Showing posts with label honor. Show all posts
Showing posts with label honor. Show all posts
Monday, November 14, 2022
Monday, April 12, 2021
Whatcha Gonna Do?
With that pandemic windfall? You know, that $1400 Biden Bonus? Let TOD offer a suggestion. Something of lasting value. Something that commemorates the greatest generation this country, this planet has ever seen.
Get yourself an M1 carbine. This is the tool your grandparents, or if you were born in the naughties, your great-grandparents used to conquer fascism and socialism. Real fascism. The kind that really killed real people. If you've ever fired an M1 or even just held one, well you know.
Now you could go out an buy a classic, an M1 that actually saw service in WWII, and there is a legit collector community supporting M1-s. But as a collectible you'd not want to fire it, at least not often, and you may have trouble staying within budget. But it could take place of honor on the wall beneath the flag that graced your forefather's casket.
There are also competitions centered around the M1 and consequently there are current manufacturers, including one tracing back to an original WWII supplier, offering competition and honest replica M1-s. Many of these, from Auto Ordnance and Inland, can be had for well under the BB limit leaving funds for enough ammo to get acquainted with your heritage.
Now if you're willing to add some funds of your own, Springfield Armory offers a fine line of M1A rifles including their M1A Loaded .308 though you may find one of their competition rifles more to your taste should budget allow.
The great thing about all these options is you can get a honest-to-God battle-proven military firearm celebrating the greatest generation in a hands-on way. So if you get one, get yourself some range time and when you get home, pour a stiff one, put on Band of Brothers, toast those who served and sacrificed and shed not a tear for how far we've fallen. You're earning this.
Thursday, October 5, 2017
Take A Knee
The recent theatre of the absurd that is society in America has NFL players "taking a knee" rather than show the more customary respect for flag and anthem at the start of football games. Setting aside that their bloated celebrity is based on little more than playing with pigskin covered balls, their antics have nonetheless captured the nation's attention. We all hear the hyperbole, "giving 110%," "leaving it all on the field," but they believe it.
Pushback has come in the form of calls to boycott all things NFL. Games, in person and televised. Merchandise. Memorabilia. These will have limited impact. After all who is really going to give up fantasy football? But there is one group that should boycott immediately and permanently.
And that would be the U.S. Military. All branches. All manifestations. No Marine color guard. No Army band playing the anthem. Not even the local high school Junior ROTC. No "surprise" re-unions. And certainly no fly-overs. No symbols of national pride for those with no pride in their nation.
Those taking a knee may be surprised to learn that nearby to almost any game played on any given Sunday there is a National Cemetery. Let them go there. Let them find the final repose of a soldier who died in service to this country. Then let them take a knee. Let them reflect as they kneel at the feet of a soldier who gave only 100%, who was not left on the field of conflict. Who gave up their future to secure a present where those with an inflated sense of self can speak their shrill opinions born of shallow thought. A soldier who gave that last full measure, fighting for the country and under the flag that now stand guard over them both.
And as they rise from their genuflection, if they have anything else to say, let it be "I'm sorry."
Pushback has come in the form of calls to boycott all things NFL. Games, in person and televised. Merchandise. Memorabilia. These will have limited impact. After all who is really going to give up fantasy football? But there is one group that should boycott immediately and permanently.
And that would be the U.S. Military. All branches. All manifestations. No Marine color guard. No Army band playing the anthem. Not even the local high school Junior ROTC. No "surprise" re-unions. And certainly no fly-overs. No symbols of national pride for those with no pride in their nation.
Those taking a knee may be surprised to learn that nearby to almost any game played on any given Sunday there is a National Cemetery. Let them go there. Let them find the final repose of a soldier who died in service to this country. Then let them take a knee. Let them reflect as they kneel at the feet of a soldier who gave only 100%, who was not left on the field of conflict. Who gave up their future to secure a present where those with an inflated sense of self can speak their shrill opinions born of shallow thought. A soldier who gave that last full measure, fighting for the country and under the flag that now stand guard over them both.
And as they rise from their genuflection, if they have anything else to say, let it be "I'm sorry."
Thursday, June 25, 2015
The Flag
Nine church goers are gunned down in cold blood in a sanctuary massacre that has all the characteristics of a premeditated hate crime and the best that mainstream media and a passel of politicians can come up with in response is to take down some silly flag that never should have been there in the first place.
It is true that that flag is neither a fitting nor honest tribute to those valiant Southerners who started, fought and lost the War of Northern Aggression. It is a symbol of racial hatred, nothing more and certainly nothing less. It was raised in the early sixties by racist white politicians as a cowardly poke in the eye of an Uncle Sam committed to ending segregation. If that flag stands for anything beyond racism it is a tribute to spineless politicians, then and now, who flap about in the direction of prevailing political winds.
And there are some so bold as to declare that should that flag come down then these lives were not lost in vain. Is life, in their eyes, so cheap that one silly rag flapping in the wind is worth the loss of nine good lives? Is it really conceivable, in their minds, that anyone who lost a friend or relative in that massacre views the loss of their loved one as a just sacrifice if it results in the removal of a banner? Or is it more likely they would fly that rag in their own front yard if it meant their loved ones were returned?
These lives were not lived in vain nor were they lost in vain, not because some flag comes down but because they, their loved ones and their fellow Charlestonians are an enduring testament to what the South and the entire United States can and should be.
It is true that that flag is neither a fitting nor honest tribute to those valiant Southerners who started, fought and lost the War of Northern Aggression. It is a symbol of racial hatred, nothing more and certainly nothing less. It was raised in the early sixties by racist white politicians as a cowardly poke in the eye of an Uncle Sam committed to ending segregation. If that flag stands for anything beyond racism it is a tribute to spineless politicians, then and now, who flap about in the direction of prevailing political winds.
And there are some so bold as to declare that should that flag come down then these lives were not lost in vain. Is life, in their eyes, so cheap that one silly rag flapping in the wind is worth the loss of nine good lives? Is it really conceivable, in their minds, that anyone who lost a friend or relative in that massacre views the loss of their loved one as a just sacrifice if it results in the removal of a banner? Or is it more likely they would fly that rag in their own front yard if it meant their loved ones were returned?
These lives were not lived in vain nor were they lost in vain, not because some flag comes down but because they, their loved ones and their fellow Charlestonians are an enduring testament to what the South and the entire United States can and should be.
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