Victor Davis Hanson asks, Are We in Revolutionary Times?

Victor Davis Hanson:  "When you collate this recent act with the class-warfare rhetoric, the “punish our enemies” threats, the president’s and Eric Holder’s serial racialist statements, the huge borrowing, the national-security leaks, the takeover of health care, the push for redistributive taxes, and even the trivial appointments like a Van Jones, Anita Dunn, or Armendariz, you can fairly conclude that Obama most certainly did not like the way the United States operated for the last 30 or so years, and has tried his best, through hook or crook, to change America in ways that simply were not possible through legislative or even judicial action."

Bing

   Obama Amnesty Plan: Catch, Release, Vote

"He thinks that the black vote and the Hispanic vote and the feminist vote and all these other constituency groups are gonna add up to an electoral coalition over the rest of the country -- which I'll call, for the purposes of this discussion, "the producers." That's what he's counting on.  We know that he's written off white working-class families.  They've admitted that they've written that group off.  They've written off the Catholics.  I don't know. How much more brazen does this guy have to be."....  Rush Limbaugh

Eric Holder still being probed by the Judiciary Committee

Obama ignores questions about de facto amnesty decision

Daily Caller  "The president has often used this no-questions strategy when making important or poll-boosting announcements. It allows him to deliver his message to his target audience, uncluttered by awkward questions. He speaks smoothly and finishes very rapidly, leaving assertive reporters few chances to ask a question before he reaches the refuge of the Oval Office door.

"Sometimes, the president does answer shouted questions. At the end of a March 23 Rose garden event, for example, he answered a shouted question about Trayvon Martin, a Florida youth killed in February.

"On Friday [Neil Munro of] The Daily Caller asked a question as his speech appeared to be ending.

"The president rebuked the TheDC, but then he declined to answer any other questions when he finished his carefully crafted statement.

Neil Munro explains his exchange with President Obama in Rose Garden [VIDEO]

" “Timing these things is a little awkward. He speaks very well, very smoothly — very nice delivery. It’s hard to know when he’s about to end. I thought he was going to end today. I asked my question too early. He rebuked me. Fair enough.” "

Obama has spoken -and spoken and spoken; Thursday and Friday

Obama tells celebs, "You're the ultimate arbiter of which direction this country goes."  And they just beam at him (Sarah Jessica  Parker,photo) 
"If you thought yesterday's campaign reboot in the form of a major economic address was the worst speech President Obama gave last night, you would be mistaken."


Our Plagiarizing President  "A Danish TV network compiled a hilarious list of the number of times Barack Obama has recycled phrases when describing foreign leaders and nations. It is an insult to those leaders and the people of those nations that our President does not even bother  to address them as individuals and unique (one might say "exceptional" nations). 
"He is on autopilot - just going through the motions, reading "cut and pasted" lines on the teleprompter."

Oh my - Dana Milbank tells Obama to 'skip the falsehoods' and give us a plan    "...Dana Milbank of the Washington Post is always a good bellweather for how Obama is playing on the left, and his column today is a scorcher aimed at President Obama.  

"Milbank didn't mince any words when writing about the president's speech [Thursday]"

RNC Video: From Reboot to Replay  "...the RNC took elements of Obama's speech yesterday and went back to a previous Obama speech and took identical phrases and sentences and sandwiched them back-to-back to illustrate: It's tired. It's old. It's worn out. It's the same old teleprompter. It's nothing new.  Stale, old, rotten, just typically antiquated.  So I have the audio of this, and when you hear the same things -- when you hear Obama say the same thing twice -- understand that once was in Cleveland yesterday. The other was in a previous speech this year."  Via Rush Limbaugh    Obama built this speech up as something significant and the press bought it, but it was nothing more than reading the same old speech, almost word-for-word.

Small President, Small Man  "President Obama’s penchant for blaming everyone but himself for his administration’s failures (pre-eminently George W. Bush, of course) has made him something of a laughingstock. He has, of course, a serious problem: his record is too poor for him to talk about it, and he has no plans for his second term other than more of the same. So he defaults to the blame game."  Power Line
Neal Boortz on Obama's speech Thursday: Caesar Obammus’ speech yesterday was a light version of his speech in Osawatomie last December.  "Telling a bank that after they spend hundreds of millions of dollars to create networks for debit card sales what they can and cannot charge merchants for transactions, instead of letting marketplace competition handle the issue, isn’t eliminating MOST regulations.  Telling a landowner that he can’t cover a wet spot in his subdivision back yard because it violates wetland regulations is NOT an attempt to eliminate most regulations." 

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

Updated: Obama enacts the Dream Act — on his own, evading Congress

Legal Insurrection  "So much for the rule of law.  This guy wants reelection, so to hell with the Congress."

OBAMA GRANTS AMNESTY TO YOUNG ILLEGALS  "The policy change, described to The Associated Press by two senior administration officials, will affect as many as 800,000 immigrants who have lived in fear of deportation. It also bypasses Congress and partially achieves the goals of the so-called DREAM Act, a long-sought but never enacted plan to establish a path toward citizenship for young people who came to the United States illegally but who have attended college or served in the military."


Obama To Protect Nearly One Million Illegal Immigrants


Update from Neal Boortz: Neal Reacts to Obama’s Announcement on Illegal Immigrants   "Caesar Obammus just announced his plans to stop deporting younger illegal immigrants and issue them work permits.  You can read about the particulars here.  Here’s Neal initial reaction to the announcement.  He’ll likely ruffle some conservative feathers with this one.  Neal says that Romney ought to come out today and congratulate Obama on this move."

Obama decrees some illegals are more illegal than others "This kind of pandering to Hispanics could win him the election. In states like Florida, Virginia, Colorado, New Mexico, and Nevada, where Hispanics are a growing part of the electorate, this sort of action could tip the balance in his favor - especially since all of those states are expected to be close."


Giving legal status to people that hate America  "U.S. soccer team booed in their own country as Mexican fans turn LA into an 'away' game."  "Reconquista"

http://www.tomllewis.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/07/7-05-Ram-Amnesty.jpg

The Irish Rovers - The Orange and the Green

This would have been great for St. Patrick's Day, but since the Irish Rovers are claimed by one commenter - "You yanks do know the Irish Rovers are Northern Irish Protestants right?" - to be Protestant, I guess any time is fine.

So what's the story behind the orange and the green?  And here:  And here.

[O]range Irish are mainly protestants who see themselves as british, they are descended from English and scottish planters who arrived in Ireland in the 17th century. The meaning behind orange is the orange order which celebrates the battle of the boyne in 1690 when king William of orange (protestant) defeated king James (catholic). Green Irish are mostly roman catholic and see themselves as Irish. They are descended from Irish natives who have always lived in Ireland. Green is the general colour of Ireland and this is why they are called the green Irish.

Hence the flag of Ireland:

Notice even in their flag, they have to keep the Orange and the green separated.

And, generally they hate each other to this day. We should be thankful that Americans from the North and the South did not carry this hatred from the Civil War into today or we'd be killing each other even now. It is good that this song can view the entire sorry situation with humor. ("Humour" in the UK.)  TD

Brunswick, Maine in the Civil War (2014 Updates) (Sept 2014 Update added also)

Sept 2014 UPDATE:  History: Brunswick, Maine Civil War Round Table


Visit the Historic Home of Civil War Hero Joshua Chamberlain in Brunswick, Maine
"Lawrence Joshua ( I thought it was Joshua Lawrence .TD) Chamberlain was a quiet college professor when the Civil War began, but before it was over he became one of the Union's most celebrated officers - the hero of Little Round Top at Gettysburg and the man selected to accept Robert E. Lee's formal surrender at Appomattox."  More here at Gettysburg Daily

Maine Memory

"After the war, Chamberlain returned to Brunswick, Maine and his teaching position at Bowdoin College. He was elected to four terms as Governor of the state of Maine and, later, became president of Bowdoin."

• Harriet Beecher Stowe house.
• Bowdoin Graduates Who Served with the Union
• Bowdoin Graduates Who Served with the Confederacy
• Maine’s Civil War Monuments
• (Below) The charge of the 20th Maine on Little Round Top, Gettysburg, 1863 Don Troiani

MAINE INFANTRY REGIMENTS in the Civil War.

Brunswick Trivia:  "Brunswick, Maine has the widest main street in Maine because Indians burned down the town and in order for that not to happen again they made the main street very wide so that the fire could not jump from building to building."  More here.

Harriet Beecher Stowe's book, Uncle Tom's Cabin was largely composed in Brunswick, ME.   "Stowe, a Connecticut-born teacher at the Hartford Female Academy and an active abolitionist, wrote the novel as a response to the 1850 passage of the second Fugitive Slave Act. Much of the book was composed in Brunswick, Maine, where her husband, Calvin Ellis Stowe, taught at his alma mater, Bowdoin College."....

"In recent years, the negative associations with Uncle Tom's Cabin have, to an extent, overshadowed the historical impact of the book as a "vital antislavery tool." "

Cumberland County Medal of Honor Recipients in the Civil War

“Facts and Legends Concerning the Underground Railroad in Topsham and Brunswick, Maine” pdf.

Library of Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain's House.  More here.

I searched over three hours for a roster of troops from Brunswick who served in the Civil War. Perhaps the numerous links included in this post can lead those interested in this subject to research further. If you find something, please leave us a link in the comments section below


the post. TD

More sources here.


2014 UPDATES:  
Civil War general's Medal of Honor discovered inside book at church sale

Joshua Chamberlain's original Medal of Honor (Courtesy Pejepscot Historical Society)

 

The August 2014 issue of Civil War Times features on pages 28-29, this article: "Chamberlain's Beloved Brunswick".  This photo showing a Maltese cross representing the Army of the Potomac's V Corps that once decorated the chimney of the Chamberlain home is in this article.

 

Dramatic video: From Conception to Birth

Also linked to here.

"Dallas"; politically correct, but still a good story. So it is said

Say It Ain’t So, J.R.: New “Dallas” Reboot is Anti-Drilling, Anti-Fracking, Anti-Oil Propaganda   ..."But they got 80-year-old Hagman out of the crypt and pulled 60-year-old Duffy back to the Southfork ranch to help introduce a new, younger generation of anti-Big Oil, anti-drilling, environmentalist Ewings–all of whom look like girliemen compared to the cowboys of the ’80s series." 

JR a threat to the environment.  "The opening scenes tell the story—evil comes in torrents of black, as in oil gushing from the earth, a gush that soils the faces of the cheering drillers who brought it forth."


Revival of hit prime-time soap is vapid, unimaginative  "But in context with this year’s update, the show exists as a record of the progress, power, wealth and success that oil money has brought to the state of Texas."


Related: Actress Lucy Lawless boards ship to protest Arctic oil drilling
Matt Damon's 'The Promised Land' to be 'anti-fracking' movie
Alec Baldwin To Host Anti-fracking Screening Event

Our father who art in the White House

Legal Insurrection  "A number of readers have sent me links or images of a Father’s Day promotion Obama is running to scoop up e-mail addresses for fundraising.
Real Clear Politics:

"Reader John saw a simlar ad at The NY Times website, which links to this sign up page.  The page asks for your name, zip code and e-mail address in order to “sign” a Father’s Day card.  I’m not sure where that takes you, because I’m not giving them that information..."

"I think it’s time for a follow up to the The “best” “worst” Obama-adoring video Reader Poll, which excluded news videos.  

"So, give me your suggestions for the “best” “worst” Obama-adoring statement on television.  There must be a video link available." ....

One such mentioned in the comments at this post: NBC's Lee Cowan: Covering Barack Obama Makes My Knees Quake     

Read more here.

Althouse:" How Obama lost me"

Ann Althouse  "It will be in the tradition of "How Kerry lost me" and "How McCain lost me." 
"But the first thing that springs to mind, that will definitely be on the long list of links to old posts of mine will be "Do you understand the massive destruction the government is paying for? The destruction of perfectly operable cars?" The video embedded at that link made a crushing impact on me."  (Below)

Romney’s Psych Out Ad

Alana Goodman  "Mitt Romney’s latest attack ad against President Obama (the first negative spot of the campaign, as Jim Geraghty points out) sends two messages. On the surface it’s a cut-and-dry ad criticizing Obama as out of touch on the economy, but there’s another message that seems aimed at psyching out the Obama campaign. See if you can catch it:"

"Look familiar? As the Huffington Post reports, Romney’s ad is a mirror image of one of Obama’s most effective attack ads against John McCain in 2008. Same music. Same format. Same kicker: “How can [he] expect to fix it…if he doesn’t understand what’s broken?” Take a look:"....