Reflections of An Uncommon Common Man

John Brown Robert Dear   There is a joke that goes like this. What is the definition of mixed emotions? Watching your mother-in-law drive off a cliff in your brand new Cadillac. I have always had mixed emotions whenever I hear of an abortion clinic bombing. A shooting, such as in the case of the attack by Robert Dear on a Planned Parenthood clinic in Colorado Springs this past Friday. Or the occasional murder of an abortion doctor. On the one hand I realize that in a civilized society we must condemn the acts of individuals who take the law into their own hands. Over the period of two days, October 16 to 18th 1859, abolitionist John Brown led 22 men in an attack on the Federal arsenal at Harpers Ferry Virginia, which is now West Virginia. His intention was to start a slave insurrection that he hoped would spread across the South. Colonel Robert E. Lee and JEB Stuart, who were United States Army officers at the time, were called in to organize a raid on the arsenal, by...

     When Obama was elected in 2008 people would ask me, Greg, what kind of a president do you think he will be?  "Jimmy Carter on steroids" was my reply. I was only partially right. Like Carter, Obama has destabilized the balance of power in the world. Carter allowed Iran to fall to a radical Islamic regime, which released the plague of radical Islamic Jihad on the world since that time. Iran was a sign to the radical Islam that their time had come. It has been on the rise ever since. Before Iran fell I never knew that there was such a thing as radical Islam. Obama has destabilized the world in an even more dangerous and insidious way. Before his election in 2008 he tipped his hand to what kind of president that he was going to be. He traveled to Kenya and spoke at campaign rallies in support of the radical Muslim candidate for president named Raila Odinga. He wanted to establish a fundamental Islamic regime and to establish Sharia law in Kenya.  ...

  Although I have always been a student of history I was ignorant of the historic significance of Edgefield when I was dating my wife Debbie in the 1960's. It was probably after her father sold the old house at 915 Boscobel street in the early 1990's that I became fully aware of it's rich history. I didn't know that Edgefield was the Belle Meade of Nashville in the 1800's and remained so until the great East Nashville fire of 1916. Edgefield was part of a large plantation owned by the prominent Nashville physician Dr. John Shelby in the early 1800's. He built two mansions called Fatherland and Boscobel for each of his daughters. During the Civil War General Albert Sidney Johnston established his headquarters in Edgefield after the fall of Forts Henry and Donelson.  The Union army occupied Edgefield after the retreat of the Confederate army and the burning of the suspension and railroad bridges across the Cumberland. Nashville Mayor Richard Cheatham was rowed ...

 On Sunday July 23, 1950 a C-46 transport plane flying airmen of the Tennessee Air National Guard crashed shortly after take off from Myrtle Beach AFB South Carolina. The crash killed 35 Guardsmen and 4 crewmen from an Air Force Reserve unit in West Palm Beach Florida. Most Nashvillian's my age or younger have probably never heard of this story. A buddy in my Guard unit told me about it on a drill weekend. It was the worst air disaster in the history of the Air National Guard. Nashville has had it's share of disasters. During the Civil War hundreds of free blacks and slaves were rounded up off of the streets of Nashville to build fortifications just after the Union army captured the city. It is estimated that over 800 black men died of exposure while building Ft. Negley. An atrocity committed by the Union army that is not highly publicized in the history books. There were many cholera epidemics in Nashville during the 1800's. The epidemic of 1849 took the life of Preside...

  On July 1st, 1971 the Twenty-Sixth Amendment to the Constitution was passed granting 18 year olds the right to vote. This Amendment had only been proposed three months earlier making it the fastest Amendment ever passed in American history. The year 1972 was the first election that I voted in and I voted for Nixon. He won the fourth largest landslide in history. I turned 18 on February 28, 1968 and if I could have voted I would have voted for Nixon that year too, Although I considered myself to be a Democrat at the time. The year 1968 was one of the most important and craziest years of my life. On a personal level it was a happy year for me. I graduated from East High, married my high school sweetheart, joined the Air Force, and discovered that I was going to be a father while in basic training. On a national level the year was absolutely crazy. In January the North Vietnamese launched an all out attack on the Marine base at Khe Sanh. By the beginning of the year there we...

Bernie Sanders   Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (1770-1831) was a German philosopher who was the philosophical mentor of Karl Marx. They never actually knew each other but Marx's Communist philosophy was heavily influenced by Hegel. If you have trouble sleeping at night just try to read Hegel. It is a good cure for insomnia. I don't pretend to know much about philosophy because it is way above my head. Hegel believed that all human history is moving toward an inevitable conclusion. The triumph of reason. I have a big problem with this. Who gets to determine whose reason wins out in the end? Karl Marx took Hegel's philosophy a step further. Human history is moving toward an inevitable conclusion. The triumph of the proletariat. Marx outlined his communistic world view in the Communist Manifesto and Das Kapital. He believed capitalism would fall of it's own weight. It would come about because of capitalism's boom and bust cycles. Reductions of the labor force...

1. Radical Islam is our enemy and has been at war with us for a very long time. Since the beginning of our country. If you don't believe me, read a book called (From The Shores Of Tripoli). It is about Thomas Jefferson, the US Navy, the US Marines and the fight against the Barbary Pirates.  2. Islam is not a religion of peace. The people who are trying to kill us are going by the Quran. Read the book. The reason most Muslims are good people is because they are not living by the book. Radical Islam's goal is a world wide caliphate. If you are an atheist, agnostic, Buddhist, Hindu, Christian, or Jew you are a heretic and are a target. During the Ottoman Empire Christians and Jews were tolerated if they submitted to the authority of the Muslim state. They were considered people of the book. This is not the case today. Modern day Muslims consider Christian's and Jews to be heretics because we have a false religion. There is only one choice for the heretic. Convert or d...

         The Army has it's claim to fame;      The Airborne Rangers, the Green Berets. The world knows the Navy Seals; Life of Danger, Men of Steel. The Corps have their elite too; Recon Patrol, the Proud, the Few. But when it comes to us, not much is heard; We're just the Cops who guard the birds. In Vietnam, through toil and strife, We gave it all, our hearts, our life. A page in history, a chapter in time; We fought for freedom, yours and mine. We stayed vigilant through cold and rain, and bear the fatigue, hardship, and pain. This piece of ground, we will defend, Side by side `til the bitter end. So fear not pilot, you can fly all day, This base is guarded by the Blue Beret. - Author Unknown   The concept of ABGD or (Air Base Ground Defense) began early in WW2 with the advent of the German Blitzkrieg tactic which overran British air bases. The Royal Air Force had no plan in place to protect them. Winston Churchill devised a...