We should all learn from our past......

Most of you that know me know there are few things on this earth i will not discuss in public forum, those being Religion and Politics, for exactly the same reason. That being said, I'm a student of history, and I love reading about the past, and, sometimes when doing so, I come across something that resonates strongly with me. Many will think this is a post about politics, but it is not. It is about our American way of life. But I'll let the man speak for himself. Some of the incidents referenced may seem a little dated, but they were written by a man who, while he himself always denied the title of "Hero", knew what heroism was. And, like many of the generation that fought WWII, he spoke his mind and saw things as they were. When I read the following, written 34 years ago, it scared me how much is exactly the same today. From the epilogue to his 1979 book: "Experience has taught me that people don't like to think about bad things happening. They do not hear a small voice howling in the wind. Even though I am a small voice, I advocate that action is not started by "outside agitators". People will make changes if they know the problems. Today, our people are not only not getting the facts, they are being convinced that wrong is right. I am stubborn enough to say that human nature does not change and all this do-good, forgive-and-take-care-of-everybody philosophy goes against every known, sensible thing that history teaches. Give somebody something and he has no respect for it. Make him earn it and he will take care of it. I do not want to preach but since you stayed with me through this whole thing, you must understand that our nation is in grave peril. 'Power to the people'. The deluded zealots that go around yelling that don't even know what it means.Nowhere on earth do people have more power than we do here in the good old U.S.A. We can vote. We are lazy and misguided and we complain, but we have the power if we just get together and say we want no more of what we have been getting. On this earth, only one person in four has the kind of freedom that we have. On September 6, 1941 I was commissioned and office and a gentleman and I swore to defend my country against all enemies, foreign and domestic. I am not now in military service but I intend to keep that oath. I have fought the foreign ones. I have seen how they learned. They now know that we are hard to whip if we are given half a chance. The logical approach, which they have taken, is to weaken us and take us from within. Our domestic enemies today are in league with our foreign enemies and that makes them extremely more dangerous. No one knows better than i that I am not smart enough to understand all that is going on. All I know is I do not like what I see, and I am compelled to say so. I do not put much stock in editorials or most of the things we are told. I never even consider polls, because it is very simple to get any answer you want to pay for. They6 have been so obviously wrong so many times. They are also obviously slanted. The idea is that if you read something enough times you begin to believe it. You do -- unless you think for yourself. Let's just look at some of the things I am referring to. I did not think these things up, but I have observed them. We let some of our nitwit senators stay in office and babble like idiots. We abandoned our effort to produce an S.S.T. That advance was coming. It did come, but ours was infinitely better than the one that was produced. The scare tactic used was that it was impractical and that it would destroy the ozone layer. Baloney! There are more aircraft up there on any given day than those planes would have numbered in years. These environmental fanatics have only very small points, and not many at that. A total clean up of our environment is a romantic illusion. It would result in our being in a beautiful world -- cold, hungry, and unemployed. Pessimism, negative evaluation of technological advance, is not news. It was once predicted that steam locomotives would result in the death of birds; it would frighten cows and hens causing a decline in milk and egg production, the sparks from the funnel were expected to set houses on fire, and that at speeds over 30 miles an hour the air supply of passenger compartments would be cut off and passengers die of asphyxiation. There are many things that history and fact could teach us, but no one pays any attention. All this foolishness did was deprive us of building a real first-class SST, and it helped our decline in the field of aviation. Our elected representatives criticize our aircraft industry and our intelligence people for dealing throughout the world. The industry is dying and the intelligence people are out in the dark. Our nation is as good as dead without eyes and ears. The people who want to take our country from us cannot want it destroyed. They want to control us. Why do we encourage and help these people? We have known since before the end of World War II what their intentions are and they have never once given us a reason to trust them nor have they lived up to a single thing that they have agreed to. I just saw where we are now sending equipment and tools to a nation that hates us. How stupid can we get? We should elect people who would put a stop to this sort of thing, and fast. Government is supposed to protect its people, not expose them to this kind of obvious danger. Our whole system needs to be brought back to its original concepts under the Constitution. A Congressman is supposed to represent his constituents and uphold the Constitution. He is not supposed to dictate or turn all authority and responsibility over to unelected bureaucrats. Write your Congressman and ask him a question. He will not answer you directly. If he does not refer your problem to a bureaucrat he will send you a computer answer that has already been furnished him by a bureaucrat. The whole thing would be funny if it were not so serious and dangerous. We elect candidates. They get into office and turn right around and say that the people who elected them do not know what is good for them. They will vote as they see fit. To Hell with the country and the people who are responsible enough to work and pay taxes. This must stop, AND SOON. What is the real reason these elected and misguided people want all of our guns? If you think it is because we would be safer or that this would slow crime down one fraction, you are not looking at the facts. You know all the statements about how guns are killing so many people, but at the risk of being repetitious, I'll restate a basic fact. People kill people, not guns. It can be done with anything and has been down through the ages. The reason the governing bodies want to control and/or eliminate personal arms is not for the good of the people. It is necessary if they are to maintain and strengthen the hold government has and wants over its people. No one wants to spend money on defense. Why is it not better to spend billions on a nuclear carrier than to give that money out to welfare and relief people who are perfectly capable of helping build that carrier? Our enemies are far ahead of us in this and that is extremely serious and dangerous. Just look at each thing our government is doing now in the light of whether it is good for our safety. Not one thing is being, or has been done, that does not make us more vulnerable. Think about it." -- the preceding was all written by Navy Lieutenant George H. Gay, the lone survivor of the TBD-1 Devastators from Torpedo Squadron 8 at the Battle of Midway. For my two cents, I am distressed at how little has changed since he wrote these words in NINETEEN SEVENTY NINE. If anything, people have gotten less able to think for themselves as a whole, and the situation has gotten much worse. People will believe anything the news, internet, or TV tell them with no fact-checking, just blind obedience, and expect everything to be handed to them. The idiotic gun control argument still flares up. There is no work ethic, very little free thought, and negligible advancement in technology, especially the aviation he was speaking of. Hell, our military is a few steps behind the Chinese now, as our "State of the Art" fighters, the F-22 and F-35, are using technology that wasn't new in the 80s. Stealth started in the 40s with the Horten Go-229. Vectored thrust has been around forever, as the Germans played with it in WWII on their V-2s. There were supersonic V/STOL fighters in the 60s, like the Mirage IIIV and P.1154. The 1970s F-15 can do more mission profiles than the current F-22, significantly more if you talk about the F-15E. Maybe reading this has struck a chord with you all, as well. Maybe some of you are annoyed by it. Maybe some of you are pissed off at me for posting it. As long as you are thinking, that's all I ask. Stepping off soapbox, dropping mic.