"Are you awake... We are under attack!"

I will never forget the title of this post. These happen to be the words that woke me from sleeping in on a rainy Tuesday morning in September. This rainy morning my phone rang just before six. I reached for the phone and said hello. The voice on the other line, in an anxious tone, asked, "Are you awake?" I snapped back, "No!" Then came the statement that jolted me out of my morning haze, "We are under attack!" The tone was unmistakeably serious. I asked what he was talking about. All he said was turn on the TV.

I woke up and turned on the TV, startling Steph. There it was, like a bad movie. Smoke was pouring out of the World Trade Center. Over the next few minutes they recounted how two airliners had "apparently accelerated into the towers," the Pentagon had been attacked, and there were reports of other plane over the West Coast that had been hijacked. How can I put into words the sense of shock and fear that suddenly ripped through my mind and sent shivers down my spine. I sat there on the corner of the bed trying to figure out how we had gone from worrying about bills, TV shows, and what color we were going to paint our kitchen to now worrying about our survival as a nation. I kept wondering and worrying, were other planes going drop from the sky, would bombs start detonating, or was this the start of World War III?

Many things happened that day that are still difficult to put into words. That day, that week, even the following month will be a time that we will look back on as my parents look back on the Kennedy assassination or my grandparents look back on Pearl Harbor. It will be our day of infamy. Many horrible and shocking events transpired that day, but I will also never forget the other events that transpired after the attacks. After the attacks we as a nation pulled together, we found national pride and pride for our flag, and most importantly vowed to never forget and seek justice for those responsible.

Today I am both encouraged and saddened on this the seventh anniversary of 9/11/2001. I was saddened and frustrated, it seems as though we have largely forgotten and/or don't want to think about what happened seven years ago. I know it is difficult to think about, but it is a pain we must revisit to remind ourselves of what is at stake. While checking the news and blogs, I found more written up about the new iPod Touch than I did about 9/11. I came home and turned on the TV to find that the only network with some specials or documentaries was The History Channel. Unbelievably, we as a nation seem to be consumed with the insignificance of life, again.

Conversely, I feel that we have much to be proud of and to be thankful for since 9/11. We have decimated al-Qaeda's financial support and senior leadership. We routed the Taliban and installed a constitutional democracy that is governing it own people. Bin Laden and his inner circle now hide cowardly in the caves of Waziristan in fear of US warplanes and drones. The last few al-Qaeda propaganda tapes that have been released have been more rants against the Shiite Muslims that have aided the US in Iraq rather than threatening the US directly. While our progress in both Iraq and Afghanistan has been slow and has cost 4000 service members their lives, we have seen results.

Victor David Hanson of the National Review put it best.

"Seven years later, hundreds of billions of dollars have been expended; over 4,000 Americans have been lost in Iraq and Afghanistan; and America’s preexisting cultural wounds have had their thin scabs torn off by acrimony over warring abroad and security at home. And yet herein lies the greatest paradox of all that followed from September 11. If no one on September 12, 2001 thought it possible that the United States would not be hit again by a terrorist attack of similar magnitude, here we are still free from a major terrorist assault over 2,500 days later.

The truth is, we chased al-Qaeda from Iraq and Afghanistan and it is now in lunatic fashion chasing Danish cartoonists, European novelists, and opera producers as it cuts the fingers off smokers, tries to cover up the genitalia of animals, and looks for the mentally ill to strap on suicide belts.

Long after Jacques Chirac, Michael Moore, Gerhard Schroeder, and Cindy Sheehan have come, gone, and nearly disappeared, a General David Petraeus and thousands of American soldiers and diplomats like him remain. George W. Bush is reviled, in part because of an inability to articulate what the war against terror was, and what it was for. But Bush hatred has been reduced to a sort of politically correct trinket, worn around the neck of the clannish critics as a reminder of the President’s ineptness in expression or supposedly dangerous views — without examining what others might have done to achieve the same results of achieving freedom from further attack.

But in years to come it may well be said that the president kept us safe for years when none thought he could, and removed the two most odious regimes in the Middle East and replaced them with the two best — and confronted a confident and ascendant radical Islam and left it demoralized and discredited among its own host Arab and Muslim constituents."

In the present toxic environment, all of that is not to be spoken — but all that has nevertheless happened since September 11."

It is on this 9/11 evening that I will give thanks to God for all that I have been blessed with and I will ask that He comfort those that still mourn and hurt due to the cowardly and criminal act of 9/11/2001.

God Bless America and Godspeed to those that serve our nation and our freedom...

Where much is given much is required

Not to beat a dead horse here, but I was doing some "deep" thinking in the midst of another Hayls meltdown. I was thinking of more reasons why we have been given the awesome and often overwhelming responsibility of parenting a bi-polar child. The answers that came to me while dodging flying feet were not all that difficult to understand. The first answer is because we can! It doesn't get any simpler than that answer. God with that infinite wisdom He wields sees that Steph and I possess the skills and patience to parent this unique child. The second reason is that we care and understand. Here again God sees that we have seen the result of what can occur when a special needs child is not properly provided for in this life. I wonder how much of youth violence either by youth or adult to youth is the result of unchecked mental illness.

Here is the overwhelming part of what I learned during this thinking session, God thought our daughter was so special and important that He sent her to us for special keeping and raising. With so many special needs children being given to parents that either do not understand or care...Hayls must be pretty special indeed

God, in all His Wisdom...

This summer has been an interesting and explosive time for our family. We have recently discovered that our daughter is afflicted with Child Onset Bi-Polar disorder. We have been given a front row seat or sometimes a spot in the ring as our daughter comes completely unglued and explosively becomes like another person. Those of you reading this post that know someone who has been diagnosed with this disease knows that this does not just go away, clear up, nor can it be cured. Our daughter and our family will deal with this for the rest of our lives. I recently have thought to myself, "Why us, God?"

As I question God, I think about all the unpredictable behavior, manic episodes, and mania to come, and I start to feel a lot of anxiety and despair. It is in the midst of this developing challenge that I can already see that I have not been injured by this, but rather I have been edified and taught about my own shortcomings and talents. I have learned that I have infinite love for this daughter that often curses me in a fit of rage. I have learned that discussing our feelings calmly and quietly can do far more benefit that raising my voice or hand in anger. I have learned that i have a lot to learn and that I need to be open and receptive to that teaching. For whatever reason, God, in all His Wisdom, has decided that this struggle we now face is the best way to teach us about love, compassion, and wisdom.

I think I ought to go pray...

Going forward...

I figured with all the blogging going on in the family that I should restart this hobby. Previously this page has been strictly a political rant but I am going to open in up into a blog of all my thoughts and contemplations. Get ready!

Money Changers in the Temple!

There are corrupt money changers within our Temple. The temple being our great nation. To illustrate this point, review this is an excellent article written by a Congresswoman from Tennessee. Having worked for a major financial services institution here on the west coast, this defintitly going on with the industry. The three largest banks here in the Northern California region not only offer this but are teaching their employees how to promote and sell these products. It deplorable that these respected institutions are catering to the people. Those people are criminals that are in the comission of a serious crime, breaking Federal Immigration law at the very least. This group has no right or claim to being in this country let alone any benefits or privledges of financial services. When I worked for this large financial institution I expressed my discomfort with this type of business and was told that this is the way things are and to accept it. I was also told that they deserve these services as much as anyone else! The very foundation of our national soverienty is under attack and our populace seems unconcerned or disinterested!

Banking on Corruption
No Visas without visas.

By Marsha Blackburn

The immigration bill that would give amnesty to millions of illegal immigrants may be dormant in the Senate for the time being, but the debate over this hot-button issue is far from over.

The terrorist attacks of 9/11 forced the federal government to change the way we look at critical national-security issues. Almost immediately, we realized that a primary task would involve tracking funding to potential terrorist organizations through American banking institutions. Our citizens deserve to know our financial institutions are not putting our national security at risk.

In order to finance their plans, terrorists need to be able to move large amounts of money in and out of the country, beyond the scrutiny of law enforcement. Choking off the money supply has been critical in our efforts to fight global terrorism.

Unfortunately, this sensible effort is being undermined from an unexpected direction. Recently, several major American financial institutions have exploited loopholes in federal law to initiate pilot programs that grant illegal immigrants legal access to our financial sector. These programs allow illegal immigrants to receive credit cards, mortgages, and transfer money to countries throughout the world.

Despite all our efforts to prevent our institutions from being used against us, some banks seem intent on creating a back door into the American financial system.

As the average American faces ever more daunting stacks of paperwork when applying for credit cards, loans, and other financial services, some banks are creating a second, parallel process for applicants who cannot prove legal residence.

Some prominent financial institutions, most notably Bank of America, are consciously exploiting loopholes in federal money-laundering law and “gray areas” within IRS regulations to allow illegal immigrants access to credit cards and loans. Despite intense media pressure and citizen backlash, these institutions continue this practice to this day, without repercussion.

Banks have the option of accepting a range of documents to verify a customer’s proof of identity under current law. And yet, operating within the letter but outside the spirit of the law, certain banks are choosing to allow anyone with an “individual taxpayer identification number” (ITIN) and an additional government-issued form of identification to apply for a credit card or loan.

The catch is that this second form of identification is often the matricula consular, issued by Mexico, and frequently counterfeited and easily obtained on the black market. Without ever having produced a Social Security number, passport, visa, or credit history, an applicant can simply maintain a $500 balance in a checking account for three months for the bank to issue a credit card.

Having made no additional effort to verify the applicant’s identity or immigration status, the bank issues a card complete with a predatory interest rate of over 20 percent. An industry lobbyist assured me that opening checking accounts and providing loans to illegal aliens are simply good-faith efforts to cater to an untapped and underserved market. In his words, financial institutions should be able to “bank illegal immigrants.”

Apparently these banks have no problem catering to an “untapped market” that often trades in human smuggling, drug trafficking, and gun running. By “banking illegal immigrants,” it is quite possible that American financial institutions could be unwitting participants in the money-laundering efforts of a Columbian drug lord or a weapons dealer from the Middle East.



And who will pay the piper when illegal immigrants cannot pay their bills? Not the bank. Instead, the American people can expect higher interest rates for those who can pay: you and me. After all, if someone is willing to apply for credit with fraudulent documents, what reason do we have to expect that person to be responsible for the charges?

I intend to cut off this regressive cost shift, invitation to identity theft, and backdoor access into our financial system with the Photo Identification Security Act. This bill requires financial institutions to accept only secure forms of identification. A non-citizen, (but) legal resident, could present a lawful permanent resident card (“green card”) in conjunction with a driver’s license that complies with the Real ID Act. Only legal United States residents will have these forms of ID, ensuring that only legal residents will have access to the services.

Simply put, banks should not be actively pursuing illegal immigrants as a new market. If we allow lenders to continue to exploit these loopholes, we are essentially saying that the distinction between a legal and illegal immigrant does not matter. By allowing a retreat from the standards of accountability and transparency that Congress enacted to prevent money laundering, we are abandoning hard-won tools against those who patiently wait for opportunities to do us harm.

It seems entirely reasonable to me to say to banks and illegal immigrants alike, “You can’t get a Visa without a visa.”

The Enemy Within Isreal

Israel confirmed that we are not the only country that allows "enemies" to exist within their government and continue to write and enact policy that is both damaging and dangerous to their nation and the worldwide War on Terror. It is disappointing that the Likud party could not see that placating to the Palastinians and their terror groups would do nothing to relieve the hate and violence against Israel over the long term. The leaders of Hamas and the others subscribe to a ideology that does not concede defeat or enter in to cease-fires. Their "religion" professes that the infidel needs to "slaughtered." Is there any way to co-exist with those that hold that belief.

Ex-hawk Sharon cements role as a centrist
Israeli premier's narrow defeat of party revolt highlights transformation

Kevin Frayer / AP
Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon smiles before his narrow win to continue as head of the Likud party.


ANALYSIS
By Tom Aspell
Correspondent
NBC News
Updated: 3:41 p.m. ET Sept. 27, 2005


Tom Aspell
Correspondent



TEL AVIV — Ariel Sharon’s narrow victory in a battle for leadership of the Likud party highlights the Israeli prime minister’s remarkable transformation from right-wing hawk to centrist.

The former general, who participated in every one of Israel’s wars since the creation of the Jewish State in 1948, received 51 percent of an intra-party ballot held Monday night while former premier Benjamin Netanyahu achieved 47 percent, thus averting early national elections.

The vote was the culmination of a policy which stunned opponents and supporters alike — his plan, realized last month, to remove Israeli settlers from the occupied Gaza Strip and give it to the Palestinians as a way to “disengage” from conflict.

But while his stand is popular with many Israelis, particularly those aligned with the coalition Labor party, it cost Sharon the support of many Likud loyalists who were angered at what they saw as a betrayal of a biblical birthright by the very man that was once their biggest booster.

The future is by no means clear
It's a long way from Sharon’s starting point as Israel's prime minister in February 2001 when he beat Labor's Ehud Barak, in part by accusing him of making too many concessions to the Palestinians.

Not that the future is likely to be plain sailing for Sharon: On Tuesday Likud opponents vowed to continue to fight against his leadership. In addition, an uneasy truce with the Palestinians, brokered before the withdrawal, is now unraveling after militant-launched rocket attacks against Israeli towns outside the Gaza Strip.

With armor and artillery now poised on Gaza's borders and Israel vowing to destroy radical Palestinian groups, the possibility of resuming meaningful peace talks seems remote. However, many Israelis believe that only Sharon is now capable of achieving peace and guaranteeing security for Israel.

Still want to open your home to refugees

Interesting article regarding the make up of some( or maybe most) of the Katrina refugees...

Half Katrina Refugees Have Records
Thursday, September 22, 2005

Then the handcuffs were placed on Murph.

State police did criminal background checks (search) on every refugee and found that more than half had a criminal arrest records — a third for felonies. Murph was the only one with an outstanding arrest warrant, for larceny and other crimes.

Around the nation, state and local authorities are checking refugees' pasts as they are welcomed into homes, schools, houses of worship and housing projects. In some states, half the refugees have rap sheets.

"It's a balancing act," said Kyle Smith, deputy director of the Kansas Bureau of Investigation (search). "We don't want to treat them like criminals after they have been traumatized, but we want to make sure they are in no danger nor the families they are housed with."

Civil libertarians call the checks thinly veiled race and class discrimination against people who have suffered already. The checks are made on those evacuated or forced to seek help from charities or others — in other words, people who are often black and poor.

"I think it's happening partly because who these people are and where they came from," said Steve Brown, executive director of the Rhode Island ACLU. "The mere fact that people have past criminal records in and of itself doesn't say anything about harm to the community."

Some state and local governments screened just those refugees evacuated by the federal government. Others screened anyone placed in private homes — and screened the hosts as well.

In South Carolina, state police checked every evacuee flown there by the government. Of 547 people checked, 301 had criminal records, according to Robert Stewart, state Law Enforcement Division Chief.

While most had been law-abiding for years or had committed minor offenses, the group included those convicted of rape or aggravated assault. Two had warrants, but were not held because the states weren't interested in extraditing them.

"This was all done for everyone's protection," Stewart said. "If you're going to be sheltering people, it would be prudent for people taking them in to know what criminal pasts they might have."

The state police in West Virginia said roughly half of the nearly 350 Katrina victims evacuated by the government to that state had criminal records, and 22 percent have a history of committing a violent crime.

In Massachusetts, where about 200 evacuees were flown to a military base on Cape Cod, criminal background checks turned up six sex offenders and one man wanted for rape in Louisiana. Two of the sex offenders have since left the state, said Katie Ford, a spokeswoman for the state public safety office. The rape suspect was being held on $250,000 bail.

In Tennessee, police checked every federal evacuee flown to Knoxville and found outstanding warrants for two people in Louisiana — but Louisiana did not want to extradite them.

In Texas, with more than 300,000 refugees, local officials have run 20,000 criminal background checks on evacuees, as well as the relief workers helping them and people who have opened up their homes.

Most of the checks have found little for police to be concerned about. Philadelphia police found no criminals as of the middle of last week, even though the local ACLU branch objected to the checks themselves.

Several states with thousands of refugees aren't checking criminal backgrounds at all. Missouri has no formal effort to check its 6,000 refugees. Neither has California, which reported about 3,800 refugees earlier this month, or Maryland, Minnesota and Michigan, which together took in several thousand evacuees.

In Middletown, a community just north of Newport, several evacuees shrugged at the prospect of background checks and said they understood the state's desire to learn more about them.

"I would like to know if there's any skeletons in the closet with my neighbors or the community," said one refugee, 38-year-old Carmen Williams.

Mexican Troops operating in the US

Does this make anyone else uncomfortable. Mexican troops on US Soil...

Mexican Troops Aid Katrina Efforts
Thursday, September 08, 2005


LAREDO, Texas — A Mexican army convoy began crossing into the United States on Thursday to bring aid to victims of Hurricane Katrina (search).

Carrying water treatment plants and mobile kitchens that can feed 7,000 people daily, the convoy bound for San Antonio is the first Mexican military unit to operate on U.S. soil since 1846.

The first of 45 vehicles in the convoy crossed the international bridge at Laredo at about 8:15 a.m. Military engineers, doctors and nurses are among the 200 people headed to San Antonio.

Mexico has sent disaster relief aid missions to other Latin American nations, but not to the United States.

In 1846, Mexican troops briefly advanced just north of the Rio Grande (search) in Texas, which had then recently joined the United States. Mexico, however, did not then recognize the Rio Grande as the U.S. border.

The two countries quickly became mired in the Mexican-American War (search), which led to the loss of half of Mexico's territory in 1848.

California Border Police

If you are tired of relying on the federal government to get it's act together to help stem the tide of illegal immigration, this is a chance for California to help itself. If you are reading this blog, I am sure I do not need to preach to you about how illegal immigration is sucking the state's coffers dry, or the security threat from Al qaeda and the Salvadoran gang MS-13, drug running, organized crime, and sex slave trade that originates south of the border. Please visit this webpage and support the initiative.

www.californiaborderpolice.com

Mayor Nagin or Governor Blanco's Fault?

The last week or two I have become frustrated with the fact that Bush has had to shoulder the bulk of the blame for Katrina. There are too many reasons why the Katrina aftermath was more the local politico's fault than Bush's. From all accounts Mayor Nagin and Governor Blanco were out of their league and ill prepared to deal with a disaster this size and scope. The city of New Orlean had been chastised prior to Katrina for having a woefully low Citizen to Police Officer ratio. Gov. Blanco should have sought help long before she did and/or should have been relieved of duty. There have been accounts of Mayor Nagin interferring with US Coast Guard Admiral on scene regarding the order of the rescue operation...ulitmately delaying the whole operation. The article below highlights some of my opinion regarding mischaractization of Bush and the Federal Government in the midst of this crisis by the media/press.

The federal response to Katrina was not as portrayed


It is settled wisdom among journalists that the federal response to the devastation wrought by Hurricane Katrina was unconscionably slow.


Jack Kelly is national security writer for the Post-Gazette and The Blade of Toledo, Ohio (jkelly@post-gazette.com, 412-263-1476).

"Mr. Bush's performance last week will rank as one of the worst ever during a dire national emergency," wrote New York Times columnist Bob Herbert in a somewhat more strident expression of the conventional wisdom.

But the conventional wisdom is the opposite of the truth.

Jason van Steenwyk is a Florida Army National Guardsman who has been mobilized six times for hurricane relief. He notes that:

"The federal government pretty much met its standard time lines, but the volume of support provided during the 72-96 hour was unprecedented. The federal response here was faster than Hugo, faster than Andrew, faster than Iniki, faster than Francine and Jeanne."

For instance, it took five days for National Guard troops to arrive in strength on the scene in Homestead, Fla. after Hurricane Andrew hit in 1992. But after Katrina, there was a significant National Guard presence in the afflicted region in three.

Journalists who are long on opinions and short on knowledge have no idea what is involved in moving hundreds of tons of relief supplies into an area the size of England in which power lines are down, telecommunications are out, no gasoline is available, bridges are damaged, roads and airports are covered with debris, and apparently have little interest in finding out.

So they libel as a "national disgrace" the most monumental and successful disaster relief operation in world history.

I write this column a week and a day after the main levee protecting New Orleans breached. In the course of that week:

More than 32,000 people have been rescued, many plucked from rooftops by Coast Guard helicopters.

The Army Corps of Engineers has all but repaired the breaches and begun pumping water out of New Orleans.

Shelter, food and medical care have been provided to more than 180,000 refugees.

Journalists complain that it took a whole week to do this. A former Air Force logistics officer had some words of advice for us in the Fourth Estate on his blog, Moltenthought:

"We do not yet have teleporter or replicator technology like you saw on 'Star Trek' in college between hookah hits and waiting to pick up your worthless communications degree while the grown-ups actually engaged in the recovery effort were studying engineering.

"The United States military can wipe out the Taliban and the Iraqi Republican Guard far more swiftly than they can bring 3 million Swanson dinners to an underwater city through an area the size of Great Britain which has no power, no working ports or airports, and a devastated and impassable road network.

"You cannot speed recovery and relief efforts up by prepositioning assets (in the affected areas) since the assets are endangered by the very storm which destroyed the region.

"No amount of yelling, crying and mustering of moral indignation will change any of the facts above."

"You cannot just snap your fingers and make the military appear somewhere," van Steenwyk said.

Guardsmen need to receive mobilization orders; report to their armories; draw equipment; receive orders and convoy to the disaster area. Guardsmen driving down from Pennsylvania or Navy ships sailing from Norfolk can't be on the scene immediately.

Relief efforts must be planned. Other than prepositioning supplies near the area likely to be afflicted (which was done quite efficiently), this cannot be done until the hurricane has struck and a damage assessment can be made. There must be a route reconnaissance to determine if roads are open, and bridges along the way can bear the weight of heavily laden trucks.

And federal troops and Guardsmen from other states cannot be sent to a disaster area until their presence has been requested by the governors of the afflicted states.

Exhibit A on the bill of indictment of federal sluggishness is that it took four days before most people were evacuated from the Louisiana Superdome.

The levee broke Tuesday morning. Buses had to be rounded up and driven from Houston to New Orleans across debris-strewn roads. The first ones arrived Wednesday evening. That seems pretty fast to me.

A better question -- which few journalists ask -- is why weren't the roughly 2,000 municipal and school buses in New Orleans utilized to take people out of the city before Katrina struck?