Fond of Fonda?

Jane Fonda once took a junket to Hanoi,

Where, with the enemy, she played coy.

Astride an antiaircraft gun,

She seemed to be  having  fun

Pretending to zap an American flyboy.

Headlines

All from Internet news sites. Guess which from Politico?

[Hawaii] Judge blocks Trump's latest travel ban order

Report: FBI sat on evidence tying Clintons to Russian bribery scheme

2,800 Huma gov't docs found on Weiner's laptop ...

Study: More immigrants in 2016 than ever before in American history

[Sens.] Alexander, Murray strike bipartisan Obamacare deal

Bob Weinstein has now been accused of sexual harassment

Alabama shock poll: Roy Moore tied with Dem ...

Trump tells McCain: 'At some point, I fight back'

Trump official halts abortions among undocumented pregnant teens

Kaepernick blames Trump for his unemployment

Anti-immigrant billionaire politician rises in Czech Republic ..?

[Jane] Fonda: 'I don't regret going to Vietnam' -- 'I'm proud'

Nam

After watching three out of four episodes of Ken Burns' "The Vietnam War" on PBS I am chagrined to confess that there was much about this war that I didn't know. But I have still drawn a few conclusions from what I have seen so far. I know not whether these conclusions are what Ken Burns had in mind for his audience, but I do feel that his treatment of this very contraversial subject seems, so far, to be even-handed. (But I haven't seen Jane Fonda on  the anti-aircraft gun yet.)

First, I must start by stating I was never in the armed forces nor, obviously, in Vietnam although I was of an eligible age. I have two metal rods holding my spine in shape as testament to why this is so. I had actually been called for my pre-induction physical in 1963 but was, to my lasting gratitude, rejected. So I spent those war years working on Wall Street, getting remarried and having another family. And, to my shame, I was barely aware of what was happening in Southeast Asia or why there was unrest at home. All this gnashing of teeth was like chirping  crickets to my busy life.

Anyway, to my few thoughts inspired by  this TV documentary special:

- Much of the angst coming out of this conflict was due, IMHO, to the gradualism exhibited by both JFK and then mostly Lyndon Johnson. I now strongly feel that getting into this quagmire was a mistake, but, once committed. I think someone very wise said, "if you go to war, go to war." Don't pussyfoot around like we have done so many times since WWII. Our painfully slow escalation of this conflict allowed the Viet Cong and North Viernam time to react to each incremental increase of commitment ... and America's youth to organize an effective domestic resistance ... the legacy of which we are experiencing even unto today.

- "A resolute army will almost always defeat a reluctant army." This is just another way of saying that, unless there is a real threat to one's homeland, your soldiers are not quite as motivated as the enemy. However bravely Americans fought in Nam, we were really not being pulled by patriotism, but rather pushed by fear and platitudes. ("Hell no, I won't go!) LBJ never really made the case that the "domino theory" was a big enough threat to Peoria. And history has shown that it wasn't. Matter of fact, I am astounded at the friendly reception American tourists recieve when they visit Vietnam (even the North) today ... given what this program showed us doing over there in the 1960s.

- And lastly, resistance to the war taught a generation of America's youth that it was OK to love one another but hate your country. This "hippie" culture was the genesis of much of our national divide today. It is a price that we will be paying for many years to come.

Sarah Silverman

along with Jane Fonda and Lena Dunham, have just been honored by the Public Broadcasting System (PBS) as “Women Who Make America” … see: Haaretz Story. Now Ms. Silverman is a bit of an iconoclast and femi-nazi (a Rush Limbaugh term) so it is not surprising that she is being so honored.  But if you want to sample Ms. Silverman’s schtick take a gander at the following video clip (excuse the ad): Breitbart Video.  If you don’t find this just the tiniest bit offensive, then you have been watching too much Bill Maher.

Now, aren’t we all so proud and excited that politically-neutral PBS gets substantial taxpayer funding?

Inclement Weather

When I was younger, I was understandably much more liberal than I am now … I was starry-eyed and naive.  But I am still a little too old to have been a war-protesting, free-loving, acid-dropping, draft-resisting, Woodstock-attending, tie-dye-wearing, radicalized hippy … like many of our influential politicians and popular entertainers of today.  Take Robert Redford for instance … he apparently is trying to recapture his youth in a bottle by making a soon-to-be-celebrated ultra-left movie called The Company You Keep … see: Michelle Malkin Post. This movie lionizes a fictionalized terrorist killer from the Weather Underground, the organization of President Obama’s "neighbor," Bill Ayers.  

Ayers founded this gang of anarchist thugs in the 1960’s ... bombed the Capitol and the Pentagon … got away scott free … and now is polluting the young minds of this country with his radical ideas … see:  Powerline Blog.  To see a scrubbed biography of Bill Ayers please reference: Biography.com.  During his 2008 campaign, Obama used this dismissive “neighbor” term ... with his typical disarming aplomb ... to describe Ayers.  But this Fletcher's Castoria blog post, hopefully, will help you see through this audacious mendacity.

I can think of few Americans more repugnant to me than Bill Ayers and his wife, Bernardine Dohrn (… possibly Jane Fonda).  But a while back I found the following reference which, to me, explains a lot about Barack Obama’s well-shrouded youth and how he had been mentored through his formative years and put on a path to the White House … and how this was all connected to that “neighbor” and person he “barely knew,” Bill Ayers … see: WND Story .  

If you have read this reference and believe that it has a ring of truth, then I suggest you peruse a more strongly worded synopsis of the Obama-Ayers connection … see: "Before It's News" Story.  Even if only half of these references are true, then it is clear how Barack Obama is not as his adoring media friends have characterized him.  In fact, a gigantic political fraud would have been perpetuated on the American public.  I really wish I could live another twenty years ... so that I might read the more reflective and documented histories of the apparent sham we are currently experiencing.  But alas, this is not to be.

Perhaps Barack Obama’s book (ghost-written by Bill Ayers?) that helped him win the White House should have been titled, The Audacity of Audacity?

Afterward:  Here is an interesting piece on Kathy Boudin, another of the original Weather Underground and convicted felon ... whose son Bill Ayers and Bernardine Dohrn raised while she was in prison ... see: Breitbart Piece

Juxtaposition VII

Exercise can be torture too ...

Hanoi Jane aiming at us.