2013 Air Force Academy graduation minus the Obama administration

This was relayed to the Tunnel Wall by former high school classmates. It is the account as written to them, unedited. TD

Good friends of ours from here in Elizabethtown, KY just got back home from a visit to the Air Force Academy,  in Colorado Springs where they attended the commencement exercises of the graduating class of 2013.  In fact John's grandson was one of the graduates and John, being a retired US Army officer was able to swear in his grandson as a brand spanking new US Air Force 2Lt.  

What an honor that must have been for John and his family, but that's not the real story nor is it the historic significance of the 2013 commencement celebration.  You see 2013 is the first Air Force graduation on record that has occurred under a Sequester created by a non functioning Congress and an unyielding Obama Administration.  Due to operating under this Sequester the ceremonies proceeded as follows:
 

President Obama regretfully declined the kind invitation of the Commandant of the Air Force Academy to be speak to the graduates and their families on the occasion of their graduation saying he was committed to addressing the graduates at West Point.  Instead it was established that Vice President Biden was free and he would come to Colorado Springs.  And, as to the request for the usual fly-over by the US Air Force Thunderbirds that was declined again due to the Sequester.


 After consultation with his chain of command the Commandant of the Air Force Academy notified the White House that due to the Sequester cancelling the traditional fly-over of the Thunderbirds that he was confident that the nation didn't need the added $1 million + expense to fly Air Force 2, of any configuration or model, and the added expense of the Secret Service and their entourage required when the Vice President traveled.  So just cancel the initial request for a speaker from the White House for the commencement.

So the commencement went off as planned sans representation from the Obama Administration.  It looked like this:


 The featured speaker was an Under Secretary of the Air Force, who is a decorated Viet Nam veteran.  The Secretary flew back and forth from Andrews AFB to Peterson AFB In Colorado Springs on routine training flight conducted by the Air Force thus costing the American tax payers nothing. 

 

John tells me that there were nearly as many Air Force General Officers in attendance as there were family members.  He thinks a dozen or more 4 Star General, three or four times as many 2 and 3 Stars an untold number of 1 Star Generals.  And, of course countless Colonels and below.

 Most of these officers were themselves alumni of the Air Force Academy and wanted nothing less than to present a perfect program for the graduating class.  Since the Congress and the Obama Administration could not see fit to allow for a fly-over by the Thunderbirds, a number of the senior generals took matters into their own hands.  And so, when the speeches, the hats were all thrown into the air, and all the family hugs were all made and it became time for the fly-over a roar of engines was detected from the West of the air strip and parade grounds there at the facility and everyone was treated to a fly-over by the Confederate Air Force.  Looking up they saw all kinds of vintage aircraft from B-17s B-24s, B-25s, P-38s, P-51s and others all represented by manufactures such Corsairs, Grumman, Lockheed and Boeing who still provide parts availability for these aircraft, and flown by our hero's from prior conflicts that still see fit to stay active for services such as this.  It was a wonderful experience for all who were there.

 I am sure you will join me in offering a salute to these serving officers who saw fit not to rob the 2013 graduating class of their day of celebration, and to our hero's who flew the planes for this worthy occasion and oh yes to the many private donors who pitched in and covered the expenses involved in bringing these aircraft in to Colorado Springs from various locations across the country.

  LADIES AND GENTLEMEN, WE SALUTE YOU

 
More photos of the ceremony
Hat tip to Ron and Gail Downie, Oregon

Where is Saul Alinsky When Conservatives Need Him?

Conservative Report Online   "One of Alinsky's theories, widely published in a famous quote from then White House Chief of Staff, Rahm Emmanuel “Never let a good crisis go to waste”, is that a competent community organizer creates crises out of which come an obvious solution: the very “solution” you had intended all along.

"Yet, fortuitously, if we look at it from the radical perspective, we have been afforded multiple crises, even if not of our own making:".... 

"The answer to these serial crises is simple:

"Return powers to the States and limit the size of the Federal government." Emphasis in the original.
Hat tip to Chip Jones at Conservative Bloggers on Facebook

sodahead 

Texas: Principal Threatens To Sabotage Naval Appointment Of Valedictorian Who Changed Graduation Speech To Defend The Constitution…

As Texas tries to lure more and more California citizens here, expect to see more of this. I do not know if this principal is a Californian, but doesn't all this originate there?
Texas: Principal Threatens To Sabotage Naval Appointment Of Valedictorian Who Changed Graduation Speech To Defend The Constitution…
"Remington Reimer mentioned God and the U.S. Constitution in his speech and now his principal is threatening to ruin his Navy appointment."

Read the Todd Starnes article here.

Reimer, a senior at Joshua High School, made national headlines on June 6 when officials cut off his microphone in mid-speech after he strayed from pre-approved remarks and began talking about his relationship with Jesus Christ.
Reimer, who has received an appointment to the U.S. Naval Academy, thanked God for “sending His only son to die for me and the rest of the world,” the Joshua Star reported. 

Obamacare, the Young Invincibles and Congress

Will a PR campaign convince healthy twentysomethings to buy insurance if they don’t want to?
"Lost in a spirited online debate last week about what young, healthy people — so-called invincibles — will pay for insurance on the Obamacare exchanges is a mundane truth: Some people don’t want to buy health insurance and will refuse to buy it no matter what the government says.
"That’s especially true of the invincibles, whose participation in the Affordable Care Act is crucial. If they don’t sign up for insurance on the exchanges, the federal health-care law could implode almost as soon as it goes live on New Year’s Day, 2014."

Dozens Of Lawmakers, Staffers May Quit Or Retire From Congress If They Are Forced Into Obamacare Exchanges…

"I wonder how many of these people voted for Obamacare?" 

Heritage  "....a stunning demonstration of political condescension on the health care front"

The Dhimmi culture in America: Obama's Snooping Excludes Mosques, Missed Boston Bombers

Lets define terms.
 Dhimmis, "protected people," are free to practice their religion in a Sharia regime, but are made subject to a number of humiliating regulations designed to enforce the Qur'an's command that they "feel themselves subdued" 
The life of Dhimmis , another example.
 GERMANY: Muslim NO-GO areas where even the police are afraid to

In case you missed it, Rep. Mike Pompeo said the failure of Muslim leaders to repudiate acts of terrorism done in the name of Islam makes them “potentially complicit” in these attacks.

CAIR Asks Kansas Rep. Pompeo to Correct 'False and Irresponsible' Attack on Muslims

"In the hours after the Boston bombings on April 15, which occurred at approximately 2:49 p.m., a number of Muslim institutions issued statements whose themes included prayers for the victims, calls for Muslims to assist humanitarian efforts, and condemnations of terrorism.

IBD   "The White House assures that tracking our every phone call and keystroke is to stop terrorists, and yet it won´t snoop in mosques, where the terrorists are. That´s right, the government´s sweeping surveillance of our most private communications excludes the jihad factories where homegrown terrorists are radicalized. Since October 2011, mosques have been off-limits to FBI agents. No more surveillance or undercover string operations without high-level approval from a special oversight body at the Justice Department dubbed the Sensitive Operations Review Committee." ....

Here, I've highlighted this next excerpt:
"One of the Muslim bombers made extremist outbursts during worship, yet because the mosque wasn't monitored, red flags didn't go off inside the FBI about his increasing radicalization before the attacks."

Boston police exercise featuring right-wing terrorists with backpack bombs disrupted by real Muslim terrorists with backpack bombs   Maybe you noticed that when terrorism is depicted in movies, they are usually white, right-wing extremists.
" "Frighteningly similar," except that Islamic jihadists are real, while right-wing terrorists sporting a metal skull wearing an Uncle Sam hat and a furious expression are figments of the Leftist imagination."

Barack Obama is fond of using the word "enemy" to define his domestic opponents.  And the word "revenge" is never applied to those who wish to kill us by the millions.

Obama Spies on Everyone Except Mosques, Missed Boston Bombers
 "Muslim Brotherhood and Hamas-tied groups have succeeded beyond their wildest expectations with the diabolist in the White House. They viciously fought to have jihad and Islam scrubbed from terror training materials and manuals. "....

Obama Includes Evangelical Christians on List of Religious Extremists
The slide below "came from a U.S. Army Reserve Equal Opportunity training brief titled “Extremism and Extremist Organizations.” The Obama Administration included Evangelical Christians with Al-Qaeda and the Ku Klux Klan."

"The Obama Administration “strongly objects” to a proposed amendment to the National Defense Authorization Act that would have protected the religious rights of soldiers – including evangelical Christian service members who are facing growing hostility towards their religion."

 

 

Hi there, little girl! Come see what I have for you.

On immigration, Ich bin ein citizen of the third world

If this bill was good for America, Obama would be against it.  "If this was a bill that any conservative could honestly support, Harry Reid would have killed it in committee and Chuck Schumer would not be begging people to support it, and the fact that 30 Republicans voted for cloture is profoundly disturbing."

 

MIchelle Malkin; Obama’s definition of “smarter enforcement”: None

 "Obama and his open-borders pals pay lip service to fairness and the rule of law for the cameras. But behind closed doors and beyond the reach of public accountability, they’ve already paved the way for mass deportation waivers. Read their actions, not their lips. The official White House operating policy is: No illegal alien left behind."
 

Wake Up!  "In 2007, John McCain’s “comprehensive” immigrant-legalization bill failed after opponents flooded the Senate with calls, shutting down the switchboard. Despite considerable press hype, the bill didn’t even muster a majority on the crucial cloture vote.

"It won’t be that easy this time. For one thing, they have a better switchboard, I’m told."

Bi-partisan Senate vote opens the door for immigration reform debate "And the fragility of the Senate coalition in favor of reform means that it wouldn't take much to have the whole thing blow up in their faces. One or two killer amendments may cause the whole thing to collapse and never make it out of the Senate."

Tips for Right-Wingers on the IRS Scandal

http://www.wnd.com/2013/06/health-care-via-the-irs/

Ann Coulter  "The IRS leaked the donor list of The National Organization for Marriage to their political opponents, the pro-gay-marriage Human Rights Campaign. This is not idle speculation: The documents had an internal IRS stamp on them. The list of names was then published on a number of liberal websites and NOM's donors were harassed.

"The IRS demanded that all members of the Coalition for Life of Iowa swear under penalty of perjury that they wouldn't pray, picket or protest outside of Planned Parenthood. They were also asked to provide details of their prayer meetings."
Just wait till you read the list of organizations that HAVE been granted tax-exempt status by this administration. Read more.

More irony...

The Comical Conservative

Victor Davis Hanson; "Violating Americans’ privacy while failing to identify the terrorists among us".

VDH's Private Papers  Pick Your Scandal
"The problem with the NSA monitoring is not just Obama’s hypocrisy of once decrying elements of the Patriot Act only to embrace them, or indeed expand upon them. By now, everyone knows that what Obama demagogued in 2008 was what he adopted in 2009. Nor is the problem that the U.S. does not have a need to monitor the communications of potential terrorists who plan attacks through the Internet, e-mail, and cell phones. Rather, the dilemma for the Obama administration is that the apparently vastly expanded NSA surveillance came at a time when, in high-profile terrorist cases — the Tsarnaev bombing, Major Hasan’s murder spree — U.S. officials did not use the intelligence in their possession to preempt terrorist acts. Fairly or not, there is the impression that a James Rosen of Fox News or the tea-party affiliates were more likely to earn unlawful federal attention than was a possible terrorist."  (Emphasis added with relish. TD)

Silent Warriors vs. the Warrior Princess

Blackfive 

"This is the absurd culmination of an extravaganza of ridiculousness that the NSW community may never recover from.  When I started blogging in 2004 as a SEAL, it was not to tell you about the things SEALs were doing and how cool we are.  It was to show you how we thought about or approached certain issues from politics to policy.  And when it became my turn to go down range, I shut it down, because you didn’t need to know, and you still don’t. 
"Here’s another thing you don’t need to know: Why Chris Beck wants to live the rest of his life as a woman."....
 

Drug Dealers In Your Home

Maya Grim "My parents used to send me out to play, and I had to be home by the time the street lights came on. Not only would I never consider letting my son do that, I have to worry about when to get him his first computer. I've noticed that a lot of us don't know our neighbors like my parents did.  If we don't know who's next door, we almost certainly have no clue as to who is lurking behind any web address. The main internet threats we all think about are scammers and sexual predators.  While these are still threats, there is a new one that is every bit as dangerous and devastating."
Hat tip to Michelle Lancaster at Conservative Bloggers on Facebook

Then there is this internet hazard:
Mom tricks sex predator with Target ad 

We can all learn from this mom. Good for her.