Omaha Beach Defences; some more links found

Hein Severloh, "the beast of Omaha"  

Killed over 1,000 American soldiers - Heinrich Severloh ( seems unlikely, given the number of other Germans defending the beach with machine guns, artillery and mortars. But still many deaths can be attributed to Severloh)

'Beast of Omaha' weeps as he recalls slaughter of thousands on beach
FOR Hein Severloh the ‘Longest Day’ meant nine hours constantly machine-gunning American soldiers as they attempted to land on Omaha Beach.

One image still brings tears to his eyes. A young American had run from his landing craft and sought cover behind a concrete block. Severloh, then a young lance-corporal in the German army in Normandy, aimed his rifle at the GI. He fired and hit the enemy square in the forehead. The American’s helmet flew away and rolled into the sea, his chin sank to his chest and he collapsed dead on the beach.

Tormented by the memory, Severloh now weeps at the thought of the unknown soldier’s death.

Severloh was safe in an almost impregnable concrete bunker overlooking the beach. He had an unimpeded view of the oncoming Allied forces. He was the last German soldier firing, and may have accounted for about 3,000 American casualties, almost three-quarters of all the US losses at Omaha. The Americans came to know him as the Beast of Omaha.

He had been saved from the waves of Allied bombing by the poor weather. The US aircrews were worried that if they allowed their bombs to fall too soon they might destroy their own landing ships. As they flew over they lingered before releasing their weapons, meaning the bombs often landed far behind the Nazi bunkers.

The Germans joked that the ‘Amis’ - their slang for the US forces - had merely bombed French cows and farmers rather than the German installations.

Alerted by the bombers, Severloh and the 29 others in his bunker rushed to their firing holes and prepared for the onslaught. Severloh, then just 20, gasped when he saw the ocean. He was confronted by what seemed to be a wall of Allied ships. He said: "My God. How am I going to get out of this mess?"

The veteran explained: "What could I do? I just thought that I was never going to make it to the rear. I thought that I was going to shoot for my very life. It was them or me - that is what I thought."

As the landing ships neared the beach, Severloh listened to the final orders from his commander, Lieutenant Berhard Frerking. They wanted to stop the Americans while they were still in the water and could not move easily. But if he fired too soon - while the soldiers were still some way out in the water - he risked missing them.

Frerking explained: "You must open fire when the enemy is knee-deep in the water and is still unable to run quickly."

Severloh had seen little action before. His previous stint on the Eastern Front had been cut short by tonsillitis. But he was anything but enthusiastic. Severloh said: "I never wanted to be in the war. I never wanted to be in France. I never wanted to be in that bunker firing a machine gun.

"I saw how the water sprayed up where my machine gun bursts landed, and when the small fountains came closer to the GIs, they threw themselves down. Very soon the first bodies were drifting in the waves of the rising tide. In a short time, all the Americans down there were shot."

He fired for nine hours, using up all the 12,000 machine-gun rounds. The sea turned red with the blood from the bodies. When he had no more bullets for the machine-gun, he started firing on the US soldiers with his rifle, firing off another 400 rifle rounds at the terrified GIs.

A leading German historical expert of the Second World War, Helmut Konrad Freiherr von Keusgen, believes Severloh may have accounted for 3,000 of the 4,200 American casualties on the day.

Severloh is less sure about the number, but said: "It was definitely at least 1,000 men, most likely more than 2,000. But I do not know how many men I shot. It was awful. Thinking about it makes me want to throw up. I almost emptied an entire infantry landing craft. The sea was red around it and I could hear an American officer shouting hysterically in a loudspeaker."

Lt-col Stuart Crawford, formerly of the Royal Tank Regiment, and a defence consultant, said it was entirely possible that a single German soldier had killed so many GIs.

He said: "I have fired that machine-gun. I did it as part of my training, and it has an extremely high rate of fire. He was in a position which was almost impervious to the weapons which the Americans could bring to bear on him. The Americans made the mistake of not landing tanks with the first wave of troops, so they had no support or protection."

HobLob verdict fine, but remember four voted against it.

Left wing hysteria ginned up over Hobby Lobby decision   "The outrage expressed by the left as a result of the Supreme Court decision to allow an Oklahoma family business to get out from under the contraceptive mandate in Obamacare is beyond belief.

 

"Social media exploded in anger and hate, as this Twitchy post shows. I would quote some of the death threats and obscenities tossed at Hobby Lobby but this is a family website and we don't do vulgarity. (Warning: Very coarse and obscene language at the link.)

 

Hobby Lobby Actually Lavishes Contraception Coverage on Its Employees    ... "In the Left’s fantasy world, the militant Christians at Hobby Lobby police single female employees to assure that they have not engaged in sinful, pre-marital sex. As for married women, Hobby Lobby deprives them of birth control so that each can deliver a new baby every nine months, for God’s glory, just like in the Old Testament.

"Liberals are living in a cartoon of their own making."

 

 

Sí Section

Nancy Pelosi,'Crisis Opportunist' Spokesperson   "Nancy Pelosi chiding political opponents for politicizing an issue is like Madonna scolding Lady Gaga for being a shameless exhibitionist. Especially when, during the press conference, the minority speaker asked, “Can we just have a woman ask a question?  Because we do have to go, but not before we hear from a woman.' ” 

HopeN'Change

 

... For starters, she declared that whether or not one is born in this country, "We're all Americans in this hemisphere. North and South America." Semantically, she's right. Legally and Constitutionally, she's out of her botoxed noggin. By her bizarre hemispheric definition, Fidel Castro is an American - entitled to Obamacare, food stamps, and the right to vote for Democrats without showing an I.D.

...

"The abortion-loving Pelosi then rhapsodized that "every child has a spark of divinity in them and is therefore worthy of respect. What we saw in those [detention and holding] rooms was a dazzling, sparkling array of God's children." Although before you start imagining the Vienna Boys Choir based on Nancy's description, keep in mind the sparkling array of interesting diseases some are carrying, including HIV, TB, and scabies ...

Obama is shameless, plain shameless on immigration reform   ..."Then President Obama blamed the GOP for refusing to put immigration to a vote.  

"And this is where he is just shamelessly shameless, if there is such a state of shamelessness.

"President Obama had majorities in the House and 60 votes in the US in 2009-10.   He proposed nothing!

"In 2012, he pandered to Hispanic groups by going around Congress on "the dreamers".   

"All in all, he did nothing when he had the votes and used the issue to pander for reelection.

Alan Caruba: When the World Goes Crazy it First Kills Jews

Warning Signs

 

If the far right were the Nazis who wanted to kill all Jews, why does the left call us who love Israel "the far right"?

 

"Consider this, if there had been a state of Israel in the 1930s, many more European Jews would have been able to escape the fate that consumed six million of them during the Nazi Holocaust during World War II."

...

 

"I don’t see any difference between the Nazis of the 1930s and the Islamists of these years. The Nazis received a lot of support from the Arabs of their era. As for Islam, the Koran is filled with admonitions against Jews in particular and every other “infidel” in general. While there have been periods of tolerance for Jews over the past 1,400 years, the animus towards them has never been reduced and, in present times, we have seen a massive rejection of Christians as well. When Israel became a state in 1948, thousands of Jews from throughout the Middle East fled for their lives to settle there.

"What history confirms is that a rise of anti-Semitism has been a signal of greater, wider troubles to come."     Full article...

Saintly old Palestinian (if there is such a thing) grandmother recalls golden memories of slaughtering Jews.

 

 

... "The massacre, together with that of Jews in Safed, sent shock waves through Jewish communities in Palestine and around the world. It led to the re-organization and development of the Jewish paramilitary organization, the Haganah, which later became the nucleus of the Israel Defense Forces.^{[citation needed]}

 

"In the metanarrative of Zionism, according to Michelle Campos, the event became 'a central symbol of Jewish persecution at the hands of bloodthirsty Arabs'^[4] and was 'engraved in the national psyche of Israeli Jews', particularly those who settled in Hebron after 1967.^[5] Hillel Cohen regards the massacre as marking a point-of-no-return in Arab-Jewish relations, and forcing the Mizrahi Jews to join forces with Zionism.^[6]"

 

^{Democratic Underground discusses if the Daniel Pearl killing was because he was a journalist or a Jew}

The deaths of the three Israeli teens

BREAKING! Israel attacking Gaza now in retaliation for murder of the 3 Israeli teens

The Israeli teens killed  "One liked basketball and was a gifted musician who played a mean guitar as well as the flute. Another liked to bake cakes for his five younger sisters. The third would bring jars of cookies to study hall for his classmates.

"Naftali Frankel, Eyal Yifrach and Gilad Shaar, Israeli Jewish teens, were robbed of their lives. Their bodies were found Monday, more than two weeks after they were abducted on their way home from school in the West Bank."

 

Gaza: Palestinians Celebrate Kidnapping by Handing out Candy   "But anti-Israel activists have attempted to hijack the viral campaign, using it to express support for terrorists and joyfully speculating that the students could be used in a "prisoner swap" to gain their release."

 

MUSLIM mother of one of the suspects in kidnapping/murder of 3 Israeli teens says, “If my son committed the crime, I would be proud of him.”    The boys were identified by their clothes; could this have been the way they were killed?

Flames billow from the blown-up house of Amer Abu Eisheh, a suspect in the killing of three

 kidnapped Israelis

Recording of teen’s emergency call released: ‘They’ve kidnapped me’    "In tape, kidnappers can be heard yelling at teens to put heads down before loud noises ring out In a recording just recently allowed to be aired, one of the three slain teens attempts to report his kidnapping by placing a phone call to 100, Israel’s emergency hotline. “They’ve kidnapped me,” whispers the teen to the operator, as the kidnappers can be heard in the background shouting in Arabic-accented Hebrew at the three youths to keep their heads and hands down. The operator tries to interact with the caller, but receives no answer. Seconds later, several loud noises, which might be gunshots, are heard. Someone in the car is heard groaning. No one in the car speaks from then until the end of the 49-second recording. -

...

"Army Radio reported Tuesday that the three were shot during the phone call. It said blood and a bullet casing were found in the car. On Monday, an investigation of the incident found a slew of professional missteps in the immediate response to the call, resulting in the dismissal of four senior police officers."

 

Muslims Attack IDF Ambulance Transporting Bodies of Murdered Jewish Schoolboys

 

 

 

 

 

Islamist speaks of the borders that will disappear and of the countries next to Israel that will become Islamic

Background and definition of terms: Sykes–Picot Agreement. It established the borders of nations in the area, breaking up the Ottoman Empire.  This was followed in 1917 later by the Balfour Declaration , creating the future state of Israel and angering many in the Middle East, including the writer of the article linked to here.

The Gateway Pundit    "The Islamist Abu Saffiya from Chile, shows off the spoils of war and raises the Islamic flag at a former Iraqi military base. Another Islamist mocks Obama at the end of the video:"

He unlocks a door in a former border checkpoint, revealing Iraqi soldiers who are prisoners in a windowless room. Later in this same video, the building is blown up with no sign of the prisoners being let out first.

ISIS Mocks Obama in Latest Video: “Obama, Did You Prepare Enough Diapers For Your Soldiers?”
 

 

A Fundamentally Transformed America

Boehner Is Bringing a Whistle to a Gunfight

"A congressional lawsuit is precisely the wrong weapon to combat Obama’s lawlessness."

Andrew C. McCarthy ... "Boehner and the Congress hold the tools that could end, or at least dramatically reduce, the administration’s onslaught. Instead, the speaker prefers to bring a whistle to a gunfight. Paralyzed by fear of catcalls from Obama’s slavish media, Boehner eschews the use of his own armaments in favor of turning to the courts — apparently, in hope that a judge will pronounce with stentorian flourish that which is already abundantly obvious to all with eyes to see: The president of the United States is in gross violation of his solemn oath to execute the laws faithfully, usurping congressional power in a systematic assault on the separation of powers that safeguards our liberties."...

 

HOBBY LOBBY AND THE VICIOUSNESS OF THE LEFT

Neal Boortz

 

          "Just what was the ruling?  In simple terms: If you’re essentially a family business, but you’re organized as a corporation purely for tax, liability and other personal reasons, you are permitted to engage in the free expression of your religious beliefs as a company.  In other words, you cannot be required to make contraceptives available to your employees if you view those contraceptives as drugs that result in an abortion.  Such a mandate would cause you to act contrary to your religious beliefs.
            "What about the employees of Hobby Lobby?  They still have, at one count, over a dozen different contraceptive methods and drugs that will be available to them under the Hobby Lobby health care plan.  This is all about those drugs that some believe end the pregnancy process after an embryo has been formed.
            "The irrationality that comes after this ruling is surprising.  To make this point I’ll pick on Bob Beckle on today’s Fox News show “Outnumbered.”  Beckel says the ruling deprives 13,000 women of contractive help.  Let’s pick that apart point-by-point;

1. The 13,000 employees of Hobby Lobby are not all women.  I would swear that I’ve seen men working there.
2. The women who work for Hobby Lobby are not being deprived of contraceptive help.  As I already pointed out – they still get contraceptive care under their plan.  The plan just won’t cover the so-called “morning after” drugs.
3. There is nothing in the Supreme Court ruling that says any woman anywhere can go and buy whatever contraceptive medication they wish with their own dollars. 

     "Beckel also makes this absurd comparison.  He asked what would happen if a business owned by orthodox Jews decided to ban its employees from driving cars on Saturday?  Damn, Bob?  I thought you were off the drugs!  Where in the hell does this ruling ban any woman working for Hobby Lobby from doing anything?  In fact .. where has Hobby Lobby banned any woman from obtaining any type of contraceptive she desires .. if she does it on her own.  Is there something in that ruling that say a Hobby Lobby employee can’t go to their doctor to get a prescription and then go to the drug store to get whatever contraceptive pill she desires?  Come on, Bob.  You’re smarter than that, aren’t you?  And by the way … why wasn’t one person on that Fox News “Outnumbered” panel with Bob who managed to point out this irrationality!
....."One of the most surprising things about this ruling would be the mindless viciousness it generated from the left. Wait … No … it wasn’t surprising.  In fact, its what I’ve come to expect from the prog world.   I would say that, but I’m really not surprised.  This mindless viciousness is just what I’ve come to expect.  The left has become increasingly violent and vicious in recent years.  Why?  Don’t know.  Maybe it’s the empowerment they feel with an úber leftist president. Maybe it’s a defensive response to losing so many Supreme Court battles.  But the viciousness is there.  Examples?  Just look at some of these tweets that hit Twitter in the moments following the announcement of the Court’s ruling."     But don't read them out loud to your children.

http://hotair.com/

MSNBC is ticked off.

The smell test

http://legalinsurrection.com/2014/06/the-smell-test/

 

Report: Canada Pulls Plug on Keystone Pipeline – Will Send Oil to Asia

The Gateway Pundit  via Lucianne
"The Keystone Pipeline project was expected to create tens of thousands of high paying jobs in the oil industry. The project itself would create 20,000 construction jobs. And the pipeline would bring oil from Canada and North Dakota to refineries in the United States."

 

"The proposed project would have extended from Alberta, Canada to Illinois, transporting approximately 400,000 barrels of crude oil per day. Estimated cost is $1.7 billion.

"But Obama rejected the plan in 2011 and 2014.

"Democrats are beholden to the radical green movement – the poor and middle class be damned.

"Now this…
Canada pulled the plug on Keystone and will send the oil to Asia.Watts Up With That reported:" ...
...

...Rather than purchasing crude from a friendly and allied neighbor, the United States will most likely need to continue its reliance upon hostile sources like Venezuela.

"Only a Democrat could make such a dangerous and irresponsible decision for the country."

The left vs. the courts today

Via Drudge, along with conservative commentary on each.

Justices: Can't make employers cover contraception  " The Supreme Court says corporations can hold religious objections that allow them to opt out of the new health law requirement that they cover contraceptives for women."
As expected, the decision was 5-4

Commentary:
Hobby Lobby 1, Obamacare 0   "Note that this ruling only applies to closely-held corporations, but does not rule out applying the same religious freedom reasoning to publicly-held firms and nonprofits."

Business Insider; Supreme Court Says Small, Private Companies Don't Have To Provide Contraception
"This is the most significant Obamacare-related case argued before the Supreme Court since the high court upheld the law's individual insurance mandate two years ago, in the heat of the 2012 presidential election. In that decision, Roberts cast the deciding vote to preserve the heart of the law and the way for which it is paid."

 

Public union can't make nonmembers pay fees  "The Supreme Court dealt a blow to public sector unions Monday, ruling that thousands of home health care workers in Illinois cannot be required to pay fees that help cover the union's costs of collective bargaining."

Commentary:

 SCOTUS: Private contractors don't have to pay union dues even if union bargains for them   "The ruling affects a very narrow group of employees who recieve compensation from Medicaid disbursements. But it leaves the door open for a broader ruling involving other private workers later."

USA Today: Supreme Court issues narrow ruling against labor unions   "The workers, who were represented in court by the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation, contended that public employee unions are engaged in lobbying the government, often on issues the workers oppose. That implicates their First Amendment rights because the union speaks for them."