Those who seek to run our lives

American Thinker "Here's a simple thought experiment. Imagine you had a neighbor, a business colleague, or an acquaintance, who was always in your face telling you what car to drive, what food to eat, what healthcare you must have, what you must allow the schools to teach your children, that your teenage daughter could have an abortion at an abortion clinic without consulting you first, that you had no right to own a gun, ad infinitum. Most of us would tell him or her to stuff it, or perhaps use a little more colorful language.
"Now, take that same person and put the title Senator, Congressman, or President in front of their name and millions of Americans accept these losses of personal freedom without a whimper. Even worse, some people worship and idolize politicians."

http://townhall.com/political-cartoons/chipbok

Hear O Israel

 Nakba Day explained.

 IDF Chief of Staff Benny Gantz



Skip MacLure  "Well, if you won’t listen to me, maybe you’ll listen to him. No disrespect intended, but it seems that Israel is in for another border invasion, and this one reportedly has between 300 and 500 busloads of Lebanese and Palestinians being moved to the borders… to say nothing of large numbers of others heading in the direction of the borders, as well."....

"Now the Iranians, in the guise of the Muslim Brotherhood, are going to test the IDF to the max. The so-called ‘Nakba Day’ protests were something only an Arab could dream up. Commemorating a battle in which the collective armies of the Arab nations got the horse pucky kicked out of them by a tiny, almost insignificant, country would seem to the western mind to be a waste of time."

Moby Bus by Rich Terrell

http://terrellaftermath.com/

SEIU marches with Southern California Communists in May Day demonstration

Via Beltway Confidential  "This year’s annual May Day March in Downtown Los Angeles was considerably smaller than last year’s demonstration which, because it coincided with the passage of Arizona’s anti-illegal immigration law, SB 1070, brought out more than 60,000 people, and only a tiny fraction of the 500,000 people who attended in 2007 when congress was debating immigration reform. The organizers estimated the number of attendees this year to be 10,000 and the police put the number at about 3000. Based on other demonstrations I’ve attended, I’d put my guess at about 4000."

May Day: Victims of Communism Day  "May Day began as a holiday for socialists and labor union activists, not just communists. But over time, the date was taken over by the Soviet Union and other communist regimes and used as a propaganda tool to prop up their regimes. I suggest that we instead use it as a day to commemorate those regimes’ millions of victims. The authoritative Black Book of Communism estimates the total at 80 to 100 million dead, greater than that caused by all other twentieth century tyrannies combined. We appropriately have a Holocaust Memorial Day. It is equally appropriate to commemorate the victims of the twentieth century’s other great totalitarian tyranny. And May Day is the most fitting day to do so. I suggest that May Day be turned into Victims of Communism Day...."  The Volokh Conspiracy

All photos from www.ringospictures.com

When you ponder whether to vote for a Democrat or a Republican in any future election consider: the above crowd, you can be sure, are virtually all Democrat voters. Granted, many would vote Communist if it made political sense, but until it does, the Democrat Party will work for them just fine. If you support the causes glorified by the above demonstrators, then vote for anyone with a 'D' by their name.

Previously unconsidered: Democrats are right...it's not about Sex..Plus comment by Victor Davis Hanson

This is the first post one this subject in the TW and we only go here because of the important point of view it presents; one we've not heretofore seen discussed.
Plus it gives us a chance to use some of the great cartoons we've seen. The Tunnel Dweller.

American Thinker  To Anthony Weiner: "...My question is simply this: How did you know with any "certitude" that you weren't exchanging salacious emails and engaging in phone sex with agents of the Russian Federation, the Peoples' Republic of China or even the Israeli Mossad?"....
"And we all should be abundantly thankful that Andrew Breitbart's  intelligence-gathering organization is apparently more efficient than the many national security agencies who could have blackmailed this clueless clown to force him to vote their way on any number of issues.
"If they haven't already..."

More like this at michaelramirez, such as this, and this. Then there are these: here, and here, and here, and here, and here, and here, and here, and here, and, well, who's counting?

What's important about Weinergate...And what's not  "...So, from a political standpoint, this was an important story. But in the larger context of history and "news," there wasn't much there. Another congressman proving himself a lying weasel is not the basis for the kind of over the top, wall to wall coverage Weiner and his dirty pictures have received.
"All in all, he just isn't worth the attention."

Victor Davis Hanson: The Collapse of a Rotten Edifice  "...the goddess has been particularly busy in destroying the carefully crafted images of Bono, John Edwards, Timothy Geithner, Al Gore, Eliot Spitzer, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Dominique Strauss-Kahn, Anthony Weiner, and a host of others. What do their tax hypocrisies, sexual indulgences, and aristocratic socialist lifestyles all have in common?"  More...

Palestinian who slaughtered Fogel family has no regrets

American Thinker  "In a chilling statement to reporters, an unrepentant Amjad Awad proclaimed "I don't regret what I did, and I would do it again," adding "I'm proud of what I did and I'll accept any punishment I get, even death, because I did it all for Palestine." "

In a related item, hundreds of Muslims took to the streets in protest against the senseless killing of innocent Israeli families... What?... Wait, um, never mind. I misspoke.

Photo from weaselzippers. Two Palestinian youths from the West Bank

 village of Awarta, arrested in April on suspicion of murdering five members

of the Fogel family in Itamar, were charged with five counts of homicide

 at a military court on Sunday.

Tunnel Dweller did an internet search for "muslims protest killing of Israeli family." The first page yielded just what you saw and the second page had just this one:



A Memo to American Muslims  "I hope that we will now rededicate our lives and our institutions to the search for harmony, peace and tolerance. Let us be prepared to suffer injustice rather than commit injustices. After all it is we who carry the divine burden of Islam and not others. We have to be morally better, more forgiving, more sacrificing than others, if we wish to convince the world about the truth of our message. We cannot even be equal to others in virtue, we must excel.

"It is time for soul searching. How can the message of Muhammad (pbuh) who was sent as mercy to mankind become a source of horror and fear? How can Islam inspire thousands of youth to dedicate their lives to killing others? We are supposed to invite people to Islam not murder them.
"The worst exhibition of Islam happened on our turf. We must take first responsibility to undo the evil it has manifest. This is our mandate, our burden and also our opportunity."
Muqtedar Khan, Ph.D. Director of International Studies, Adrian College, MI. Association of Muslim Social Scientists.
Center for the Study of Islam and Democracy.

To which we say amen and thank you, Doctor.

Omaha Beach D-Day landings from above; Victor Davis Hanson column. (Updated with more info.)



(Above) Some sources list this as Omaha Beach, but this is most certainly Utah Beach. The small dots on the beach are men standing and the longer ones are bodies laying down. Since troops moved quickly off Utah Beach and there was not quite as much debris buildup as on Omaha Beach where the beaches were covered with destroyed vehicles, it is probably Utah Beach. Omaha was covered with wreckage by the third wave.  TD

(Above) Taken a few days after June 6th, this view is over the hedgerows of the Normandy bocage where so many thousands of lives were lost. Look back toward the beaches at the massive amount of ships involved in the landings. The area in the foreground was the graveyard of much of the 29th Infantry Division in the drive toward St. Lo.  TD
 

The National Collection of Aerial Photography  (UK)  Labelled elsewhere as the Vierville draw at Omaha Beach, it is actually the neighboring landing site, the Les Moulins draw, where Gen. Cota went ashore, worked his way to the top of the bluffs, then moved west to the Vierville exit, where the worst slaughter took place. This beach is distinguished by the immense, 18-foot-wide anti-tank ditch inland.  (Gen. Cota was portrayed by Robert Mitchum in the movie, "The Longest Day".)  TD

Robert Capa photo of French fishermen gazing at the aftermath of the Normandy landings.

UK Daily Mail photos

US Army D-Day site

AwesomeStories.com

This photo and many more at Boston.com

Updated Aug 20th: My educated guess about the above photo is this: At the top, just right of center is the bulge in the shoreline known as the Point et Raz de la Percee. About an inch or so to the left of that is the Vierville Draw where the Bedford boys and Co. A, 116 RCT, 29th Division were annihilated. The next draw to the left of that and close to the left margin is the Les Moulins Draw where General Norman Cota (or was it Robert Mitchum?) personally led his men off the beaches. This is either very early on D-Day as there do not seem to be many vehicles and boats jamming the beaches. (Or it is several days after as the line of sunken ships off the beach at Les Moulin would indicate? They were placed there for a breakwater.) More here. And here.  TD

 Link replaced with this from History News Network:    What We Might Remember This Memorial Day  by Victor Davis Hanson

(Link fixed)    "The list of American wars, interventions, and campaigns, past and present, is endless — a source of serial political acrimony here at home over the human and financial cost and wisdom of spending American lives to better others. Sometimes we feel we are not good when we are not perfect, whether trying to stop a Stalinist North Vietnamese takeover of the south, or failing to secure Iraq before 2008. But the common story remains the same: For nearly a century, the American soldier has often been the last, indeed the only, impediment to butchery, enslavement, and autocracy." . . . (National Review article no longer good

Oldie, but a goodie: www.partamian.net

Rich Terrell on D-Day plus posts from MilBlogs Mudville Gazette and Blackfive

TerrellAfterMath.com

D-Day posts  from Mudville Gazette.

Added: Omaha; posted on Blackfive
"Omaha, bloody, Bloody Omaha. Thank God for those that fought and died on you."

Leading the Democrats into Battle: Debbie Wasserman Schultz; Demagogues Ryan plan

Pajamas Media "Born in Queens, New York, Wasserman Schultz, a former legislative aide, was, at one time, the youngest female legislator in Florida history. A prolific fundraiser — she reportedly raised more than $17 million for her congressional colleagues in 2006 — she nonetheless seems an odd choice to lead the national party. She is not terribly well-known, is not considered an expert on the less-than-gentle art of politics, and, as she has shown in recent days, is somewhat gaffe prone." ....

"These are the kind of hypocrisies that voters understand intuitively. The hypocrisies that reflect one set of rules for the people we don’t like and another set of rules for the in clique. They don’t like it and they remember it when they vote.

"Wasserman Schultz has some time yet to “grow into the job.” As long as the White House is happy with what she’s doing, she’s not going anywhere because, at the end of the day, she works for the president — not the party. Meaning he bears some responsibility for what she says and does."

DNC Chair Wasserman Schultz Has No Clue That ‘Undocumented’ Immigrants Being In Our Country Is Currently A Crime  Video.

WashPost Fact Check: Wasserman Schultz 'Scaremongering' on Ryan Plan "U.S. Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz’s claims that the GOP plan to remake Medicare would throw seniors “to the wolves and allow insurance companies to deny you coverage” are bogus, The Washington Post concluded in a fact check of the assertion."

D-Day; Omaha Beach then and now photographs (Updated, 12/3/2011)

Dec, 2011 Update: Normandy, 1944; then and now photos   "Our previous emphases (below) on Omaha Beach gave short shrift to the other landing sites. This should do a bit to fill in some of those gaps with photos. Click on some of the WW2 photos of the site, "Men of D-Day" and you will also see that location as it is today. Don't you love stuff like that?"  TD


Omaha Beach  "Of the invasion beaches, Utah,Omaha, Gold, Juno, and Sword, the issue was in doubt only on Omaha Beach.  Bad Allied decisions could only do so much harm on other beaches, but they nearly resulted in a disastrous defeat on Omaha Beach.  Many lives were needlessly lost, and the whole invasion was threatened with failure by the difficulties there.  In "Omaha Beach - A Flawed Victory", Adrian Lewis convincingly shows this."

jewishvirtuallibrary.org

1. Omaha Beach - Vierville Draw  D-1 Beach exit. The beach featured in the movie, "Saving Private Ryan". It was also the beach that saw the annihilation of 95% of the men in 'A' Company of the 116th RCT of the 29th Infantry Division, including a score of young men from the tiny town of Bedford, Virginia.

Some raw film of the landings..

2. Les Moulins and St Laurent Draws
3. Colleville Draw

4. Cabourg Draw
The above draws pictured on the map below, including the landing zone designations and the
German resistance nests: 
In depth details here.


Much more on this topic in the Tunnel Wall posts for June 5th and 6th.

Our emphasis has been primarily on the struggle for Omaha Beach. This in no way disregards the valiant efforts of the British and Canadians who took Sword, Juno, and Gold Beaches nor the men of the 4th US Infantry Division and the Paratroopers who took Utah Beach.

Many more conservative posts about American history, politics and culture here at the Tunnel Wall

Higher Education and its state

Victor Davis Hanson: Now That’s a Higher Education Bubble  "The point is not to bash the students or the faculty, but to ask the university to reexamine the way it does business.

"Maybe raising admission standards would improve the quality of student, end the trend toward watered-down classes, and encourage those who do not belong at CSU to invest their time more productively in the work place. As it is now, over 50 percent of incoming freshmen in CSU must take remedial classes to qualify for university courses; why are they there in the first place?"

We can't reverse the spiral unless we strike at the causes of decline.
"The situation is rather dire: the products of our education system administer, teach, vote, and otherwise direct the course the country is to take. The social harm inherent in that process is set to continue at an accelerating pace."....
"There are other concerns, too, lest we forget. While they lie at the root, we bemoan their consequences and say little about causes. Truly better education for all who are capable of benefiting from it provides the only realistic path out of the morass." Dan Miller

UC Santa Barbara Student Government Tries to Derail David Horowitz Event, Lies About It "The University of California, Santa Barbara (UCSB) student government has unconstitutionally discriminated against the UCSB College Republicans by twice denying funding for a lecture tonight by David Horowitz because of his conservative views."  Foundation for Individual Rights in Education

David Brooks: It’s Not About You  "...many graduates are told to: Follow your passion, chart your own course, march to the beat of your own drummer, follow your dreams and find yourself. This is the litany of expressive individualism, which is still the dominant note in American culture.
"But, of course, this mantra misleads on nearly every front. "

D-Day Monday UPDATED with more links

Watch the Tunnel Wall on Monday for some historical photos of the landings at Normandy on 6 June, 1944. The photos were released in 1949, but I just found them last month.
The aerial photos of the landings and their aftermath that will show you the magnitude of the operation known as Overlord and what great things were accomplished by the industrial might of the allies.  The Tunnel Dweller  
Some D-Day links added below and if you search the words "D-Day" in our search box, you will find more.


http://tunnelwall.blogspot.com/2011/06/omaha-beach-d-day-landings-from-above.html
http://tunnelwall.blogspot.com/2011/05/d-day-and-beyond-airborne-site-one-of.html
http://tunnelwall.blogspot.com/2011/08/25-photos-of-d-day-from-robert-capa.html
http://tunnelwall.blogspot.com/2011/06/d-day-omaha-beach-then-and-now.html