The media has all the time in the world to cover Trayvon Martin....

.....but can't be bothered with this?

A West Palm Beach grand jury declared “fundamentally inadequate” the medical care given to an 18-year-old who died after two head injuries he received at the county juvenile lockup were ignored for hours by guards, supervisors and the facility’s superintendent.

Eric Perez, who was detained after being arrested with a small amount of marijuana, died in the early morning hours of July 9 after spending most of the prior night hallucinating, vomiting, soiling himself and seeking help from guards who ignored him. The grand jury’s report, issued Friday, said Eric had been dead for an hour before lockup corrections officers noticed he had passed away. An officer stationed outside his cell had checked on him every 10 minutes without noticing his death.

“The only attempt to seek an outside medical opinion during the entire episode was two phone calls to the head nurse that went unanswered during the night,” the report, called a presentment, said. “The officers’ response to Mr. Perez’s hallucinations, instability and cries of pain were to simply observe him as he lay on the floor vomiting and defecating in his underwear. More effort was spent cleaning the floor around the youth than attending to his welfare.”

Link

The 'war on drugs' at it's finest.

Wrong, wrong, wrong....

E.J. Dionne of WaPo:

"For much of our history, Americans — even in our most quarrelsome moments — have avoided the kind of polarized politics we have now. We did so because we understood that it is when we balance our individualism with a sense of communal obligation that we are most ourselves as Americans. The 20th century was built on this balance, and we will once again prove the prophets of U.S. decline wrong if we can refresh and build upon that tradition. But doing so will require conservatives to abandon untempered individualism, which betrays what conservatism has been and should be."

No Sir.....not a moment before Liberals abandon untempered entitlement! The forces at work within our nation are those resolutely arrayed against individualism. Whether they be tax fiends on the left or religious fundamentalists on the right.......those who would mold our society into a groupthinking herd, they are responsible for the decline of this nation.

A Daily Dose of Christian Love.....

Coming fresh off of the heels of North Carolina's Pastor Worley calling for gays to be placed inside concentration camps with electrified wire.....we now have an upstanding, good Christian Pastor from Kansas preaching love and brotherhood:

"They should be put to death. That's what happened in Israel. That's why homosexuality wouldn't have grown in Israel. It tends to limit conversions. It tends to limit people coming out of the closet. — 'Oh, so you're saying we should go out and start killing them, no?' — I'm saying the government should. They won't but they should. [You say], 'oh, I can't believe you you're horrible. You're a backwards neanderthal of a person.' Is that what you're calling scripture? Is God a neanderthal backwards.. in his morality. Is it his word or not? If it's his word, he commanded it. It's his idea, not mine. And I'm not ashamed of it."

Audio at the link.




And just "think of the children!"


From Indiana, we have the Christian version of child abuse, a 4 year old singing: "Ain’t No Homos Going To Make It To Heaven" on the church stage.

To a standing ovation.

Link

Awww.....aren't kids cute?

Sick. Bastards. All of them.

Read this and Remember......

what Memorial Day is really about.

As Memorial Day Nears, a Single Image That Continues to Haunt

Rest easy Night Train...your journey is over

A Japanese man’s Harley-Davidson motorcycle that washed up on the shores of western Canada more than a year after it was swept away by the devastating tsunami will be preserved in a Harley museum in the U.S.

The 2004 FXSTB Softail Night Train motorcycle will be permanently housed in the Harley-Davidson Museum in Milwaukee, Wis., as a memorial to the victims of the March 2011 earthquake and tsunami, which swamped several coastal towns in northeastern Japan and left more than 15,000 people dead.

Mark found the motorcycle, still bearing its Japanese license plate, while driving his ATV on an isolated beach on Graham Island on the west coast of British Columbia on April 18. The bike, along with several other items, was inside a rusted cargo van container that apparently drifted more than 4,000 miles across the Pacific Ocean.

No words are needed

So sad....So true....

From Preparing for Tyranny.

Sunday Funnies

Saw this on Facebook, from fellow rider and former colleague Mark.

Welcome Home Brother....

For years, the family of Gerald "Mike" Kight has wondered: What happened to the handsome 23-year-old who went to war with his three brothers and one brother-in-law, but never came home? He lives on in old photographs and family lore, but he disappeared following a battle along Wylerbaan Road in the Netherlands, between Groesbeek and the little town of Wyler, Germany, in World War II. He was one of 39 Americans who were never found following clashes in the area with German troops in late September 1944. 

The mystery, at last, will be laid to rest at West Klickitat Cemetery in White Salmon, Wash., on May 19, following a noontime memorial service at Gardner Funeral Home. 

A Dutch farmer was turning the soil in his cornfield last September when he saw bones jutting from the ground. That brought out the Royal Netherlands Army's Recovery and Identification Unit, which unearthed two sets of human bones, in what apparently were two depressions about 100 yards apart

Dog tags found in the foxhole in the Dutch cornfield and delivered recently to Frances and Robert Hembree of Southeast Portland.

The remains in one depression, which may have been formed when a shell landed in the battle, were so fragmentary and so incomplete that they haven't yet been identified. The remains in the foxhole were more complete. They belonged to a man lying on his back with his knees elevated -- and they rested with the dog tags of Gerald Kight. 

Link 

Well Damn.....

In May of 2007, the Commander of our Brigade's Field Artillery Battalion had just left our BDE HQ on Fob Falcon to make his way back to his Combat Outpost just north of Route Irish. An EFP prevented him from making it back.

I was in the TOC when the call came into to Dragon X-Ray requesting an Air Weapons Team and for us to clear the route into the CSH. Another bad memory of a bad place.

Things seem to have gone as well as anyone could expect after losing both of their legs; he has been an inspirational honorary member of the New York Giants; he's taken a key role in the Army's Wounded Warrior Program....and I just found out that he's in the cast of the summer action flick Battleship.

Now....just between you and I, I have my doubts as to the cinematic quality of a movie based on a board game...but it's damn good to see a fellow Dragon doing well.

Random thought of the day

If many on the right call the current POTUS Barack Hussein Obama, and slyly justify it by saying "it's just his name..."

Why aren't they calling his opponent Willard Mitt Romney?

Hard as Woodpecker lips

Two Special Forces officers who's attitude in the face of physical and mental adversity should make all of us quit our whining and bellyaching when we have a boo-boo.

via Blackfive:

Maj. Kent Solheim, Charlie Company, 4th Battalion, 3rd Special Forces Group Company commander, defends his position from insurgent small arms fire during a fire fight in Kunar province, Afghanistan, Mar. 7, 2012. Solheim was injured July 27, 2007 in Karbala, Iraq, while conducting a raid to capture an insurgent commander. During the firefight that ensued, Solheim was shot four times. Solheim did not initially lose his leg. It was only after he lost function of his lower left leg that doctor’s felt there was a slim chance of making a full recovery. Solheim eventually elected to amputate his leg below the knee. Solheim was motivated by others he knew who continued to serve on active duty with a prosthetic.

“Last year I sat at the bedside of a friend who had just lost both legs in Afghanistan,” said Solheim. “He told me this was the hand he’s been dealt, so he should make the best of it. I took those words to heart and would like to think this is my mantra also. This is the hand I’ve been dealt, but life goes on and I will make best of it.”

U.S. Army Major Robert Eldridge, 2nd Battalion, 7th Special Forces Group executive officer, prepares before mounting a Mine Resistant Ambush Protected vehicle, in Kandahar province, Afghanistan, May 7. Eldridge was injured while on a combat patrol in Shkin, Patika province, Afghanistan, Dec 17, 2004. He was in the lead vehicle when it was struck by an anti-tank mine. Upon arriving at Forward Operating Base Salerno, his left leg was amputated in order to save his life.

“You can get angry and upset, but you can’t get angry and upset if you don’t do anything about it,” said Eldridge. “These guys make it through the (Special Forces) qualification course for a reason. They have the mental capacity to overcome something like this. You see them in the hospital and they’re the guys figuring out what they need to do to get better, not waiting around for someone to do it for them."

The US political Game of Thrones

From Duck of Minerva

Another step in the right direction

...toward fulfilling actual Conservatism, rather than the flimsy facede the GOP has been propping up. A memo from Republican pollster Jan van Lohuizen. Something I've been saying for some time now, though he obviously didn't get this from me.....the GOP needs to restore true Conservatism to it's platform in order to be an unassailable honest party. That must include owning the civil rights and liberties issue. In part:

Recommendation: A statement reflecting recent developments on this issue along the following lines:

“People who believe in equality under the law as a fundamental principle, as I do, will agree that this principle extends to gay and lesbian couples; gay and lesbian couples should not face discrimination and their relationship should be protected under the law. People who disagree on the fundamental nature of marriage can agree, at the same time, that gays and lesbians should receive essential rights and protections such as hospital visitation, adoption rights, and health and death benefits."

Other thoughts / Q&A: Follow up to questions about affirmative action:

“This is not about giving anyone extra protections or privileges, this is about making sure that everyone – regardless of sexual orientation – is provided the same protections against discrimination that you and I enjoy.”

Conservative fundamentals:

“As people who promote personal responsibility, family values, commitment and stability, and emphasize freedom and limited government we have to recognize that freedom means freedom for everyone. This includes the freedom to decide how you live and to enter into relationships of your choosing, the freedom to live without excessive interference of the regulatory force of government.

Read the entire memo

And this is why I'm a beer snob

Can Beer save America?

In the fevered battle between the macrobrew behemoths and the craftbrew insurgents, both sides are digging in for an epic confrontation.

The history of the face-off is illustrative. For decades, the big brewers (Anheuser Busch, MillerCoors, etc.) have marketed their products less on the basis of taste or quality than on identity branding. What you drank subsequently became a statement not necessarily of what your taste buds enjoyed, but of your self-image. The Miller versus Budweiser wars and Old Milwaukee ads, for instance, were so often a pitch to guys looking for working-class street cred. Meanwhile, Pabst Blue Ribbon lately has been pitched as a retro-themed statement of hipster style.

This kind of marketing made a certain sense, because while macrobrew brands are certainly appealing, the actual beers in question are basically terrible. Produced through the macrobrews’ low-price, high-volume process, they don’t contain high-quality ingredients, they don’t contain much alcohol and, thus, they simply don’t taste good. Knowing this, the macrobrews have logically designed their marketing campaigns to focus on everything (the can, the type of people who drink it, the logo, etc.) but the actual product. Indeed, if there’s one ubiquitous reference that macrobrewing companies make to the beer itself, it’s usually one telling you how cold the beer is or should be — a temperature that, quite deliberately, helps hide just how bad the beer actually is.

The obvious assumption in this business model is that Americans generally reward low price over everything else, and specifically preference beer that is cost-effective to drink in mass quantities, rather than beer that delivers more alcohol or taste in less volume of liquid. In other words, the model assumes consumers see beer as a homogenized, undifferentiated commodity and that therefore less can never be more. In this view, more is always more, and since cheaper means more, cheaper is inherently better.

Salon 

Hypocritical Tweet of the Day

In reaction to Obama supporting gays in having the liberty to enter legal, committed relationships, Allen West tweets:

"Pres failures are masked by irrelevant pandering as a collectivist who does not respect individual sovereignty. More of the same politics."

Mr West...do you even know the meaning of individual sovereignty?

Crass thought of the day....

But still funny.

LP Nominates Gary Johnson

At least I can now officially say who I'm voting for in November.

The Libertarian Party nominated former New Mexico Governor Gary Johnson for President of the United States, expressing confidence he will be able to find effective small-government solutions to the country’s most pressing problems and mount a strong challenge to his major party rivals.

Mr. Johnson was declared the party’s Presidential nominee after he won 70% percent of the vote in the first round of balloting by the 595 delegates of the National Libertarian Convention held at the Red Rock Resort in Las Vegas, NV.  

In his acceptance speech, Mr. Johnson promised to present a clear and viable alternative to major party candidates, saying his victory in November will offer Americans effective solutions to slow economic growth, high unemployment and endless foreign military commitments that sap the country’s financial strengths.  America, for the first time in modern history, is poised to reject the tired two-party duopoly that has brought the nation to its knees economically.

Looking for a pistol for Household 6

I've been checking out this little gem. A Smith & Wesson 380 with integrated laser. I'm thinking it would work great for her grip and fit in her hydration vest when she trail runs.

Need to find somebody who's shot one.

Today's Morning Funny

This is becoming a fairly normal occurrence; I mosey on over to MSgt B's place and get a dose of hilarity to compliment my morning coffee[s].

If you like guns and random morning musings, go check him out.

Beck's Brain

I'm sure he mean's well, but I just can't wrap my head around most of Beck's 'theories'.