Rudyard Kipling"
“When you're left wounded on Afganistan's plains and
the women come out to cut up what remains, Just roll to your rifle
and blow out your brains,
And go to your God like a soldier”
General Douglas MacArthur"
“We are not retreating. We are advancing in another direction.”
“It is fatal to enter any war without the will to win it.” “Old soldiers never die; they just fade away.
“The soldier, above all other people, prays for peace, for he must suffer and be the deepest wounds and scars of war.”
“May God have mercy upon my enemies, because I won't .” “The object of war is not to die for your country but to make the other bastard die for his.
“Nobody ever defended, there is only attack and attack and attack some more.
“It is foolish and wrong to mourn the men who died. Rather we should thank God that such men lived.
The Soldier stood and faced God
Which must always come to pass
He hoped his shoes were shining
Just as bright as his brass
"Step forward you Soldier,
How shall I deal with you?
Have you always turned the other cheek?
To My Church have you been true?"
"No, Lord, I guess I ain't
Because those of us who carry guns
Can't always be a saint."
I've had to work on Sundays
And at times my talk was tough,
And sometimes I've been violent,
Because the world is awfully rough.
But, I never took a penny
That wasn't mine to keep.
Though I worked a lot of overtime
When the bills got just too steep,
The Soldier squared his shoulders and said
And I never passed a cry for help
Though at times I shook with fear,
And sometimes, God forgive me,
I've wept unmanly tears.
I know I don't deserve a place
Among the people here.
They never wanted me around
Except to calm their fears.
If you've a place for me here,
Lord, It needn't be so grand,
I never expected or had too much,
But if you don't, I'll understand."
There was silence all around the throne
Where the saints had often trod
As the Soldier waited quietly,
For the judgment of his God.
"Step forward now, you Soldier,
You've borne your burden well.
Walk peacefully on Heaven's streets,
You've done your time in Hell."
Behold the Democrats: party of the people, party of progress, party
of the perpetually aggrieved. In Philadelphia on Monday, they kicked off
their quadrennial convention, in the process reminding everyone that
they are also the party in power.
The task before them is formidable: to
sell Americans on the notion that eight years of Democratic rule have
left the country better off, while at the same time convincing swing
voters in Ohio and Florida that a host of ills—from patriarchy and
institutional racism to corporate greed and police brutality—plague us
still, and require ever greater levels of government intervention to
solve.
The argument lends itself to cognitive dissonance. Monday’s speakers
testified to the devastation of the opioid epidemic, which has emerged
as a national crisis only in recent years. Undocumented immigrants spoke
of the hardship of living in the shadows, though the label “deporter-in-chief” was affixed
to Obama not by the restrictionist Right, but by the open-borders Left.
Last night’s convention theme was “United Together.” In the interest of
truth in advertising, it ought to have been “Having it Both Ways.”
