Testing the Hello Bloggerbot with a picture of Dad

A picture of Dad while he was in the Navy. Taken about 60 years ago.

I'm posting this to test my ability to store and post pictures using the Hello BloggerBot. It seems to work pretty well and it's free. It's looks like a good way for people with a Blogspot blog and no other online storage space to be able to put pictures in their blogs. Another freebie from Google (Blogspot blogs are also Google freebies.)

(Up till now, I was posting pictures by linking to my web site, but some people have Blogspot blogs who don't have web sites. Now that I know this works, I can email my neice who's studying in Argentina and my nephew who's stationed in the Azores and tell them they no longer have excuses for not blogging pictures. )

A Link and a Clarification

My daughter posted this on her blog (I’ve copied the whole thing, but check out her blog, anyway.)

William Penn once said, "I may not agree with you but I will defend unto death your right to say it."

Click here to read an article written by a Republican (see, I am open-minded) regarding "Free Speech Zones".

This is a hilarious little clip, regardless of which side of the political fence you are on.

And finally, a great article about the Patriot Act . "People willing to trade their freedom for temporary security deserve neither and will lose both" - Ben Franklin

I’ve never tried to claim that George Bush was rocket-scientist smart. There are a lot of things I wish he’d do differently. He’d be glad to let the entire population of Mexico, and anyone else who could find their way to Mexico, waltz across the U.S. border without even slowing down to sign a guest book; he’s placed people in management positions who don’t see anything wrong with letting a dozen scruffy-looking Middle Easterners board the same airliner without pulling more than two of them aside for special pre-boarding attention; he used to drink a bit (but so did I); etc.; etc. On the other hand, his heart’s in the right place; he says what he means and means what he says; and he’s a lot smarter than John Kerry. Kerry would be even worse on immigration and security issues than Bush is; he wouldn’t know the truth if it hit him in the face; and he’s too stupid to understand how anyone could figure that out.

Maybe a little bit of my problem is having a long memory. I enlisted in the Air Force of my own free will and volunteered for a tour of duty in Vietnam. I’ll never forgive Bubba Clinton for dodging the draft and I’ll never forgive John #@%& Kerry for his “anti-war” (anti-Soldier, anti-Marine, anti-Sailor, anti-Airman, and anti-Veteran) activities after he got back from ‘Nam. I can’t help but believe, though, that even I’d stayed in school and missed Vietnam I’d still be smart enough to understand that Kerry is on the wrong side of some very important issues, including the very most important issue in the upcoming election.

I have a beautiful, intelligent daughter and the world’s most amazing grandson. I want to see them both live long, happy, safe, lives. With that in mind, there’s only one way I can even consider voting this fall. We’re at war. We didn’t start it, but we have to win it or die. George Bush understands it’s better to fight that war overseas, in the terrorists’ home territory, than to wait for them to bring it to the streets of America’s cities. John Kerry would rather just pretend there’s nothing wrong and hope those poor misunderstood people with the beards, bombs, and guns will leave us alone. They won’t.

Another site you should know about

These guys are always good. Click the picture for more.

Kerry on (just about anything): Yes, No, Maybe

Donald Sensing, a retired Army officer and current Methodist minister, links to a number of worthwhile posts concerning John Kerry’s defense policy in general, and his acceptance speech in particular, then offers some observations of his own:

But I can't see where Kerry understands the complexities of defense policy. Why did he verbally bifurcate his apparent doctrine of response to attack and pre-emption of imminent threat? They are heads and tails of the same coin, joined at the self-defense hip, but Kerry seems not to have made the connection.

... Click here to read the whole post. ...

So after hearing the keynote address of his entire campaign past or future, I don't know what John Kerry's defense doctrine or guiding philosophy are other than proclaiming every other breath, "I served in Vietnam!" Nothing Kerry said last night or any other time has enlightened me further than that.

Update 2004-07-31: Two things I should have mentioned about Rev. Sensing:

1. He was retired from the Army (artillery) before he entered divinity school to become a minister
2. His son is currently in Basic Training with the Marine Corps., so he isn’t exactly a disinterested party here.

Kerry wants Osoma bin Laden to be the next O.J.

From the Associated Press:

John Kerry said Friday he would put Osama bin Laden on trial in U.S. courts rather than an international tribunal…

Michelle Malkin, as usual, explains how stupid that idea is much better than I’d be able to:

In short, John Kerry's bold new counterterrorism proposal is to turn Osama into the next O.J.

Read the whole thing here.

File Corruption, apparently

Ok, so moving the "Strong? Decisive?" post to my backup blog fixed the formatting problem on this one without breaking that one, then copying it back to a new post here seems to have been OK too. I guess since I have the other blog and it isn’t too hard to copy things back and forth, I’ll probably put duplicate copies of most of what I post there too, just to be a little safer.

Strong? Decisive? (Republished)

From the Associate press on 7-28-04:

John Edwards Claims John Kerry Is "Decisive. Strong."

John Edwards saluted John Kerry Wednesday night as a man tested a generation ago in the heat of battle, ready now to lead America in an age of terrorism. 'Decisive. Strong. Aren't those the traits you want in a commander in chief?' Edwards said at the Democratic National Convention.

Click here for a few facts about that. Actually, the whole site is worth spending some time studying.

More Testing/Debugging

I got lucky and my first educated guess about which post caused things to go sour was correct. Moving the body of that post to my other blog fixed this one without breaking that one. I’ll see what happens when I copy it back.

Testing/Debugging

The blog formatting thing is really starting to bug me. I just started a 2nd Blogspot blog using the same starting template and it looks just fine. I’m going to start moving things from here to there and see if the problem follows one particular post, etc. Depending on the results I may retire this blog and just leave a link to that one here.

This land ...

This is all over the web already, but I won't be the last one to link to it, either. It’s worth watching.

Have you forgotten?

Charles Johnson at LGF just posted a painful slideshow for those who’ve forgotten we’re in a war we didn’t start.  Watch it, then remember.

Maybe it's time to switch to Firefox for good.

So, with Internet Explorer, the sidebar containing my profile, blogroll, etc. is off to the side where it should be, but the top of it is just under the bottom of my bottom post. That happens even with the basic Blogspot template I’m using, even with no customizations to add a blogroll, links to my web site, etc. I tried a couple of their other templates and they look even worse. I’ve seen similar problems on other Blogspot blogs in the past, then they were back to normal after two or three days. I guess for now if anyone wants to see what my blog site is supposed to look like they’ll have to use Mozilla Firefox. I’ve been reading a lot of good things about Firefox anyway, especially that it’s immune to a lot of viruses and junkware that take advantage of Internet Explorer bugs. I downloaded it to see how it liked my blog, but I may start using it a lot, maybe all the time.

Well, it seems OK in Firefox

Part of whatever was/is wrong with Blogspot seems to have gone away on its own, but my blog still doesn't look right in Internet Explorer. It looks just fine in Mozilla Firefox. I'm going to do some more playing, and some more waiting, and see what developes.

Just testing

Somethings not right about blogger. I hope it's temporary. Please don't blame it on me unless I post a message saying I've realized I was doing something wrong.

Update: It turned out to be a corrupted file. It remains to be seen whether Blogger is prone to do that occasionally or if it was an extremely rare event.

Decisive? Strong?

(See Testing/Debugging etc notes above.)

Moving the body of this post to my other blog seems to have fixed the sidebar problem here without creating a problem on the other blog. I’ll repost what used to be here somewhere above this.

Something for my Illinois Readers

Well, Jack Ryan got the shaft and Coach Ditka decided not to run, so we're still waiting for the Republicans to announce a candidate for the U.S. Senate, but it's not too early to start learning about the democratic candidate, Barack Obama. A good place to start is the Obama Truth Squad site. He sounds like a typical Democrat. I don’t think I like him very much.

Is this who we want for a first lady?

Thomas Lifson posted some interesting thoughts on The American Thinker after watching Teresa Heinz Kerry's convention speech: 
 

...

...  it was really all about her. This is clearly a woman who thinks and feels that she is the one paying the bills, so she gets to call the shots. I can imagine that Sen. Kerry has had to put up with a lot of this, but has made his peace with it, considering the financial benefits.

None of the details of her marriage would be of the slightest interest to me or anyone else, if it weren’t for the fact that her husband could well be the next President. A man bought and paid for, with a willful, short-tempered, somewhat angry and defensive, egotistical spouse, one who is used to getting hr(sic) own way whenever she demands it.
 
...
 
Conventional wisdom holds that nobody votes for a First Lady, that candidates’ wives may be interesting, but are unimportant in voting. I am not so sure this time around. John Kerry’s choices for spouse share one thing in common: vast wealth. That kind of money affects the behavior of those around it, the same way that black holes bend the waves of light and gravity. The candidate himself has been living in this bizarre environment of marriage to great wealth for decades. The strange, somewhat disturbing woman, who bears all the marks of the one in charge, may well be even more influential than Hillary Rodham Clinton, given an opportunity to live in the White House.

... 

Click here to read the whole thing.

Big Sad John

(Sing to the tune of Jimmy Dean's "Big Bad John")

Every mornin' on the Hill you could see him arrive
He stood six-foot-four, and weighed one-twenty-five
Kinda' scrawny at the shoulders and lacking a spine
And when he spoke at all, it was mainly to whine.
(Big John, Big John) Big Sad John.

Nobody really knows what's in John's soul
His "beliefs" are all based on the latest poll
Though he'll say what it takes to get your votes
It's the leftist agenda that he really promotes
Big John.

...  Click here to see the whole thing ...

Thousands have sacrificed their young lives
To help ensure that our nation survives
A vote for Kerry is a slap in the face
To all the brave soldiers that he's disgraced
(Big John, Big John) Big Sad John

The Kerry they'd rather you not know

From Ann Coulter's new book, "All the Best," via The Braden Files :

Kerry is like some character in a Balzac novel, an adventurer twirling the end of his mustache and preying on rich women.  This low-born poseur with his threadbare pseudo-Brahmin family bought a political career with one rich woman's money, dumped her, and made off with another heiress to enable him to run for president.

If Democrats want to talk about middle-class tax cuts, couldn't they nominate someone who hasn't been a poodle to rich women for past 33 years? Don't forget -- John Kerry is strong on defense:

• He voted to kill the Bradley Fighting Vehicle


• He voted to kill the M-1 Abrams Tank


• He voted to kill every Aircraft carrier laid down from 1988 on


• He voted to kill the Aegis anti aircraft system


• He voted to Kill the F-15 strike eagle


• He voted to Kill the Block 60 F-16


• He voted to Kill the P-3 Orion upgrade


• He voted to Kill the B-1


• He voted to Kill the B-2


• He voted to Kill the Patriot anti Missile system


• He voted to Kill the FA-18


• He voted to Kill the B-2


• He voted to Kill the F117

In short, he voted to kill every military appropriation for the development and deployment of every weapons systems since 1988 to include the battle armor for our troops.

Click here to read  the whole thing, then click here for more of Ann's insights.

Oh, about Kerry's Vietnam service...

Guess what! John Kerry was in Vietnam (for almost half as long as I was)! Obviously that was before he joined Vietnam Veterans Against The War Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen, Marines, And Veterans. Ever wonder what the guys who served with him think about his “heroic” service while he was there? See what they have to say at http://www.swiftvets.com. Just a sample of the many interesting things you'll find there:

"Swift Boat Veterans for Truth has been formed to counter the false "war crimes" charges John Kerry repeatedly made against Vietnam veterans who served in our units and elsewhere, and to accurately portray Kerry's brief tour in Vietnam."

"So far as we are able to determine, Kerry was the only Swift sailor ever to leave Vietnam without completing the standard one-year tour of duty, other than those who were seriously wounded or killed."

and

"It is clear that at least one of Kerry's Purple Heart awards was the result of his own negligence, not enemy fire, and that Kerry went to unusual lengths to obtain the award after being turned down by his own commanding officer."

Update: There's some good related stuff at www.Wintersoldier.com

Whos more dangerous? (Expanded)

Neal Boortz can't decide who's more dangerous, Islamic jihadist terrorists or people who think John Kerry belongs in the White House. I have to agree with him -- It's a tough call. Let me tell you why:

We're in a war, people. We didn't start it, but our only choices are to win it or die. The enemy is radical Islam and its followers. If the jihadists could, they’d kill every non-Moslem on the planet, even if it meant killing most of the Moslem population in the process. John Kerry would rather let that happen than do something about it without U.N. “permission” and the approval of our European “allies.” George Bush isn’t taking as strong a stance as I’d like him to on some things (immigration control is one important example), but at least he’s headed in the right direction. Kicking the Taliban out of Afghanistan and forcing Al Queda into hiding was a good first step in that direction. Deposing Saddam Hussein’s Baathist thugocracy in Iraq was the next right thing to do. Both jobs still need a little more “tidying up,” but at least we’re off to a good start. Voting for Bush and Cheney means voting to finish those jobs and move on to whatever needs done next. Voting for Kerry means voting to leave those jobs unfinished, retreat to our own borders, and wait to be slaughtered like so many scared little rabbits.

No, Kerry voters won’t kill us themselves, but voting for Kerry is voting to let the jihadist terrorists do it. There is no more important issue, or more important set of issues, in the upcoming presidential election.

I could go on for hours about John Kerry’s elitist attitude; his dishonesty; his inability to take a position and stick to it; his leadership position in the Vietnam Veterans Against The War Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen, Marines, And Veterans organization; and a dozen other reasons not to vote for him, but I’ll put those off for later posts.

If you only have time for one more blog ....

If you only have time to go one more place after you read my blog (and Heather's and Brandi's and Robbie's of course), make it Michelle Malkin's blog. I especially like her attitude on and coverage of this country’s lack of a coherent immigration enforcement policy, but everything she writes is worth reading.  If there’s still time, check out Instapundit for links to and comments on just about everything that’s happening on the web, then start working your way through the blogroll ("Other Worthy Sites") on the right side of this page. You'll learn things.

2004-07-28 Update: There's an excellent example of Michelle's work at http://michellemalkin.com/archives/000306.htm. Also, don’t miss her latest weekly column or her column archives.

Let the debate begin?

I was a little disappointed to find the following on my (adult, very intelligent) daughter's blog, but I'll keep right on loving her forever:

I am not a democrat at heart. I have a liberatarian "leave me alone and stop trying to protect me from myself" attitude towards government. But whatever your political leanings, you've got to be scared to death of the inexorably mounting federal deficit Bush has helped to create. And don't even get me started on how safe I feel after having him in charge of our foreign policy for 4 years.  Click here to learn more about John Kerry or to help out with his campaign.  Get Bush out of office before he gets us all blown up.

I guess I have until November to change my little girl's mind. She apparently thinks she and her family would be safer with Kerry in the White House, and I strongly disagree. At least we seem to agree that’s a very important issue. I’ll do what I can through my blog and the op-ed page on my web site to change her mind and watch her blog and my email for any signs of progress.  I’ll start by questioning how anyone with Libertarian leanings (which I share, btw) could possibly vote for the Democratic ticket, then try to find a way to explain to her about Kerry’s activities in the Vietnam Veterans Against The War Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen, Marines, And Veterans, then go on from there.

Who's more dangerous?

Neal Boortz can't decide who's more dangerous, Islamic jihadist terrorists or people who think John Kerry belongs in the White House. I have to agree with him -- It's a tough call.

Update: I've reposted this with some commentary above.