Thursday, September 30, 2010

An "unfortunate misunderstanding"

An unfortunate misunderstanding? So that's what they are calling it huh. I was wondering, as a number of other descriptive terms came to my mind while reading this report. And a matter of fact, there are a number of adjectives that leap to my mind when I read about this incident.

Baker family invited back to White House

The White House hopes to make amends to the family of Congressional Medal of Honor recipient Vernon Baker after they were turned away from a West Wing tour because of dress code issues.
Reports surfaced Wednesday that the St. Maries family was turned away from a West Wing tour over the weekend because Baker’s step-grandson was wearing shorts and a T-shirt bearing the war hero’s image. The family was in the D.C. area for Baker’s burial at Arlington National Cemetery.

Another member of their party, North Idaho resident Thomas Norris, a retired FBI agent and Medal of Honor winner, also was denied entry to the West Wing because the Secret Service didn’t have time to complete a background check on him.

A White House spokesman said Wednesday evening that the incident was the result of an “unfortunate misunderstanding.”

“We would have loved to have hosted 10-year-old Vernon and his family at the White House and we have reached out to the Baker family and Lt. Norris to communicate our deep regret and invite them back to the White House,” spokesman Adam Abrams said. “This family, as well as Lt. Norris, have given so much to our nation and they have our sincerest appreciation and our apologies for this misunderstanding.”

Norris, who served as a Navy SEAL lieutenant before becoming an FBI agent, had accompanied the Baker family to Washington for the military burial Friday. He said Wednesday that he was told when he arrived at the White House with the Baker family on Saturday that the Secret Service had not run a security clearance on him.
“He apologized,” Norris said of the government employee who explained the problem to him. “He told me ‘The Secret Service has informed me they haven’t had time to do a background check and you can’t get in.’ ”

Moments later, after Norris gave up his place in the tour to the Baker family’s driver, who had clearance, Baker’s step-grandson, Vernon Pawlik, 10, was denied entry because of the dress code. Also on the tour were Vernon Baker’s widow, Heidy, and her daughter Alexandra.
At that point the family gave up and left the White House, Norris said. Heidy Baker was traveling on Wednesday and could not be reached for comment.

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Prime's Worm hole

This is a place for me to muse about the issues that affect our world. My world and my country and my life in particular. I can say what I want to here and those who may stumble across my musings, are welcome to comment,or not. America is under siege. Everything this nation has ever represented, is now being torn asunder and crushed by the onslaught of egalitarian socialism. All morals and social values have been devolved into the belief that systemic racism, is the only underlying cause or reason for any societal ills in America. And that representation, is nothing but a Trojan Horse argument. A means of getting the egalitarian camel's nose into the tent. And now that it has been inserted? There is mayhem and anarchy and burning and looting all across America. And the only questions that remains to be asked and answered? Are these. When is enough enough and when will the American people call full stop and take the law into their own hands, to repel this socialist based attack on the Constitution and our personal freedoms.

Thinking

It started out innocently enough. I began to think at parties now and then -- just to loosen up and be a part of the crowd.
Inevitably, though, one thought led to another and soon I was more than just a social thinker.

I began to think alone -- "to relax", I told myself -- but I knew it wasn't true.
Thinking became more and more important to me and finally I was thinking all the time.

I began to think on the job. I knew that thinking and employment don't mix, but I couldn't help myself.

I began to avoid friends at lunchtime so I could read Thoreau, Muir, Confucius and Kafka. I would return to the office dizzied and confused, asking, "What is it exactly we are doing here?"

One day the boss called me in. He said, "Listen, I like you and it hurts me to say this, but your thinking has become a real problem. If you don't stop thinking on the job, you'll have to find another job."

"Honey," I confessed, "I've been thinking..."

"I know you've been thinking," she said, "and I want a divorce!" "But Honey, surely it's not that serious." "It is serious," she said, lower lip aquiver.

"You think as much as college professors and college professors don't make that much money, so if you keep on thinking, we won't have any money!"
She exploded in tears of rage and frustration, but I was in no mood to deal with the emotional drama.

"I'm going to the library," I snarled
I headed for the library, in the mood for some John Locke. I roared into the parking lot with NPR on the radio and ran up to the big glass doors.

They didn't open. The library was closed.

To this day, I believe that a Higher Power was looking out for me that night.

Leaning on the unfeeling glass, whimpering for Emerson, a poster caught my eye, "Friend, is heavy thinking ruining your life?" it asked.

This is why I am what I am today: a recovering thinker.

I never miss a TA meeting. At each meeting we watch a non-educational video; last week it was "Porky's." Then we share experiences about how we avoided thinking since the last meeting.

I still have my job, and things are a lot better at home. Life just seemed easier, somehow, as soon as I stopped thinking. I think the road to recovery is nearly complete for me.

Today I took the final step...I joined the Democratic Party

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If you are able,
save them a place
inside of you
and save one backward glance
when you are leaving
for the places they can
no longer go.
Be not ashamed to say
you loved them,
though you may
or may not have always.
Take what they have left
and what they have taught you
with their dying
and keep it with your own.
And in that time
when men decide and feel safe
to call the war insane,
take one moment to embrace
those gentle heroes
you left behind.

Major Michael Davis O'Donnell
1 January 1970
Dak To, Vietnam

Captain Michael O'Donnell was lost in Cambodia on March 24 1970, while flying a UH1 rescue helicopter, trying to rescue an eight man LRRP team under attack in Cambodia. He was listed as MIA along with the eight he had attempted to rescue after his UH1 Huey was shot down by enemy fire. The official military report listed the eight as shot down 'non survivable' and 'non recoverable.'

Michael O'Donnell was submitted for the Congressional Medal of Honor for his actions that day. He was awarded the Distinguished flying cross, the Bronze Star, The Air Medal and The Purple Heart and he was promoted to the rank of Major (posthumously).

In 1978 he was officially listed as KIA by the Department of Defense.

A little about the philosophy of the author

The Borg Conspiracy is one man's purely pedestrian thoughts, independent musings and frequently cheeky commentaries...Mixed with an abundance of patriotism, love of God, and love of country.

My thoughts?

In my opinion........in another generation, all that will remain of our once great republic, may be little more than what is left to weather the passage of time in the form of a few obscure and forgotten monuments to the great American experiment.

If America should fail....let it be written as her epitaph.....died by her own hand. The greatest experiment in freedom ever undertaken, lost in the end to the pursuit of the illusion that egalitarian tolerance was more valuable than individual freedom.

Let us be warned.
Franklin, Payne, Jefferson. They all knew the consequences of the lack of vigilance and they tried to warn us. They gave us a document as our guide post. We were to guard it and revere it and use it to guide and govern our future and our posterity.

No one listened.

Prime's Worm Hole

Thursday, September 30, 2010