A NEW Note to the GOP

Now that the elections are pretty much over, Americans have handed the GOP a mandate. That mandate is to put an end to the rampant Socialism being brought forward by the Democrat Party. It is also to lower our taxes, stop the rampant spending spree that the Dems have been on and to secure our borders. DO NOT fail America and it's citizens!!

Here is the golden opportunity to reverse the damage that's been done. Do the right thing and you will have the respect of the American public and perhaps, even the World. It's time to put 0bama in his place and take away his checkbook!!

The Denison, Texas Walmart

I've been with the local VFW for almost two years now. During this two years, the Post Commander has approached the local Walmart for a contribution. He's approached them several times, without any luck. He's submitted the paperwork at least twice, if not three times. For some reason, the paperwork seems to become conveniently "lost". Today, I read about where a Walmart in Arizona just opened and gave out several grants to serveral different charities, including the local VFW.

From a friend of mine: "Like to tell everyone what a good neighbor Walmart is. There is a new Walmart super center opening here in Flagstaff. They have the built a very environmentally friendly store. keeping with the spirit of Flagstaff living. They Have also chosen to give 10 local charities grand opening donations. The San Francisco Peeks post 1709 of the Veterans of Foreign Wars was honored with a donation of $1500. We will use this money in our relief fund to help local veterans and their families. Thank you Walmart" - Joe C.

We've been after the Walmart in Denison Texas to contribute to the local VFW to no avail. I'm beginning to think that the Denison, Texas Walmart Manager is anti-military & anti-veteran!! Not only that, but the Denison Walmart is one of the dirtiest and most poorly maintained Walmarts I've been into. To top it off, their "customer service" is non-existent. The employees there, on the whole, seem to have the attitude that if they DO help you, they are doing you a favor That is, IF a customer can even FIND an employee to render assistance. I continue to shop there because it is close. However, I have started shopping at Krogers or Albertsons when I see a decent sale. (Normally, their prices are significantly higher than Walmart's)The Walmart in Durant, OK is far better, but OK charges sales tax on EVERYTHING, including food and Durant adds in their little bit of extra sales tax to make it impractical to make the drive.

What I fail to understand is why the local VFW's requests have been ignored. The Denison Walmart is ALWAYS busy. It's not like their losing business like most of downtown Denison has. I've even cornered the one of the Assistant Managers and voiced my displeasure with them. So, my question remains, is the Denison, Texas Walmart manager anti-military and anti-veteran? Or is he just anti-VFW? Just in case anybody is of the inclination to give the manager a call and inquire as to WHY he's ignoring our repeated requests, you may contact the store directly:

Walmart Supercenter

401 N Us Highway 75

Denison, TX 75020

(903) 465-9744

On Spouses & Wedding Vows

Darryl Curtis made a post on Facebook that kind of rubbed salt in an old wound. He was writing about how the feminist movement has adversely affected marriage. He stated:

Too many women fail to see their marriages as a source of satisfaction and accomplishment in the way they’ve been led to believe their careers will be. This mentality is the ugly part of the feminist movement, which supports personal success, acquisition, accomplishment, power, and the feminist political agenda over love, marriage, and family.

I kind of agree with him. While my "Ex wife" and I worked pretty well together as a team, apparently she got "tired" of me. I feel that this was mainly because I suffered a couple of injuries during a move and afterwards. The entire reason we decided to make this move was that it was a new company and had LOTS of potential and I wouldn't be constantly working outside during the harsh Minnesota winters. That move was of more benefit than just the job. It also gave us the extra money that would enable her to go to Real Estate school and obtain her license.

She worked hard at selling homes. With our combined incomes, we were pretty much set and could live a "comfortable" life, which we were doing. We had everything a couple could want or at least I THOUGHT so. In the interim, my left foot started dragging. I went to see my Doctor about it and he ordered an MRI. I had a ruptured disk in my back. I was thinking, "OK, well that's not such a big deal". I had an L4-L5 discectomy. For some strange reason, I never got ANY better. I was in constant pain and didn't want to take anything more than Ibuprofen due to my job. Next came an automobile accident which herniated two disks in my neck. I hung in there. Ultimately, due to my pain & frustration with the way my body wasn't working, my anger got out of hand. I was angry towards some contract workers not only because I was in pain, but also because they wouldn't pay attention to what I had attempted to teach them. Most of these contract workers were not very intelligent, had little or no experience and some had extensive criminal backgrounds. I ultimately got fired from this job because I was "offensive and rude".

As it worked out, I looked for work that I thought I could do. I wasn't able to find anything. I pretty much became "Mr. Mom". That was OK because the Real Estate market was booming and I still had my retirement from the military, along with the medical benefits. During this time, we started sleeping in different rooms because my medications were keeping me awake and I didn't want to disturb her sleep. After all, she was working and I wasn't. As time went by, I attempted to convince my wife to obtain her brokers license. She really didn't listen to me much and that should have been an indication. After running it by several of her coworkers and with my continued insistence, she did get her brokers license. Things continued to go well. I wound up with a two level fusion in my neck. Money was still not a problem. We still had everything we needed and most everything we wanted.

The next move was that because we lived in an almost rural area, she wanted to be closer to work. She didn't like driving Hwy 10 from Becker to Elk River. I could sort of understand that because it was a 20 minute drive and during the winter, it could be extremely dangerous. ( I should mention that at this time she started hanging out at the bar with her co-workers and "friends".) She decided that moving to Ramsey would make life better for her as it was closer to work, some of her family and friends. I assented with reluctance. Her brother had found a lot just four houses down from his house. We had him build our new "custom home". Lots of problems, but she closed on it anyways. She didn't want to hold her brother accountable for the flaws and get them fixed or repaired. We then moved from Becker to Ramsey. It was a difficult move for me because we had a LOT of stuff. Some of it got moved by a local mover, but not nearly enough. After we moved, our home in Becker sat on the failing real estate market. We were making payments on two houses !! In that time, she decided that she wanted to be in this new office building where the rent was TRIPLE of what she was paying. Funds drained slowly until we reached a point where we were struggling to even make ONE house payment. I found a temporary summer job in Minneapolis. That kept us afloat for another six months. I sucked it up that entire summer and made do by whatever means I could with the job. It was physically hard on me. Not only the commute, but the job, itself. After that job ended, I was out of work again. Another several months went by and the real estate market continued to fail. All the while, I did the outside stuff at the new house and at the old house, for the most part, which included moving massive amounts of snow.

Knowing that I was still infirmed, I sought out more surgery to correct the problems. To put it bluntly, I was tired of hurting, not being able to do things and most especially, being unable to find work that I could actually DO. After that surgery and while I was recuperating, I got the deck installed on our house that was supposed to have been installed before we took occupancy a year and a half earlier. Thank God that the sub-contractors had already been paid and held to their word. During that time, I contracted a post-surgical e-Coli infection in my bladder that ultimately found its way to my kidneys. I laid in bed for almost three weeks, with a fever and chills. My "loving wife" just told me to "quit whining" and insinuated that I was malingering. She would come home at all hours of the night. What little did I know what she was actually doing. After three weeks, I finally got enough energy to convince my daughter to take me to the Doctor. Three injections of Rocephin set me straight. I was on my way back to recovery. During this time, my "loving wife" of 19 years came home drunk and told me she wanted a divorce. I thought that it was he liquor talking. She continued to come home at all hours of the morning, if at all.

Two weeks before Christmas that year, she told me again that she wanted a divorce. This time I knew that it wasn't the liquor talking. That was the worst Christmas of my life. Finally, I said, "fine" took my retirement check and went home to my Texas hometown. I found some work, which I wasn't real certain I could physically do, but it was a start. I sold off some things to get some money that would enable my relocation and packed up things and moved. The things were mutually decided on. I still remember her watching me and my friends like a hawk as we were loading up. I don't know why. She almost made me feel like a criminal as I was leaving. I said goodbye to my daughter and we headed South.

Fast forward to a a couple of years later....... Once again, unemployed, I discovered through some connections I still had in Minnesota that she had been unfaithful to me just after my surgery. I guess that with her dad telling her that she was too young to be saddled with someone infirmed and broken, my infirmities themselves, and her friends pushing her in a bad direction, this might be why. They didn't want to tell me at the time as they were afraid of what I might have done. (I would have left earlier had I known is about it.) I already had my suspicions, but I didn't want to face them. I'd like to think I tried, but apparently I didn't try hard enough. She didn't try at all. As I see it, she just bailed.

Jumping to the present, I have finally discovered, through relentless pursuit, the cause of my problems; I have Spino-cerebellar Ataxia. What this means to the layperson is that my cerebellum is dying off. I will ultimately wind up in a wheel chair and worse as my cerebellum continues to die off.

Jumping Back in Time

Getting ready for my 35th class reunion, I was going over some songs to see what I had from that era. It's amazing just how a song, a movie, a picture, or even just a car on the road can draw one's memories back to a time almost forgotten. My roads have been traveled, many bridge crossed and some burnt and years have flown by in almost an instant.

I do think that music was best in the 60s and 70s. Here's why. People had talent. They didn't rely on voice synthesizers or manipulation of the recorded music. Studio time was expensive and musicians better have had their stuff together before they entered the studio. It was also usually "fun" music. Uplifting, not usually blatantly immoral (there were a few RARE exceptions), all in all, it seemed like a more pleasant time despite Viet Nam, the hippie protesters (now we call them "Progressives"), the gas shortages, etc. We all seemed to get by. Life was still lived under the constant threat of Mutually Assured Destruction as it had been for the decade plus before.

Anyways, as I listened to some of the songs, I was immediately drawn back to that somewhat more pleasant time in my life.

The Hypocritical Democrat Party

Fairly breaking:

 Democratic leaders in the House and Senate alleging GOP groups have funneled foreign money into campaign ads have seen their party raise more than $1 million from political action committees affiliated with foreign companies.

House and Senate Democrats have received about $1.02 million this cycle from such PACs, according to an analysis compiled for The Hill by the Center for Responsive Politics. House and Senate GOP leaders have taken almost $510,000 from PACs on the same list. More Here

 What I don't comprehend is why the Dems are whining about foreign campaign contributions. The Chamber of Commerce has donated to BOTH parties and yet, the Dems seem to want to cry, "FOUL". Did we forget all of the foreign monies that rolled in for Obama's campaign? Yet, what happened with all of that money?? Some was returned. Some was kept and used because some donors were suspiciously "Anonymous". The real truth of the story can be found here.

To put it bluntly, I'm getting sick and tired of the Dems disparaging anything that goes against their Socialist agenda. Because some people consider Obama an inept leader, they're called, "Racists". Because some people don't like the potential Mosques being built near Ground Zero in NYC, they're called, "Islamophobes". Now, because campaign contributions are being thought to have been generated by foreign donors, they're crying foul, again!! It's time for the Dems to suck it up, grow a pair, and fight the righteous battle instead of being a bunch of whiners.

The VFW National Commander Moves to Dissolve the VFW-PAC

I hate to seem to be stuck on one subject, but this is important to me and many other Combat Veterans: 

VFW National Commander Moves for Dissolution of Political Action Committee

by Veterans of Foreign Wars VFW on Monday, October 18, 2010 at 9:55am

I have reviewed the Political Action Committee (PAC) Board of Directors’ response to our request to rescind this year’s Congressional endorsements.  I disagree with their assessment.

It is now evident to most of the VFW leadership, both National and especially the departments, that the VFW has been subjected to extreme negative publicity throughout the nation, and the recent endorsement decisions have, in fact, harmed the VFW’s reputation and future ability to fulfill our mission.

I cannot let this erosion of public support for our great organization continue.  The apparent lack of the committee to address these concerns will lead to a proposal by me, as Commander-in-Chief, to amend the by-laws at the 112th National Convention for the purpose of dissolving the PAC.  Meanwhile, under the authority granted to me as Commander-in-Chief in section 619 of the VFW National By-Laws and under section 620 of the Manual of Procedure, I am withdrawing all PAC appointments effective October 15, 2010.

Accordingly, I’m asking the VFW national council for a vote of “no confidence” in the VFW PAC.

Commander-in-Chief
Richard Eubank

I think that this is the best move the VFW National Commander could make.  It seems to be within the requests and attitudes of of its members, at least the folks at MY VFW Post.





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VFW PAC won't rescind endorsements

The VFW PAC, an independent political action committee connected to the Veterans of Foreign Wars, rejected its parent organization's call on it to "rescind" its endorsements after a firestorm of criticism from conservative veterans.
In a statement on its website, the group said it had endorsed Democrats and Republicans using the narrow criteria it always has: "grading an incumbent's support by the position taken on critical issues of importance to the VFW," namely 13 House votes and nine in the Senate. Incumbents with 10 of the 13 or 7 of the 9 got the endorsement.
The statement continues:

In the political endorsement arena, there will always be party loyalists and individuals that will not agree with the VFW-PAC decision. The Board respects their position and appreciates their activism in support of the candidate of their choice. The VFW-PAC endorsement is not designed to tell people how to vote; but to point out who has demonstrated support for veterans and America's security.
The VFW-PAC disagrees with those who claim the endorsement process is skewed, flawed, or unfair. Some incumbents will have an advantage over another candidate because they have a good voting record on the issues. They also have a disadvantage if their votes don't support the VFW's position.

Politico.com


Well, ain't this just dandy. No matter. This will be another nail in the PAC's coffin come next August when the National Convention is held. To ignore the outcry of the members of the VFW and the call from the National Commander is beyond ridiculous. As I've state earlier, the process IS flawed!!