With all the posers and petticoat progressives we have to deal with around here, I thought a little quality time with a true Patriot might be in order. Relax, sit back and enjoy a few moments with another American. Just a free public service we offer here at TAH. Oh, the ending is Epic.
Proud to be an American
Brian Hawkins was fired from his job as director of the DC VA hospital system for “the hospital putting veterans at “unnecessary risk,”” according to a VAOIG preliminary report released in early summer. The Merit Systems Protection Board ordered the VA to rehire him on August 2d.
Well he’s been fired again, according to Stars & Stripes;
The VA inspector general released more findings in August that Hawkins sent sensitive information to private email accounts belonging to him and his wife.
The office found the emails while investigating whether Hawkins had purposefully delayed an Administrative Investigative Board inquiry about thousands of dollars in employee bonuses given without justification. Though the inspector general found the investigation into the bonuses was delayed by hospital personnel, the office did not confirm Hawkins had impeded it. Inspectors did determine he sent sensitive personnel information to his spouse – a violation of VA policy.
The VA said Wednesday that it began the process of firing Hawkins again after the report was released.
Maybe he’ll stay fired this time, but I’m not holding my breath.
President Trump made his first speech to the United Nations General Assembly yesterday and I guess he pissed off a few people by threatening to “totally destroy” North Korea if they didn’t do something to step back from the nuclear brink. According to NBC News;
“If the righteous many do not confront the wicked few, then evil will triumph,” Trump said, as he detailed the horrors of what he called the “depraved” North Korean regime.
“Rocket man is on a suicide mission,” he said, using a nickname for Kim that refers to the North Korean leader’s recent missile tests.
“The United States has great strength and patience, but if it is forced to defend itself or its allies, we will have no choice but to totally destroy North Korea.”
The president’s intention, I think, is to make the United Nations take up it’s own part in the North Korea nuclear problem. The US has few options short of war without the cooperation of the UN members and I think that was Trump’s inelegantly expressed comment.
Huffington Post misquotes the President, by omission, when they report that he said;
“As president of the United States, I will always put America first,” he said. “The United States will always be a great friend to the world and especially to its allies, but we can no longer be taken advantage of or enter into a one-sided deal in which the United States gets nothing in return.”
The part they left out of the quote, is in the full text from Politico;
As President of the United States, I will always put America first, just like you, as the leaders of your countries will always, and should always, put your countries first. (Applause.)
All responsible leaders have an obligation to serve their own citizens, and the nation-state remains the best vehicle for elevating the human condition.
That kind of changes the tone of his speech, doesn’t it? He was only expressing the intent of each country’s mission to the UN. If he doesn’t put his own country first, then who will represent our own interests? Leaving out the remainder of his quote makes him appear to be a bully, instead of being inclusive.
Leaving out that portion of the quote makes it fake news.
Since nobody else seems to want to stick their neck out, this old fool might as well do it and point out the obvious: those who have shouldered the heavy lifting in the disaster and rescue work in South Texas and South Florida during our hurricane events have been – with plenty of exceptions, of course – those hated white males the left loves to disparage. Yep, those despicable conquerors of Caucasian extraction, who are responsible for all the ills of the world, were repeatedly caught on camera in countless settings and poses doing the unthinkable: helping people of color in dire straits reach safety, shelter, and succor.
If you care to take the time to review the endless stream of videos out there from these disasters, particularly of the widespread flooding from Harvey, one truth quickly jumps out at you: the Americans driving those boats and operating other rescue vehicles are far and away mostly white males, and a disproportionate number of those being rescued are people of color. Yes, there are numerous Hispanics and some blacks among the rescuers, but the undeniable reality is that the bulk of that huge rescue team was lily-white – and, even worse for liberals, Southerners, which represents a truly inconvenient truth for all those rabid progressives who would have the world believe that Southern White Males are all vicious racists, most of whom have freshly laundered white-sheet KKK attire hanging in their closets.
It’s almost as if all those wicked, Southern, white men didn’t understand the role the media and the liberals had typecast for them and just went out there for some unfathomable reason.
This brings to mind the Cajun Navy, a bunch that might be described someday as a hate group by the SPLC. It’s a loose amalgam of mostly white Louisiana fisherman and hunters who streamed into the stricken area by the hundreds, if not thousands, hauling their bass boats and air boats to into rescue missions of thousands of people, regardless of ethnicity or color. Yes, there were some black and Hispanic men out there driving boats and picking up the helpless, but in the videos being shown by the media at the time of the operation, the vast majority of independent boat rescuers were those hated white males.
There’s a problem, though: just a few weeks later, visual evidence of what I’ve described is disappearing. If you Google images of the “Houston rescue efforts,” you’ll find mostly white people being assisted, with only some people of color. On a recent check, pic after pic was of white victims, not blacks or Hispanics. Here are the first two images that come up.
Is Google, a propaganda apparat of the Democratic Party, not about to buck the party commandment that white males are evil personified? Perhaps they simply can’t allow that to happen, so once again, the truth and reality of America and its good people smack Democrats square in the face, and it looks like they’re doing their best to exercise their control over the media to suppress it.
However much the Dems try to cover it up, one wonders how hurricane refugees who were rescued by white males are going to react the next time they hear some black social justice warrior or some dimwit pol like Sheila Jackson Lee telling them that their greatest societal enemy is that cold, uncaring white male who lives only to keep them oppressed. You suppose that it just might create some doubt in their acceptance of party dogma? I’m thinking those black and brown folks rescued may have a bit of a different view.
Crossposted at American Thinker
Something happened recently that bothered me. And since it may have happened to other TAH readers, I decided to write this article detailing the facts – just in case someone else might need them.
The other day, I was conversing with a friend who’s more liberal politically than I am. They informed me I shouldn’t use the term “special little snowflake”, as it had a dark history. They weren’t much more specific.
Now, unlike some I tend to do a bit of homework before running my yap. But something about that claim just didn’t sound right to me. I decided to check into it.
What I found leads me to believe that someone is trying to create a false meme for political purposes. Once again, the political left is trying to redefine language – this time through blatant falsehood.
If you search the Internet, you’ll see claims that the term “special snowflake” or “snowflake” is of Nazi origin and is a racial slur. The claim is that the Nazis used it to refers to Jews – more specifically, their remains in the form of crematoria ash from Nazi concentration and/or death camps that “fell to the ground like snow”. There’s even an Urban Dictionary entry to that effect.
Well, that means it must be true, right?
In a word: no. Those claims are absolute bullsh!t.
There is no evidence that the Nazis ever used the terms “snowflake” or “special snowflake” to refer to Jews or crematoria ash. Those claims are a baldfaced lie.
The US Holocaust Museum’s Holocaust Encyclopedia does not contain the terms. Their archives do not show the terms used in that manner. Museum officials are unaware of Nazi soldiers routinely using the term “snowflake” or “special snowflake” with that meaning.
The same is true of the education team at the Illinois Holocaust Museum. They were also unaware of that use of the term “snowflake” or “special snowflake” by Nazis during the Holocaust to refer to crematoria dust or Jews.
Don’t believe me? Well, don’t take my word for it. Check out Snopes – who actually researched the claim and found it to be BS. Snopes may lean a bit left, but they’re generally extremely good at fact-checking questionable claims like this. And they’re honest about what they find.
As far as Snopes could find, the sole purported source allegedly “documenting” Nazi origin for the terms is an entry in an Internet site called the “Racial Slur Database”. To put it charitably, the “Racial Slur Database” is unreliable as a source. As Snopes states in their entry I linked, the “Racial Slur Database” site freely admits that their entries are “entirely from data gleaned off the ‘net and via submissions from people like you and your parents.” In plain language, that means they just put any and everything they find on the Internet or that someone sends them in their database – NQA, and without fact-checking.
In reality the sarcastic phrases “special snowflake” and the variant “special little snowflake” probably gained popularity as a variation on the following quote from the 1990s book and movie The Fight Club.
“You are not special. You are not a beautiful and unique snowflake. You are the same organic and decaying matter as everyone else.”
Couple that with the common knowledge that every snowflake is unique, and the phrases “special snowflake” and “special little snowflake” – used sarcastically – practically suggest themselves. Indeed, one commonly accepted definition of the phrase “special little snowflake” is as follows:
A below average kid who is coddled and rewarded for mediocrity, usually by an overprotective mother, a ‘sensitive’ dad, or the public education system. The term stems from the concept that, like a snowflake, all children are special and unique and thus they should be treasured just the way they are so as to build their self-esteem.
Use of the phrases are so ubiquitous today that they’ve spawned a related term, Special Snowflake Syndrome:
A malady affecting a significant portion of the world’s population wherein the afflicted will demand special treatment, conduct themselves with a ludicrous, unfounded sense of entitlement, and generally make the lives of everyone around them that much more miserable.
. . .
So how did the term become falsely associated with the Nazis? Dunno for sure, but I’ll hazard a guess.
Here’s what I think happened. One day, some bozo was acting like an immature, conceited, childish twit – a “special little snowflake”, if you will – carrying on and acting as if they were the center of the universe while demanding special treatment they didn’t rate. When they got called on it, the person calling them out used the term “special little snowflake”.
The jackass in question didn’t like being called out – and particularly didn’t like the perfectly descriptive term used in calling them out. So they decided to try and “poison the well” regarding the use of the term by creating the false entry in question in the “Racial Slur Database”.
What they apparently didn’t count on was the fact that although the Internet makes it easy to spread lies, it also makes it easy for someone who wants to fact check bogus claims. And there are reputable sources out there that do the latter.
In other words: someone tried to pull a fast one using the Internet and got caught lying.
So if you run across someone who tries to tell you that the term “snowflake” or “special little snowflake” is “racist” or has a Nazi past, tell them they’re full of it. And then tell them to check Snopes for verification, since they probably won’t believe the truth from you.
Author’s Note: Definitions above for Special Little Snowflake and Special Snowflake Syndrome are also from the Urban Dictionary. I won’t repeat their thoroughly-debunked-as-bullsh!t definition that falsely associates the term Special Snowflake with Nazism, as it’s been proven bogus and was obviously written by someone on the Left with a political agenda.
Having lived right off the water in Pensacola for thirteen years and lived through several hurricanes, my wife and I have learned to be very wary of the media when it comes to these storms. First they always exaggerate the deadly potential of approaching storms which some might consider a good thing as it motivates citizens to prepare their property and possessions and to evacuate from particularly vulnerable areas. However, there’s the risk that such overselling a storm’s threat creates a future risk that the citizenry will ignore warnings of a true killer storm.
What I find unforgivable though, is the way the mainstream media, and that includes FOX News nowadays, exaggerate the damage and destruction in a storm’s aftermath, creating huge anxieties in those displaced citizens unable to return to their homes until authorities give them permission. I well recall how fearful and anxious we were as evacuees up in Alabama, hearing the media use terms like total devastation to describe hurricane damage to the Pensacola area, and how worried we were as we drove back, expecting to find little remaining of our waterfront suburb, only to find minor wind damage, trees and fences blown down, shingles blown off, etc.
What the media does is to find one area that has been heavily damaged, perhaps from a tornado embedded in the hurricane, and then repeatedly show differing views of the same area from multiple angles to give an impression of much more widespread destruction. That is apparently the case now with the effects of Hurricane Irma on the Florida Keys. Yes, there was some heavy damage to a few mobile home parks with total destruction of some homes there. But most site-built homes, which far outnumber the mobile homes, weathered the storm well, with the usual roof damage and siding blown away.
The way I know this is that NOAA has posted high-resolution satellite photography on the Web which allows Key’s homeowners to check out their property. Using this tool, I have been up and down the Keys, an area I know fairly well, having worked there for years, and the damage I have found is far from the total devastation being described by the media. There is plenty of marine damage as is to be expected from any hurricane, but the home damage is very limited. And if you go down to Key West, the population center of the Keys, you will see even less destruction. Doubt me? See for yourself:
Use the plus and minus and your mouse or arrow keys to navigate the map. One caveat: this satellite view does not include Cudjoe Key which is reportedly heavily damaged, but I still remain skeptical. From what we can see there are lots of boats blown about, carried ashore by wind and storm surge but that’s expected from even small hurricanes. There is indeed total destruction of some mobile homes, but even there, more mobile homes in the same parks are still intact and standing. Look at site-built homes and you will find only roof damage although I’m sure there are missing shutters, fences and decks washed away. The point is, there is absolutely nothing in those Keys which constitutes the total devastation the media is hawking.
A lesson learned decades ago: Never ever trust the mainstream media on politics or hurricanes.
Crossposted at American Thinker
Politico reports that the Republican-led Congress passed legislation condemning the Charlottesville, Virginia protest last month.
The resolution urges Trump to “speak out against hate groups that espouse racism, extremism, xenophobia, anti-Semitism, and White supremacy.” It also calls on the administration to “use all resources available to the President and the President’s Cabinet to address the growing prevalence of those hate groups in the United States.”
Yeah, well, Alberto Martinez, a professor of History at the University of Texas at Austin wrote a largely ignored piece, published on December 16th last year in the New Standard Press which talks about the 55 times that President Trump condemned white supremacists and the KKK since 1990, so I don’t know what one more time will accomplish in that regard.
From August 2015 until election day in November 2016, I’ve counted that Donald Trump repudiated or disavowed David Duke or the KKK no less than 55 times in 15 separate venues. (And I expect that there were other instances too.) Four of those denials happened before the now infamous interview with Jake Tapper. Plus, Trump had publicly criticized Duke and the Klan at least since 1991. But none of this mattered to the critics. Rather than paying close attention to his track record, they preferred to make a monstrous cartoon out of the one instance when he didn’t instantly say: I disavow.
The legislation scheduled to hit the President’s desk for his signature soon to what purpose, I’m not sure.
The resolution also urges Attorney General Jeff Sessions to investigate any acts of violence or domestic terrorism perpetrated by white supremacists.
As if the Justice Department wouldn’t consider investigating without the resolution. This is what Congress is doing besides writing a new DACA bill and the thousands of other things that they actually NEED to do.
Congress needs to be a part time job, then they wouldn’t have time to write stupid useless bullshit things like this.
Jeff Schogol sends us a link to his report in the Marine Corps Times about John Kelly’s reaction to draft-dodger, Puerto Rico socialist party member, and terrorist sympathizer Democrat Congressman Luis Gutiérrez (D-IL) who said that Gold Star father, retired Marine Corps General Kelly was “a hypocrite who is a disgrace to the uniform he used to wear” because the President withdrew the Executive Order that was the underlying authority for the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program – the executive order that Gutiérrez helped Obama write.
But in a double-knife-handed response emailed to Fox News, Kelly countered that Gutiérrez and “other irresponsible members of Congress” have failed to address issues about whether the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program was constitutional.
“Every [Justice Department] and [Homeland Security Department] lawyer says DACA is unconstitutional,” Fox News quoted Kelly as saying. “Every other legal scholar ? right and left ? says the same thing. Trump didn’t end DACA, the law did. That said, I worked and succeeded to give the congress another six months to do something. I am not confident.”
DACA was a booby-trap laid by the Obama Administration and it exploded all over Congress, who, in their usual manner, refused to do their jobs and legislate.
Kelly continued;
“They can call people liars but it would be inappropriate for me to say the same thing back at them,” Kelly told Fox News. “As my blessed mother used to say ‘empty barrels make the most noise.’”
Gutiérrez is only angry because he knows that he doesn’t have the political wherewithal to pull off legislating the issue. He’s a feckless boob.