Dear America,

He's not really a risk taker, is he?

Case in point, he picked the favorites to get to Final Four:  Duke, Kansas, Ohio State, and Pittsburgh.

And just who got there?

Risk takers, underdogs, countrymen of different colleges but same spirit, teams with heart and soul leading the way, if not tattooed in their brains; the teams arriving at the coveted Final Four spot exhibit the kind of innovation and magic that is only made in the USA.  I, myself, kinda like VCU -- any college with the word Commonwealth within must be cool -- aside from the fact that my Aries side loves that little ram connection -- either way, we'll see where that leads soon enough.

He, the chosen one, seems to be only comfortable taking the lead when in comfortable, predictable, situations -- associating with the like-minded, other radicals, people who believe and think in community with each other, justifying any means to an end; or if not in alignment with "predictable", he takes an aggressive stance, putting the boot to the neck, ridiculing dissension by the opposition party as labeling them simply "teabaggers," jumping to conclusions against presumed authority and calling it "stupidity" -- but painfully hesitating to make a sound when America's honor and glory are being attacked, terrorized even, from the inside...as in Fort Hood.

No, he runs with the party line all the way to the hoop -- even if he misses.

Apparently, following the pack is just something that we (america) do now -- feeling very much punched in the stomach, like the favorite, totally upended in the final bell, all of a sudden, we are reduced to nothing right before our very eyes.

Robert Gates admitted Sunday that there was no immediate threat to the United States; while Hillary Clinton (the same Hill that wants out in less than two years from now)  added that it was the perceived humanitarian threat we acted upon.   So with that logic, anyone who appears likely to do any possible harm against humanity, we should attack anyway, even if there is no eminent danger for America specifically?

How did we get here?  How in the world did the party of make love, not war, come out of nowhere launching missile attacks based solely on the perception of things to come?  huh?

We are part of the coalition forces now enforcing a "no-fly zone" for a country that doesn't even have an official Air Force. huh?

We are part of coalition forces now thinking about supplying guns and ammo to 'the rebel forces' -- who may very well be playing on the same side as Al Queda.  huh?

We are part of coalition forces now turning our military over to the strategy and agenda of NATO, allowing even the United Nations to have the ball, allowing our sovereignty to sit on the bench for a long, long, drawn out campaign for all we know -- because, after all, who really knows, right (not even Clinton or Gates)?

...we have no idea who we are dealing with here, these are rebel forces meeting up with more cocky-and-nothing-to-lose rebel forces, and some with guns even!...sit tight, this seems to be anybody's game...

huh?


Our president hesitated on taking sides on this one for the longest time -- only being pushed into it by the new world order mandate, star player simply called, The UN; what was our president doing when the Libya situation was just beginning to heat up?  Oh, he was making his picks for the Final Four.

Let's review:  all of his picks (aka the favorites)... Duke, Kansas, Ohio State and Pittsburgh failed miserably.  Following the line of the favorites didn't really work for him, did it?


The thing is, this is HIS GAME we are talking about; this president, of all presidents probably to date, KNOWS, really KNOWS, basketball (and you thought I was gonna say foreign relations, silly...); this is what for the love of the game is all about (oops that is mixing baseball with b-ball, my bad); hoops -- this president plays it, breathes it, lives it and studies it in his spare time, for all I know -- probably talks about it while playing golf with the boys while half the world is going up in smoke...AND HE, oh chosen one, didn't get anywhere close to calling it right.  His final four crashed and burned.

How in the world does a guy with no military history, no respect for authority (really, let's be honest shall we, review the cold, hard stats all the way back... go to his own words, his books, his community organizer tapes of the game before he was president...), no experience with international relations, no reverence to America's sovereignty and exceptional-ism respective of how this franchise was built -- how could we ever have such highball hypocrisy in this position, being paid too much, for too little, and with such attitude?  Do I dare wonder, how does he maneuver a win for the home team, America, out of this?

Where is our true heart and soul?  Where is our will to win against all odds?  When will we get our game back -- and focus on the things that have made this country pretty great...

...saving umpteen questions as to why are we drilling in Brazil and not our Gulf and Anwar, why are we punishing Arizona for protecting our own security, why are we bankrupting our children with Obamacare, and why our president isn't leading congress on tackling the 1.1 Trillion dollar deficit, please pardon another play of words using the wrong sport....

...so many questions... and we're running out of time... good thing it only takes a nano-second in basketball to have the game turned upside down. I call for a miracle...a three pointer from the center...

It is a show of real character, and will, and self-reliance, that rises to the top in situations like the Final Four -- just as those same principles touch us all, equally and fairly, out in the real world.  America was built on the idea that it could be anybody's game, anybody's day, at any time -- as all things boil down to a wicked (and by wicked, I mean wicked good) combination of skill, knowledge, experience, heart, with a whole lot of good timing and the law of Any Given Sunday thrown in from the sidelines (and it wouldn't hurt to also carry the approach of consciously aligning with, not so much hoping God is on our side...but that we are playing on God's side).

oh, and at the risk of sounding like I'm dithering here, I wouldn't mind the Bulldogs to come out on top either, THEY COULD GO ALL THE WAY!

(darn it, you can take the girl away from the football, but you can't take the football out of the girl).

Now for Libya, now that things are totally stirred up -- democracy must prevail; but if the Wisconsin rebel forces/coalition/unions tell us anything at all...definition of democracy and what it looks like, acts like, is very much in question; as clear and present danger of the unknown wears us down, it is anybody's game, at any given time.

yea cloud.

Make it a Good Day, G

for another take on the same two points, read this.

Dear America,

"Do not separate text from historical background.

If you do,

you will have perverted and subverted

the Constitution,

which can only end in a distorted,

bastardized form of illegitimate government."

James Madison

Gosh,

"I was not commenting and I will not comment on the wisdom of making the decision to put a mosque there," he said. "I was commenting very specifically on the right people have that dates back to our founders."

"In this country we treat everybody equally and in accordance with the law, regardless of race, regardless of religion."

So to separate grey area from grey area, he believes that Muslims have the right to build -- for it's a free country -- but that doesn't mean that he means what he said, in that it may not be the right thing to do, now that he's had a chance to think about it.


Who's "he"?  Why our president, of course.

You know, for the longest time, the White House position was simply this... it's not my problem - - it's a local issue, and it should be resolved, of course, locally.


Well, it takes some kind of audacity to go against the 70% of the people who are against the locale of this mosque, some kind of audacity, indeed.


And what a contrast to Germany, no? For in this moment, Germany up and closed a mosque for ties to Radical Islam. The timing of Obama's bah Hamburg is astounding, don't you think? I mean, it was within days of one mosque door closing and another mosque door opening...just a coincidence I'm sure.


And speaking of revolving doors, how about the timing of this little tidbit coming out of Washington:

"The point of all of that is I think that by next year I'll be in a position where, you know, we're going to know whether the strategy is working in Afghanistan. We'll have completed the surge. We'll have done the assessment in December. And it seems like somewhere there in 2011 is a logical opportunity to hand off.

I think that it would be a mistake to wait until January 2012. First of all, I think we might have trouble getting the kind of person they want if there's a possibility that they might only be in the job for a year. You know, who knows what the election situation will look like. But also I just think this is not the kind of job you want to fill in the spring of a presidential election. So I think sometime in 2011 sounds pretty good."

Said Robert Gates, U.S. Secretary of Defense, to Fred Kaplan, of Foreign Policy Press.

So what he means to say to Mr.Kaplan, Gates would rather have it's not my problem be his own personal -- abridged version, that it is  -- foreign policy strategy of 2011...for the benefit of the country, so as not to create more harm than good, if he should wait until 2012 to bail, because he's thought about it and he wants out.

And yet, hasn't it become increasingly clear lately, we have a long way to go?

I just have to wonder, a girl just wants to know, just why would he say this right now?  We have everything in Afghanistan hanging on by it's last surge of ammo, and Gates goes out on drone and drops this?  And coming from a reputable source, unlike the Rolling Stone (only speaking on foreign policy, everything else is golden). 

At a time when Afghanistan is searching the mountain tops high and low for a little bit of lasting security, you, Mr. Gates, makes this crowing revelation that it is time FOR YOU to think about getting out -- aside from the already weary circumstances that lead us to July 2011, when we all pull out; what were you thinkin?

And Mr. President, how in the world could you pick the side of those who wish to build a celebratory mosque over and above those who put you in office?  With all due respect, in the minds of most Americans, you have committed a war crime, treason, call it what you will. 

Absolutely stunning.

A quick glance at either polls or opinion tells you, if nothing else, the issue of the mosque is divisive in and of itself -- not for virtue of the religion, egads no! -- but for the utter, pure destruction of the spirit of America that is of the essence part and parcel of the exact location Imam Rauf intends to build it.

Countless opinions have chimed in to say, the Japanese could not build a monument on Pearl Harbor (not that they would try (lingering on in my head...as an interesting point); and as much as there remains a right for all people to speak their mind, if a person -- of any color -- would be found in the town square preaching racial obscenities or casting declarations to harm another in any way, on the basis of color or religion -- they would be hauled off in handcuffs for reason none other than the blatant and barbarous abuse of their own God-given free speech, end of story. 

"America is a free country where you can build whatever you want -- but not anywhere. That's why we have zoning laws. No liquor store near a school, no strip malls where they offend local sensibilities, and, if your house doesn't meet community architectural codes, you cannot build at all. These restrictions are for reasons of aesthetics. Others are for more profound reasons of common decency and respect for the sacred. No commercial tower over Gettysburg, no convent at Auschwitz -- and no mosque at Ground Zero. Build it anywhere but there." --columnist Charles Krauthammer

The unconscionable acts of 9/11 rests heavy in the heart of every American -- still, and for our very own president to be so off base on this one (again), to be so laissez faire in a new world, warped sort of way -- to be so it's not my problem, but at the same time, I will intercede and not only form an opinion but voice it, too, and may even go so far as to further rub it in your face after months of community organized debate -- that is a stroke of audacity that is unprecedented (and we all know how much He loves to be unprecedented).

It's like our own president gave the imam his blessing, or something; like a father over a marriage, like a God over a land, but only in the most perverse sense.  Most Americans see it as such.

I can't wait to see how this administration argues on behalf of the Muslim woman wanting a divorce.  In this country, women are granted a divorce for simply irreconcilable differences, and can be granted rather quickly; I wonder, which law will have "precedence" -- America's rule of law as designed by the founders (Obama's go-to answer of his answer) and embedded deeply and faithfully within our Nation's Constitution and every way of life since 1776 (or thereabouts) -- or the Muslim sharia law, embedded by the rule of man over every woman and child within their nation of Islam since nearly the beginning of time?  Which law has precedence there, or is that a rhetorical question?  (Oh, we are young, but are we that stupid too?  -- oh what?  you don't think it could happen?  here in America?  bit by bit, the people will never know what hit them until it's too late)

Our house is no longer being built on rock, but upon sand.

The Taliban of Afghanistan stoned a couple over the weekend for adultery; is that what we have to look forward to in the town square?  The article linked includes this:

"could mean a step backward for human rights in the country. When the Islamist extremists ruled Afghanistan, women were not allowed to leave their houses without a male guardian, and public killings for violations of their harsh interpretation of the Quran were common."

Could mean?

I mean, really?  Seriously?

I mean, Muslims have that right, but that doesn't mean it is the right thing for them to do.

I mean, I think it would be a mistake to wait until 2012 (for me, anyway, need to time my withdrawal just right, for this ship is going down).

The funny thing about It's not my problem is that it's never usually the right answer -- and surely, you better KNOW it's not your problem, or at the very least wait until the coast is clear, before you speak the words out loud -- any commander in chief or defense secretary should know that much.

Make it a Good Day, G