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
Post contains 441 words, total size 3 kb.

Gee -- the human population of the palnet would have been inconsequential in 5000 BC. What caused the advent of global warming then?

Archaeologists have unearthed the prehistoric equivalent of the M1, apparently built in a hurry across flooding peat bogs during global warming around 5000BC.

The track of parallel pine logs on Hatfield Moors, near Doncaster, South Yorkshire, is one of the earliest of its type to be found in Europe and was described by English Heritage as "internationally significant". More than 50 metres of track has been excavated in the past year.

Findings suggest that the roadway, discovered accidentally by a Doncaster man, Mick Oliver, was laid out hurriedly as rising seas spilled on to the moor.

Would any of you care to rethink the notion that humanity is reponsible for current climate changes -- which are much more likely cyclical in nature.

Posted by: Greg at 01:27 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 155 words, total size 1 kb.

Whenever I visit family in the area, I always stop in to visit the replica of Lewis and ClarkÂ’s Fort Clatsop, where they spent the winter after crossing the continent. Much of the fort has burned in a suspicious fire earlier this week.

A 50-year-old replica of the fort where the Lewis and Clark expedition spent the soggy winter of 1805-1806 was destroyed by a suspicious fire, authorities said Tuesday.

Volunteer firefighters worked for hours to try to save Fort Clatsop at the Lewis and Clark National Historic Park after the fire broke out Monday night, park superintendent Chip Jenkins said. But "half of the fort was burned up, and the other half is essentially a loss," he said.

The site was being treated as a crime scene, and investigators said they were looking for a truck seen leaving the area as the firefighters arrived.

State police and agents from the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives were sending in dogs trained to sniff out the presence of any flammable liquids.

Jenkins said the fort had no electricity or gas source.

The fire happened less than six weeks before a Lewis and Clark Bicentennial event was scheduled to be held at the fort, the culmination of a two-year, national celebration of the explorers' journey West. The expedition had wintered at Fort Clatsop after reaching the Pacific Ocean in November 1805.

"We will rebuild," Jenkins said. "The Lewis and Clark Bicentennial events will go on through the winter."

The current structure was built 50 years ago to celebrate the sesquicentennial of the expedition in 1955. The fort has been the location of interpretive programs that do a superg job of recreating life at the fort during that winter, and has among the best historical programs I have seen at a national park. I hope they catch the perps.

Posted by: Greg at 01:06 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
Post contains 315 words, total size 2 kb.