I had Russian Lit in college... still have my books buried in boxes at the Ex's place, too.
Anti-Strib 2.0, huh?
Details, Duce, please.
When, where. how, why?
Russian Lit? I read Crime and Punishment.
Turns out the punishment didn't fit the crime.
I have qoutes from The Brothers Karamozov that would be very fitting.
In soviet russia, road forks you.
I've done the required reading, except for American Architecture.. I'll hit that up when I get back to work, in between calls. I'm stuck working till 9 tonight. Ish.. on such a nice day, too.. I wish it were raining, so I wouldn't feel like I'm missing anything.
Obama has a lot of required reading to do as well. Like doing vital homework before hastily announcing a major policy decision.
http://www.denverpost.com/ci_12424986
Hardy-har! - The O said last Thursday the Gitmo detainees can be housed in US prisons like the SuperMax in Colorado. At least ONE metro newspaper in the US is still doing its job instead of slobbering over The One. The Denver Post reports SuperMax officials have ONE SINGLE open bed and they were not consulted on housing those detainees there. Does Obama have ANY sense of how to deal with reality?
I wish it were raining, so I wouldn't feel like I'm missing anything
Gee, and I spent the day at the UofM Lanscape Arboretum with my two best girls. Sniff! I coulda been BYA 24/7ing.
AJ, the best solution I can think of is to change the name of Gitmo and tell the liberals that the terrorists are now being detained there.
How do you say Guatonoimo in French?
send them to antartica. Problem solved. I'm not kidding, the weather there would kill them not us 
Okay, required reading done. Now I need something interesting to fill the void between calls for the last half hour of my shift. Drat! I read too fast.
Actually, the section on American Architecture in Wiki is pretty interesting, and I'd recommend it as a quick overview.
Bats, I would be all for renaming the facility - the US Navy S.E.A.L. Marksmanship Training Range
2009 Miss Universe Dayan Mendoza displayed better judgment about Gitmo than Obama did:
http://www.powerlineblog.com/arc...9/03/
023212.php
I wonder how many of the hard core Jihadists in Gitmo would want to leave there if they knew their only alternative was the Supermax in Colorado. Maybe Obama should give them a choice of being faux-tortured in their current tropical campground, or rot in the concrete dungeons of Supermax. But he won't try that, because very few would.
That would be Dayana Mendoza, Miss Venezuela of 2007; Miss Universe 2008-2009. Featured in my HCF post when she became Miss Venezuela. http://anti-strib.blogspot.com/
s...=dayana+mendoza
Sorry for the typo Margaret. My favorite pic of Dayana is the one where she is joyfully splashing through the shallows of Guantanamo Bay wearing her crown.
Only at the Anti-Strib were the WOMEN the ones posting the hottest chicks. Kudos to you Margaret.
In all seriousness is War and Peace worth the read and about 3-8 month time commitment (depending on how busy I am) I would have to sink into it?
No, it's not. You'll fall asleep every time you pick it up. It needs to be read in original form to really be understood well, from what I was told by my Russian lit instructor in college. He didn't even make us think about reading it.
Yes, it is. It takes some effort, but you get out what you put into it.
jeezus,
And Odie thought that I was a cold-hearted bitch.
http://news.aol.com/article/suic...r-pushed/
496337
Heh, I remember several years ago, my Dad told me a story about how a jumper closed down I-5 south of Los Angeles during afternoon rush hour traffic. By the time police talked the guy off the bridge, the southbound parking lot was 21 miles long. LOTS of people in the immediate vicinity of where my Dad was stuck were ready and willing to voluteer to assist the jumper with his goal.
A.J. - Naming it "US Navy S.E.A.L. Marksmanship Training Range" works for me, though I'd prefer that was tranlated into French or "Austrian."
Another possible name for Gitmo could be the "Hope and Change Rehabilitation Center for Muslim Extemists."
I do wonder how the terrorist would fit in with the other inmates at a federal maximum securty prison. I'm guessing they'd be treated with open arms and zippers.
From my understanding, Supermax is the only prison where the terrorists themselves wouldn't be at risk, since they would be completely segregated from general population.. in fact, I don't believe they even have a 'general population' there. I think their choice of it is as much for the protection of the suspected terrorists as it is for the protection of America itself. They'd probably last about as long as Jeffrey Dahmer did, in any other prison.
It's been awhile since I saw the documentary on the place, so I could be wrong, but it's been my understanding that there is no mixing of prisoners there, due to the natures of their crimes and tendancies to attempt escapes, kill other inmates, etc. It would sort of defeat the purpose of the place anyway, if they do allow it.
from Aunty's article...
Xinhua said Lai was "taken away by police" but did not elaborate.
translation: he was killed.
Another good name change for Gitmo would be: "JDAM ordnance experimental testing range". Of course the guards and other essential personnel would have to be given enough notice to vacate before it was used.
An interesting talk by Jamie Glazov about the mind of the Leftist:
http://dhfcenter.simplwebsite.co...united-in-
hateq
For those who fought the good fight against the Al/Fid borg and who have no family experience under Leftist rule.
Thanks, A.J.
for required reading shouldn't either 1984, Animal Farm, A Brave New Wold and/or Atlas Shrugged be on the list too?
I just watched them AJ man he is so right
Moon, I too lost my grandfather to Stalins murderers. My grandfather was also a doctor, a prominent one. I understood deeply what Jamie Glazov was saying from his heart.
Moon, another view into what life is like in Socialist utopia is here:
http://www.netflix.com/Movie/The...Others/
70056425
"The paradise has to be built on the ashes of the old order." - Glaazov
These prophetic words are a good descriptor of the Obama Mission. Then carefully ask yourself again, HOW can they justify these trillion dollar deficits as far as the eye can see?
Ben, true stories from the mouths of those who have lived through it, suffered through it, and survived it are more important and cannot be ignored. Fiction is still just fiction and often discounted as being such, even if the content is based on reality.
A.J., I've known a few people over the years who got out of E.Berlin and soviet Russia and have heard more stories from Aunty about other regimes. She tells one that makes me want to cry, as a little girl is shot while crossing with her parents, and SHE brought her lifeless body over the border. The girl's mother was responsible for it all, too.
The left will continue to try to revise the history of this time, try to negate the deaths of those who fought within their boundaries for freedom, and portray the enemy as a friend. We know it, we see it, and we don't fall for it. How that pisses them off!
When I was a kid, I used to go down by the river a half mile from my house to walk, and watch the endless flow of water go over the dam. In the 70s there were quite a few Russian immigrants that would go there to fish. Once one tried to tell me that communism was better than American Capitalism, and that our country was bad. I laughed at him-an adult in his 30s- when I was only about 11. I told him I thought he was a spy, and if it really was so much better there to go back, that he didn't deserve the freedom he was enjoying, espeically if he was not. Leftists work that way, by getting to the children. Even then I didn't fall for it.. and man, did it REALLY piss him off!
You learned early and well. Why aren't there more like you around?
Teacher's unions.
True, and a media that doesn't care about lost freedoms, only in "making a better(sic) world".
Kermit, maybe you should do a post on your new blog linking to the video Glazov's speech. The more people that listen to what he has to say, the better. That is a full broadside for our side in the ideological war if there ever was one. And with such passion for life and love of humanity.
My grandfather on my mother's side was also executed by a shot in the back of the head. He had the audacity to go to the Gulag authorities in 1940, on behalf of the people in his camp, to appeal for better food rations. They were literally starving and freezing to death in the Siberian winter. He took this initiative at great personal risk. This was rewarded by being marched out of the commandant's building and having his brains blown out in full view of the rest of the prisoners. We didn't learn of his fate until the late 1980's, when several survivors of the Gulag he was in, wrote a book with the stories of those who persished.
Why was he in the Gulag? He was a prominent man, well established as both a gifted surgeon, and the head of that country's military medical service. My late grandmother told me many stories of her remarkable husband, his many accomplishments, world travels, and his unshakeable integrity. He was even called in to mediate disputes within the inner circle of the government by the President, he was so respected by all parties, for his impartiality and incorruptibility.
When you have that kind of man in your blood history, you grow up with different values and attitudes, than if you had a father that abandoned you and your mother to go back to Africa. I very much understood the crack in Jamie Glazov's voice, as he mentioned his grandfather the second time, near the end of his speech.
No wonder the Al/Fids said I was "too far gone to be helped" by hollow hopeychangitude. Thus they were right at least once.
There is a rich family narrative of the "wonders of the Soviet Union" that I would like to sometime reveal. Will it be here in A-S 2.0? Only time and the will of Il Duce' will tell.
Il Duce' puts forward St. Barts, Whisky, Cigars, Wine, and the like. I understand these luxuries and enjoy (some of) them myself. But I am far more hesitant to embrace luxury than others, for I know where I came from.
I have a grandpa who fought in the battle of the bulge, agreat uncle who came up through Italy and actually spent time "relaxing" in Rome, and another great uncle who fought in the pacific campaign against the japs. He says he saw more people die of infection and jungle rot than in combat. My bloodline is full of patriots who fought to defend this great country from the evils of socialism, fascism and nazism. And the kooky japs too, but I guess they're ok now.
I have never cared for my father's side of the family (and neither did he) but even so all of the men served their country. This includes my da and his brother serving this country during WWII and his father and ancestors fighting for Ireland and Irish independence. My da went on to serve in Korea and in an "advisory" capacity in Viet Nam.
The men in my mum's family did the same, although the generations before my mum's did what they did (I have no specifics beyond the fact that they served) in Norway. All three of her brothers served in WWII; one was a tanker with Patton who painted "Country Boy" on the side of his tank. And my brother served in Viet Nam (later than my da).
The wives, husbands, mothers, fathers, siblings, daughters and sons at home serve right along with the troops, albeit in a different, and maybe harder, way. Waiting for word and walking that widow's walk is never easy. My da didn't even meet me until I was 10 months old and I never even knew him, other than as a label saying "daddy", until he came home for the last time when I was almost 5. When you have a brother that is 20 when you're born and a "missing" father, labels get confusing.
My folks met in the Bremerton Naval Shipyards when da was waiting for his ship to be finished and commissioned and my mum was working on it. That was the second (of 3) ships shot out from under him. He was first in the Pacific theatre, got wounded, healed up and went to the Atlantic. Same story, got wounded, healed up and went back to the Pacific where he was wounded for the final time. He could have come home after the first or second time but that wasn't his way. I should say, "that wasn't their way." For most people, "honor" and "duty" and "responsibility" meant something then. Still does even now but only to a vanishing breed.
I listened to stories all my life about my family but the ones about my da didn't fit the man I knew. He wasn't the man in the stories. He tried to get to know me but it took a while and it was never quite the way he knew my sibs and they him even though he was gone quite a bit of their lives too. I didn't even call him "dad" until I was 8 or so. That was also when I decided to join the Navy (my da's service) when I grew up. I s'pose it must have had something to do with him and trying to understand him.
Sometimes I get so pissed off when I hear someone say "He's/she's just not the same." What the fuck do they think is going to happen? We leave home, are recreated to be what our country needs, with or without seeing combat or becoming a killer. Even in peace time, no one ever comes home "the same person". Boot camp begins the change and service after completes it. We aren't and won't be "the same", ever. And, here's a newsflash, we aren't "the same" to ourselves either. We can't say when or how it happened but we all knew it had. I knew that I wasn't the same the first time I went home. I was in my "A" school at the time and had not yet been out in the fleet but I was still "different". After a year or two I was a helluva lot different even to myself.
I'm not sure that my da, my brother or one of my uncles ever "came home" at all. They seemed to have lost something in all those "over theres," that can't be named or described.
The prices paid by a family with a member in the military are always high. Most people think that having someone die is the highest price and it probably is. Still, sometimes I wonder if the highest price isn't paid when and until the troops or just one trooper come home. "Home" isn't the world we left and we aren't the "kid" who left it.
aunty, you speak truth in volumes - we are all changed by what we do. Military combat experience probably changes a person more than any other. I do not have such experience, so I only surmise.
I have also changed... many times. Life experience impacts anyone paying attention. But I am sure someone seeing a human, being killed will pay extreme attention, whether they want to or not.
Aunty, I don't share your experiences, but I have heard much through the narrative of my family's history. Thank God I didn't have to live those stories myself.
RE:" aunty, you speak truth in volumes - we are all changed by what we do.
I have also changed... many times. Life experience impacts anyone paying attention. "
One would hope so.
RE:" Aunty, I don't share your experiences ... "
I am more than glad that you don't share them, A.J. What my forebears sacrificed may have been necessary but they did it so that others did not have to share them. I am beyond proud of what my da, brother, uncles and forebears did for their countries and what their women and children did too.
RE:" ... but I have heard much through the narrative of my family's history. "
A.J. have you considered getting these stories on tape or writing them down? They have enormous value and should be preserved for your family and its successive generations. And not just what happened in their homelands but what it was like for them to come here and start new lives. If some of your folks compatriots are still around, getting their stories would be great too. Once they are gone so are the stories and the memory of both the hardships and the valor.
AJ
You will find that aunty and I both would never wish what we have gone through on our worst enemy's but I know I would do it all over again with out a seconds hasten.
RE:" You will find that aunty and I both would never wish what we have gone through on our worst enemy's but I know I would do it all over again with out a seconds hasten. "
Same here, Tim. Even knowing that everything would happen just the way it did.
aunty, the way I really wanted to get those stories down, was in my late grandmother's voice, for this is how I heard them. But for reasons I shall never understand, she repeatedly refused my request to record her. There is nothing I wouldn't give to hear her voice tell them today.
My grandmother was a remarkable woman. She married a famous doctor, lived a prosperous life, traveled Europe in the 1920's, and ended up in America washing the floors at General Hospital, the only job she could get when she came here. Never once did I hear her complain. She was always so happy to see me.
RE:" She was always so happy to see me. "
Which is all that mattered to her, I bet.
Even without her voice A.J., you should record them so they are not lost. The lessons our elders learned should be saved if only for their own families. People seem to only learn by their own harsh experiences so using such stories for educational purposes is probably useless. Still, your kids and grandkids might want to know where they come from.
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