President Bush's Birthday Parachute Jump

Not only have President Bush and I both jumped with the U.S. Army's Golden Knights parachute display team, but we've both jumped with the same guy -- Tandem Team Leader Sergeant First Class Mike Elliot.

This photo is of Mike and me about 8,000 feet above Wyoming. President Bush's first jump was during World war II into the Pacific ocean as a navy pilot when he was shot down. He has jumped with the Golden Knights on his 75th, 80th, and now his 85th birthday.

Here's the article I wrote shortly after my jump in 2005. Thank you, Golden Knights. And Happy Birthday Mr. President!


"You can tell when the jumpers are leaving the aircraft. They make a swoosh sound that I can hear up in the cockpit,” pilot Alan Aber told me, “When the new guys are trying out for the team, they aren’t used to jumping out of something that goes 105 knots. There’s a blast shield that folds over the rear doors when they are locked back in the open position. Sometimes they don’t push off far enough and they really smack into that blast shield. But generally it’s more embarrassing than anything else,” Aber chuckled. I chuckled too, thankful that I had not collided with anything when I made my skydiving debut the previous day out of Aber’s plane, a Fokker F27, used by the U.S. Army’s Golden Knights Parachute Display team to introduce lucky individuals like me to the sport of parachuting, and to promote the Army’s ongoing public relations campaign. My jump took place over Cheyenne, Wyoming, where I was strapped to Sergeant First Class Mike Elliot, an Airborne Infantryman and tandem instructor on the Golden Knights Gold Demonstration Team to literally hitch a ride on his parachute. Like many people, I have an irrational fear of heights; Standing on the observation floor of the Sears Tower in Chicago, the Eiffel Tower in Paris, and the Royal Gorge Bridge in Colorado have all triggered sweaty palms and the feeling that the great void around and below me would somehow reach up and drag me down into it. I had already decided not to dwell on putting my life in the hands of a stranger while jumping out of a perfectly good aircraft. At least by jumping with the Army I knew I was beginning my skydiving career at the top--no pun intended. Mike and I began by examining the tandem parachute: a 370 square foot elliptical nylon canopy and container which together weigh approximately 60lbs. Next, we reviewed the method by which we would leave the aircraft. “You’re going to look like this in freefall,” Mike explained as he slid belly down, arms and legs extended, onto a convenient coffee table in the Regional Airport building in Cheyenne. He played a short video showing Golden Knights jumpers freefalling in complicated geometric shapes with other team members, popping smoke, and generally having fun while on a collision course with planet Earth at 120 mph, all to the sound of some good rockin’ music designed to get your adrenaline level up. By the end of the film I was not only eager to jump, I wanted to invade a foreign country just for the fun of it! And maybe that’s the point of all this. At a time when many of our soldiers are deployed overseas, the Golden Knights don’t hide the fact that their mission is to promote the Army to the public. It’s called advertising, and these soldiers are wonderful ambassadors both for the sport of parachuting and for the Army.


Our third jumper was Staff Sergeant Joe Jones, who would jump with Mike and me and film our descent for the personalized video tape that all guest jumpers receive; capturing the rare privilege of wearing the Knight’s famed yellow and black jump suit. Joe’s parachute is a 120 square foot elliptical nylon canopy and container weighing approximately 20lbs.


In addition to display jumps at events like Cheyenne’s annual Frontier Days festival, the Golden Knights also field Style and Accuracy teams for both inter-service and civilian (inter)national competitions. In the Accuracy event, the team must touch down as close as possible to a target that is only a few centimeters wide. In the Style competition, the team jumps at 7500 feet and is judged by the number of different formations they can make, requiring that they separate and rejoin for each successful maneuver. Based at Fort Bragg, North Carolina, the Golden Knights unit is comprised of only 86 members: jumpers, parachute technicians, aircrew and support personnel. There are two demonstration teams: Black Team and Gold Team. I made my jump with Gold Team. I asked Mike Elliot the age of his oldest jumping partner: “A ninety-two year old lady,” Mike replied, “and President Bush senior has also jumped with us.”


A typical jump is made from one of the two Fokker F27 twin turboprop aircraft that the team purchased in 1985. Built in Holland, these aircraft were customized with an oversize door on each side of the fuselage, just forward of the tail, and were originally destined for delivery to the parachute regiment of an African army. But when the deal fell through, the aircraft were sold instead to the Golden Knights. “We had to fly them back from Holland in stages,” Alan Aber recalls. “We added fuel tanks inside the fuselage and hopped from Holland, to Ireland, to Greenland, and finally to the East Coast. We had a couple of factory pilots with us, but it still amounted to on-the-job training to get used to them.” The F27 meets some important criteria for the team: It is of the correct size to transport a team and all their gear from one jump location to the next, while being small enough to operate from short runways and fly slow enough (105 knots) for parachutists to exit the aircraft and stay together in formation.


Cheyenne, Wyoming, where I made my tandem jump is 6,000 feet above sea level. We jumped at 14,000 feet above sea level. As the airplane spiraled upwards in the thinning air, we passed around an oxygen bottle. At one point, I found myself getting light headed and took a few extra lungs-full. I had to sit on Mike’s lap in order to get his harness hooked to mine, and then we stood up and duck-walked down the aisle to the rear of the aircraft. As we approached the open door, with the green light above it, I hooked my thumbs into the harness. I looked out of the door and then it finally hit me that I was about to throw myself into the same nothingness that surrounds the Sears Tower. Oh well, too late to back out now. Pride took over and we stood in the door. As instructed, I lifted my feet, hanging in my harness, legs slid backwards in between Mike’s knees, my heels pointed up. I rested my head back against his left shoulder so that he had an uninterrupted view of the ground, and raised my hands in a surrender position. “Ready?” Mike asked.“Yes, I’m-“ Before I could take a breath, we were gone. Whoa! I wasn’t prepared for such fast acceleration. Our combined weight would cause us to accelerate to 170mph if Mike did not release the small drogue parachute immediately after we left the aircraft. The drogue is designed to keep the speed down to a maximum of 120mph. As we fell to earth in the classic horizontal, arms and legs extended position, two other Golden Knights jumpers swooped down and linked hands with me. For a few precious seconds I was part of one of the finest display teams in the world. I was literally jolted back to reality as Mike deployed the parachute. The sudden deceleration gave me the impression we were shooting upwards, rather than down. And then we were floating silently, gliding in a series of lazy figure eights as Mike steered us to land on the airport grass, scant feet from where we had taken off. What a rush. Forget my fear of heights. I’d do this again in a heartbeat.

Another Murder at Virginia Tech

I'm sure we all remember the mass shooting at Virginia Tech in which a student from China went on a rampage. Remember the big debate about whether or not students who have a state-issued permit to carry a concealed handgun should be allowed by the university to do so on campus?

Of course, like many universities, Virginia Tech does not allow students to be responsible for their own security, preferring to rely on campus security to keep the peace. Well here's a story that I don't think made many ripples in the national media. At the end of May, another student from China, Haiyan Zhu attacked a female chinese student, Xin Yang in the cafeteria and cut off her head.

How can this possibly happen on a campus that has already dealt with violent crime, and, presumably either improved it's security, or was already confident that the security was adequate? Well, to be fair to the university, no amount of security guards can respond instantly to every incident on campus.

The news report indicates that the couple were not alone in the cafeteria. There were other people present at the time of the attack. One onlooker said, "...he had just returned from a break at his job at Au Bon Pan in Tech's Graduate Life Center on Jan. 21 when he heard growling and screaming. He looked up to see Haiyan Zhu attacking Xin Yang."

The onlooker went on to say that,"...he dove behind the counter and called 911 while customers and his manager ran from the coffee shop. "

Why did these people run away? How can you witness a savage attack and do nothing? These are not bad people, they are not stupid people. I think the reason is that they have not been conditioned to belive that they can act against violence and prevail. They have likely been conditioned by the nanny state to give in to violence--"if I don't fight back, he won't hurt me".

How many times have you heard the victim of a mugging say, "there was nothing I could do."

The fact is that we don't know what we can do until we try. Self defense is not primarily about how big we are, how strong we are, or how well armed we are. Self defense is about having the correct mindset. It is about having that fighting spirit that says, "You will not do that to me! Even if I get hurt, or die, I will fight you until you stop being a threat to me."

Our society is teaching each generation that all violence is bad. Tell that to the bad guys because it seems they didn't get the message. We need to teach every generation that there are times when it's morally acceptable to physically hurt a person who is committing a criminal act of violence.

Surely the right to self-defense is the most basic right of all living things.

Do You Want to Know What the Economy is Really Like?

I'm not an economist, and, frankly, I struggle to understand some of the financial and economic information that is presented on the nightly news. But lately, I've been reading John Williams' website, Shadow Government Statistics: http://www.shadowstats.com/

I haven't explored all of it yet, but it's packed with information that not only explains how the government (often incorrectly) analyzes and presents economic information, but comments on the pitfalls of long term financial policies. His essay on the hyperinflation that he predicts is going to hit the U.S. economy in the near future is not only educational, but chilling, to say the least.

I've also added it to my blog list so that you can check it from time to time.

The Pakistan Hotel Bombing - Who's Next?

Yesterday's terrorist bombing of the Peshawar Pearl Continental Hotel in Peshawar, Pakistan is not something that we in the West should ignore.

According to a Fox News report from the site of the explosion, the homicide bomber attack breached the hardened checkpoint at the entrance to the hotel, and then the vehicle containing about a half ton of explosives was driven to a pre-arranged position in the hotel where the driver detonated the bomb. So far, eighteen people are reported dead. Damage to the hotel is pretty heavy. The bomb left a crater about six feet deep and about twelve feet wide, according to a Fox News reporter who was standing in it.

It sort of reminds you of the Oklahoma City bombing doesn't it? An explosive-laden vehicle causes massive damage to a large, concrete building. This was not a small explosion. The motive behind the Peshawar bombing is obvious: retaliation for the Pakistani government's military campaign against Al Quaeda in the Swat Valley. But what is also interesting, is that the hotel was under consideration by the United States government as a possible location for a U.S. Consulate. Either way, the bombing demonstrates that Al Quaeda is capable of attacking soft targets in response to military or diplomatic actions that it perceives as a threat.

As Al Quaeda seems to be regrouping and becoming bolder, I think it is certainly possible they could again stage similar attacks in western countries. Terrorist organizations need two things to flourish: money and active supporters. The way for Al Quaeda to continue its campaign of murder and terror is to appear to its supporters to be proactive and successful. And that is accomplished by attacks like the one in Peshawar. At some point, the terrorists will once again turn their attention to western Europe. Illegal immigrants from Afghanistan have already proved that once they gain access to one of the European Union member states, they can travel freely throughout the continent, and even into the UK. It isn't hard to imagine that terrorists can do the same.

Al Quada must surely be loooking to pull off another high profile bombing such as the ones in England in July, 2005, and in Spain in March, 2004. Free and open societies are vulnerable to these attacks. The question is, who's next?

We have to be vigilant. Terrorist attacks against civilian targets are not always prevented by the authorities. As individuals, we have to take care of our own personal security. And that begins with being constantly aware of our surroundings. If you are not already living in Condition Yellow, I suggest you read my essay, "What is Condition Yellow and Why Should We Care?" on this blog site.

Where's Al Gore?

Let me see if I've got this right: Two journalists who work for Al Gore's Current TV channel were arrested by North Korean guards near the Chinese border. They have been tried and convicted of "grave crimes" and sentenced to 12 years in a North Korean labor camp.

People over here are speaking out. Hillary Clinton in her role as Secretary of State, has spoken against the trial. The U.S. Government has expressed concern. There has even been talk of former New Mexico governor Bill Richardson negotiating a release, which he has done before with the North Koreans.

But Al Gore has remained silent. Newsmax reports that, "Gore had no comment."

I don't expect Mr. Global Warming to just drop what he's doing and go sailing off to north Korea to negotiate the release of two people who work for him. The Nobel Peace Prize winner is far too busy saving the planet. Right? But how long would it take for him to issue a simple statement like, "Hey, Kim Jomg Il! Let my people go, or we will take your carbon credits away."

But seriously, am I the only one who thinks that even a simple public statement from Mr. Pulitzer, condemning the trial, would at least be the decent thing to do for people who work for him?

Hmmm. Okay, maybe Bill Richardson would be more effective.

D Day + 1

photo: GIs train for the invasion at Slapton Sands, south coast of England, 1944. [photo courtesy U.S. Army Center of Military History]

While we're on the subject of the invasion of Normandy, it's appropriate to remember that the invasion didn't just happen. The planning and preparations literally took years. One of the biggest feats was to assemble the necessary manpower and equipment, and train the troops, to be able to pull off the largest invasion in history. And they would likely only get one chance to do it.

The British Army lost most of its equipment when it evacuated from the French beaches at Dunkirk in 1940 as Hitler's armies advanced across France. Starting around 1942, massive amounts of arms, munitions and other equipment were shipped to Britain from America. Without these supplies, the Brits would not have been able to continue the war. In addition, thousands of American and Canadian troops also arrived--a total of 1.5 million ground troops, and an additional 500,000 airmen and sailors. Thousands of men and women who had escaped from Nazi-occupied Europe also managed to reach Britain with the intention of fighting to free their homelands: French, Poles, Czechs, Dutch, Belgians, and Norwegians all gravitated to Britain to fight the war.

Huge bases were set up in England to house and train the invasion troops. Farm land was acquired to build airfields for British and American bomber and fighter aircraft, so that they could conduct raids into occupied Europe and Germany. A lot of the civilian population in England were required to give up their houses, farms and villages to make way for the bases. American forces were assigned to the counties of Cornwall, Devon, Dorset and Somerset on the southwest peninsula of England where there was space for them to train.

Sure, there was some friction between the locals and the tourists, but overall, it was an incredible example of people pulling together and making sacrifices for the common good. I came across this message that was posted on a church in south Devon, where the local population had to leave in order to make way for the U.S. Army:

"TO OUR ALLIES OF THE USA: This church has stood here for several hundred years. Around it has grown a community, which has lived in these houses and tilled these fields ever since there was a church. This church, this churchyard in which their loved ones lie at rest, these homes, these fields are as dear to those who have left them as are the homes and graves and fields which you, our Allies, have left behind you. They hope to return one day, as you hope to return to yours, to find them waiting to welcome them home. They entrust them to your care meanwhile, and pray that God's blessing may rest upon us all." signed, Charles, Bishop of Exeter.

[extract from "The Normandy Landings" by Derek Blizard 1993, Reed International Books, ISBN 0-600-57905-0]

D-Day in Europe

photo: The first view that many soldiers had of France was from the deck of a landing craft like this one. In many cases, incoming fire from German machine guns also made it the last view they had.


Today is the sixty-fifth anniversary of the allied landings in Normandy, France; the largest one-day invasion in history. The invasion force consisted primarily of American, British, and Canadian troops, but also included soldiers from most commonwealth countries and european soldiers who had escaped from their own occupied countries to fight on the side of the allies (sorry if I left anybody out).

A successful allied invasion of Europe was essential to support the previous invasion in the Mediterranian sea by allied forces landing in Italy. Without it, the war with Nazi Germany could have dragged on for years, and the way that the world looks today would have been vastly different. The Americans who took part in World war Two, young service people from every state in America, people who worked in factories building tanks, aircraft, and ships, have been appropriately named "The greatest generation." Without them, and their counterparts in allied countries, it's conceivable that the entire world may be living today under the rule of German fascism.

The landings by sea were conducted across five Normandy beaches; Two for the American forces, codenamed "Utah" and "Omaha", and two for the British forces: "Gold" and "Sword", and one beach, "Juno" for the Canadians. In addition, American and Commonwealth airborne troops landed by parachute and glider.

The logistics and preparations involved in mounting such an operation took years. I remember my mother, who was driver in the British Army at the time, telling me how she and the other female drivers in her unit spent months in the lead up to the invasion hauling naval shells from the factory to the south coast of England.

The surviving veterans are now all in their eighties, or older. They are dying at a rate of about 300,000 each year.

So if you know one, today may be a good time to ask them if they would like to talk a little bit about their experiences sixty-five years ago. Many of them don't want to remember, but at the very least, you might take the time to say thanks. The world war two generation made history and shaped the future.



The U.S. cemetery in Cambridge, England, contains the remains of 3,812 of American war dead from World War II.

A New Aspect of Domestic Terrorism

The Muslim convert who shot two U.S. Army soldiers in Little Rock, Arkansas on June 1st may herald the beginning of a type of terrorism that is relatively new to the United States, but is very familiar to Israelis, Iraqis, the Irish, and other nationalities.

We in the USA have seen criminal attacks by lone gunmen before: Charles Whitman, who killed 14 people at the University of Texas, mostly from atop a tower, in 1966; Patrick Purdy - the Stockton, California school shootings in 1989, for example. But in other parts of the world, similar attacks have been carried out for political reasons: U.S. Army Colonel Nick Rowe was assigned to provide counter-insurgency training to the Armed Forces of the Phillipines. In 1989, on his way to work one morning, Colonel Rowe's vehicle was ambushed and he was shot dead by two Filipinos.

So, what has been happening around the world for decades has come to America; the deliberate assassination of individuals for political or religious motives. The shooting of the two soldiers, and the subsequent discovery on the assassin's computer of other targets indicates the possibility that this was more than just one lunatic's plan to get even with the world. At best, he alone intended to target other individuals. At worst he is part of a conspiracy--a terrorist group--to attack americans on our own soil. If the history of other nations is anything to go by, sooner or later, politically motivated assassinations of targeted individuals will occur here. We may very well have already seen the first. The big advantage an attacker has is that he blends in with the locals right up to the point where he begins his attack. Mao said that a terrorist is a fish in a sea of humanity, and he was right.

The question is, how do we handle such attacks? As a nation, we can no longer expect our military to be the first and only line of defense as we have done up to now with wars overseas such as Iraq and Afghanistan. Likewise, we cannot expect our police, from the FBI at the federal level to individual state, county, and city departments, to prevent attacks or stop them once they are under way. The cops cannot be everywhere, and it's likely that they would be unable to respond to such an attack in time.

The answer lies with us, as civilians. Fortunately, we live in a country where some form of concealed or open carry of a firearm is allowed in about 48 of the fifty states. Somewhere there is a statistic that says that armed, law-abiding civilians shoot (in self-defense) about the same number of violent criminals each year as the police do. That means that there is at least a chance in many parts of the country that if a terrorist attack similar to the one in Little Rock happens, an armed citizen or two might be on hand to deal with it.

We have only to look at what types of attacks occur in other countries to see what we might be up against here; shootings and bombings. The Israelis have lots of experience in dealing with both. When a terrorist has shot up a restaurant or some other public place, Israeli civilians have defended themselves and those around them, and in many cases they have prevailed. Defense against a terrorist wearing an explosive vest--a homicide bomber--is tougher because these people have no intention of living through the attack. But nonetheless, a well placed round or two in the brain box may prevent an explosion, or at least stop the attacker before he enters a building.

There are no easy solutions to the problem of people who look like the rest of us right up until the point where they launch their attack on civilians. The goal of people in this country should be to ensure that we are not helpless or hapless civilians. Concealed carry is an essential tool, but so is constant vigilance, which we strive for by living in Condition Yellow--being constantly aware of our surroundings. We can learn the easy way from the lessons of other countries now, or we can learn the hard way from attacks here later.

Free NRA Membership

The NRA is offering a free, one-year trial membership. Now, even in these tough economic times, there is really no excuse for any gunowner, or anyone who values the freedoms bestowed upon us in the Bill of Rights to not join the gun lobby's nine-hundred pound gorilla.

Just go to: https://www.nrahq.org/nrabonus/accept-membership.asp

If ever there was a time since the Clinton administration for gunowners to unite to defend the Second Amendment, this is it! The assault weapons ban is hanging around out there, and so is Congressman Bobby Rush's bill H.R.45 that would put severe restrictions on handgun ownership.

But Ben Franklin said it best: "We must, indeed, all hang together or, most assuredly, we shall all hang separately."

Why Socialists Don't See Illegal Immigration as a Threat to National Security and Sovereignty

This evening I had one of those rare (for me) forehead-slapping why-didn't-I-think-of-this-before? moments.

The TV news channel, World Focus aired a report from Greece about the number of immigrants from Afghanistan (mostly young men) that are illegally entering the country as a way to get into Europe, and then ultimately to Britain.

This is nothing new for the Brits. For a decade or more, the British government, first under Prime Minister Tony Blair, and now under Gordon Brown, has ignored the flood of illegals from north Africa, middle eastern countries, and elsewhere and simply labeled them as asylum seekers.

Watching this similar situation in Greece, it occurred to me that socialists like Blair, Brown and most of the ruling Labour party that has been in power in Britain since 1997, have an agenda to make their socialist policies global. And if that's the case, why would they care where anyone of any nationality lives?

As a legal immigrant myself, I sympathize with individuals who do whatever they have to in order to live in a country other than the one in which they were born. But sympathizing with an individual's plight doesn't make their actions right or lawful. I believe in the rule of law, and the importance of each nation's individual sovereignty.

In Blair, Brown, and other socialist politician's vision, there would only be two classes: The socialist ruling class, and the rest of us. No national governments or national borders and boundaries. So what would it matter to them where a person was born and where they decided to live?

Forget Guns. What About Mexico's "Assault Jet Skis?"

It appears that Mexican drug traffickers are using jet skis to smuggle drugs into the United States.

There is a simple solution to this: Instead of the Mexican government exaggerating the number of guns that are smuggled across the border from America to Mexico, and demanding that we ignore our Bill of Rights and ban so-called assault weapons, let us demand that the Mexican Government ban ownership of jet skis.

Of course, in the real world, that isn't going to happen. But why should law-abiding Americans allow one of our rights to be infringed upon because of some fabricated story from a foreign government? And even if it was possible for the Mexican government to enact jet ski legislation, the argument from south of the border would undoubtedly be that law-abiding Mexicans have a right to own a jet ski, and that if jet skis are banned, only criminals will have them.

Exactly.

Colorado Governor Ritter Vetoes Background Check bill

On Friday, May 15, Governor Bill Ritter (D) vetoed Colorado house Bill 1180.

The bill, passed by both houses, would have exempted Colorado concealed handgun permit holders from the background check requirement for the purchase of a firearm. That may be scary to some people, but the truth is that people who are granted concealed carry permits have to undergo a stringent background check as part of their application.

The current National Instant Check System (NICS) that performs a criminal background check on potential gun buyers at the point of sale is overloaded to the point that there is nothing instant about it. Frequently, buyers have to wait at the gun store for hours while the gun dealer hangs on the phone, waiting for the system to perform the check. Quite often shoppers must return to the store the following day to purchase and pick up their new firearm.

HB1180 would have relieved some of the load on the system by allowing people who have a concealed weapons permit to purchase a firearm (remember, most likely they already own at least one) without having to endure the background check. It should have been a simple administrative change to the system, but the Governor saw fit to not streamline an overloaded procedure.

This wasn't really a gun bill because it didn't change anything except a bureacratic procedure that costs taxpayers money. Feel free to contact the governor at (303) 866-2471.

Memorial Day in Boulder

Boulder, Colorado has something of a reputation as a town run by goofy people. Certainly if you look at the decisions of the city council, (passing resolutions against the Iraq war, declaring that pet owners are now animal guardians) not to mention the antics of Ward Churchill, it may not be a surprise to know that those of us who live outside Boulder city limits refer to the town as "seventeen square miles surrounded by Reality".

But one thing that we can all be proud of Boulder for is its hosting every Memorial Day for the past 31 years of the Bolder Boulder 10K run. This is one of the most popular and well-attended 10k street races in the country. Professional runners from countries like Ethiopia compete here. Tens of thousands of amateur runners and walkers run the ten kilometers (about 6.2 miles) every Memorial Day for fun.

And the race is linked directly to remembrance of our veterans with a flyover by military aircraft and participation in the run by many of our local servicemen and women.

Every year, people show up along the route to show their support for the runners. You will find guys with a guitar and an amp standing at the side of the road, playing to the crowd. There are at least two groups of belly dancers, Blues Brothers impersonators, and some pretty good local bands.















This year, my wife and I hung out on Pearl Street with our friends from King For a Day (KFAD), a local rock band. Above Right photo: left to right, Vicar (lead guitar), Simon (acoustic guitar and vocals), Goose (bass guitar)and Johnny (drums).

But the Bolder Boulder isn't just about running and music, it's definitely a chance for some self-expression:















Below, KFAD's Vic(left) and Goose rockin' out with the runners.



















But you know the really great thing about Memorial Day in Bolder?



Nobody gets left out...

Ronald Regan on Memorial Day

Today is Memorial Day. It is the day that Americans pause for a moment to remember, honor, and give thanks to all the people in our five service branches, the Army, Navy, Marine Corps, Air Force, and Coast Guard, who have sacrificed themselves for our country. The rest of us owe these people for everything that we have. Spanning four centuries, every war fought by Americans from the Revolutionary War to the two world wars, Korea, Vietnam, and the current Global War on Terror, has influenced who we are as a nation, and what we have accomplished.

I wanted to write something profound to mark this important day. But in the course of my research I came across the speech that President Ronald Reagan gave at Arlington cemetary on Memorial Day, 1982. He said it so much better than I ever could, so here is a particularly relevant excerpt from one of this country's greatest presidents. God bless our service people, our veterans, and our country:

"The willingness of some to give their lives so that others might live never fails to evoke in us a sense of wonder and mystery. One gets that feeling here on this hallowed ground, and I have known that same poignant feeling as I looked out across the rows of white crosses and Stars of David in Europe, in the Philippines, and the military cemeteries here in our own land. Each one marks the resting place of an American hero and, in my lifetime, the heroes of World War I, the Doughboys, the GI's of World War II or Korea or Vietnam. They span several generations of young Americans, all different and yet all alike, like the markers above their resting places, all alike in a truly meaningful way.

"Winston Churchill said of those he knew in World War II they seemed to be the only young men who could laugh and fight at the same time. A great general in that war called them our secret weapon, ``just the best darn kids in the world.'' Each died for a cause he considered more important than his own life. Well, they didn't volunteer to die; they volunteered to defend values for which men have always been willing to die if need be, the values which make up what we call civilization. And how they must have wished, in all the ugliness that war brings, that no other generation of young men to follow would have to undergo that same experience.

"As we honor their memory today, let us pledge that their lives, their sacrifices, their valor shall be justified and remembered for as long as God gives life to this nation. And let us also pledge to do our utmost to carry out what must have been their wish: that no other generation of young men will ever have to share their experiences and repeat their sacrifice.

"Earlier today, with the music that we have heard and that of our National Anthem -- I can't claim to know the words of all the national anthems in the world, but I don't know of any other that ends with a question and a challenge as ours does: Does that flag still wave o'er the land of the free and the home of the brave? That is what we must all ask."

President Ronald Reagan, Memorial Day, 1982.

The Taurus Judge revolver

I recently had a chance to evaluate the "Judge" revolver, made by Taurus. This is a five-shot revolver with a short barrel, chambered for both .45 Long Colt and .410 shotgun ammunition. At first glance, I was sceptical. With its three-inch barrel, it is a rather large snubnose revolver to carry only five rounds of .45 ammo. I'm sure the sub-compact .45 caliber semi-auto pistols are slimmer, with a slightly higher capacity. So what's the big deal with the Judge?

The big deal is that you have the firepower of a .410 pump action shotgun in something the size of a pistol. When we loaded it up with .410 buckshot rounds, we found that it put a pattern of buckshout about 3-4 inches wide on paper at about twelve yards. I shot it on eight-inch diameter falling steel plate targets at about the same distance, and had one of the fastest runs on steel I can remember! The large red fiber optic front sight was very quick to pick up and place over the target.

This gun is touted by Taurus as being a good choice for close quarters self-defense, particularly in a bedroom in case of home invasion, or in a car, in case of a car jacking. I'd also add that I think it would very good for people who sail small boats where piracy is a threat.

Al I can say is, I want one!

The Best Defense: Survival

I was fortunate to be invited by Michael Bane to put in some work on his upcoming "The Best Defense" series that airs on the Outdoor Channel. Along with highly accomplished Sci-fi author and US serviceman Michael Z. Williamson, the three of us have just finished a couple of days filming some material on survival. This includes discussions of how to bug out or escape from a life-threatening situation, and also some pointers on surviving hard times if the economy continues to follow Plan B, while the government follows Plan A.

If you haven't seen Michael Bane's blog, it's full of good firearms, shooting, and Second Amendment related news.

Don't be Too Harsh on Pelosi

Poor Nancy Pelosi. Every time she says something about what she was told, what she knew, what she understood about what she was told, who lied to her about waterboarding and torture methods, it all just seems to get twisted by the evil CIA, the Republicans, and the media.

Some people are even beginning to question how long she can remain as the Speaker of the House. The audacity of those right-wingers who hope to bring her down!

I say, don't be too harsh on Speaker Pelosi. If she is forced to step down from her position as Speaker, we may get some replacement who is competent enough to do some real legislative damage.

I for one hope that she's around until 2010. By then, we may have a functioning Republican party and an electorate that is tired of the Democrats trial and error approach to some of those annoying things that keep them up at night, singing Kumbaya around the hot tub. You know, stuff like the on-again, off-again ideas of a catch-and-release program for terrorists (oops, can we still use that word?). By 2010, into our twentieth stimulus program, with the Dow Jones at 3,000 points, civil rights advocates in California clamoring for english to be taught in schools, and Chrysler and GM reduced to selling ride-on lawnmowers, we may just be able to install a Republican as Speaker of the House.

You go, Nancy Girl, but not just yet.

HB1180 -- A Pro-Gun Bill in Colorado

When a statewide instant background check system was first implemented back in the late nineties, anyone who had a concealed weapons permit could buy a gun without having to submit to the background check. Later, the regulations were changed and anybody, including CCW permit holders had to undergo the instant check (which the gun dealer conducted by phone) when purchasing any firearm from an FFL dealer.

The problem was that with the increasing number of sales of firearms over the past year or two, the phone call background check is no longer instant. It can take several hours sometimes for dealers to get through to the government database and verify that it's OK to sell the gun to the customer.

Well in Colorado, both houses of the legislature have passed House Bill 1180, that grants FFL dealers the right to waive the instant check for CCW permit holders. The bill is on its way to Governor Bill Ritter's (D) desk for signing.

No word yet if the Governor will sign it, but considering it's harder to get a CCW permit than it is to pass the instant check, logically, signing the bill should be a formality. We'll see if logic prevails. Stay tuned.

Today is Victory in Europe Day. What have We Learned?

Sixty Four years ago today, the part of the Second World War that was fought in Europe was officially brought to an end when the president of Germany, Admiral Donitz (Hitler's successor) surrendered to the Allies. The war in the Pacific against Japan would continue a while longer. But for the people of Europe, the war that had begun in September of 1939 was finally over on May 8th 1945.

In 1938, British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain met with Adolf Hitler in an attempt to avoid a war between Britain and Germany.

The following is the wording of the statement that Neville Chamberlain waved when he stepped off the plane after the conference in Berlin had ended on 30 September, 1938.

"We, the German Führer and Chancellor, and the British Prime Minister, have had a further meeting today and are agreed in recognizing that the question of Anglo-German relations is of the first importance for two countries and for Europe.

"We regard the agreement signed last night and the Anglo-German Naval Agreement as symbolic of the desire of our two peoples never to go to war with one another again.

"We are ... determined to continue our efforts to ... contribute to assure the peace of Europe."

Chamberlain read this statement to a cheering crowd in front of 10 Downing St. and said;

"My good friends this is the second time in our history that there has come back from Germany to Downing Street peace with honor. I believe it is peace in our time."

On September 3rd, 1939, Britain and France went to war with Germany, after Germany invaded Poland.

What can we learn from the lessons of history?

1) Aggressor nations cannot be appeased by simple negotiation. We must always negotiate from a position of strength if we want to win and survive against dictators and aggressive ideologies.

2) Maintaining a strong military is the final solution to aggression after all other political and diplomatic methods have been exhausted.

3) It is naive and dangerous to assume that we can change the minds of heads of state or people of other countries, civilizations, or religeons simply by talking to them and assuming that while we don't understand their reasons and point of view, they will easily see ours and come over to our way of thinking.

Today, we face threats to our nation's security, and the security of our allies on many fronts: Nuclear proliferation, the spread of nuclear weapons to rogue nations is upon us. Radical islamic terorrism is here and growing. We cannot secure our borders. We cannot afford to fight another large war.

But we absolutely cannot afford to appease dictators and rogue nations. History is clear about what happens when we try.

Are We Ready for PAKIS-TALIBAN?

The Taliban is back. They have managed to take over a province in northern Pakistan, and the Pakistani government has made the mistake of trying to appease the Taliban by allowing them to impose Sharia law in that region.

No doubt, the Pakistani government hoped that if they gave in to the Taliban and threw them a bone, the radical religious group would be satisfied. But no. The Taliban is on the march to secure a much larger area. I'm sure it's obvious to a lot of people that the ultimate goal of this group is to take control of the entire country.

Currently, the Pakistani military is fighting the Taliban in the Swat Valley, with the nation's capital of Islamabad only about sixty miles away.

If Pakistan's nuclear arsenal falls into Taliban hands, it changes the whole balance of power in the region, and in the world. India would have a rogue state armed with nukes on its border.

My question is, where is the UN? Where is the organization that wants to impose a worldwide ban on private ownership of firearms, but doesn't seem to be worried about the potential for terrorists holding nuclear weapons?
Where is the UN, the organization that intends to tell parents how they can discipline their children, but ignores the abuse that muslim women have to endure under Sharia Law?

I'm not sure which organization is the bigger threat to western civilization--the Taliban, or the United Nations.