Ordinary Majesty, Extraordinary Failure

November 12, 2009 | Filed Under Democrats/Leftists, Government, Corruption, Islam, Islamofascism, John Armor, Security/Safety, Terrorism, War on Terror | No Comments

-By John Armor

Until the mass murder at Fort Hood intervened, I’d intended to write about Thursday’s bingo night to benefit the Girl Scouts.

It was a cold and stormy night. Almost all of the summer visitors are gone. We thought there’d be sparse attendance at the monthly charity bingo game put on by the Rotary Club. But the place was packed, wall to wall. Dozens of Brownies and Girl Scouts in uniform were scurrying about, serving the players.

Final figures weren’t available on the spot. From prior experience, however, I’m sure more than $1,000 was raised for the Scouts.

How ordinary is that? Rotary sponsoring bingo to benefit the Girl Scouts in a small town 12 miles south of Nowhere? And yet, as Alexis de Tocqueville observed in his1831 masterpiece, Democracy in America, we are a nation of joiners. We get active in thousands of organizations to help ourselves, and each other. That is the ordinary majesty woven into the fabric of our nation.

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Wars and Dead Soldiers

November 5, 2009 | Filed Under Afghanistan, Anti-Americanism, Barack Obama, Campaign Finance, Democrats/Leftists, Economy/Finances, Elections, Freedom, Government, Corruption, John Armor, Liberals, President, Society/Culture, Taxes | No Comments

-By John Armor

Late last week, in the dead of night. President Obama made an unannounced trip to Dover, Delaware, where he was photographed saluting some flag-covered coffins that were coming in from Afghanistan. There were about 18 coffins on this day. And afterwards, Obama said that this experience “would influence his decision” on troop levels and future policies in the war in that Afghanistan.

Well, first I fault the press. I’ve been saying for years that facts on war casualties, in Iraq, Afghanistan, or wherever, is defective. The national importance of casualties should be gauged by relative casualties in other, American wars. It’s called context. It is especially important in public issues involving deaths of Americans.

Is a disease or condition that kills ten children a year as worthy of public attention and millions of dollars of spending as a another disease that kills a thousand children a year? Put the question that way, and any sensible citizen or sensible politician will say, of course not. The focus and the spending should go where it will save the most lives, do the most good.

But that sort of question cannot be answered without the comparative statistics. Few things matter in the abstract. It is only when put in context that the importance of most fact can be weighed. By and large, the American press does not put death stories – civilian or military – in comparative context.

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Oxygen and Old Age

November 1, 2009 | Filed Under Humor, John Armor, Society/Culture | No Comments

-By John Armor

I hate defeat. No concessions. No quitting. No giving up before the goal is reached. Last week I made one of the greater concessions of my life. It was a concession to oxygen and old age.

All of us maintain a certain fiction, as long and as far as we can. Well, for Jack LaLanne, he’s still the same trim athletic guy he always was, and leading exercise groups at the age of 92. But for the rest of us, we are not the young, agile folks we once were.

Hair goes. Teeth go. Gravity takes hold of various body parts. Knees and other joints get stiff and uncooperative. We pretend it isn’t much. But all together, it’s a lot. It’s permanent. And, it’s all downhill.

But there is one symptom of deterioration I’ve always thought is an order of magnitude worse than all the others, combined. All of you have seen it. Some of you have experienced it. It is the plethora of take-along oxygen bottles that are appearing all across the greying face of America.

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A Slimy ‘Man,’ a Slimy Network

October 23, 2009 | Filed Under Conservatives, Democrats/Leftists, John Armor, Journalism, Liberals, Media Bias, Society/Culture | No Comments

-By John Armor

Last week, on air, Keith Olbermann (a leading personality, if there is such a thing on his network), described columnist Michelle Malkin as “a mashed up bag of meat with lipstick.” Before I discuss all the things wrong with this comment, the “man” who made it, his network, and its corporate owners, here are my prejudices in the matter.

First, I know and respect the journalistic abilities of Michelle Malkin. I was present in D.C. in February when she received an award for her work. On the other hand, I agree with the hundreds of millions of Americans who indicate their opinion of Olbermann’s show on MSNBC by tuning to other channels, any channels.

Olbermann’s previous job, before he got promoted per the Peter Principle, was as a sports reporter. To use a sports analogy, when he appears the stands are packed with people, disguised as empty seats. In short, I respect Malkin; I do not respect Olbermann.

That said, here’s what’s wrong about his false and grossly insulting attack on her: There is a nasty tendency in politics which applies mostly to women. People who oppose political opinions or factual statements made by women in a position to be heard, will often resort to ad hominem attacks. They will go on at length about how ugly the woman is, in various ways. If they are being really sleazy, they will attack the women for her presumed sexual habits.
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Peace Prizes for War and Death

October 10, 2009 | Filed Under Barack Obama, Democrats/Leftists, Government, Corruption, History, John Armor, Liberals, President, Society/Culture | No Comments

-By John Armor

Below are all the American Presidents and Vice Presidents who have received the Nobel Peace Prize, in order from first to most recent. It was an educational experience to review all the awards since the first was given in 1901. That bears on whether the Prize just awarded to President Obama is a positive or negative thing with respect to international war and peace.

1906 - (President) Theodore Roosevelt who “drew up the 1905 peace treaty between Russia and Japan.” T his was an actual shooting war, which ended with the Treaty which Roosevelt negotiated.

1919 - (President) T. Woodrow Wilson as “Founder of the League of Nations.” The fatal failure of the League of Nations was a major contributing factor in the outbreak of World War II. Had the League acted against Italy for its brutal invasion of Ethiopia in 1935, Germany might have been discouraged from invading Poland three years later. Major powers had a veto power on League actions, so Italy and Germany could and did prevent the League from acting to protect its member state. Ethiopia. The UN shares the same veto defect.
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Dubrovnik, Pearl of the Adriatic

October 5, 2009 | Filed Under Europe, John Armor | No Comments

-By John Armor

Dubrovnik, Croatia, in the former Yugoslavia, is a relatively new city by European standards. It began in the 7th century AD, when sailors and traders in its area built the first fortifications to protect themselves from raids by various interests, all classified as “barbarians.”

We would not have gone to this town except that it was one of the ports of call of the Costa Fortuna, an Italian ship with fine crew and service, on a eastern Mediteranian tour. We are very glad that by accident, we got to Dubrovnik.

It is one of the most successful of the city-states of Europe in maintaining its independence from various invaders and attackers. Venice held sway over the Republic of Dubrovnik for about a century. Napoleon conquered it in 1806 and on his fall, the European powers gave it to Austria. The Ottoman Empire conquered it during WW II. The remnants of the Yugoslavian Army laid siege to it for a year, shelled the town and killed thousands of people, but could not take the town.
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Julius and Julius (Caesar and Genachowski)

September 26, 2009 | Filed Under Communism, Congress, Constitution, Democrats/Leftists, Government, Corruption, John Armor, Liberals, Society/Culture | No Comments

-By John Armor

Two days ago we were sitting on the dock in Como, having a gellato, waiting for our ship to come in. Not actually a ship, just a small commuter boat that connects the small communities on the shores of Lake Como in northern Italy.

It is a breathtakingly beautiful place. I can see why VIPs come to a small hotel, built by a mediaeval Cardinal as his residence, just up the Lake. No wonder that George Clooney has a villa here, that is reached only by helicopter, or so the gossip says.

And, this area’s history reaches deep into the mists of time. The streets of the town were laid out about 2,500 years ago, when Julius Caesar conquered the city from its previous conquerer. I came to talk about the sweep of time and history, and how gellato in Italy is a divine concoction, compared to what bears that label in the US, and how going on vacation is good for the soul.
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A Million People Prove NPR Doesn’t Count

September 19, 2009 | Filed Under Anti-Americanism, Barack Obama, Congress, Conservatives, Democrats/Leftists, Economy/Finances, Government, Corruption, Health, John Armor, Journalism, Liberals, Media Bias, Security/Safety, Socialism, Society/Culture, Taxes, Tea Party | No Comments

-By John Armor

How many people still listen to NPR (National “People’s” Radio) and take it seriously? Apparently that list doesn’t include the editors and reporters for NPR. Two cases in point, both having to do with numbers.

As I was driving up to D.C. for the Rally on the Mall on Saturday, I heard NPR gushing over (excuse me, reporting on) the President Obama’s speech to a Joint Meeting of Congress. In that speech, the President said that “there are 30 million uninsured Americans.” Notice that the number dropped from 45 million because that part of the uninsured are not Americans. They are mostly citizens of Mexico.

The polling of the American people on health care reform has made it crystal clear they do not want American tax dollars paying premiums for foreign citizens. Remember that Cong. Joe Wilson called out, “You lie,” when President Obama was claiming that health care “reform” did not include the illegal aliens. Joe should certainly apologize for interrupting the President, with a true statement.
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Birth of a New Political Party

September 11, 2009 | Filed Under Elections, Government, Corruption, John Armor, Society/Culture, State Government | No Comments

-By John Armor

The last time a new American political party came into being, one strong enough to elect a President, was in 1854. As you have guessed, that was the Republican Party. Its first elected President was Abraham Lincoln in 1860.

Many third party and independent campaigns have been mounted since then. The Progressive Party around 1900 managed to elect Governors and majorities in the legislature of several states. Their high water mark was in 1912, when former President Teddy Roosevelt chose that Party as his vehicle to run again when the Republicans declined to nominate him, again. (No, there never was a “Bull Moose Party.” Don’t send letters and postcards claiming that there was.)
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A Fitting Legacy for Teddy

September 4, 2009 | Filed Under Anti-Americanism, Barack Obama, Congress, Crime, Democrats/Leftists, Government, Corruption, John Armor, Journalism, Liberals, Media Bias, Society/Culture | No Comments

-By John Armor

What would make a fitting legacy for Ted Kennedy in the Senate? I think it would be the election of a Senator to take his place, who committed to the same great public ideas that Senator Kennedy spoke about, so often and passionately.

Teddy often spoke of his dedication to and respect for the Constitution. This is to be expected where Sam Adams created the Sons of Liberty who threw the tea in Boston Harbor. And where the first shots of the American Revolution were fired at, and later fired by, the Minutemen at Concord and Lexington. So, the person who replaces Teddy should never vote to confirm as a judge, much less a Justice of the Supreme Court, anyone who has stated his or her intent to follow personal choices, rather than the Constitution itself, in deciding cases.

Again and again, decade after decade, Teddy bellowed his insistence for “new and fresh ideas” in the government. That’s an excellent idea. But new and fresh ideas do not usually come from tired old men. So, the person who replaces Teddy should support what John Adams called, “rotation in office.”
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The Plame Blame Game, for Real

August 28, 2009 | Filed Under Anti-Americanism, Congress, Conservatives, Democrats/Leftists, Dick Cheney, Government, Corruption, John Armor, Journalism, Liberals, Media Bias, Security/Safety | No Comments

-By John Armor

The Associated Press reported today (Friday) that lawyers for certain detainees at the Gitmo Prison in Cuba, possibly violated federal criminal law by releasing the identity of CIA covert operatives. The current Justice Department investigation connects to both the Valerie Plame matter a few years ago, and the current issue of where and how Gitmo detainees should be charged and tried.

First, the Plame affair. According to the mainstream media, that was about the “outing” of a CIA “covert operative” in violation of federal law. But that law applied only to people who had been a covert operative “within five years.” The only person who identified her as a CIA covert operative within five years of her service was her husband, who let the cat out of the bag in a Who’s Who entry.

She wasn’t outed by anyone, per the law. And it turned out further that the person who gave her name and status to Bob Novak for his column, was the
Chief of Staff to Secretary of State Colin Powell. What Administration he represents, and even what party, depends on when those questions are asked.
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Randy and Susan

August 23, 2009 | Filed Under Family, John Armor, Marriage, Society/Culture | No Comments

-By John Armor

Some names just belong together. Mention one, and the other comes to mind automatically. Romeo and Juliet. Tom and Jerry. Currier and Ives. So it is with Randy and Susan, who came up this weekend to hike a part of the Bartram Trail and had dinner with us on Saturday.

Randy is E. Randolph Wootton, Jr., a classmate and friend of mine for six years at the Gilman School in Baltimore. Susan is Susan White Wootton, also a friend at the same time, who attended Notre Dame Preparatory School in Baltimore.

I graduated in a class of 66, as I recall. There were exactly two of my classmates who had dated the same girl for all their years since they first discovered girls. Both pairs married, had children, went into their professions. In one couple, Walter Leach tragically died young, twenty-five years ago. So, that left Randy and Susan as the one, lifetime pair.

Several of us in the class dated Susan on occasion. She was, and is, attractive, witty, with a fine sense of humor. But there was never any doubt that Randy was her guy. End of discussion. And the same was true for Randy. Susan was, since they began dating at about age 15 his lady. End of discussion.
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Column 666, about President Obama

August 16, 2009 | Filed Under Anti-Americanism, Barack Obama, Budget, Business, Communism, Congress, Constitution, Democrats/Leftists, Economy/Finances, Energy, Free Trade, Freedom, Global Warming, Government, Corruption, Health, John Armor, Journalism, Liberals, Media Bias, President, Science, Security/Safety, Socialism, Society/Culture, Taxes | No Comments

-By John Armor

This is the 666th column in this weekly series. It had to be spent on an overarching subject. So it is.

President Barack Obama is the most accomplished liar I have ever encountered, and that includes several pathological liars I faced in court. The best of those I could not rattle even with a well-prepared and vigorous cross-examination. Only the weight of solid facts from other sources served to expose and defeat those people.

Pathological liars can give the impression that they are telling the truth because they are smooth, accomplished, and effective. But the most important reason is that they have learned to lie to themselves. When they tell a bald-faced lie, right to your face, they actually believe what they are saying.

I’ll use exactly one example. On the campaign trail, Obama repeatedly said that “no one earning less than $250,000 a year will pay any additional taxes.” This was his definition of the middle class, in his universal mantra of no new taxes for the bulk of Americans.
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Cash for Clunkers, Gatesgate, Plus A Special Treat

August 10, 2009 | Filed Under Anti-Americanism, Barack Obama, Book Reviews, Budget, Business, Communism, Congress, Democrats/Leftists, Economy/Finances, Free Trade, Freedom, Government, Corruption, John Armor, Journalism, Liberals, Media Bias, President, Republicans, Socialism, Society/Culture, Taxes, The Law, Welfare | No Comments

-By John Armor

Let’s begin with the easiest subject to understand – economics. Last week two important events happened. The Cash for Clunkers program shut down when it burned through money planned for four months, in four days. And based on a previously passed federal law, the minimum wage went up again.

Now, the two programs are different in size. The minimum wage only increased by 70 cents an hour; whereas, the Clunker program is/was giving away up to $4,500 per transaction. So, the change was both larger and faster in the latter instance. I was on the road on family business and saw a hand-lettered sign in a Tennessee Tasty-Freeze that said, “Prices have increased due to wage increases.”

The bottom line is simple, and every student who was awake during the first day of Economics 101 knows it. When the price of anything goes up, people buy less of it. For sure, assorted studies by economists hired by labor unions have produced “academic” studies showing that raising the minimum wage does not cost anyone their jobs. But no honest studies support that conclusion.
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Of Scouts, Scholarship and Swans

July 23, 2009 | Filed Under Children, Conservatives, Democrats/Leftists, Elections, Family, John Armor, Liberals, Society/Culture | No Comments

-By John Armor

Today I read an obscure book which is adequately written. Its subject is not of front-burner importance, all things considered. And yet, it tells a story that entirely too many Americans are unaware of, but should be. The book is “Legacy of Honor, the Values and Influence of America’s Eagle Scouts,” by Alvin Townley.

There are now about two million people in the US who hold the rank of Eagle Scout, of the 110 million Americans who have ever been part of the Boy Scouts of America. The Eagles are a small fraction of Scouts, a tiny fraction of the nation’s population. Yet, they are present far out of their proportion among astronauts, Congressmen (not necessarily a recommendation), business leaders, military officers, and last but best, among the winners of the Congressional Medal of Honor.

Why is this all true?
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Judge Sonia Sotomayor: Liar?

July 18, 2009 | Filed Under Barack Obama, Congress, Democrats/Leftists, Government, Corruption, John Armor, Judges, Liberals, President, Society/Culture, Supreme Court, The Law | No Comments

-By John Armor

Here is what Judge Sotomayor said in her opening statement to the Senate Judiciary Committee yesterday. She said, “my judicial philosophy… is simple: fidelity to the law. The task of a judge is not to make the law — it is to apply the law.”

On seven occasions, one by example in an opinion, she made clear an opposite opinion, that the outcome of a case decided by a judge of her style of decision-making, can and should be varied according to the “experience” of the judge. She wrote and published, “a wise Latina woman with the richness of her experience would more often than not reach a better conclusion that a while male who hasn’t lived that life.”
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A Map-Based Answer to the Palin Question

July 15, 2009 | Filed Under Crime, Democrats/Leftists, Elections, John Armor, Journalism, Liberals, Media Bias, Sarah Palin, Society/Culture, State Government | No Comments

-By John Armor

[I wrote this column a week ago, and posted it on the Internet without sending it to my usual publishers. Since then, almost a dozen people who live in Alaska and regularly travel to the Lower 48, or the reverse, live in the Lower 48 and travel to Alaska, have responded to my column.

[Every one of those commentators have agreed with my point about the geographic facts – which almost all of the national, media pundits have missed in their hot-air speculations about the reasons for Governor Palin's resignation. It used to be that I would remind members of the press of their first duty -- get the facts straight, before they go out dancing on spider webs of political speculation. But there is so much failure in this area today that it’s useless to point it out.]

There are two aspects of Governor Palin’s decision to resign now, which have not been competently discussed, or discussed at all, in the main stream media. One is based on the map, the other is based in American political history.
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Seven Generations of Service

July 8, 2009 | Filed Under John Armor, Military, Security/Safety, Society/Culture | No Comments

-By John Armor

I was asked to write a brief history of the Church of the Incarnation, in Highlands. North Carolina, for a local magazine. The piece was intended to be about the building itself, which is on the National Register of Historic Places, and was built in 1896. But you cannot research the history of a church without also researching the history of the people who brought that church into being.

Of the dozen people who formed the congregation for this church, one was Sarah Whiteside Norton. She was the first non-native American child born in the Highlands area, the daughter of Barak Norton, who moved to Whiteside Cove in 1825. The town of Highlands itself, did not exist until its land was purchased and mapped by Kelsey & Hutchinson in 1879. But that’s another story.

The priest for the tiny Episcopal community in Highlands was the Rec. Deal. On a starting salary of $100 he traveled on horseback and on foot among four widely separated communities, holding the first service in Highlands in 1879. Shortly after, there was a meeting in the home of the Postmaster, David Norton, to petition the Bishop to create a mission in that area. That was the first step toward creating a church, David Norton was the grandson of Barak Norton.
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Stayin’ Alive. Ah. Ha, Ha, Ha….

June 20, 2009 | Filed Under Budget, Constitution, Democrats/Leftists, Economy/Finances, Government, Corruption, John Armor, Liberals, Security/Safety, Society/Culture, Taxes | No Comments

-By John Armor

Saturday Night Fever begins with the classic scene of a very young John Travolta striding through the streets of Brooklyn. His shoes slap the pavement, his body sways to the rhythm of the Bee-Gees’ immortal song, played sotto voce, Stayin’ Alive. The story is about the attempt of the protagonist, his whole family, his friends and his community merely to survive.

Therein lies a lesson for our times.

The late, great Peter Drucker once wrote to the effect that, “Once an organization exceeds 1,000 people, its first purpose becomes self-preservation.” (Anyone who can find the precise quote in Professor Drucker’s monumental opera, please e-mail me.) The point, of course, is the tendency of any organization to become destructive of the ends for which it was created, when its staff goes to seed as bureaucrats.
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Sotomayor, Thomas, Twain, and the NY Times

June 11, 2009 | Filed Under Anti-Americanism, Barack Obama, Constitution, Democrats/Leftists, Education, Government, Corruption, John Armor, Judges, Liberals, Media Bias, President, Race, Society/Culture, Supreme Court | 1 Comment

-By John Armor

One of Mark Twain’s well-known quotes is this: “There are lies, damned lies, and statistics.” The humor works because it is based on truth. We all know there are those who play games with statistics to support a false conclusion. One of Twain’s own examples was that “the number of Methodists and murderers is rising at the same rate in the Nebraska Territory.” That “proved,” of course, that Methodists are murderers.

It is also possible, however, to present a lie by constructing a discussion with nothing but hard, provable facts. The New York Times demonstrated that fact today (Sunday) with a frontpage, above the fold article comparing Sonia Sotomayor, nominee to be a Justice on the Supreme Court, with Clarence Thomas, who has been a Justice since 1991. The title of that article is, “For Sotomayor and Thomas, Paths Fork at Race and Identity.”

I have read extensively on the backgrounds of Justice Thomas and Judge Sotomayor. I am satisfied that almost all of the facts about the childhoods, educations, writings and careers of these two judges in this article are accurate. It is true, as the article states, that both suffered great racial prejudice at all stages in their lives. It is true that they reacted somewhat differently to that prejudice.
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