[Guest post by DRJ]

Click here to make your own Statue of Liberty fireworks.

– DRJ

[Guest post by DRJ]

NORMANDY AMERICAN CEMETERY AND MEMORIAL

“This embattled shore, portal of freedom, is forever hallowed by the ideals, the valor and the sacrifice.”

President Barack Obama commemorated today the 65th anniversary of D-Day at Omaha Beach, France, where he paid tribute to valiant Soldiers, Sailors and Marines:

“Friends and veterans, what we cannot forget—what we must not forget—is that D-Day was a time and a place where the bravery and selflessness of a few was able to change the course of an entire century,” he said.

“At an hour of maximum danger, amid the bleakest of circumstances, men who thought themselves ordinary found it within themselves to do the extraordinary.”

– DRJ

[Guest post by DRJ]

And now for something completely different.

The Van Cliburn International Piano Competition — The Cliburn — is an international piano competition for promising pianists that takes place every 4 years in Fort Worth, Texas. It’s named for Harvey Lavan “Van” Cliburn, Jr., an American pianist who won the first International Tchaikovsky Piano Competition in Moscow as a young pianist during the height of the Cold War.

The 2009 Cliburn competition began May 22 and ends June 7, and includes preliminary, semifinal and final rounds. This year’s event hosts 29 young pianists from all over the world. The contestants play solo recitals in each round and also perform with a string quartet in the semifinal round.

(more…)

[Guest post by DRJ]

Memorial Day is the day to remember those veterans who made the ultimate sacrifice to defend our great nation. I am grateful to them and their families. To honor them, I’d like to point out a post entitled “The Names in the Stone” by Gerard Van der Leun, whose family knows the cost of war.

And while Veteran’s Day is 6 months away, the Austin American-Statesman adds this article and video showing the warm send-off given to Fort Hood and Fort Bliss troops as they fly to the Middle East.

– DRJ

[Guest post by DRJ]

This week’s “Britain’s Got Talent” segment with Susan Boyle.

Enjoy.

– DRJ

[Guest post by Jack Dunphy]

Critics of Wednesday’s Tea Parties are fond of distinguishing the grievances that inspired them from those that engendered the 1773 Boston Tea Party. The familiar colonial rallying cry was “No taxation without representation,” prompting some to point out that those who participated in Wednesday’s rallies are indeed represented in government, they just don’t like the results.

Fair enough. But given the staggering debt the Obama budget passes on to generations of Americans yet unborn, perhaps a new slogan is called for. My suggestion:

“No taxation without gestation!”

–Jack Dunphy

[Guest post by Jack Dunphy]

The Divine Mrs. Dunphy and I (along with Mrs. D’s sister and niece, in from out of town) drove down to Santa Monica this afternoon to see for ourselves what all this Tea Party business was all about. We didn’t expect much of a turnout; Santa Monica, after all, is a town where every fourth car is a Prius with an Obama sticker on it. Conservatives in Santa Monica and L.A.’s Westside tend to operate as Christians did in the Soviet Union: maintain secrecy at all costs. But imagine our surprise to arrive and find a few hundred people gathered at the entrance to the Santa Monica Pier, some waving signs and flags, others just milling about in a state of semi-wonderment at being in the company of so many fellow citizens who, like themselves, are immune to Barack Obama’s many and wondrous charms. And just as surprising were the many horn blasts from sympathetic drivers passing by on Ocean Avenue.

There were of course some in attendance one might label as eccentric, and most of the news reports will no doubt focus on them so as to discredit the movement now coalescing, but for the most part the crowd seemed pretty normal. A small contingent from Code Pink were the ants at the picnic, but no one seemed to pay them much attention. I don’t think they stayed long.

I know there were far larger gatherings elsewhere today, but for Santa Monica it was a remarkable display. I can’t wait for the next one.

–Jack Dunphy

[Guest post by Jack Dunphy]

Last night Mrs. Dunphy and I were discussing the continuing hostage drama off the east coast of Africa. “What do think is going to happen?” asked Mrs. D.

“I think the captain is going to be rescued,” I said, “and the pirates are going to be killed.”

I got it almost right.

–Jack Dunphy

New York Times: U.S. Is Said to Offer $30 Billion More to Help A.I.G..

Remember when that seemed like a lot of money?

Meanwhile we have threatened bank collapses in Venezuela and steep losses in stocks overseas Monday.

Good times.

UPDATE 3-2-09 at 6:48 a.m.: The Dow just dropped below 7000. So we got that going for us.

You know what might solve things? Fearmongering!

[Guest post by Jack Dunphy]

This week Time magazine published its list of the “25 People to Blame for the Financial Crisis.” It’s an interesting list, as much for who is included as for who is not. George W. Bush is there, as one might expect, as are Phil Gramm, Christopher Cox, and Alan Greenspan. Bernard Madoff is there, too, and there was even a spot reserved for “the American consumer,” who for 40 years, in Time’s view, spent too much and saved too little.

In placing President Bush on the list, Time allows that he “did push early on for tighter controls over Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac,” but notes that he “failed to move Congress.” Conspicuously absent from the list, though, are Barney Frank, chairman of the House Financial Services Committee, and Christopher Dodd, chairman of the Senate Banking Committee. Recall that in 2003 Mr. Frank, at that time the ranking Democrat on the committee, claimed that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were “not facing any kind of financial crisis.” Recall also that as late as the summer of 2008, Mr. Dodd assessed these institutions as being “fundamentally strong.” Subsequent events would seem to have proved otherwise, and you know the rest.

I marvel at the intellectual contortions required to exclude these men from the list. In Time’s view, President Bush is more worthy of blame for his failure to “move” Messrs. Frank and Dodd than they are for “moving” themselves. I was a Time subscriber for more than twenty years, and every so often, as in this instance, I am reminded of why I am no longer.

–Jack Dunphy

[Guest post by Jack Dunphy]

Mrs. Dunphy and I have lately been toting up our annual obligations to the public fisc, and preparing to write our check for same. It has been a discouraging experience, to understate the matter considerably, as we ponder our contribution to the trillions of dollars soon to be gushing out of great chutes at the White House and the U.S. Capitol, then to be cast hither and yon across the countryside. As best we can discern, not one of those trillions of dollars will find its way into the Dunphy coffers. And by the way, until a few months ago, had you ever heard the word “trillion” tossed about the way it’s been lately? For the innumerate, a trillion is a thousand billions, and a billion is a thousand millions. We’re talking Real Dough here.

But I digress.

Mrs. Dunphy and I are not wealthy, but our balance sheet is in good order as we have been frugal with the money we have. We currently rent, but have been considering buying a home as we observe the downward trend in real estate prices here in Southern California and elsewhere. This downward trend is in large part due to the fact that people who have lived less frugally than we have are losing their homes to foreclosure. But today we are informed that President Obama will soon open up another spigot and bequeath untold billions of dollars on those very people, with the net effect being that the tax dollars of those, such as Mrs. Dunphy and myself, who have made prudent financial decisions will be used to subsidize those who have not and, even more insultingly, artificially prop up the real estate market and thereby discourage our purchase of a home.

With this in mind, I wish to point out a few things to those fortunates being stimulated with other people’s money:

1. The government has no money but that which it extracts from its citizens through taxation under pain of imprisonment.

2. The taking of that money from those who have earned it and then distributing it to those who have not is considered to be, in a different context, robbery.

3. People who are immunized from the consequences of imprudent decisions are very likely to continue making them. And, when their imprudence is once again revealed, they are just as likely to extend the greedy hand once more in expectation of further assistance from their fellow citizens.

It is Mrs. Dunphy’s and my misfortune to live in an area represented at all levels of government by liberals, so we would waste neither the time nor effort to petition any of them with our grievances. But my question, for anyone who’d care to answer, is this: Is there anyone in Washington willing to speak for those of us who are footing the bill for all this blessed stimulation but are left unstimulated ourselves?

–Jack Dunphy

[Guest post by Jack Dunphy]

In two posts from early last year (here and here), I discussed the ongoing dispute regarding a provision in the federal consent decree governing the Los Angeles Police Department that requires gang and narcotics officers to provide financial disclosure information to auditors as a means of preventing corruption. The Los Angeles Police Protective League, the union representing rank-and-file officers, has contested the implementation of this provision, and the case is now under review in the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals.

One objection officers have to providing this information is that there is no guarantee that it will be safeguarded as promised, exposing the officers to such mischief as identity theft or perhaps worse. L.A. Times columnist Tim Rutten scoffed at this, calling the officers’ concerns “preposterous” and “baloney.”

Ahem.

Today the Times reports on the inadvertent release by the LAPD of a confidential report on officers accused of racial profiling, a report that included the officers’ names. The release, says the Times, violated LAPD policy and perhaps even state law. The blunder was blamed on a “clerical error.”

Not so preposterous now, is it?

–Jack Dunphy