Annus Horribilis 2020

After missing last month for good and varied reasons, I’m shotgunning this year-end entry more as a stream of consciousness meandering than a focused assessment.

For context:

In 1992, 40th anniversary of her coronation, Queen Elizabeth spoke of Annus Horribilis, with sufficient reason.

Not one, not  two, but three royal breakups:
Princess Ann and longtime husband Mark Phillips

and

Prince Andrew and Fergie

and

Princess Diana’s tell-all book about her vastly unhappy marriage to Prince Charles (who 28 years later still remains a prince while Mum retains the throne), ending in divorce in 1996. 

Then there was the disastrous palace fire that gutted or affected 100 rooms.

Well...

2020 makes the short list of Worst Annus Horribilis for reasons the CCs know all too well.

Trying to maintain some perspective for a moment:

Massive wildfires ravaged the American West, but far worse than previous years.  Depending upon one’s sources, nearly 60 fires killed almost 200 people and seared 10 million acres.  In my home state of Oregon five small towns were “substantially destroyed.” 

Down Under in Australia, the “black summer” bush fires were responsible for 30 or more human deaths, millions of animals, and destruction of almost 60 million acres.

In March the Chinese-Wuhan-Corona Virus engulfed the world either because the Chinese Communists erred massively or sprung a global pandemic for their own nefarious reasons.  In either case, Beijing refuses to accept responsibility while global politicians’ pledges to Hold China Responsible remain just that…broken pledges.

President Donald Trump, pilloried as a Russian agent for three years by propagandists masquerading as journalists, launched Operation Warp Speed.  

(Sidebar: in nine congressional hearings accessing over 300,000 documents, more than seventy witnesses were asked for evidence of Trump’s “collusion” with Moscow. None were unable to do so.)

https://www.cnsnews.com/news/article/terence-p-jeffrey/intel-committee-no-evidence-trump-campaign-colluded-coordinated-or

Despite the fact that he was dissed daily for the erratic response of the Centers for Disease Control, Food and Drug Administration, etc. (the same bureaucracy inherited by every president), Trump streamlined procedures and seemingly did the impossible—got the first Wuhan vaccines to market in months rather than the usual two or three years.  Or more.

The one-time good deal—praise from hard-over Democrat governors of New York and California—came and went in a single 24-hour news cycle.  Both reverted to type thereafter, and since.  And therein lay the open secret: the president has no authority to dictate health policy.  That's the province of governors and mayors.

Those same liberal governors and mayors--and the rest of the leftist establishment--stood mum for months while Democrats and anarchists rioted, looted, and assaulted people and businesses.  All in the name of...well, whatever blank you care to fill in.  (Occasionally I still hear from liberal colleagues who insist that those black looters were White Supremicists.)

Then of course there was the presidential election, still officially uncertain at this printing.  The scandalously brazen Democrat usurpation of the election process in multiple states—including Arizona where I live—remains a “secret in open sight.”  Few of the conspirators have even been identified, and in the unlikely event that they are, there is Absolute Zero chance that any will be prosecuted.  Lest anyone doubt it, consider the litany of criminal offenses attributed to the Obama administration, still high-centered on the political roadway.

Ohio Republican congressman Jim Jordan—a collegiate wrestler whose trademark is no jacket with shirt and tie—recently was interviewed by Fox News (that’s a story in itself, seemingly swayed to The Other Side of the Aisle.)  He said that time after time constituents and strangers approach him on the street and in airports asking when-o-when somebody—anybody—will go to prison.  His response is always the same: Congress cannot sentence anyone.  That’s up to the Department of Justice, which has been notoriously unresponsive.

And, in a tip of the hat toward objectivity—Trump has a horrible record of selecting people for key positions: attorneys general, FBI, intelligence, secretary of defense, four-star officers, etc.  For a TV mogul whose trademark was “You’re Fired,” he’s exercised the motto while tolerating non-performers.

However, Donald J. Trump has a way of confounding the “experts.”  He defeated a heavyweight roster of 16 Republican candidates to win the nomination and perhaps the last honest presidential election in U.S. history.  The industrial-grade toxicity of his opposition will not change, nor can we reasonably expect it to.  After all, seven decades after Lyndon Bastard Johnson stole his 1948 Texas congressional race, “winning” by 87 votes as “Landslide Lyndon,” the Democrat activist responsible was still laughing about it to LBJ biographer Robert Caro.

Meanwhile…

With a birthday this year I have concluded that 72 is the new 71.  I’m grateful for friends and relatives, another award to hang on my I Love Me Wall (thank you for the second time, Naval Institute), and a book nearing completion.

In appreciation to one and all.

A LETTER TO AMERICA

This month's entry comes from a long (long) time friend and colleague.  He's one of the smartest and most  versatile people I've ever known--a legal immigrant (!) who built two extremely successful businesses including an industrial plating firm.  Some of his products are orbiting alien worlds; others keep American warfighters in the fight.

As election day approaches, Mr. B's words assume greater importance than ever.

The post originally appeared in David Leeper's http://deplorabledavid.com earlier this year.

AMERICA'S CROSSROAD

The current dismal state of our nation and the political and social mess we are now in compels me to write this letter to my fellow Americans.

I am an American by CHOICE, not by accident of birth. I was born and raised in South Africa and served eleven and a half years in the South African army. I took my South African citizenship very seriously due in part to the insidious, ongoing, brainwashing literally from kindergarten on. To question or disagree with an edict put out by the government never crossed our minds! This is the moral price one unconsciously pays for being born into an autocratic system of government.

In 1977 I was invited to teach at a world famous school in Arizona, a great honor and, for a young man, a great adventure. Little did I know at that time it would change my life forever.

The owner of the school was a former lieutenant colonel in the Marine Corps (Corpse? Re Obama) and a retired political science professor. He was hard-core dyed in the wool believer in Freedom and the Constitution. I ate most of my meals with him and his wife, beginning my education, and in short order my conversion into a FREEDOM loving AMERICAN. 

Two years after my arrival in America I returned to South Africa to visit my parents. My mother was driving us to the family home in Johannesburg and I turned to her as we left the airport and said, “You know Mom, I can never come back to live in this country.” It was a pivotal moment, a metamorphosis that literally came in a flash. All the input from years of indoctrination and then a short two-year tango with Freedom synthesized into a new American. Me!

I love America and the principles for which it stands. 

My proudest day came when I was sworn in as an American CITIZEN. I was no longer a two-bit subject. 

I am in total awe of the founders and their wisdom in propagating what I consider the greatest document about the balance of freedom and government ever written: The U.S. Constitution.

I read it, I study it, and I now understand WHY the Articles and Amendments exist. IT is close to perfect. WE, The People on the other hand are not. 

That our past is checkered with wrongs and inequities isn’t open to debate. But with time we have identified and made a concerted effort to correct these wrongs. However, in today’s climate nothing we’ve done is good enough. I believe this is about the politically inspired manipulation by the brainwashed Left and its supporters, both foreign and domestic, looking to destroy America. 

To understand the basis of my concerns we need a quick history lesson. Remember, those who don’t learn from history….

America was from 1787, with adoption of the Constitution, arguably the freest, fastest growing and most prosperous nation in the world. The rot began with our Congress in 1913. (Pretty much as it is today.) That was a very bad year for freedom, here’s why. 

The passing of the 16^th Amendment literally gutted the independence of the States and gave almost total fiscal power to the Federal Government. The Federalist system of checks and balances put forth by our founders eviscerated. What the traitorous Congress did was usurp the power to tax from the State to the Federal (Central) government. That gave Washington the power to tax the individual American citizen. 

That same congress passed the 17th Amendment. Once again the checks and balances on government were castrated. Instead of the House being elected by The People and the Senate from the State house, the 17th Amendment changed the election of Senators also to the People. So in reality what’s the difference? Two years to the House and six years to the Senate. Add another major travesty that year thrust upon We the People; the establishment of the Federal Reserve. You need to research exactly who the Fed is and who controls it. America The Free is an illusion, as you’ll see. You will be outraged!

One more bayonet thrust into the gut of We The People was the 1935 Butler vs. The United States case in which our Supreme Court in its infinite wisdom decided the Founders’ idea of the General Welfare Clause was interpreted and applied incorrectly. Seriously! And thus was born the ever expanding Welfare state spurred on by the likes of Woodrow Wilson, Franklin Roosevelt and others of the Progressive ilk. 

Today we are in a similar position, betrayal by elected politicians who swore an oath of allegiance to uphold and defend the Constitution. We might as well add the Supreme Court to the list of miscreants, apparently putting politics over the law. But I digress.

This coming General Election is no longer about Donald Trump or Joe Biden. This is no longer about Republicans and Democrats. This is no longer about Conservatives and Progressives.

This IS about FREEDOM verses TYRANNY.

This IS about CHAOS verses RULE OF LAW.

This IS about SELF DETERMINATION verses SUBJUGATION.

Being American is about Freedom. Real Americans are free in their heart, their soul and spirit. Freedom is what has made ours the most powerful nation in the history of the world. WE THE PEOPLE have made this happen in spite of government and its continuous goose-stepping attempts to trample our rights in the name of power.

The congress of 1913 I absolutely believe betrayed us, and I believe the Left leaning contingent of Congress in 2020 is in lockstep once again to attempt wrestling power from We The People. 

I have lived in a country that switched systems and can tell you there is no going back. If the Socialists (that’s being gracious) win this next election, we, as the Light of Freedom for so many in this world, will be extinguished and the rest of the few remaining freedom loving counties will fall too.

You have a choice to make. 

The time has come to stop looking at personalities but rather examine the substance of what these people represent. It’s really that simple. Time to use your brain and reason to override the out of control emotional hurricane engulfing so many. Like a hurricane it is totally destructive and short sighted.

One last thought. To you reading this who have children and grand children. How are you going to look them in the eye when they ask you, “How was it to be free Grand-whatevergender?” 

Again, a simple choice, your emotions selling your grandchildren and future generations into what will be tantamount to bondage, or your brain choosing freedom for future generations like that which we’ve enjoyed?  I guess it’s a matter of how selfish and short sighted you are.

Pinch your nose; take a deep breath and vote for FREEDOM.

THE WAR

 

Among my most valued colleagues is Stephen Hunter, Pulitzer Prize movie reviewer for The Washington Post.  In summarizing Saving Private Ryan (1998) he wrote, “This movie is about a generation that put its heart on the shelf, dialed its minds down into a small, cold, tunnel, and fought with its brains.”

In newspaper terms, I cannot think of a more fitting “lead” for the current blog.

With the VJ Day 75th anniversary this month I'm reminded that we've all grown up with The War as a huge influence upon our parents and ourselves.  Here's a short personal compendium. 

 

++++++

 

My parents’ generation seldom referred to “World War II.”  Mostly it was “The War” and everybody knew which one.  It was an all-consuming endeavor that defined the era for millions.  We boomers grew up knowing our parents were involved at least to some extent.  My father was trained as a naval aviator but saw no combat.  My mother worked in a shipyard; her cousin was in the Women’s Army Corps.  An uncle was a Marine Corps officer in the Philippines.  

 

My wife’s father was a teenaged sailor awaiting the invasion of Japan in 1945.  Her uncle, a Princeton PhD, worked on the Manhattan Project; her aunt was an army nurse on a hospital ship.  

 

My parents’ family doctor, whom my mother credited with saving us when I was born, was a Jewish immigrant from Lithuania.  Sixteen years later he signed my student pilot's medical certificate.  As an army flight surgeon he had been decorated for rescuing crewmen from a crashed bomber in the Gilbert Islands.

 

My Oregon hometown (1940 population 513) lost two young men: a marine at Tarawa and an army flier in North Africa.  The American Legion Post still bears their names.  

 

My county seat had the army airfield where the Doolittle Raiders were recruited.

My father’s childhood best friend bailed out of a P-38 near Paris just after D-Day, captured by the Luftwaffe.  Two of Dad’s flight school room mates died: one disappeared on a Catalina flying boat in the Aleutians; the Hellcat fighter pilot was killed by nervous U.S. gunners off Japan.  One of my flight instructors earned a Navy Cross and Purple Heart flying Corsairs off the same carrier.  

My best friend’s grandfather was the general who ran clandestine operations in China and oversaw disposition of U.S. assets at war’s end.  When he returned home he took the one man he most trusted--his enlisted driver--and turned him into a millionaire.  My friend and I had a mutual pal whose father commanded a tug at Pearl Harbor.

A schoolmate’s father swam away from a sinking destroyer in 1942.  Another’s father was caught by the Luftwaffe trying to escape Occupied Europe after his B-17 was shot down in 1943.  

 

One of my college professors had been a “wrench bender” on B-29 Superfortresses in the Mariana Islands.

As a deferred student, a future aviation colleague worked on the proximity antiaircraft fuse at Cal Tech, under pain of “death or worse” for revealing it.  

 

A history colleague lost an uncle in Italy, fighting with the First Special Service Force, better known as the Devil’s Brigade.  (The William Holden movie repeats frequently on cable.)

All are gone now yet we still feel their presence....

 

Reflections from some friends.

From a navy and army veteran:

Rick's and my parents were nine and eight at the time of the Pearl Harbor attack.  Dad's father was a steamfitter/welder, he spent the war at the Mare Island Navy Yard.   

 

His brother, our great-uncle, was a forward observer/artillery spotter with the 45th Infantry Division, KIA at Anzio. 

 

My ex-wife's great-uncle was a sailor in USS Barton (DD-599).  He went down with the ship during the First Naval Battle of Guadalcanal on 13 November 1942, following hits by two Long Lance torpedoes fired by the IJN destroyer Amatsukaze. 

 

The father of one of my best friends at University of New Mexico NROTC flew FM-2s with VC-10 off the escort carrier Gambier Bay and another CVE during the Battle off Samar (fighter ace Joe McGraw).  

From a Vietnam War naval aviator:

Personal count:

Dad and his brother wounded in Italy.  Uncle KIA 8th Air Force. Another Navy uncle campaigned through the Pacific.  Developed a bad drinking habit and, I understand, was killed in a car wreck within a year of coming home.  Only a couple of pix of him and buds on an R&R beach remain as evidence.

From a Vietnam War army vet:

My dad had already been admitted to medical school before the draft began, and thus was exempted.  However, due to a BB gun mishap as a boy he was functionally blind in one eye and would have been 4-F in any case. But, upon receiving his MD, he became acceptable for the doctors draft and was commissioned a first lieutenant.  After being processed he was assigned to an army field hospital scheduled to participate in the first wave of the Japanese invasion.  As chance had it, his locker was deployed on ahead, but his own travel was stopped by the big you-know-what. My dad never had a bad word to say about that bomb.

++++

The same pattern seen here can apply to any war, any event, any era.  The difference is that today we’re where we were in 1940, seventy-five years after the Civil War.  So please folks, if you have the opportunity to record someone’s experiences:

Do

It

Now.

WHITE PRIVILEGE AND REPARATIONS

“We would hire you today but you’re the wrong sex and the wrong color.” 

That was the shortest job interview I ever had, and it was also the first.  Straight out of college with my newly-printed journalism diploma, I approached a Portland radio-TV station that employed a former University of Oregon J-school colleague.  He was two years ahead of me at the U of O, but we’d been acquainted tolerably well so I gave it a shot.

That was in the 1970s.  As in, forty-plus years ago.  In those days anti-white bias was accepted as “reverse discrimination” in which “reverse” is the adjective and “discrimination” is the noun.  Just thought I’d mention it.  But today we’re riding the same semantic merry-go-round again. 

Now we’re hearing a great deal about the wider matter of White Privilege and “reparations” for slavery.  So what are we to make of the 360,000 or so white Union soldiers who died to free the slaves?  If “reparations” are to be paid to descendants of slaves, logically (!) compensation should be made to descendants of those who died to free them because those soldiers’ relatives received almost nothing.

I asked some history colleagues and Veterans Administration sources about Civil War “GI insurance” for Union KIAs.  Apparently there was none.  This is the most detailed response, from a friend finishing the history of a Wisconsin regiment: 

“The family would get whatever money was due to the soldier, such as pay and enlistment bonus.  Certain next of kin: widows, parents (if they could demonstrate need), and minor children if orphaned could apply for a pension, but it was not always automatic. Rates varied over time but they were not generous.” 

My VA source (a Vietnam War platoon leader) is a retired attorney who says the first wartime death benefits arose in World War I.

Now, for some personal perspective, here’s the lowdown:

Two of my paternal great-grandfather's older brothers from Ohio served in the Union Army and survived.  They were the fortunate ones.  (Their cousin born in 1863 was named in honor of Copperhead politician Clement Vallandigham.  His northern party favored a negotiated settlement with the South, resulting in a military tribunal, imprisonment and deportation.)  

A brother of my maternal, Barrett, great grandfather from a Maine regiment died in Confederate captivity.  Two Union Tillmans from Maine and Massachusetts (cavalry) died of other causes, plus another in U.S. Colored Troops.  Another distant kinsman, Private Tillman Westfall, died in an Ohio cavalry regiment.

Sothen: what are we to make of “reparations” as one of many routes to offsetting White Privilege?  We The People are expected to dip into the U.S. Treasury (already billions in debt) and pay atonement money to people who were never slaves and who have never known anyone who was a slave.  In fact, it seems uncertain how the recipients of Reparations would prove eligibility.  And for that matter, what degree of consanguinity would apply?  How many generations and how many tenth cousins six times removed? 

Some definitions are required.  Would reparations only apply to descendants of black American slaves from 1776 to 1865 or from 1619?  And where’s the documentation?  

Would payments be based upon the number of slave ancestors, or do recipients get the same amount whether they had just one such ancestor or ten, or one hundred?  Some phenotypically “white" Americans have black slave ancestors.

I'd guess that most non-black Americans today don't have a slave-owning ancestor. Is it fair for taxpayers all of whose ancestors arrived here after 1865 to contribute to this fund?  

What about black and American Indian slave-owners?  Many if not most black Americans descend from slave owners.

How about American Indians, Asians and Latinos?  

How would the total amount be derived?  No matter how high, it would never be deemed enough.  Abolitionists wanted every family of freedmen to receive forty acres and a mule, but few did.  With four million freed slaves, there might have been a million such families.  The value of forty Southern farmland acres and a mule today would run around $120,000, thus about $120 billion en toto.  At present possibly eligible population of perhaps 40 million, that's only $3,000 per person, which probably wouldn't be acceptable.

And how many additional Reparations will ensue?  (In ’86 Reagan foolishly signed a one-time good deal amnesty on behalf of illegal immigrants.  Yeahright…)

You see where we’re headed…

Usually I allow myself 1,000 words for each blog but this month I don’t see any point in expounding beyond what I’ve already written.

Besides, I’m working on two more books that I hope will enhance my self-employed, non-pensioned White Privilege.

VE DAY PERSPECTIVE

I began my blog in 2009, and this will be the shortest entry ever.  That’s because there is no elaborating upon it.

This month marks the 75th anniversary of VE Day, Victory in Europe, ending that phase of the Second World War.

Amid the celebrations and commemorations, my memory reverted to an event that has stayed with me for thirty-five years.

In 1985 I hosted a member of the American Fighter Aces Association and his family, touring the Champlin Fighter Museum in Mesa, Arizona.  We had friends in common from his ETO fighter group and quickly bonded.  

After awhile I sensed that the ace wanted to talk, so we edged away from the group.  He looked me in the eye.  “I'll tell you a secret."  He inhaled, paused, and said, “I loved aerial combat.  On the day the war ended I sat down and cried, and not because I was glad it was over."

I'd heard similar sentiments. "How old were you?"

"Not quite twenty-six."  (Later I found his birthday was VE + 1.)

"You knew you'd never be that happy again."

His eyes misted, he nodded, and rejoined his family.

IN PRAISE OF HOSPITAL SHIPS

Hospital ships are like antifreeze: you cannot have them too early; you can only have them too late.  

The U.S. Navy and the Trump administration demonstrated that fact by deploying both of our hospital ships (designated AHs for “auxiliary hospital”) within days of the order to sail amid the Wuhan Virus emergency.

Hospital ships have a history spanning millennia, dating from ancient Greece and Rome to the Spanish Armada of 1588, which had two.  The British Royal Navy deployed dedicated hospital ships from the 17th century.  

The first six American vessels were commissioned between 1798 and 1896, serving in climes as varied as President Thomas Jefferson’s 1803 campaign against Tripoli, and anti-piracy efforts in the West Indies.  The Union Navy had at least three hospital ships during the Civil War and the Confederacy confiscated a Cornelius Vanderbilt yacht for the purpose.

Despite international conventions, hospital ships were not always immune to danger.  In World War I twenty-six were sunk by intention, mistaken identity or crew error, including sixteen British Commonwealth vessels.  Austro-Hungary lost three, the Netherlands two, Czarist Russia two, with one each by Greece, Italy and Germany.

The U.S. transport Henderson, accompanying an Atlantic convoy in 1918, rammed a German submarine, inflicting serious damage.  She began her second war at Pearl Harbor and was converted to the hospital ship Bountiful (AH-9) in 1944.  The second Solace (AH-5, converted from a passenger ship in 1940) also was at Pearl Harbor and earned seven battle stars through 1945.

The Navy acquired twelve more AHs during World War II.  Three were crewed by sailors on behalf of the army: Comfort (AH-6), Hope (AH-7) and Mercy (AH-8).

During World War II twenty-five hospital ships from seven nations were lost to all causes, including seven British Empire and six Italian vessels. Japan’s three included the Awa Maru, sunk in error by a U.S. submarine in 1945.  The lone survivor admitted she was carrying military supplies (a violation of international law governing hospital ships)   but the sub skipper was court martialed and found guilty of negligence.

Subsequently, U.S. hospital ships came under attack.  Off Okinawa on April 2, 1945, Relief (AH-1) was bombed by Japanese aircraft with slight damage but far worse awaited.

On the night of April 28, south of Okinawa, the third Comfort (AH-6) was running illuminated as per international regulations.  But a Japanese kamikaze pilot made a masthead pass over the white ship with red crosses, circled and dived into the sweet spot.  The impact in an operating room killed 28 patients and staff, including six nurses.

As many as three other AHs also were attacked, ineffectually.

Three hospital ships served during the Korean War—Haven (AH-12), Consolation (AH-15) and Repose (AH-16).  Two deployed during Vietnam—Repose and Sanctuary (AH-17).

Today’s AHs are far beyond anything previously envisioned.  At 900 feet long and 69,000 tons they displace four to ten times their predecessors, well over twice the tonnage of a large World War II aircraft carrier.  When Mercy (AH-19) and Comfort (AH-20) were commissioned in the mid 1980s they were the first new hospital ships in four decades.  Both were christened in honor of prior AHs, each becoming the third to bear the name.

The ships have responded to humanitarian crises in the Caribbean and Pacific, the 9-11 response, Operations Desert Shield and Iraqi Freedom, plus Hurricane Katrina, among others.

Two years ago the navy considered decommissioning both AHs or scrapping one to maintain the other.  Congressional opposition not only saved the ships but led to some upgrade funding.  That was money well spent.

One AH is allotted to each coast: Mercy in San Diego under Captain John Rotruck, and Comfort under Captain Patrick Amersback in Norfolk.  President Trump announced their possible activation on March 18 and, upon completing scheduled maintenance, they arrived in Los Angeles and New York within thirteen days, vastly less than “weeks to come” floated in some media.  Mercy arrived at San Pedro Bay on the 27th; Comfort at New York’s Pier 90 on March 30, following a few days of required dredging in the harbor.

The Mercys bring enormous capability to any port.  With 1,200 military and 60 civilian staff they possess 1,000 beds, a dozen operating rooms, an ICU, laboratory, dental service, and even a morgue.

Early reports indicated that neither ship was required to meet the actual number of patients.  However, combining mobility and capability, America’s two hospital ships should remind We the People why they maintain a navy that often performs duties beyond its primary role of keeping freedom of the seas.

GUNS AND APOCALYPSE FEVER

This month's entry is courtesy of a valued friend and colleague writing under the moniker "Cincinnatus."  Previously published in Powerline, March 15.

I shoot a lot. A lot. Three times a week minimum, sometimes four, and if I’m lucky and time permits, five. That’s one of the benefits of retirement, besides granddaughters and late-- sometimes optional--awakening.

So my shooting range/gun shop is what sociologists would call my Third Place. It’s not home, where I’m a spouse and indifferent layabout, it’s not work, since I am 10 years beyond the horrors of office life; it’s the place where I’m me without any effort. They’re probably sick of me there but that’s OK because they do a good job of hiding it. The talk is always banter and needle and jest, all bonding courtesy of a sense of being a besieged community, and  general enthusiasm for the gizmos themselves. Needless to say, it’s as non-racist, non-classist, non-mysogenist as any place in America. 

But today it wasn’t my place. It was a hot mess.

People, people, people! Everybody is buying guns. It happens every time apocalypse fever fills the air, animated by crazed dreams of civil breakdown, anarchy, food shortage, the whimsy of life and death, and anyone’s aching need to protect children, spouse and self in that order. This time it’s COVID-19, but it could be any dodgy possibility as sustained and amplified by an ignorant media.

So as I sat there in the crowd, waiting for my turn to get to the firing line, I wondered: Who ARE these people?

They’re not conservatives. Conservatives already have their guns, many of them of the so-helpful AR and AK variant, and many boxes—and crates and pallets—of ammo. That’s because apocalyptic thinking is never far from the conservative mind, with its realthink about the evil the men do and how quickly they can do it. It wasn’t a liberal who said “When seconds count, the police are only minutes away.”

Some are certainly the low-informed indifferent, bludgeoned into fear by the media blackjack.  Some are the occasional shooter discovering himself low on ammo.  But certainly, some--maybe even most--are liberals.

They make me sick. You would think them at least capable of some honor on these issues.  They desire a certain world, one without the righteous force of self-protection, which they consider vulgar and immoral.  (Hard to tell which looms larger in their imagination!)  So here is an opportunity for them to live in that world and they say, No thanks.  Not me.  Him or her, but not me.  Which way to the .45 automatics?

These are people who would deny us any living creature’s fundamental right to self defense. These are a tribe that condemns righteous force as both vulgar and unnecessary. These are the creatures who want to look in our bedstand for the .45 auto with the light aboard. These are the lads whose ignorance is bliss when it comes to the things themselves, as if knowledge of the difference between a .308 and a .30-06 disqualifies one from the human race. These are the dweebs who want gun-owners listed in a public registry, like child molesters, of whom they consider gun-owners the moral and ontological equal.

I have a modest proposal for this annoying situation. The gun industry, especially at the retail level, should boycott THEM.  It is for their own good.  In my deep empathy for my fellow humans, though of the sub-special homo liberals, I wish to spare them the danger of an accident, the trauma of shooting a fellow sentient beings or even their own foot, the hypocrisy of not practicing what they screech. I feel those burdens are simply too heavy for their turbulent emotional state.

Thus I believe gun stores should be encouraged to sell only to select groups of those who can be trusted with the power of life and death. That would be NRA members or members of any other of the many pro-gun rights groups. Another group would be those who already have state issued gun-possession permits. Another would be known customers, those who’ve supported the places for years, not only with cash but with comradeship. Of course active-duty police and armed forces, or retirees, would be included as would sons and daughters of all of the above.

As for liberals, what do they do when S hits F, and bad dudes are smashing down the door to get at the food that was meant for Jimmy and Little Sally? Why, they can call the police.

What do you mean, there’s no answer?

SHIP NAMES--AGAIN

As they say, what goes around comes around.  This column in July 2011 noted the U.S. Navy’s atrocious record for naming its own ships.  Much of that posting is duplicated here, with a current wrinkle.

The U.S. Navy is institutionally incapable of following its own rules. In recent years Secretaries of the Navy have ignored historic conventions regarding appropriate names for different classes of ships, repeatedly catering to political factions.

The situation was recently summarized by a retired chief petty officer. He says, “The Navy has a system for naming submarines. They’re named for cities, states, politicians, and fish.” 

That’s an apt description of the “system.”

Naval purists recall the long-gone era of logical ship names: battleships were states; carriers were battles or historic ships; cruisers were cities; destroyers were people; submarines were fish, etc. No more.

The essence is rule of man rather than law, as new ships are named by the Secretary of the Navy—a political appointee. A congressional summary notes, “The Navy states that while ‘it has attempted to be systematic in naming its ships, like all institutions it has been subject to evolutionary change…’”

That’s one way of putting it. But for a reality check, exchange “evolutionary change” with “politics.”

The Navy was not always so political. In the 19th century four living people saw their names on naval vessels. Ten ships were named for living people in the 20th century (six since 1980) and there have been eleven since 2002 (five since deceased).

At Tailhook ‘87 Secretary John Lehman was asked about ship names. He responded that sometimes the Navy has to play the name game to get funding. A retired CPO exclaimed, “SecNav, are you saying that Congress will shell out $3 billion for a carrier named Vinson but not for a carrier named Essex?” Lehman replied, “That’s about it.”

Controversy also involved naming a Lewis and Clark class supply ship for labor activist Cesar Chavez. Reportedly Chavez described his Navy service as the two worst years of his life, but rather than continuing to honor pioneers, SecNav—somebody named Mabus—opted for a Democrat Party figure in a totally unrelated field. 

In 2016 a new replenishment oiler was announced for San Francisco homosexual politician Harvey Milk, a navy veteran assassinated by a city supervisor in 1978.  He was known for his preference for juvenile boys.  The same Mabus person made that decision, too.

Then there are aircraft carriers.

For decades the most important ships afloat were named for battles or historic ships. However, two carriers have been named for presidents who died in office: Franklin D. Roosevelt (CVB-42) and John F. Kennedy (CV-67).  USS Forrestal (CV-59) honored another naval veteran, the first Secretary of Defense.

After Nimtiz (CVN-68) in 1972, every subsequent carrier has been named for presidents and politicians, including Senator John Stennis and Representative Carl Vinson. Both were Navy supporters who, like Nimitz, should have been honored by naming of destroyers or frigates.  (Both were southerners and devoted segregationists.)

Hardcore naval aviators disapproved of USS Harry S Truman (CVN-75) and George W. Bush (CVN-77). Truman slashed naval aviation, seeking to transfer its mission to the Air Force, and tried to disband the Marine Corps.  Bush presided over the 1991 Tailhook witch hunt that denied thousands of innocent officers due process. But partisan politics won.

Interest in christening a new carrier Enterprise—the most storied of all flattops—brought a brief resurgence of optimism among purists. With CVN-65 due for retirement, the lead ship of the CVN-79 class could become “Big E III.”

However, Republicans insisted on honoring Gerald Ford with CVN-78, who was never elected president, and whose primary naval duty was a ship’s athletic officer.  His namesake, lead ship of the class, has turned into an open-ended sinkhole: perennially late with enormous costs at very little return.  It was delivered incomplete and may not deploy for years to come.

Then the Democrats intervened, and the Obama administration favored John F. Kennedy for CVN-79, even though CV-67 was only decommissioned in 2007. As long as “a real carrier name” was ignored, rather than recycling Kennedy the Navy might have considered another WW II naval officer: Richard M. Nixon.  And good luck on that one!

The Enterprise name was bestowed upon CVN-80, much to the satisfaction and amazement by the dwindling crew of the World War II “Big E” vets.

But naval purists will continue their critique. As long as SecNav makes the decision, the process will remain subject to political favoritism. The only way to change it is to enact a law requiring adherence to convention, but guess what? That decision would have to be made by politicians.

Now apparently the interim SecNav, somebody named Modly, makes the decisions.  He’s a former naval officer and D.C. denizen who was executive director of the Defense Business Board.  Whatever that is.  He seems to be a space holder until his full-time successor is approved, somebody named Braithwaite.  Presumably Braithwaite is supposed to sort out the USS Ford mess, which had only worsened under his predecessor, somebody named Spencer.  (The Ford is still a mess and likely to remain so indefinitely.)

In any case, Modly is the culprit behind naming CVN-81 for Pearl Harbor hero Doris Miller, the black sailor aboard the battleship West Virginia portrayed by Cuba Gooding in the egregious 2001 movie Pearl Harbor.  Miller received a deserved Navy Cross and died aboard the escort carrier Liscome Bay (CVE-56), sunk in November 1943.

Here’s the thing: “Dorrie” Miller already had a ship named for him, the frigate FF-1091 between 1973 and 1991.  That was entirely appropriate, as destroyers and frigates historically have been named for naval heroes.  But of the 190 aircraft carriers owned by the U.S. Navy since 1922, none have been named for any individual below the rank of fleet admiral (Nimitz, CVN-68). 

Unfortunately, the legacy of Doris Miller has come down to racial politics.  The PC police were in full enforcement mode with CVN-81, not only emphasizing Doris Miller’s ethnicity, but making the announcement on Martin Luther King Day.  

Perhaps even more to the point, consider the huge list of war-fighting, war-winning naval heroes who have no ships named for them.  If you’re unfamiliar with them, all are easily googled:

Joe Foss, John L. Smith, Marion Carl, Richard C. Mangrum,  Robert L. Galer, Jeff DeBlanc, Kenneth L. Walsh, and James E. Swett.  All were recipients of the Medal of Honor and/or Navy Cross; all contributed significantly to the Guadalcanal and Solomons campaign, America’s first offensive of WW II.  

Shame on the United States Navy for its institutional abandonment of Marine Corps aviators who made a difference in the greatest of America’s wars.