Missile Defense System Faces Hostile Threat...From the President-Elect

Back in the days of the Soviet Union, as the Free World and the Communist World stared down nuclear barrels at each other, the relative peace was kept through the embrace of a doctrine called "Mutually Assured Destruction" or MAD.

The doctrine was indeed mad because, according to the doctrine, the only thing keeping the Soviets from launching a nuclear strike against the free world they had sworn to bury was the realization that we had enough nuclear might to destroy them in turn.

This doctrine did the job, but it kept the world on edge and on hair-trigger alert for some forty years. I was in the United States Air Force during the final years of the Cold War, and occasionally guarded those alert nuclear forces. I was also there, in the winter of 1991-1992, guarding B-1 bombers as nuclear warheads were taken off the alert bombers the afternoon President George H.W. Bush took our nuclear forces off alert for the first time in decades.

But some ten years or more before the end of the Cold War and the Soviet Union, a visionary saw the possibility for something better. This visionary saw an end to the threat of nuclear annihilation under which the peoples of earth had lived for too long. This wise man believed the United States could build a defense system which could stop incoming missiles without the threat of nuclear annihilation against an enemy.

That visionary was President Ronald Reagan, and his vision was the Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI), or "Star Wars" as his detractors often called it.

The plan looked at a number of possible defense options including land-based missile interceptors, space-based or aircraft-mounted lasers, kinetic weapons and many others. The idea was to knock out an incoming enemy nuclear missile strike before those missiles could take out our cities, killing millions of Americans.

While liberals in the United States may have been laughing at Reagan's "Star Wars," the Soviets most assuredly were not laughing. They took SDI very seriously.

In fact, when the Americans and Soviets met in Reykjavík, Icleand for nuclear disarmament talks, the Soviets were adamant that Reagan must give up SDI in order for negotiations on European intermediate-range nuclear missiles.

Reagan refused to budge, and negotiations eventually broke down. However, after the Soviets saw Reagan's resolve, a treaty was eventually worked out (with the important verification necessary to ensure compliance, and large numbers of intermediate-range missiles on both sides were decommissioned. I was also fortunate enough to have a front-row seat for part of this history, working at a Ground Launched Cruise Missile (GLCM) base in England when the Soviets visited for inspections.

Many experts credit Reagan's commitment to SDI not only for a vital contribution to...

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Man Doesn't Blame Pilot for F-18 Crash That Killed Family

The story of the F-18 that crashed in San Diego was remarkable enough on the face of it. After all, military aircraft don't crash every day, and they certainly don't often crash in residential areas.

This one unfortunately killed two adult women and two children who were in the home where the plane struck.

Remarkably, Dong Yun Yoon, the 37-year-old Korean immigrant who lost his family in the home, is not angry with the pilot at all.

While I'm sure the pilot did everything he could to avoid such a tragedy, many people might find themselves silent on the issue of blame while they sort out their feelings. Many, in our day and age of "blame someone, blame ANYONE," would have lashed out against the military and this pilot.

But Dong Yun Yoon says the pilot is a hero and bears him no ill will.

Our prayers go out to Dong Yun Yoon. He needs them no matter what. But this poor man also deserves to be commended for his remarkably mature attitude in the midst of this terrible personal tragedy.

May God bless and comfort him, and the F-18 pilot.

The Infamous Date at Pearl Harbor

American Minute from William J. Federer

"DECEMBER 7, 1941- a date which will live in infamy- the United States of America was suddenly and deliberately attacked by naval and air forces of the Empire of Japan."

Thus spoke President Franklin D. Roosevelt following the attack on Pearl Harbor by over 350 Japanese aircraft. Five American battleships and three destroyers were sunk, 400 planes were destroyed and over 4000 were killed or wounded.

President Roosevelt concluded: "No matter how long it may take us to overcome this premeditated invasion, the American people in their righteous might, will win through to absolute victory...We will not only defend ourselves to the uttermost but will make it very certain that this form of treachery shall never again endanger us."

FDR continued: "Hostilities exist. There is no blinking at the fact that our people, our territory, and our interests are in grave danger. With confidence in our armed forces- with the unbounding determination of our people- we will gain the inevitable triumph- so help us God."

(As a note, FDR's phrase "So help us God" is not on the new World War II Memorial in Washington, D.C. Of the over 500 words inscribed, the designers chose not to include any mention of God.)

William J. Federer is a nationally recognized author, speaker, and president of Amerisearch, Inc, which is dedicated to researching our American heritage. The American Minute radio feature looks back at events in American history on the dates they occurred, is broadcast daily across the country and read by thousand on the internet.

Yet Another Successful Missile Defense Test

Yet another successful test of our missile defense system occurred yesterday.

From Reuters:

The U.S. military conducted a successful test of its system built to knock out long-range missiles that could be fired by North Korea or Iran, the Pentagon said on Friday.

The target missile for the test over the Pacific was launched from Kodiak, Alaska and an interceptor was launched from Vandenberg Air Force Base, California, officials said. The intercept took place at 3:29 p.m. EST.

This is the much-maligned (by the Left) "Star Wars" missile defense system that President Ronald Reagan put in motion...and helped bring down the Soviet Union because they could not keep up with us militarily or technologically. The Soviets finally came realistically to the negotiating table in the 1980s and desperately wanted us to give up Strategic Missile Defense (SDI), but Reagan refused.

President Bill Clinton essentially mothballed the program during his presidency like a good flower child, but President George W. Bush revived the program and has successfully brought segments of the system online.

This missile defense system, which could protect the United States from missile attacks from belligerent nations such as North Korea, China or Iran, is the one president-elect Barack Obama is on record stating he intends to slash.

He wants to gut a weapons system which could save millions of American lives, when it only costs a fraction of the more than $1 trillion dollars spent on unconstitutional social spending every year.

Liberals would rather leave our nation vulnerable in order to spend even more money to hire government to do things that people should be doing for themselves.

What in the world is wrong with the Left's priorities?!

Thanksgiving Overseas for the Troops

Having spent several Thanksgivings overseas, I can attest that spending the holidays in a foreign land--especially being away from family--can be a bit lonely.

As we celebrate Thanksgiving today, please say a prayer of thanksgiving for our troops fighting to keep us free and safe, and a prayer for their safety and their spirits.

Obama May See Russia From Front Porch

When you don't stand up to bullies, thugs and other bad guys, they become emboldened.

How long will it take President-elect Barack Obama to learn this lesson?



From our friends at Americans for Limited Government.

Obama Already Shaky on Missile Defense

In this video, former UN ambassador John Bolton talks about President-elect Barack Obama's weakness on our missile defense system.

The Russians don't like it (surprise) and Obama appears ready to placate them.

Obama also says he's uneasy about doing anything positive about our missile defense system until it's "proven" its effectiveness.

As hard as it may be to believe, apparently our president-elect seems unaware that our missile defense system has been online for several years now. It has gone through multiple successful tests and was even used to knock down a failing satellite earlier this year.

You might recall that Ronald Reagan toppled the monolithic Soviet Union by refusing to compromise on missile defense...not kowtowing to the wishes of belligerent nations.

But Obama's intentions with regard to missile defense--and other key areas of our national defense--are really no mystery. He has already told us here that he plans to gut missile defense, cut future combat systems and degrade our nuclear arsenal.

We're in deep trouble, folks.

Obama Supporter: Obama Lacked Courage to Leave Racist Church

According to Rep. Jerrold Nadler (D-NY), the reason Barack Obama stayed in Rev. Jeremiah Wright's hate-filled church for 20 years wasn't because he agreed with all this hate; Obama just lacked the courage to leave.

From WorldNetDaily:

"Think of the history here. You have a guy who's half-white, half-black. He goes to an Ivy League school, comes to Chicago ... to start a political career. Doesn't know anybody.

"Gets involved with community organizing – why? Because that's how you form a base. OK. Joins the largest church in the neighborhood. About 8,000 members. ... Why did he join the church? ... Because that's how you get to know people.

"Now maybe it takes a couple years," states Nadler, claiming eventually Obama begins to view Wright differently. "'Jesus, the guy's a nut, the guy's a lunatic.' But you don't walk out of a church with 8,000 members in your district."

"He didn't have the political courage to make the statement of walking out," Nadler said of Obama.

You know, this explanation has a lot of merit. I really couldn't think of another reason why Obama would stay in such a racist, anti-American church--not just for "a couple of years" but for 20 years--like this...unless he stayed because he agreed with these racist, anti-American sentiments.

Given that Obama is surrounded by anti-American associates like the domestic terrorist Bill Ayers, PLO spokesman Rashid Khalidi, Ali Abunimah and others, maybe Obama fit in there better than we know. After all, terrorist organizations like Hamas and al-Qaida think pretty highly of him.

But even if Nadler is right and Obama just lacked the "political courage" to leave this hate-spewing church, what would such a huge lapse in courage bode for a President Obama on the national scene.

Would President Obama lack the political courage to oppose terrorist organizations like al-Qaida and Hamas? Would he have trouble summoning the courage to protect the U.S. from threats like Iran? Could he overcome his naive predilection to talk with America's enemies without precondition?

Could he get over the fear of hurting the feelings of his terrorist allies?

Words don't mean squat without tangible acts to back them up. What does Obama's history tell you about how he would handle America's enemies?

That's a question Americans need to consider first and foremost before pulling the lever tomorrow.

Sarah Palin: Two Big Reasons to Vote McCain-Palin

Sarah Palin breaks down two of the main reasons to vote for the McCain-Palin ticket and to oppose the Obama-Biden ticket with all our might.

1. Socialism is counterproductive and NOT the American way

2. We need a strong commander-in-chief to ensure solid national defense and not coddle our enemies.

Could Barack Obama Pass a Security Background Check?

Given all the shady characters (Bill Ayers, Rashid Khalidi, Ali Abunimah, et al) that Barack Obama has been associated with, the question has come up--understandably--of whether Obama could pass a security clearance background check like average Americans have to go through when working around sensitive national security information.

Fox News interviewed Daniel Pipes, Director of the Middle East Forum, (see video below) who doesn't think Obama would pass. Pipes sees Obama's associations with terrorists, anti-Americans and other radicals as a serious obstacle to a security clearance.

Pipes tells of a person who was looking to get a clearance to work at the National Security Agency (NSA) who had a French girlfriend; no dice on the clearance.

I remember when I was in the Air Force and came back to the States after spending three years overseas. While on leave between my last duty station and my upcoming one, I went to Del Rio, Texas to visit a friend stationed at the Air Force Base there. While I was there we went over into Mexico a few times since Del Rio sits right on the border. We just did a little sight-seeing, partying and dating some Mexican gals.

When I got to my next duty station, coincidentally I was up for a regularly scheduled security clearance review. One of the questions they ask is whether you've been to any foreign countries recently. When I told them I'd done a little partying in Mexico, suddenly the bright lights came on and they got the bamboo shoots ready for my fingernails. They were eventually satisfied I wasn't a commie spy or drug runner, but they gave me the third degree for a while.

But Barack Obama has associations with multiple radical anti-Americans going back many years. Most of these people have made it clear that they have immeasurable and burning hatred for the United States and would throw the party of the century if it was destroyed.

Because Obama is elected, he gets a free pass around the security standards average Americans would be held do.

If Obama is elected president, he will have access to ALL of America's national security information. He will be entrusted with America's national security itself.

Imagine that: someone who probably couldn't pass an average security background check, in charge of America's national security!

"You look at someone like Senator Obama with his plethora of very strong associations with radicals, with subversives, with anti-Americans, it's inconceivable to me that he could get a standard security clearance to work for the U.S. government."

Dictators Mock Obama's Ignorance

This video shows a meeting of the League of Rogue Nations and Iran's Mahmoud Ahmadinejad taking a call from President Barack Obama.

President Obama is eager to sit down with them without precondition.

"Tuesday is no good. Thursday they'll be busy enriching uranium, er, the bowling league night."

As the ad humorously points out, Obama's naivete is no match for our enemies.

Obama doesn't take seriously that they are our enemies...but they most certainly take us and hurting us seriously.

Obama: Dangerously Unqualified on the International Front

Great new John McCain ad!

It points out that Iran is a major sponsor of terrorism with nuclear intentions and belligerence toward our ally Israel and to America itself.

But Barack Obama lacks the fundamental understanding of evil necessary to recognize the threat from Iran. He sees it as "tiny" and unimportant (after all, there's a lot of your wealth that he'd rather be busy redistributing--now that's important!), and doesn't pose a serious threat.

America--and the world--can't afford this kind of naivete.

Inviting Attack on America

I and others have said that Barack Obama's soft approach and willingness to coddle evil around the world will invite evil to attack us.

Obama doesn't understand that when the thugs and dictators and terrorists and belligerent around the world see weakness in America, they aren't impressed--it encourages them to strike a weak enemy.

As odd as it seems, apparently Obama's running mate Joe Biden realizes this as well, and admitted it recently.

Listen to this video to hear Biden talk about the attack against America that will surely come if Obama is elected.

America has projected strength since 911, and we have not been attacked. If we go back to projecting weakness again, this will surely come to pass.

Questions McCain Should Have Asked Obama

John McCain missed some great opportunities tonight to really point out some important differences between himself and Barack Obama--and some critical deficiencies in Obama's judgment.

As Fred J. Eckert pointed out earlier today in his column at Human Events, McCain should have taken Obama up on his invitation and asked him, to his face,

“Why are you so comfortable keeping company with people who hate America?”

As important as so many issues are right now to our country, I can think of no more important one than this.

The welfare and defense of our country should come before health care, the economy, before social policy, before anything. If our country is under attack, our very lives and future as a country are at stake.

If someone in a position of power is friendly with people who hate our country, this is cause for alarm. If someone who wants to run our country is friendly with people who hate America, alarm should be off the scale.

Eckert has a few other choice comments he would have liked McCain to have made at the debate tonight:

“Senator Obama, aren’t you at all embarrassed that something you and Osama bin Laden have in common is that you both have associates who have bombed the Pentagon?”

“You were full grown and holding public office on 9/11 when Ayers was saying that he wished he had bombed more American targets.”

"You were full grown when Ayers appeared on the cover of a Chicago magazine stomping on an American flag.”

Read Eckert's full post for some more things it would be good to hear from Barack Obama on.

Along the same lines of Eckert's original question, there are some things I wish Obama would explain to me:

- Why do you want to lead a country that your pastor of 20 years seems to loathe so much?

- Why do you want to lead a country when you plan to gut the military defense of that country?

- Why do you want to lead a country that your wife could find no reason to be proud of until recently?

I also have a question I would like every Obama voter to explain to me: do you love America, and if you do, why would you vote for someone so surrounded by people who loathe America?

Obama's Confusion About the 'Iraq Distraction'

In today's Wall Street Journal, David Rivkin and Lee Casey pull the veil of naivete off the Left's assertion that Iraq is a "distraction" in the War on Terror

As in many other conflicts in American history, our enemies in this war operate in many geographically distinct theaters. The essence of being a good commander in chief is appreciating the connections among these theaters -- including the adversary's willingness to open new fronts -- rather than obsessing about where the last enemy attack originated.

This is exactly what President Franklin Roosevelt did in World War II when he chose to dedicate initially the bulk of American resources to the European theater, believing that destroying Hitler's Reich was the most urgent task and that Imperial Japan could be dealt with in turn; history proved him right. Yet, under the Obama-Biden playbook, FDR blundered by getting distracted from the "real" war -- in the Pacific, where America had been attacked.

Though I've seen it countless times, the naivete of the Left never ceases to amaze me. It's hard to believe that a particular political party could be so myopic and incredibly inept at recognizing threats to the United States--and then, even after slapped in the face by those threats, remain totally inept at dealing with them.

Perhaps such profound dysfunction stems from the fact that the Left lacks a fundamental understanding of evil--actually, the Left refuses to admit evil even exists (except maybe in conservatives).

Not only is this seen in the War on Terror, but is acutely evident in how liberals want to deal with threats on the horizon of the world stage.

Instead of meeting those growing threats with strength and decisiveness, the Left desperately seeks to coddle and appease those threats. They seek to negotiate with evil, treating it as if it's methods and intentions were legitimate.

Rivkin and Casey also call out this dangerous predilection from Barack Obama and others in the Left:

Having a president try and fail fundamentally damages the nation's own credibility. The textbook example of this phenomenon remains Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev's taking the measure of a young and inexperienced John F. Kennedy in the 1961 Vienna Summit meeting. Khrushchev found Kennedy to be ill-informed and weak, and consequently embarked on an aggressive policy in Berlin and Cuba. Although Kennedy ultimately proved that he was made of sterner stuff, the world was nevertheless brought to the very brink of a nuclear war during the Cuban Missile Crisis.

The next president will likely be similarly tested by Russia and by Iran

The dangerous naivete of Barack Obama and Joe Biden render them both a incredibly dangerous proposition at the nation's helm.

This shocking reality isn't even something that must be gleaned through guesswork and intimation; Joe Biden's record proves it for him, and Barack Obama has proudly told us he will gut the U.S. military if he becomes president. He has also made clear his willingness to sit down as equals with the belligerent, nuclear-intent, Israel-hating thug of Iran, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

Our nation is about to make a profound decision about our safety and welfare. Let us hope our vision is clear enough to make the right call. If we choose gullibility, we will surely pay a heavy price.

Joe Biden Condemns Obama's Lack of Support for the Troops

To the Left of Obama in South Dakota

I wouldn't have thought it possible, but apparently we have at least one person in South Dakota who is (a) to the Left of Barack Obama and (b) more invested in defeat in Iraq than Obama has been.

Publius at SouthDakotaMac states today that Sarah Palin "gaffes on Iraq:"

Palin said the United States had achieved “victory” in Iraq. Read it here. Palin’s stunning ignorance is profound, as is seen in the Couric interview and from Kurtz’ analysis piece here. Here’s a sample of the Palin blather, lifted from Kurtz’ article in the Washington Post:

"Things like the terrain even in Afghanistan and that border between Pakistan and Afghanistan, where, you know, we believe that -- Bin Laden is -- is hiding out right now and . . . and is still such a leader of this terrorist movement. There . . . there are many more challenges there. So, again, I believe that . . . a surge in Afghanistan also will lead us to victory there as it has proven to have done in Iraq. And as I say, Katie, that we cannot afford to retreat, to withdraw in Iraq."

Publius must have missed the DNC memo allowing liberal operatives to acknowledge success in Iraq, because even Barack Obama got it:

“I think that the surge has succeeded in ways that nobody anticipated,” Obama said while refusing to retract his initial opposition to the surge. “I’ve already said it’s succeeded beyond our wildest dreams.”

Sounds like a pretty victorious pronouncement to me.

We still have troops in Korea after 50 years; I guess we're in a losing quagmire there, too.

I guess some folks just won't be happy unless America loses...and as long as somebody else is happy.

Video of Pentagon 911 Attack

From CNN, Jamie McIntyre describes impact area of the Pentagon, intense heat from the fire, and small plane pieces.

Rare Video of Second 911 Tower Strike

This is rarer footage of the second plane strike on the Twin Towers on 911.

From the person who posted the video:

At the time I received this video it was not released publicly. It's the personal video of someone i met.

After the first plane hit one of the towers, this cameraman set up his home video camera on a balcony 1 block from the world trade centers and left the room to let it record unknowing a 2nd plane would hit and he would catch it on tape.

Video Tribute to the People Who Died on 911

Audio: Hands By Jewel
Creator: Brian Bezalel (Skyracer90)
Date of Creation: 2003

**Due to the increased amounts of requests to download this video, I have decided to allow the video to be downloaded. I feel that the people who want to use it in schools, churches, projects and reports should be able to do so. I ask that you do not edit or modify it in any way. I know that I can not enforce this, but I trust that most people will listen.

This is a music video I made in about 2003 that tells the story of the events that occurred on September 11, 2001 as well as after.

This is a tribute to all 2,973 people who died that day. Please be respectful.