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Aztecs celebrating Indigenous Peoples’ Day

Happy Indigenous People’s Day

Happy Indigenous People’s Day replaces Happy Columbus Day for the same reason Confederate Monuments are destroyed, Critical Race Theory is taught, the Taliban erases historical treasures, the Muslims, Croats and Serbs murdered each other, and the Hutus massacred the Tutsis.  It’s cultural cleansing.  Indigenous People’s Day is a pathetic, but persistent effort to culturally cleanse Western Civilization from America.

Cleansing Western Civilization requires the willful ignorance of history, the rejection of rational empiricism, and contempt for fact-based knowledge. 

Oddly enough, academics burdened by worthless degrees and unencumbered by common sense, love of learning, or a fierce devotion to truth-seeking are most adept at mouthing the mantras that support a “Happy Indigenous People’s Day.”  Amoral and ignorant politicians run a close second.  The bobble heads of media and entertainment repeat what they are told, so normal Americans have it shoved in their ears.

But, let’s take the silliness seriously for a moment.

What if Columbus hadn’t discovered the Americas?  What was so special about pre-Columbian Indigenous Peoples?

They were Neolithic, Stone Age, peoples for the most part.  The Mayan, Inca, and Aztecs built empires and impressive stone buildings.  Yet, most Indians lived in subsistence tribal groups like the Europeans, the Middle East, and China did before the Iron Age.  They were over two thousand years behind the West and not showing signs of catching up ever.

They lived in “harmony” with nature as every pre-historic tribe did. The tribes using fire for slash and burn agriculture did so because they had no idea about the plow.  Or, how to domesticate animals other than the dog and llama. 

Outside the Mayan writing and Aztec hieroglyphics the rest of two continents were illiterate. Their oral histories were like other tribal lore around the world.

They certainly knew how to kill each other.  The Aztecs were so brutal, there were more Indians fighting as Allies of Cortez than Aztecs fighting against the European invader. 

Likewise, a year after the Europeans started Jamestown, Chief Powhatan exterminated the Piankatank Indian tribe when it refused to join his confederation.  It was an all Indian affair.  

During the King Phillip’s War, the Mohawks refused to help their ancestral enemies fighting the Europeans.  It continued to the end of the frontier in the U.S. where some Indian tribes always served well as scouts against their Indian enemies.

How would the clash of civilizations have happened if the Aztecs had been able to send an Army to Europe or Asia?  Would the Aztec visitors share their taste for cannibalism?

Obviously, the discovery of two previously unknown continents was earth-shattering, pun intended, news to Europe.  The conquest, colonization, assimilation, and abuses that followed were not unique to “Whiteness.”  The favors would have been returned in spades, if the Indians had had the wherewithal.

As it was, the Indians gave as good as they got – to the best of their ability.  They lost. 

Now, the Human Secularist Totalitarians – the Left – who hate Western Civilization, despite their personal privilege living in America, revise history to claim multiple cultures combined in the New World. 

That’s the story line at Jamestown – at both the U.S. and Virginia parks.  European, Indigenous, and African cultures amalgamated.  Yes, if Virginia Culture – and subsequently American Culture – which is about 96% English, 3% African, and 1% Indian, is “multi-cultural.”  Those rough estimates of any quantifiable aspect of culture indicate more assimilation happened.

Except, assimilation into American Civilization doesn’t fit the Cultural Marxist narrative.  Changing the word taught at Jamestown and in Virginia public schools from “massacre” to “attacks” does. 

It was over 30 years ago that Jesse Jackson went to Yale to demand they drop their core curriculum Western Civilization requirement. 

“Hey, hey, ho, ho, Western Civ has got to go.”

Too bad.  Yale was once a treasure of American Civilization.

Ancestry, as in my children’s Indian blood, should be treasured.  But, the history of their Indian ancestors should be measured by truth, not Cultural Marxist mythology. 

Finally, on every Columbus Day to come, all of my descendants should be filled with gratitude and admiration for the brave Admiral of the Seas. 

No Columbus Day means no Virginia and no America – past, present, and future. 

Happy Columbus Day 2021!   

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U.S. Army at gates of Beijing during the Boxer Rebellion.

War With China

The U.S. and China are both competitors and partners in trade, influence, culture, and across the board of international relations.  Yet, we’ve been in a cyberwar for over a decade.  Will it come to a shooting war?

A real war with China is likely before the end of this century.  Perhaps in the next couple of decades.  It’s likely because people are people.

It begins with China and the U.S. identifying each other as the “enemy.”  Knowing that another state is competing, or even hostile, can still allow large degrees of engagement.  Engagement across the board in international relations creates complexities which don’t have to be simplified to simple antagonism.  But, people will boil the complex down to the simple to make it easier to understand.  Unfortunately, simple understandings easily end in conflict. 

The people at the pinnacles of power are so fallible, so human, that when the preparations for war reach a point of no return they won’t stop.  They could, but they won’t.  It’s the way of the world. 

Ultimately, just before the breakout of hostilities, there are very simple choices a handful of people with the most power in their respective states must make.

What one state sees as self-defense, looks like offense to an “enemy” state.

Consider what the Japan saw in FDR’s embargo of oil and raw materials. 

Consider what Germany saw in FDR’s un-declared naval war in the North Atlantic.

Attack or not.  Attack or negotiate.  Stand down forces or mobilize.  Initiate war plans or stop.

Since Cain killed Abel, the final decision from an individual act of violence to the horrific cataclysm of world war is an unequivocal choice.  It’s an act of human will.

So, war with China could be avoided, but it probably won’t be.

In the late 1990’s I lead a study, “Most Likely China 2000-2030”, for the U.S. Army. Our study was classified, but our report was unclassified.  (That was a challenge making that happen.)  The report was read by the Army Chief of Staff. 

Our study examined China from its military to the political, social, economic, technological, religious, cultural, and environmental aspects for a tour d’horizon of China.  We concluded that China faced a number of impending crises which could cause implosion of the People’s Republic of China (PRC) during the 30 year period.  It was unlikely there would be a war, unless there was a major miscalculation on the South China Sea or over Taiwan.

Over 20 years later, the study stands up well.  But, after 2030, we enter into a new era with China.  China, which has already surpassed the US in one measure of Gross Domestic Product (GDP), should be able to challenge the U.S. as a world hegemon and superpower. 

The transfer of hegemonic power has always meant war since Rome and Carthage competed for dominance around the  Mediterranean Sea – with one exception.  The U.S. surpassed its English-speaking Mother country, the U.K., in the 1920’s in quantifiable terms of national power. 

Pray that it can be done again, if China surpasses the U.S. across the board in national power.  Unfortunately, China, more than the U.S., may be incapable of letting power shift peacefully.

The Chinese leadership inherits the cultural framework of the Emperor and his learned advisors making all major decisions from the “center”. Historically, the rulers of China’s large regions stay in conflict with the Center about who rules what.  Regardless, all Chinese share the historic self-image of the “Middle Kingdom”.  All outsiders beyond China are barbarians. 

Consequently, the Chinese remember the humiliating insults of European powers and U.S. running roughshod over the Chinese since the 19^th Century.  These abuses include U.S. troops landing, invading, and liberating the foreign delegations during the Boxer Rebellion.

The U.S. alliance with China during the long and terrible fight with Japan through World War II, was with the Nationalists, not the Communists.  The Communist Chinese see the Chinese Nationalists as traitorous puppets of the foreign devils.

Soon after the Communists defeated the Nationalists, who fled to Taiwan, they fought the U.S. in a direct, bloody conflict in Korea.  Then, right after the Korean War, the U.S. Navy and Air Force deployed to deter the Chinese from conquering the Nationalists in Taiwan.  The Communists had to settle on shelling the Nationalist islands of Quemoy and Matsu. 

While China supported the North Vietnamese less than the Soviet Union, nonetheless, they saw the U.S. Vietnam War as another American intervention in their sphere of influence.

Americans don’t live with such a list of grievances against the PRC.  The Communist Chinese leaders know their history well.  They want greater China to be reunited and the far flung people of the Chinese diaspora protected.   

How long do you imagine the People’s Liberation Army has practiced for an invasion of Taiwan?  Since the U.S. and Taiwan (Republic of China) have a bi-lateral defense treaty, when will it be safe and sure enough for the PRC to attack?  When will the PRC reckon the U.S. won’t keep its promises?

This is the war which can be avoided and likely wouldn’t be.

If the PRC miscalculates the U.S. courage and loyalty for treaty commitments with Taiwan, then an invasion starts a China-U.S. war.

If Taiwan isn’t the spark, then a collapsing North Korea or territorial waters dispute with South Korea, Japan, or the Philippines could start the shooting – through another miscalculation.

Regardless of the cause, once Chinese honor and reputation – their ‘face’ – are presented in public, the PRC can’t back down. 

In a war with China, the PRC won’t hesitate to attack the U.S. with nuclear weapons.  It’s different from the decades of mutual assured destruction (MAD) deterrence with the Soviets.

MAD was based on the Soviets’ aversion to suffering as they did in WW II and an understanding of a common culture based in Western Civilization.  Even thought the Russian Communists were at the Human Secular Totalitarian polar extreme from America on the other side of Western Civilization,  we communicated clearly.  There is no such common cultural ground with China.  There’s no such basis of really, clearly understanding one another.

There could be a commonality if China converts to Christianity in a big way just as Europe and Canada succumb to the Muslim population bomb towards the end of this century.

The Chinese wouldn’t hesitate to pop an Electro-Magnetic Pulse (EMP) over the U.S. to fry our electronics and send all of America back to the 19^th Century.

Additionally, the Chinese wouldn’t hesitate to use a biological weapons against all non-Han peoples.  An attack more selective and deadly than the Wuhan Virus.  Or, they would use chemical or laser blinding weapons if they find them useful.  No international agreements, like the Geneva Conventions, mean anything to their leadership when war drums sound.

Finally, the People’s Liberation Army is a threat to Taiwan and anywhere they can walk.  For now.  Yet, as the industrial capacity of China increases compared to the U.S, much like our capacity increased to exceed the U.K., the PRC could engage in a long, long war where they could out produce and out manpower the U.S.  The PRC could eventually build up and invade the U.S. – even after a nuclear exchange.  Especially so, when much of the U.S.’s former industrial base is in China.  

Possibly, peace could be had.  Compromises could precede confrontations that can’t be reconciled.  There are many policy options for every issue.  But, people are people.  

Will the Presidents of the U.S. and Chairmen of the PRC choose peace or war when a crisis comes?  Can the nature of competition, the memory of grievances, the pride in the present, and the continual talk and preparation for war make war inevitable? 

Was World War I inevitable?  No, but pride prevailed.  World War II?  No, but grievances governed.

The coming war with China is both as avoidable and likely as those tragedies were.  It may be a long, short, or broken path to war, yet it’s most likely that my descendants will live it.   

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Perversion’s Progress leads in the opposite direction.

John Bunyan wrote how a “Pilgrim’s Progress” leads to Heaven.  Just as assuredly, a person or a people can follow a descending pathway of perversion’s progress that leads to a personal Hell or civilization collapse.  Four thousand years of recorded history since the time of old father Abraham testify to this truth.  Accepting perversion inevitably leads to more, greater, and worse perversion.

When family, marriage, sex, and gender roles deviate from traditional, best practices, it perverts the good order of society.  While change is inevitable through the epochs of time, not all change is good. 

It’s good for society’s social mores to change when it ends persecution and espouses toleration.  It’s Biblical and a testimony to Christianity’s role in Western Civilization to give Grace instead of burning people at the stake. 

But some changes aren’t improvements.  They’re perversions.  Perversion begets more perversions.

Unfortunately, America’s Left – your Democrat-voting neighbors who support Human Secular Totalitarianism – promotes an expanding panoply of perversions.

The Left hijacked Christian tolerance to create the rigid orthodoxy of Political Correctness, initiated an Inquisition of gas-lighting, doxing, and de-platforming, and threatens to use the armed police and military powers of the state against any who dare oppose them.

Hopefully, the absolute absurdity, the staggering stupidity, and the manifest lies of their ideas are about to crash and disintegrate.  Perversion’s progress in America is coming to a cliff.

Consider a partial list of perversions’ progress in America.

Pervert Family.  Child support is meant to provide support for children of single mothers.  Sadly, child support substitutes the state for the father as the financial provider for a family.  Child support perverts the family.  Three generations born into the welfare underclass in 60 years have destroyed millions of families – especially among Blacks. 

When courts and schools limit the rights and responsibilities of parents, they pervert the family and subvert it to the state. 

The family is an institution that shapes culture, stabilizes society, and sustains civilization.  When the state makes up new definitions for family with “same-sex” adoptions, it means the state orders a child to NEVER have either a mother or a father. 

Pervert Marriage.  No-fault divorce is supposed to free women from abusive men.  In fact, it allows men to abandon and impoverish their first family.  When 50% of marriages fail or couples chose not to marry, then marriage is perverted from lifelong commitment to a ceremonial and uncertain connection.  Children pay the price when marriage doesn’t provide permanent parents.

When Muslims can have four wives or there is group marriage, it is perverted.  “Same sex” marriage isn’t marriage – regardless of its legal status.

Pervert Sex.  Every society from tiniest tribe to greatest civilization has rules for sex.  There’s sex that’s encouraged and honored, sex that is tolerated, and sex that is forbidden and punished.

The birth control pill and abortion won the sexual revolution that began in the 1920s.  Sex without consequences explodes sex without commitment.  Cheapening the context of sex doesn’t change how sexual relations affect people deeply.  Casual sex isn’t free sex.  There’s a tragic cost in demeaning the most intimate act, the privilege of privacy, and one’s individual humanity.   

Homosexuals and lesbians, who are 1-2% of the population, have moved their sexual behavior from unlawful, to tolerated, to honored, to a legal status as protected class of persons.  Now, it’s even to the point where failing to honor homosexuals is bigotry, political blasphemy, and hate speech. 

The “Gaystopo” used the rhetoric and cloak of Civil Rights, political muscle like old Big Labor, and the propaganda power of Hollywood to pervert sexual norms since 1969.       

Pervert Male and Female.  A man who truly believes he is a woman is mentally ill.  He suffers sexual dysphoria.  Likewise for a woman who thinks she is a man.

When a man has sex with a man, one of them plays the role of the woman.  When sodomy was elevated to iconic glory, who could argue that men believing they are women – and having sex with men – is wrong? 

Enter the imaginary human – the Transgender. 

Explain it with imaginary science that we are born with biological gender, but we can “identify” as a different gender.  So a man who imagines he is a woman is in fact a woman.  A real woman.

This absurd falsehood is gospel to the Left.  Despite how they legislate, executive order, and rule from the bench, as well as suppress “Transphobia” across social media, the reality will prevail.  The truth every child knows will come out.  Remember “The Emperor Who Wore No Clothes” story?  We are all made male and female. Not Trans.

Since the 1970s, the “Feminazis” taken female equality issues and perverted them to female equity outcomes.  Case in point: women in the infantry. And everywhere else biology matters.     

Pervert Science and Medicine.  The Covid mandates, lock downs, and mad state spending make a mockery of science and medicine.  The Vaxx requirements, firings, papers, and discrimination are about state control and corporate enforcement.  Covid is the cliff where making up science and medicine will fall.   The health and economic results in free states and some foreign countries will expose the lies.

Hopefully, a majority of Americans will connect the dots that the people promoting Covid fear porn are the same people pretending that men can be women and women can be men.     

It shouldn’t be too long before most Americans laugh at Covid mandates like we mock the Salem Witch Trials.  Soon enough, the demand for Vaxx papers should be as shameful as forcing Jews to wear the Yellow Star of David.

Prayerfully, a majority of Americans will see perversions’ progress.  

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9-11 at 20 The war isn’t over.

Emotions rule.  We’re just human.  The profundities can wait for this passion to subside.  Twenty years, as all young people will learn, are but a snap of the finger.  Memories live as freshly as the moment just passed.  So, here we are 20 years after the Islamists attacked America in our homeland.  We feel it.

The grieving for those lost that day, in the warring that followed, and the long string of murders the Left always insists isn’t about Islam – is real.  It’s a hard gut punch.  Since Afghanistan is suddenly ruled by the same Taliban as it was 20 years ago, but now they’re better armed with American equipment, the grief may feel worse.  Grieving for many could be bitter, because defeat steals the honor from sacrifice, as if they gave everything for nothing. 

But, they didn’t die in vain.  They weren’t wounded without reason, nor crippled unto suicide for a failure.  The Afghan Vets kept the snakes in their pit for 20 years.  And, although the snakes are out and about since August, the war didn’t end there.  The “endless wars” didn’t begin on 9-11.  That’s just the date when the Islamists killed almost three thousand Americans in one day. 

The war with Islamist Totalitarianism started in 627 AD when Mohammed committed his first genocide – against a Jewish village.  The past 20 years has been the latest series of campaigns around the world, but not a completed war. 

The betrayal Veterans feel is like what Vietnam Era Vets felt when the politicians didn’t have the vision to fight the right war and win it.  Likewise for Vietnam, the Generals said, “Yes Sir” and did the best they could.  Unlike Vietnam, though, losing this war doesn’t end our engagement with the enemy.  The Islamist enemy won’t stay put in Afghanistan.

The anger Americans feel about the humiliating debacle of a Non-combatant Evacuation Operation (NEO) abortion is justified.  The CENTCOM Commander should be fired, or if he had a plan that would work and it was denied – he should resign in protest.  More heads should roll in the Defense chain of command, because they’ve been approving every action since the Biden Administration took power.  

The fears for the future are well-founded.  Biden’s failure in Afghanistan emboldens every enemy and enterprising despot.  It was the worst body blow to our NATO Alliance in its history.  Other allies, as well, must consider other plans than trusting America. 

Meanwhile, millions of Americans are apathetic, unaware, or unengaged with anything that happened in Afghanistan.  They don’t know Gold Star families.  They don’t live with PTSD.  Some are too busy hating opponents of vaccination and mask mandates for a pandemic that serves political purposes more than it threatens national survival.

Regardless, the pride felt for serving and sacrifice is worthy.  The honor given is good.

Let this day of remembrance pass and the emotional stew boil itself out.  

After all these emotions are exhausted, let’s consider coldly what I wrote in the piece, “One Front: Two Wars”, the week after 9-11-2001.  Twenty years ago I called our fight the World War against International Terrorism (WW-T) and our Culture War “ACW II” – for American Civil War II.

“The distinctions between today’s liberals and conservatives will widen as WW-T progresses. When American Civil War II heats up – may it be a war of words and battles at the ballot boxes only – the two primary sides of the conflict will shape up in new alignments of allies, perhaps with new political labels.

One side will be soldiered largely by citizens who know that since 1776 America is the country where it is safe to be a believing, practicing, proselytizing Christian and Jew. Their troops will advocate the big ideas, the worldview supporting American Civilization and the West, namely, Judeo-Christian thought. This side will show tolerance for the Moslems, the pagans, the atheists among us, but not cede the nation to their hyphenated ideas of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

America faces a long, long perilous WW-T and ACW II indeed. May the God of America’s Founders, the God of Jesus Christ and Abraham, have mercy on us all. May God Bless America. In God We Trust.”

Twenty years after 9-11, the grey ashes of the collapsed Twin Towers are just starting to settle on the ash pile of history.  Human history is war after war, conflict after conflict, sorrow heaped upon suffering, hardship and hatred, grieving and regret since Cain killed Abel.  Yet, we have no choice, but to fight, when attacked.  The War with Islamist Totalitarianism is far from over.  The fight with Human Secularist Totalitarianism is heating up because of Biden’s arrogant over reach of power, abuse of the Constitution, and disregard for the Rule of Law.  As awful as fighting is, we must be in it to win it.

Twenty years from now, may the Lord let the living remember more victories over both Totalitarianisms.  

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Kabul, Afghanistan Like Saigon, Vietnam 1975

1^st Order Observation.

Vietnam fell in 1975.  Afghanistan in 2021.  America lost two wars it chose not to win.  Actually, America never made the right choices in either war because the decision-makers didn’t understand what war they were fighting.  All the powerful, elected and appointed officials believed they knew exactly what was what.  And what to do.  But, they didn’t.

If they asked Napoleon’s basic question, “De quoi s’agit’il?”, which is “What is it about?”, they didn’t get the right answer. 

In Vietnam, the nature of the war was “Dau Tranh”, not domino Communism.  Millions of illiterate peasant Vietnamese were willing to die for the “Struggle” to rid Vietnam of foreigners.  First the French, then the Americans.  Yes, Ho Chi Minh was a Communist and had support from the Soviet Union.  Yes, it was a proxy conflict in the Cold War, but that wasn’t the essential nature of the war. 

In Afghanistan, the nature of the war is tribal Islamism.  Millions of tribal “Afghans” are willing to die to fight anyone their clan leaders say to fight.  Yes, the Taliban commit terrorism.  Yes, Islamists around the world support their brand of Islam.  Yes, the Taliban gave refuge to Al Qaeda, but their largely Pashtun push for primacy is as tribal anti-everybody or more so than it is theological anti-Infidel Islam.

After the Vietnam War, Col. Harry Summers wrote “On Strategy: A Critical Analysis of the Vietnam War.”  He correctly analyzed the three levels of war for American tactical success, operational failure, and strategic collapse.

Again with the genius of Napoleon, “The moral is to the physical as three is to one.”  In other words, the winners in Vietnam and Afghanistan had the strategic Will to persevere unto victory.  America didn’t offer a “Dau Tranh” to Afghans, while the Taliban had the Koran – beloved and honored by millions of Afghan peasants.

Blame Games.

The Afghanistan failure isn’t a political orphan.  Four Presidents, their civilian leaders of Defense, and their generals made plenty of mistakes.  Their best of intentions and greatest efforts don’t exonerate their bad judgement calls.  Because at the highest levels of power, it’s understanding more than expertise and wisdom more than policy that matters.

President Bush made a strategic diversion with the invasion of Iraq in 2003.  The whole of American power could have been used to rip out the Taliban militarily root and branch for 10 years or more.  Moreover, Bush and Rumsfeld talked the fuzzy, PC chatter of a Global War on “Terrorism.”   They could have stated the limited objectives of maintaining, secure operational bases to keep cutting the head off the snake for as many decades as it takes.  Hard stop.

President Obama did well going after the enemy with drones – even in Pakistan, but that tactic was like McNamara’s failed bombing campaign against North Vietnam.  The personal murder tactic isn’t sufficient to address the operational imperative to destroy sanctuaries.

President Trump failed the “art of the deal” to sign any agreement whatsoever with the Taliban – other than an unconditional surrender dictated to the remaining leaders.

Posing-President Biden pulled the plug on support to friendly forces and green-lighted the opening to the Taliban.  He expedited failure in such a way that its perception to our enemies may cost us dearly for decades.  It may even lead to some defeats.

Civilian Defense leaders and Generals who thought “nation-building” would work in Afghanistan are fools and poltroons, not leaders deserving their decades of accolades.

Bad Outcomes.

The Taliban will control many billions of dollars in opium and minerals to promote Islamism world-wide.  Their Islamist supporters around the world have new reasons to believe in victory over Western Civilization.

China may conclude that the invasion of Taiwan is more doable.  China will be more confident in the destiny to restore the Middle Kingdom and gain world hegemony.  Their confidence can become the deadly arrogance that the Japanese displayed at Pearl Harbor.

NATO may lose their last bit of confidence in the U.S. and their own defense of Western Civilization. 

Russia and Iran will leverage US failure to their gains as best they can.

The Commies, a.k.a. Democrats, in the U.S. will draw all the wrong conclusions and promote them as “provens” as they did after Vietnam.

And, But.

The “woke as a joke” U.S. Army has the opportunity to analyze and understand a On Strategy II for the failures of Afghanistan.  Then, put the lessons learned into building an Army that will win.  Like the armed mob that came out of Vietnam that was transformed into the victorious Army of Desert Storm and the tactically tough and competent Army of Operations Enduring Freedom in Afghanistan and Operation Iraqi Freedom.

This will require another transformation of the Army, like the 1970/80s, but much like a reformation.  West Point needs to restore integrity and honor to the officer corps.  All of the Army needs to conduct an inquisition against Critical Race Theory and all things Politically Correct.  Focus on winning wars.  Be the masters of Land Warfare.

Another generation of American veterans and their families must suffer the sting of sacrifice squandered by politicians.  May their suffering bring them wisdom more than bitterness. May their awful loss prompt their engagement for better over hatred and apathy.

Let a new generation of military leadership devise the next American Way of War with winning strategies, operations, and tactics.  Pray that the political leadership will understand “De quoi s’agit’il” about the next war.

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“Who is John Galt?” is Ayn Rand’s catch phrase for America’s imagined descent into Socialism.  How about “What happened to JAB?” for America’s actual descent into Socialism?  Because I’m JAB – a.k.a. James Atticus Bowden – and I got permanently banned from Facebook. 

That’s just phase one of today’s socialism becoming tomorrow’s totalitarianism.  I’d like to be a catch phrase for what’s going wrong, so that maybe we can make it right.

Why do the Thought Police at Facebook bother to ban someone as insignificant as I am in the public domain? 

They’re really afraid of some ideas.  They’re really determined to censor some arguments.  They’re really arrogant about using their absolute power with impunity.

Consider the Thought Crime I committed.

In May 2021, I got a message when I tried to log onto Facebook.  Apparently, a cartoon I re-posted from August 2019 “violated their community standards.”  It was a cartoon of a stick figure hanging himself and another stick figure watching and eating popcorn.  I posted it when Epstein was arrested.  Before he was murdered.

It was a cartoon.  Of stick figures.  I re-posted it from someone else’s page. 

A child of five knows it was just a cartoon.  With stick figures. Not an endorsement of suicide.     

I was notified that I had 30 days to have my file reviewed.  Immediately, I clicked on the button and got an email saying Facebook would review my files and determine if I should be permanently banned.  

At the end of 30 days when I tried to log on, I got a message that I was permanently banned from Facebook.  That’s it.  No explanation.  No due process.  No appeal.  No recourse. 

After 12 years on Facebook, all things “James Atticus Bowden” went down the memory hole.  Every post, pic, and comment of mine disappeared.  That’s more “1984” than “Atlas Shrugged.”  It’s fitting as the proven progression of Human Secular Totalitarianism since the French Revolution.

What “community standards” were so horribly violated that I can’t go back in time on Facebook to see a comment my late wife posted?  Or, see pictures of my grandchildren which exist only in the archives of cyberspace?  Or, let my classmates see every monthly prayer list I posted to my West Point class prayer page – that I created? 

I’m not allowed to know and confront my accuser.  I’m not permitted to know who decided I had to be removed from a body of over 2 billion people.  I’m not able to see the process and protocols that declared my posts “Verboten.”  I’m not allowed to network in any of the on-line communities I’ve participated in – for years. 

No evidence other than the stick figure cartoon.  No due process.  No jury of peers.  No justification. No transparency. It’s what tyrants, dictators, and bullies dream of having.  Nameless, faceless, unaccountable, absolute power is exercised in complete secrecy.

Being de-platformed is personal.  12 years of memories are gone.  Felt like my personal effects were stolen.  Furthermore, I’m denied a lot of public information.  I can’t “just look it up on Facebook.”

The state and federal legislatures will eventually do something.  The politicians will have to decide how social networks – which amass hundreds of millions of dollars for their super privileged elites to buy elections – fit in the law.

Are they private companies of such magnitude that anti-trust laws apply?  Should they be broken up like Ma Bell was? 

Are they public utilities subject to regulation? 

Are they newspapers of the 4^th Estate? 

Are they public squares open to free speech and statutory limits against libel, slander, communicating threats and incite to riot?

Are they the public airwaves regulated like television and radio?

Or, are they some synergism of existing protections of personal free speech and public accountability?

Regardless of what they should be, let my example be a warning of Facebook fascism.  Of social network socialism trending, inevitably, to totalitarianism.

Please post this piece on Facebook. 

Ask “What happened to JAB?” Maybe one of my almost 5,000 “friends” will see it, understand why I disappeared and know a bit more truth about Facebook. 

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Winsome Sears for the Win!

Why Winsome

Or

Elect Winsome Sears for Lieutenant Governor of Virginia

I hadn’t seen Winsome face to face since she was running for Congress.  When I heard she’s running for Lt. Governor of Virginia I knew instantly that I support her.  I don’t care who her opponents are.  There’s no one in politics who will serve The People of Virginia better than Winsome Sears.  None.

My confidence in her after all these years is precisely because I see the sum of my 30 years in Virginia Republican politics is many politicians and so few public servants.  Winsome Sears breaks the mold.  Her uniqueness isn’t being the first legal immigrant and the only black Republican woman ever elected to Virginia’s House of Delegates.  Her standout capability is her courage, conviction, and commitment.  

Winsome has lived life.  She’s grateful, as most immigrants are, to have lived the American dream.  She gives credit to America for every opportunity from service as a Marine to building a small business to being elected to represent Virginians to being appointed to serve the Nation.  Her modesty masks what she achieved.  Her grace covers over what she’s endured.

I remember the awful, truly hateful, vicious lies, slander, and epithets the Democrats heaped on her – because she was running as a Republican.  That’s “too uppity” for the Democrats.  No one running across Virginia in this race has ever stood up to the abuse she faced.  No one currently in Virginia politics has shown the courage she demonstrated.

Winsome can take the rocks, arrows, bullets and bombs that you know are coming at any Republican who dares run in Virginia.  Especially, if the candidate isn’t an Establishment career politician.  Winsome is running from the same conviction that lead her to ministry in a men’s prison ministry and women’s homeless shelter.  Her convictions are tried, tested, and true.

When elected, Winsome’s experience as a Delegate makes her ready on day one to make things happen in the General Assembly for all of Virginia.  She’ll make the difference that politicians promise, but only fighters deliver on the issues that matter. 

Winsome will get Virginia back to normal.  That means back to our basic freedoms and business.  She’ll reopen our economy.  Furthermore, she’ll clean up our elections by improving ballot box integrity.  Winsome won’t back down on challenges to our rights – especially the Right to Life for babies in the womb and the Second Amendment right to bear arms.  She’ll work for school choice, funding families to choose the best education for children instead of spending your tax dollars funding failing schools.

Politicians run from school choice.  They fear the teachers’ lobby and all their loot. But, Winsome seeks to serve all Virginians from every walk of life – at every stage and condition of life.  Her commitment to all Virginians is personal.

Since the Democrats took over the General Assembly in 2019, they’ve passed over a thousand bills that do more than harm Virginia.  Their bills and the Governor’s edicts make the damage to families, jobs, schools, and freedom malicious enough to be called evil.  They are destroying the Commonwealth of Virginia with the cancerous rot of Cultural Marxism. 

Winsome Sears is the bravest and finest fighter for family, faith, and freedom running for office in Virginia.  Please help elect her as our next Lt. Governor.

James Atticus Bowden

Chairman, 91 HD Legislative Committee

Former: Chairman, 1 CD, RPV,

Member, SCC, RPV, and

Chairman, Poquoson City Committee, RPV

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Sanctuary at Seven

When I visited Henry David Thoreau’s Walden Pond in September 2018, I thought I should keep such a journal about my home, Sanctuary, as a take-off from his two years “On Walden Pond.”  The seventh anniversary of my life at Sanctuary was February 14th, 2021.  It’s the Hebrew number of completion – 7 years.  I posted a long piece last year about what Sanctuary means to me – as well as on a number of other occasions.  They all sing Sanctuary’s song. 

Here are some eclectic pieces from my Sanctuary journal:   

“The first night at Sanctuary for me, the widower Bowden, was Valentine’s Day 2014, the first in my adult life without Nellie Katherine Kyle Bowden.  The house hard by The Chesapeake Bay was cold and drafty.  Beyond the wide wall of my bedroom windows the waters of The Bay were black.  It was foreboding.

Over time, the nights of black water and twinkling navigation beacons turned the strange into the familiar.  They transformed further into a fond friendliness.  This house became a family home as “Papa’s house.”  Sanctuary sheltered me as the Lord God sustained me, healed me, strengthened me, and filled me with purposes fueled by gratitude.  

Sanctuary is set feet from the Chesapeake Bay.  The water lapping on my rock rip rap flows unbroken to the eye to the Northeast and heart of The Bay.  

Sanctuary’s third of an acre has two old wood seawalls defining its left and right.  Its dock juts out bravely beside sea grass struggling to survive.  The heavy rip rap and wooden seawall measure the limits of tides, but merely suggest the same to a storm. Three times in seven years sea water has rushed under and around Sanctuary.  The waves break in the yard with any Nor’Easter pulling its weight.  It’s awesome and intimidating.       

Sanctuary begins each day better than a symphony tuning up.  It opens with instruments of light, temperature, sounds, smells, sights of creatures alive and ever-changing clouds – all in harmony from the first note.

I’m particularly partial to sunsets at Sanctuary.  The clarity of light skimming the earth’s circumference brings everything into its finest focus.  Such clarity.

Nothing compares to storms marching across The Bay.  Great storm clouds building upon each other with contending light and dark at different levels.

Sanctuary is shifting from a gift to me to a gift for others.  Yet, personally, Sanctuary is a state of being.  It’s the transformed state of consciousness to live with a constant awareness of ever present beauty.  Beauty which is a mere opening of the eyes.  It’s a slight shift of the head away.  Beauty which is so close that I feel its presence as a physical touch to my body.  It moves me to give thanks to God continually.  It’s the altered state of being, feeling, so alive.  Really alive.  Completely alive. Youthful and vigorous.  At once, peaceful and joyful.  I live here in a different state of being.

There are two seasons at Sanctuary.  Kayak season is from the first week in March to early December.  Fireplace season is from the first week in October to the first week in May.

In my kayak I can see about 2.1 miles to the horizon of the water.  When the distant line looks like it is dancing, the waves are really up.

I like living in synch with the tides.  Using the tide, not a clock, to mete out the day.  Much better way to measure time.

The morning after my longest dolphin encounter there was a thick morning fog.  Had my fog encounter where you can’t see the shore anywhere.  It’s eerie, moody, spooky, and magical.  Seeing things so differently is disorienting and challenging.  Exciting to explore through the fog.  To keep stroking without any land to guide by.  No beacon.  No direction.  Could be cliché about how life felt at times.

A paddle of many minutes up to a couple of hours isn’t finished until the last stroke is taken.  Flash of the obvious.  The last stroke is as important as the first.  The first is as vital as the last.

Slow and steady.  Slow and sure.  Even and relentless.  Suddenly, you’re there.  There are times when stroke after stroke seems like you aren’t moving whatsoever.  The faraway marker, the far beacon, for this leg seems just as far away.  How surprising it becomes when you can tell the beacon has grown significantly larger because you are significantly closer.  There are times when the easy stroke is sorely painful and when powerful strokes feel absolutely, effortless.  There are times out of breath.  Times when breathing in is like drinking the air.  Times of cold and heat.  When sudden winds come unseen to challenge, truly threaten safety.  When the beauty of the moment, in the very commonplace for here, is overwhelming.

Every day is a beauty to behold, breathe – to be – at Sanctuary.”

Many more observations – about water, wind, sky and season commentary, paddling pensees, navigating marshes, light, sound, and smell.   They may not rise to Thoreau’s level of literature.   They simply speak for me “On Sanctuary.”

Old Man and The Bay

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https://www.buzzsprout.com/1675510/7921726-american-civilization.mp3?blob_id=35417278&download=true

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Conspiracy theory crazy is really Krazy.  Krazy with a K is special. 

Gloom on the Doomsayers

Or

How Clever Hype Hides Woesome Hysteria

 

Recently, my classmate and brother Thomas Waller shared “THE CORONOVIRUS PLANNEDEMIC IS THE RED CARPET TO THE NEW WORLD ORDER DISGUISED AS THE GREAT RESET!”   Yes, it was all caps. Someone is using this piece to create alarm and fear among Christians.  If the year were  1487, this piece would be all about “The Hammer of Witches (Malleus Maleficarum) Is For the Common Good Because Lucifer Knows He Has Little Time Left!”  The message is the same.

“Church leaders approve that the Bible and reason lead rational people to believe X, therefore go and do Y.”  Unfortunately, X is poppycock and Y is balderdash.

Let’s look at today’s cherry picking reality as it creates science fiction and political farce.

• Targets of Opportunity. Calling a pandemic “a plannedemic” is making something from nothing.  It’s what the Left does with every mass shooting.  Take an element of truth – the virus may have been engineered in a lab – and make up more.  Like, it was planned all along.  There’s evidence about the virus being created.  There’s no evidence, yet, that it was planned.  Conspiracy theorists targets of opportunity to weave their spider web of truths, half-truths, and lies.
• The Names of Things. Demons have to have names to be known.  Since the French Revolution those demons have been called the Nobility, Bourgeoisie, Robber Barons, Capitalists, Rothschild Family, Bankers, Arms Manufacturers as Merchants of Death, International Jews, Kulaks, Counter-Revolutionaries, Four Olds, etc.     
  • New World Order. NWO is a scholarly term in the study of International Relations.  The bi-polar world ended when the Soviet Empire collapsed.  Projecting a New World Order is the normal course of events.  But it became the scary term for the 1990s and beyond.  It came with all the reports of black helicopters and chem trails.
  • Great Reset. This is a real term used by people who want to change the world to their liking.  The Muslim Brotherhood wants to do the same – to their liking.  The record on global ideologies since 1789 is map of shipwrecks on nationalism, theological tribalism, economics, and failed leaders.  It’s a good idea to learn the ideas of the Great Reset to defeat them – if they show up where you can beat them.
• Just No.  No, it isn’t “without a shadow of doubt that the Coronavirus pandemic is the Trojan Horse setting the stage for the coming New World Order, One World Religion, and the Rise of the Antichrist.”  No, Covid-19 wasn’t released deliberately for the Great Reset.
• Usual Boogie Men.
  • Davos and World Economic Forum. The annual gathering of the WEF is called Davos.  Yes, the attendees want to do what they publish.  But, they aren’t the absolute masters of the universe to make it happen.  See the UK’s Brexit from the EU.  Note the freedom of Eastern European countries.
  • George Soros. He is accused of funding everything wrong and evil. Who knows what he actually funds?  A real free press would find out.  If the accusations are true, he lost millions of dollars in losing elections in 2020.
• Cultural Marxism. Cultural Marxism evolved from the Communism of old.  It’s embedded in concepts of Social Justice and Critical Race Theory.  It should be opposed, on its own, everywhere the cancer appears.  Go see if your public schools teach students to be “global citizens” and see how they celebrate Earth Day.
• Globalism and Stakeholder Capitalism. The economic arguments for the European Union are used for a global economy.  There are legitimate advantages and disadvantages.  Gains and losses.  Stakeholder Capitalism is a deceptive name for a centrally-directed, statist economy.  It includes social justice redistribution of wealth based on group rights.
• Biblical Scares. Is a digital ID actually the Mark of the Beast?  Linking the Bible to specific events isn’t good theology.  The Bible speaks to the nature of God and man.  You can see those natures in events.  But, it’s bogus to tie a specific event today to the Bible that is history from Genesis 12 through Revelations 4 (except for the book of Job).  Prophecy is for prophets.
• Bad Science. A vaccine containing RNA won’t control biological processes, except for the immune response to a specific pathogen.  And, DARPA-funded light sensor technology won’t deploy a vaccine to literally change our DNA.
• Just Nuts. This discredits the entire 56 page article: “The NOW controllers want to download some kind of Microsoft office system and software into your body and brain, and hook you up to the JEDI and/or Amazon CIA cloud, so they can have direct access to your brain.”  It’s just crazy.
• Bad Policy. Universal Basic Income is very bad policy.  Creating public health credentials is very bad policy.  All bad policies can be argued against on their faults alone.
• The reference to a 2001 Wargame “Dark Winter” is amusing.  I worked in Army Futures Wargames on and off for over 20 years.  Every imaginable attack has been imagined and played out.  When my Red Team talked about using hijacked civilian airliners to attack the US in 1997, that didn’t become the Oplan for Osama Bin Laden.  Likewise, the comments about Cyberattack are very old news.  Over a decade old.
• Real Problems. Meanwhile, there are real problems created by governments. The Green Deal destroys Western economies.  The $30T deficit will destroy the U.S. sooner or later through inflation or bankruptcy.  Shutting down cities and states kills small businesses which are 60% of our economy.  Illegal immigration will break the federal and state welfare systems – including Medicaid.   No conspiracy theories needed.
• End Times Freakout. Good Christians have pointed to the End Times happening since the generation that saw Jesus rise from the grave.  It was especially strong when the Black Death ravaged Europe.  Likewise, before the 1900s it fueled missionary movements to speed up the coming of the End Times. Peppering a paper with Bible verses doesn’t make absurd allegations true.

The Wuhan Virus is three times more deadly than seasonal virus.  The Left uses crises for their political agenda.  Hyping their cynical causes to hysteria doesn’t help defeat them.  Combining conspiracy theories and hawking them as wrapped in the Bible doesn’t make them real.  Nonsense wasn’t true when it was written in Malleus Maleficarum.  Such nonsense isn’t true now