The Origin of Memorial Day: Moina Belle Michael

Memorial Day, Decorations Day, Civil War Veteran's Day. The day has several names and histories. While a number of origins to Memorial Day have been forwarded, arguably the modern national holiday began in 1915. While Northerners observed a Memorial Day beginning in 1868 with flowers being placed on Union and Confederate troops in Arlington National Cemetery, southern states observed separate memorial days for more than 50 years. It took another "Great War," a poem, and an inspired teacher to bring North and South together in honoring their dead.
Moina Michael, a 49 year-old teacher from Georgia, inspired by the tremendous sacrifice of American soldiers during World War I and the poem, In Flanders Field by John Mcrae, began distributing poppies on Veterans Day.
In 1922, Michael enlisted the Veterans of Foreign Wars and the idea took off in both the North and the South. Michael's inspiration, and her response, symbolizes not only the sacrifice of veterans who have gone before, but the need to be willing to make the same sacrifice in each generation to secure liberty:

In Flanders fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses, row on row,
   That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
   Scarce heard amid the guns below.
   We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
   Loved, and were loved, and now we lie
         In Flanders fields.
   Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
   The torch; be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
   We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
         In Flanders fields.
 ___________________________________
Oh! you who sleep in Flanders Fields,  
Sleep sweet - to rise anew!
We caught the torch you threw  
And holding high, 
we keep the Faith With All who died.

We cherish, too, the poppy red  
That grows on fields where valor led;  
It seems to signal to the skies  
That blood of heroes never dies,
But lends a lustre to the red  
Of the flower that blooms above the dead
In Flanders Fields.

And now the Torch and Poppy Red  
We wear in honor of our dead.
Fear not that ye have died for naught;  
We'll teach the lesson that ye wrought  
In Flanders Fields.

Remember, and Teach this Memorial Day.

Border Crossings Down? Check the Video Cameras

Raul "Boycott Arizona" Grijalva's response to calls for border security? "Border fence? We don't need no stinkin fences!"
Arizona rancher John Ladd says otherwise. According to Ladd, more than 500,000 illegals have been caught on his land over the last 5 years. His buildings have been broken into seven times and he has seen multiple ethnicity of illegals, including Middle Easterners and Russians:

Well, private citizens, fed up with federal officials dragging their feet, are out to illustrate Ladd's complaint in real, documented terms. Using hundreds of surveillance cameras,
Secure Border Intel, and Border Invasion Pics
have recorded thousands of illegal border crossings by coyotes and drug runners. A few examples:




How can Grijalva argue that there is no need for more border security? Nowhere else in the world do countries allow drugs,weapons and people to violate their borders in this way. Come November, let him advocate for illegal immigrants as a private citizen.

Bill Clinton: Back in the News Amid Scandal, Political Favors

Obscurred today by the news of Obama in the Gulf is the "specter" of the alleged influence of election in the Joe Sistak/Arlen Specter primary.
Sistak claims that the Obama administration offered him a federal position in exchange for his dropping out of a Pennsylvania House primary against Arlen Specter. The White House today released a legal memo claiming the offer was a non-paying position, and made by Clinton.
Clinton, who has shown his ability to lie strait-faced to the American public under oath, is the perfect middle man for committing a federal, impeachable crime. His ability to save his own presidency by demonizing the women he has abused in his sexual addiction. Let's not forget what Clinton, a 50 year old man, did to a 21 year old in what has been called the "Monica Lewinsky affair."
In a London Times interview last year, Barbara Hudson, former Lewinsky publicist describes what Clinton did to the former intern to save his presidency:

"...She was 21 years old, it was a stupid thing. She made a mistake. Look at all the girls who are doing crazy things now.”
Hutson says the Clinton Administration tried to ruin Lewinsky’s reputation. “They destroyed her and never apologised. They ruined this girl’s life. Every major company here has somebody on the board who is friends with Bill. They are not going to give her a job no matter how smart she is.”

Hutson says that when Nixon and Reagan were engulfed by scandal the stories were called Watergate and Iran-Contra, but the emphasis of the 1998 scandal was put on the intern rather than the President. She says the media were influenced by the White House to coin the phrases Monicagate and the Lewinsky scandal. It is hard to imagine that such nomenclature was uppermost in the minds of presidential aides at the time but Hutson believes “very simply they put it all on her and for ever that will haunt her. She is a private citizen and her name is mud, her family’s name. Why didn’t they call it Clintongate?”

Bob Bitman of Kenneth Star's prosecution team called Clinton, "...very experienced at misleading people.” There is the understatement of the year. Clinton has offered himself up as the sacrificial lamb, to be pardoned by Obama if necessary, while insulating the President from what he is guilty of: attempting to bribe a Senate candidate out of running for office, an impeachable offense.
This is what liberals do: ignore the law, cover the truth, deflect blame. Remember in November.

Liberals Do Not Have a Monopoly on Civil Rights

A Message to Grijalva and the "progressives" who would like to leap to the front of the parade and define racism and civil rights in political terms: Freedom IS Colorblind (courtesy of JoeDanMedia):

The Arizona Immigration Law, Have YOU Read It?

Words Do Have Meaning: Liberals and Boycotting Arizona

San Diego officials who jumped on the Grijalva "Boycott Arizona" bandwagon may have to eat their words come election time. It seems Arizonans, who fill San Diego hotels in the summer, are creating a grassroots boycott of their own. San Diego hotels send word that Arizonans are canceling reservation to the economically beleaguered city in response to votes by San Diego city council and school board officials to end trips to the Grand Canyon state.
"Community activists" turned politicians need to understand that words have meaning. Grijalva continues to sidestep and categorize his call for a boycott of Arizona as a convention destination, saying it was a "targeted call." But liberal politicians continue to jump on his bandwagon, costing Arizona an estimated $10 million in business. Arizona will not be nearly as damaged by this as California, which depends on Arizona for everything from airline travel to water and power.

Unfortunately for these mind-numbingly arrogant officials, their constituents remember words, especially when those words hurt at the economically personal level. In an unofficial poll conducted by the LA Times, readers were asked:
"Was the L.A. City Council right to pass a boycott of Arizona?" Here are the results:

Yes. Arizona needs to feel the consequences of enacting a bad law. 2.1% (378 votes) 
Yes, though the boycott should be more of a symbolic gesture than an official measure. 0.4% (64 votes) 
No, but only because doing so is probably illegal and not in L.A.'s interest. 4.2% (771 votes) 
No. The city should mind its own business. 93.4% (17,030 votes) 

Does Grijalva and his ilk really think that his community organizing threats will work on the national level where economies are intertwined to such extent that an economic pissing contest hurts everyone? Does he care? Apparently not.
 UPDATE:
this week Arizona corporation commissioner Gary Pierce has threatened to cut off Arizona power purchased by the city of Los Angeles based on LA's Villaraigosa's push for ending contracts with Arizona:

"Doggone it -- if you're going to boycott this candy store ... then don't come in for any of it," Pierce told FoxNews.com. 
In the letter, he ridiculed Villaraigosa for saying that the point of the boycott was to "send a message" by severing the "resources and ties" they share. 
"I received your message; please receive mine. As a statewide elected member of the Arizona Corporation Commission overseeing Arizona's electric and water utilities, I too am keenly aware of the 'resources and ties' we share with the city of Los Angeles," Pierce wrote. 
"If an economic boycott is truly what you desire, I will be happy to encourage Arizona utilities to renegotiate your power agreements so Los Angeles no longer receives any power from Arizona-based generation." 
Appearing to tap into local frustration in Arizona over the raft of boycotts and threatened boycotts from cities across the country, including Los Angeles, Pierce warned that Arizona companies are willing and ready to fight boycott with boycott. 
"I am confident that Arizona's utilities would be happy to take those electrons off your hands," Pierce wrote. "If, however, you find that the City Council lacks the strength of its convictions to turn off the lights in Los Angeles and boycott Arizona power, please reconsider the wisdom of attempting to harm Arizona's economy."

Seeing as how 70% of Californians are supportive of Arizona's new law (including, apparently Coach Phil Jackson ), seems like the LA city council is on shakey ground.

More on La Raza and Immigration

Grijalva and the "community organizers" of the la Raza Umbrella corporation are willing to do whatever it takes to advance their agenda, including intimidation and extortion. They follow the La Raza line when it comes to immigration:

'For La Raza todo. Fuera de La Raza nada.' - 'For The Race everything. Outside The Race, nothing.'

How about the email sent out by La Raza officials recently condemning new immigration legislation in Congress:

“while it doesn’t overtly mention assimilation, it is very strong on the patriotism and traditional american values language in a way which is potentially dangerous to our communities.”

How are patriotism and American Values dangerous to Hispanic communities? They aren't. They are dangerous to the liberal agenda of Grijalva and other radical Hispanic leaders.

"We are a bronze people with a bronze culture. Before the world, before all of North America, before all our brothers in the bronze continent."
El Plan Espiritual de Aztlán (1969)

Border Collapse Brings "Return of La Raza"

For the first time in 30 years the Ethnically divisive La Raza/Aztlan student organization has reared its head in Tucson. A Contradiction of Beliefs, the Brown Berets are for 2nd Amendment rights, against due process. In favor of racial preferences (and undocumented immigrant voting rights), against police brutality.  Here is their "modernized manifesto":

1. We fight for the unity of all our people, regardless of age, income, or political philosophy. The ties that bind us are Chicanismo and our land Aztlan.
2. We demand the right to bi-lingual education as guaranteed under the treaty of Guadalupe-Hidalgo.
3. We demand a Civilian Police Review Board, made up of people who live in our community, to screen all police officers, before they are assigned to our communities.
4. We demand that the true history of Chicanos be taught in all schools in the southwestern states, known as Aztlan.
5. We demand that all police officers in Chicano communities must live in the community and speak Spanish.
6. We want an end to the “Urban Renewal Programs” that replace our barrios with high rent homes for middle-class people and “big box” stores. As guaranteed under the Constitution we a right to have our lands and home and not be threatened by “imminent domain” favoring the wealthy and large corporations.
7. We demand a guaranteed annual income of $45,000 for all Chicano families. The restitution that we demand for over 150 years of American occupation and oppression of our lands and people is just and reasonable in that we are willing to honorably work to succeed in life; we do not want hand outs.
8. We demand that the right to vote be extended to al of our people regardless of their “legal status” in this country. If they are here working, paying their taxes to this government, helping to strengthen the country with their labor and money they should have the right to voice their vote.
9. We demand that Chicanos be tried by juries of their peers consisting of only Chicanos.
10. We demand the right to keep and bear arms to defend our communities against racist police, as guaranteed under the Second Amendment of the United States Constitution.

One of the more humorous descriptions on their website regards immigration. Here is a quote:

Illegal immigration started with power and land hungry, gold digging Europeans that were wiping themselves out. They were miserable barbarians that would wage countless wars, wipe out entire civilizations, enslave different races and even themselves, they were filthy and were full of plagues, they destroyed their environment, had a corrupt degraded society, with a political system that served the politicians and upper class and shitted on the population. Hmmm, that sounds like America today doesn’t it? WOW, things haven't changed, just names I guess. America is New England!! It is merely an extension of the old order of things.

 Oh, the last time this radical group made the scene in Arizona? The 1970s. Raul Grijalva was a member.

More Reasons to Boycott Grijalva

Some have called SB 1070 an attempt to "fool" Arizonans' into looking for a trite solution to immigration concerns.
The real attempts to fool Arizona and the rest of the country is Grijalva and the Dems. The teeth of the Bush Administration's Border policy was Section 287(g) agreements and the Secure Communities Program. Highly successful (I talked to several Border Patrol Officials last year who said they felt they were finally turning the corner on stopping the flow through Yuma County), these programs drove amnesty Nazis like Grijalva crazy, and the Obama administration's first order of business was to dismantle and defund them quietly over the last year. According to the Heritage Foundation:

In the seven years since ICE started using section 287(g), roughly 66 state and local agencies have entered into MOAs resulting in roughly 1,000 law enforcement officers being "deputized" to enforce federal immigration law. Even more importantly, over 120,000 individuals have been identified as illegal immigrants under the program.

According to Heritage, in mid 2009, under former Governor Napolitano, the Obama administration began changing the rules of the 287(g)s apparently responding to efforts of Amnesty groups like those Grijalva draws support from. Napolitano should be ashamed of herself for administering the changes. Grijalva's recent request that the Feds stop cooperating is ridiculously moot, since the process has already started. The real fools are any voters who believe 1070 is unconstitutional. SB 1070 simply allows local law enforcement to continue to operate under the successful guidelines they had been, holding drug and human traffickers until they can be identified and prosecuted by the Feds. SB 1070 is not as effective as BP doing it's job, but it does shine a light on the travesty of Obama's "changes" designed to lead to amnesty.

Government does not solve problems; it subsidizes them.
Ronald Reagan

Grijalva to Reporter: Questions about Illegal Drug Enforcement "Punk"

Continuing his call for a boycott of Arizona, Raul Grijalva last week walked away from a Hispanic reporter for CNS news:



Transcript of CNSNews.com interview with Rep. Raul Grijalva (D.-Ariz.):

CNSNews.com: Last year, The Justice Department reported that last year 19 percent of young adults age 12-17 used illicit drugs, much of which came through--

Rep. Grijalva: What does this have to do with our press conference today?

CNSNews.com: Well, I just want to know. Are you committed to sealing the border against the influx of illegal drugs?

Rep. Grijalva: I-- [walks away] that has nothing to do with our press conference.

CNSNews.com: Well it’s about the border sir.

Rep. Grijalva: That’s punkish.

http://www.cnsnews.com/news/article/64975

Your Representative, what a guy!

"Legal Immigrants" to U.S.: Enforce the Law!

Glenn Beck this week had on his show 40 plus legal immigrants, all of whom supported Arizona's tough immigration law. Some had some harsh words for the supporters of "Open borders.":

"As a former teacher, you teach your kids rules and regulations ... you want to set the [rules] with the child. I believe in the countries that we come from...our laws were either being bought or being trumped by corruption and we come here to look for that."

"You can't have it both ways. Someone who's fickle you can't respect. ...So how can you respect a country where on the one hand you have to go through all  these rules and regulations ...  be smart ...or be wealthy enough...On the other hand you look across the street and [you see], "well if I was a fast runner I could have just run across the border and we can both buy cars and both have the same privileges. In essence the country loses respect from the rest of the world."

Watch the responses for yourself:



The rest of the show can be found on Youtube.

Grijalva: Wrong Again, With More Lies Than a Pinocchio Cartoon

Here are excerpts and my comments of Raul Grijalva's latest editorial, posted on the Huffington Post about Arizona's new immigration law (it seems mainstream media outlets had trouble with the accuracy of his content)Grijalva's words are in red:


The law violates due process, civil rights, and federal sovereignty over immigration policy.
It does no such thing. It makes federal law the state law. Courts have repeatedly allowed states to enforce federal law. Grijalva only wants federal sovereignty because it benefits his liberal agenda, not because of any desire to defend the Constitution.

While I believe the courts will quickly overturn it, I am concerned that the damage to my home state's credibility has already been done.

If Grijalva was so certain that the courts would overturn the law, then why did he call for a boycott of Arizona businesses? Most of the damage to the state has been done by Grijalva, who has no legal experience, proclaiming that the law is unconstitutional, which it clearly is not. Grijalva's only hope is that the outrage he has created forces Arizona lawmakers to repeal the law. 

 

Arizona has long been the epicenter of our national immigration debate. Unfortunately, that debate has been driven by extremists like Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio, who is under a federal investigation for civil rights abuses.
Only because liberal extremist groups have requested the investigations from the Obama Justice Department, which was all too happy to oblige. Again, Grijalva is passing judgment based on his own extremist views, not on any legal facts.

...Arpaio, like Gov. Brewer, seems to believe that every immigrant is equally capable of being a violent drug dealer to be dealt with harshly. Although this belief has no basis in fact, it has been the foundation of a fear-based campaign against immigrants and people of Hispanic descent for years.

Amazing how a sitting US Congressman can read the mind of state and local officials and determine their rationale for their actions without ever having spoken or listened to them. Arpaio's actions are not fear-based, they are reality-based. And Grijalva hates the fact that Arpiao is successful in enforcing the law.
Last year, under pressure from Grijalva and other liberals, Immigration and Customs Enforcement changed it's agreements with states, know as 287(g) agreements, limiting Maricopa county sheriffs' authority to arrest illegal immigrants. Why? Because Arpiao's sheriffs office has successfully arrested close to 1,900 unauthorized immigrants under state law and the same number under federal law, with an additional 33,000 immigrants detained and transferred to federal authorities for deportation, one of the most successful programs in the nation.
One of the reasons for the new Arizona law was to restore Arpiao's authority to continue the program, which successfully thwarted drug shipments and kidnappings that threaten to turn Phoenix into a war zone.

Indeed, opportunistic political voices have worked hard to make a connection between crime and immigration where none exists. Forget the rhetoric for a moment and consider the facts. In 2008, the Immigration Policy Center found that on the national level, U.S.-born men aged 18 to 39 are five times more likely to be incarcerated than immigrants. While the number of undocumented immigrants in the country doubled between 1994 and 2005, violent crime declined by nearly 35 percent and property crimes by 26 percent over the same period.
Grijalva loves to manipulate facts for his own benefit. Here are the real facts:

In April 2005, the Government Accountability Office released a report on a study of 55,322 illegal aliens incarcerated in federal, state, and local facilities during 2003. It found the following:

• The 55,322 illegal aliens studied represented a total of 459,614 arrests – some eight arrests per illegal alien;

• Their arrests represented a total of about 700,000 criminal offenses – some 13 offenses per illegal alien;

• 36 percent had been arrested at least five times before. 

Twelve Americans are murdered every day by illegal aliens, according to statistics released by Rep. Steve King, R-Iowa. If those numbers are correct, it translates to 4,380 Americans murdered annually by illegal aliens. That's 21,900 since Sept. 11, 2001.

I believe we need comprehensive, nationwide immigration reform, and while we continue to debate what that should look like, I believe the laws of this country should be enforced and respected. Those laws include the principle that the federal government, not state or local authorities, sets immigration policy. States can no more supersede federal immigration law than enter into their own treaties with foreign governments. By inventing a new way for local officials to treat American citizens as potential criminals, Arizona has violated that principle.
The  Arizona law is designed to enforce and respect the law. Having cooperated and coordinated with the federal government in the past, they are now being told via the Obama administration to "mind their own business" and ignore illegals because of interventions by those like Grijalva. There is plenty of legal precedent for a state applying federal law to itself and enforcing it. It is Grijalva and the Obama administration who are inventing immigration law, not Arizona.

On a practical level, local law enforcement agencies do not have the manpower or financial capacity to serve triple duty as street cops, Border Patrol agents and Immigration &; Customs Enforcement officers. Conservatives who worry about government overreach and unfunded mandates should be up in arms about this law. Their silence is disappointing. This is not a left-right issue, it's a question of basic Constitutional process.

 Local law enforcement does not have a choice when drug dealers, rapists and coyotes enter their jurisdiction. Asking them to turn a blind eye creates a moral dilemma. Furthermore, it is not an unfunded mandate to enforce existing laws and the 287(b) guidelines. It is a travesty of justice not to enforce the law of the land.

As far as what that reform should look like, I remain a proud co-sponsor of H.R. 4321, the Comprehensive Immigration Reform for America's Security and Prosperity Act of 2009. That bill takes a broad-based approach. It would protect our borders by requiring the development and implementation of border security initiatives, including information-sharing, international and federal-state-local coordination, technology exchanges, anti-smuggling initiatives, and other actions to secure the borders. It creates new opportunities for young people who were raised here, worked hard in school, and want to pursue higher education or serve their country in the military to adjust their immigration status. It requires employers to comply with new employee document verification requirements and creates a phased-in electronic employment verification system. It creates a path to legalization by requiring undocumented immigrants to register with the government, submit to a criminal background check, pay any back taxes and speak English.

I wanted to be sure a copied Grijalva's complete summary here because the Gutierrez bill does none of these things. It would curtail border security, end completion of the border fence, end the hugely successful E-Verify program, and grant amnesty for $500 dollars (the fine could be waived for those who cannot afford it). And here's the kicker: Gutierrez would end the 287(g) program so successful in coordinating law enforcement between local law enforcement and BP. It is mockingly referred to in Congress as the "No Illegal Left Behind Bill" in reference to Bush's No Child left Behind initiative. Joe Jenkins of NumbersUSA describes the bill's enforcement aspects:

The bill is also quick to point out that Immigration and Customs Enforcement would still be allowed to do it's job. However, enforcement actions would not be allowed to occur within the vicinity of: a school, a childcare provider, a legal-service provider, an administrative building, a funeral home, a cemetery, a college, university, or community college, a hospital, a health care clinic, a place of worship, a day care center, a head start center, a school bus stop, a recreation center, a mental health facility, or a community center. As the bill is rather vague about the definition of "vicinity," illegal aliens probably only have to fear detention if they are boating on Lake Michigan or surfing in Maui.

In truth, the only cosponsors for the Gutierrez bill are Progressives with extreme views from relatively secure districts like Grijalva's, where it is assumed that Hispanics will vote in lockstep loyalty without regard to the views of a Hispanic candidate.
 
This is what real reform looks like: focusing on the realities of our immigration system, not the myths and falsehoods that have led us to where we are now in Arizona.

The myth is that Grijalva has any concern for border security. He is willing to degrade his state using false information and manipulate public opinion in order to advance his radical agenda on immigration.