Teen Suicide and the Power of Positive Thinking (With Guest Blogger Jim)

Today we get another insightful post from my old Army buddy, Guest Blogger Jim, who is originally from Michigan.




Jeff and Laura Edwards lost their son Chase, top, in 2003 to suicide when he was 12. Since then they’ve become suicide education advocates, and helped create the Chase Edwards Act, which encourages schools to hold suicide prevention programs.


I was looking at the Detroit Free Press earlier in the week, when I saw a headline for an article about teen suicides. The reporter was wondering about high teen suicide rates in the state, and went on to talk about a law Michigan passed encouraging early intervention or counseling in the schools.

Just by reading the headline, and having lived there, I was able to come up with the correct answer to the higher-than-national suicide rate. A doctor of psychiatry at a Michigan children's hospital blames it on homelessness, a lack of jobs, depression and hopelessness.

I knew that was going to be the answer before I ever read the article. How, you ask? Because as a kid growing up all I ever heard was negativity. The economy is bad, the schools are bad, the roads are bad, the hunting is bad. You name it; if it was shitty Michigan had it, twice. Back then we called the Red Wings the Dead Wings. The Lions are actually worse now than when I was growing up.

While there is no denying that Michigan has hit a shitty spot on the trail, I still believe it's possible to grow roses there. You don't have to stay there to make a living; move. I did and 17 years later I’m still holding the same job, with no layoffs. If you work for a car company or one of their satellite suppliers, sooner or later you will be out of a job. You stay, hoping it won't happen to you, but everyone gets bit eventually. You people stay ‘cause you like the 3 weeks paid vacation every year as the factories retool for the next model year. That shit is over with Obama running the show, no matter how much money and votes the UAW throws his way.


Teach the kids to be independent thinkers, not followers (Since Dad and Uncle Joe worked for GM, so will I). That starts in school, too. Everything is team-oriented, which is okay for tug-o-war, but not so hot for the rest of your life. Yeah, you have to be able to work with others, but the coach is going to put the best linebacker on the field or center on the ice. Do you get to take anyone else with you on job interviews?

I’d love to know just what the homeless rate is in Michigan. I feel this is just another liberal attempt to make people think things are worse than what they truly are.

The kid the story was about hung himself in an upstairs closet as his dad prepared dinner. While sad, I gotta say the pictures sure don't lead me to believe they have ever been homeless or anything. There was nothing, they said, that made anyone in the boy’s circle of family and friends to lead anyone to believe he was depressed. Not to speak ill of the dead, or pour salt into wounds, but sometimes things happen in life that we just can't control. The article says nothing about if the kid was taking anti-depressants, which we know are linked to higher incidents of suicide in teens. Funny; the doctor of psychiatry, who probably prescribes lots of that stuff, never mentioned it as a cause.

Hopelessness? Is that like teen angst? No one cares, nothing matters, and no one understands me, on and on. Just a guess, but kids: get interested in something or several somethings. Stop veggin' out, alone, in your room, and go do something. Hunt, fish, bike, canoe. Go to church, go out for the team, GET A JOB, and buy a car.

You know, during survival training you are taught to accomplish something, however small, everyday. You know why? To keep you from dwelling on your situation. People who have a purpose don't usually just curl up and die. Stop waiting for something to happen to give your life meaning; go make your life meaningful. Sometimes depression is a chemical imbalance in the body, but sometimes you're just bored.

I guess the big message here is, we’ve got to stop babying our kids and tell them to man up, in my opinion. Don’t push it on the schools; they are our kids, so let’s fix 'em ourselves. Teach them to be self-reliant, self-starters, independent thinkers, and tell them it's okay to be the best. Not assholes, but hard workers. A dose of that might bring down the suicide rate.

I'll leave you with two of my favorite quotes, although I don't know who exactly they are attributed to.

Tough times don't last; tough people do, remember? and
Every time you fall, pick something up.

What are your thoughts on this? I’d love to get some feedback.
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Allow MojoSteve to provide the opening feedback.

Your first quote is from Gregory Peck. It was also paraphrased as the title of a book by Reverend Robert H. Shuller. Your second quote is from Oswald T. Avery. He was one of the first molecular biologists and was a pioneer in immunochemistry, but he is best known for his discovery in 1944 with his co-workers Colin MacLeod and Maclyn McCarty that DNA is the material of which genes and chromosomes are made.

According to a 2007 report by the Michigan Statewide Homeless Management
Information System (MSHMIS) and mihomeless.org, there are 79,940 homeless people in Michigan. That's less than 1% of the 10.1 million population. The May 2009 unemployment rate in Michigan was 14.1%, according to Michigan Labor Market Information.

And, dude, the suicide rate is kinda weirdly high not just for teens on antidepressants, but adults too…and they can cause homicidal rages in oversexed pet chimps in the Connecticut suburbs. The snap-rate is high with those drugs. How many people on Zoloft, Prozac, Ritalin, Luvox, Paxil or other tasty treats have snapped and gone on rampages, or just sunk deeper and ended it? (By the by, Ritalin is an SSRI (Selective Serotonin Reuptake Inhibitor) in the same category as Prozac, Luvox, Zoloft, and Paxil.) If I recall, kids like Eric Harris (who along with Dylan Klebold killed 13 and wounded 23 at Columbine), Kip Kinkel (who killed 4 and wounded 23 at his school in Oregon), and Jeff Weise (who killed nine and then himself at his school in Red Lake, MN) were on SSRI drugs, and Brynn Hartman was on Zoloft when she killed her husband, actor Phil Hartman, and then herself.

Sure, we all wanna worry when our kids start doing things out of the ordinary beyond normal teen moodiness. But you need to openly communicate with your kid to know when they're just being a whiny Emo kid in Hot Topic eyeliner listening to sad music and reading Twilight to being a serious risk for harm to themselves and others. I spent hours being a moody shit in my room, listening to The Cure, The Smiths, and Depeche Mode, and I was fascinated with military history, but I also had a great relationship with my mom and my friends and I turned out pretty damned chipper. I channeled my moodiness into my writing and turned my interests into a great 4 years in the Army, getting focused and getting a head start on being in the Real World.


Over 600 people took a ticket to wait for up to five hours to make an unemployment claim on a Tuesday afternoon at the Michigan Unemployment Office in January 2009.

Death is good for the bank account

If ever you needed proof that dying increases your popularity, radio play for Michael Jackson's music is up 1735% this week. Yeah, One thousand, seven hundred thirty-five per cent. That ain't a typo.

According to research provided by Nielsen BDS of monitored airplay from over 1,600 terrestrial and satellite radio stations, 143 of Jackson's recordings totaled 67,383 plays for the week ending June 28, up 1,735% from last week's sum of 3,671 plays.

After having just one song("Rock With You") post more than 500 plays in the week prior to his death, 22 of Jackson's tracks eclipsed 1,000 plays this past week, led by his biggest Billboard Top 100 hit, "Billie Jean" (4,500 spins). That total places the track at No. 51 among all current or recurrent titles for the week. It was followed, of course, by "Thriller", the video for which received more spins after his death than anything else I saw on VH1 Classic.

And since he had over a hundred songs stashed away for release after his death to feed his kids off future royalties, we'll be hearing him for years to come, just like every other dead pop star. In fact, it's almost time for another album from either Tupac or Biggie...

A song of solidarity for the Iranian people

I'm not a Bon Jovi fan. Never have been; probably never will be. I respect them as a band and as musicians, but I'm just not a rock band kind of guy. I'm more the old school New Wave and synth-pop kind of guy. However, I happened upon this article on Billboard's website while researching the latest releases.



A new version of Ben E. King's "Stand By Me" featuring Jon Bon Jovi and exiled Iranian singer Andy Madadian, which is making the rounds as an online video, is meant to send "a musical message of worldwide solidarity" to the Iranian people in the wake of the country's controversial recent election, according to co-producer Don Was.

Was tells Billboard.com that the session, which took place June 24 in Los Angeles, was spurred by a conversation he had with Madadian about "whether there was something we could do just to send out a little message of solidarity, remembering the '60s, believing music can change things." When they arrived to record the song, they found Bon Jovi, guitarist Richie Sambora and John Shanks, who's producing their next album, sitting outside and having lunch.

"They asked what we were doing, I told them, and Jon said, 'Look, man, if you do it right now we'll do it with you,' " Was recalls. "So we did." Madadian -- who's lived in the U.S. since the Iranian revolution of 1979 -- and Bon Jovi duet on the song, with both men singing the first verse in Farsi. Sambora plays a guitar solo, with Was on bass, Patrick Leonard on keyboards and Jeff Rothchild on drums.

"We just cut it," Was says, "and the video is the session. It took about four hours and just fell into place nicely." The video, which features footage and still photos from the session, went up on Was' portion of My Damn Channel on Saturday and was quickly disseminated via MySpace, Facebook, Twitter and other sites. At the end of the video Madadian and Bon Jovi stand next to each other, with the latter holding a sign saying "We are one" in Farsi.

"It is not for sale," Was says. "It wasn't intended to be on the Billboard charts, wasn't meant to be a hit record or even pressed on a CD. It's intended to be downloaded and shared by the Iranian people. The whole idea was to get it into Iran and tell them...to carry on, that the world is watching and we're with you."

Didja' know June was Gay Pride Month?

Careful, you might catch the Gay Cooties.....
(Special thanks to Mark at Slap Upside The Head for the pic)

Being that this is, or at least was until recently, basically a free country, people are entitled to their opinions and to their own personal belief systems. Often times those opinions will clash with the opinions of others. Most of the time my opinions and feelings on matters are shared by my fellow conservatives, but there’s one viewpoint that I have that often gets an askew glance and raised eyebrow from my contemporaries. I support my gay friends, and being that June is Gay Pride Month, I didn’t want to let the month go by without a mention.

As always, it pains me to put people in the Tool Box that I once championed. However, when you’re being a dick, I gotta call you out.

Samuel Wurzelbacher, the Ohio man hailed as "Joe the Plumber" by John McCain's presidential campaign last year and castigated and crucified by the liberal media for daring to question The Annointed One B-Hussein-Obama, said a month or two ago that he believes gays are "queer" and said he won't allow them near his children.

"People don't understand the dictionary -- it's called queer," Wurzelbacher told Christianity Today in a recently published interview. 'Queer' means strange and unusual. It's not like a slur, like you would call a white person a honky or something like that. You know, God is pretty explicit in what we're supposed to do -- what man and woman are for."

He added, "I've had some friends that are actually homosexual. And, I mean, they know where I stand, and they know that I wouldn't have them anywhere near my children. But at the same time, they're people, and they're going to do their thing."

Those so-called friends probably think you’re a dick, too. And they probably aren’t your friends; they’re just people you know who haven’t yet kicked you in the balls out of politeness.

Look, man, people can’t help who and what and how they are. Some people are just gay. And I guess some people are just uptight religious types who use their chosen deity as a crutch and a shield to stay closed-minded. (Remember, I’m a conservative for the most part but I have an open mind—see http://www.mojosteve.blogspot.com/2009/05/defining-my-blogs-philosophy-for-my.html)

If indeed the Christian God is so horribly offended by homosexuals, and God created everything and everyone, then why does God create homosexuals, thusly creating something He hates? Why doesn’t God strike them down and smite them to the Earth as abominations? Sounds like bullshit to me. Keeping your kids away from gays as if they’ll catch the Gay Cooties or some such drivel is just that: drivel. Keeping your kids away from gays doesn’t keep them from becoming gay, either. By that same logic, do you keep your kids away from blacks so that they don’t become black or catch blackness, or away from white kids so they don’t become white or catch white cooties?



Keeping your kids away from something that’s different from what you personally don’t believe in just keeps them from understanding differences and only serves to perpetuate the prejudice. You’d be better served by explaining things to a kid the best you can, so they can understand and respect that people are different and let them make their own choices as they mature.

And if God really does have a problem with it, then that’s really between the gay couples and God, isn’t it? If there’s some evil vile sin been committed, then I guess the Big Reckoning will occur at Judgement Day, no? I do believe that somewhere in that Bible my fellow conservatives love to thump, there’s a quote about letting he who is without sin cast the first stone…and trust me, so many of you live in glass houses that ya’ll best not have a gravel driveway nearby. That, or you best have stock in a glass company.



And while I’m already up on my Big Gay Soap Box…

A couple more states recently began allowing gay marriages, and it’s about time. However, no one can say for certain how long the statutes will stay in effect since every time I turn around some state or other that had previously recognized same-sex marriages overturns the laws and makes it illegal again.

I already covered gay marriage once before. Go see: http://mojosteve.blogspot.com/2008/06/just-legalize-gay-weddings-already.html

Maine is one of the states that recently allowed same-sex marriage, so when my dear friend Wil finally finds the right guy, maybe I’ll get a wedding invite. But for another dear friend of mine, it’s too late now.

My friend Paul has had a really hard time dealing with the death of the man who would legally have been his husband had they been allowed to marry in New York state. His partner, a prominent doctor specializing in reconstructive plastic surgery, tragically passed away this past October at 47 from sarcoidosis that he picked up breathing in all sorts of toxins helping people out of the rubble on 9/11. Helping the same straight people who wouldn’t grant him the same rights to marriage that they themselves enjoyed.

Because of the 9/11 connection to his disease, he was unable to get life insurance. While he was a doctor and they lived a somewhat privileged lifestyle, things have been extremely rough without any life insurance benefits or legal rights.

In Paul’s own words:

“Because we weren't "married", we were not allowed over 1,400 rights afforded
"married couples". After my husband died, I couldn't even go to the morgue to
identify his body. I had to wait till his family arrived from Montreal to go with
them to do this. Can you fathom this scenario? I have NO rights what so ever
regarding his estate and things that belong to me can be taken away by creditors.

The family has not yet named me the administrator of the estate, which has left me in a terrible situation. Everyone is calling me about bills but I have no authority to do anything, and he was MY HUSBAND of 14.5 years.

I could go on and on but I don't have the time right now as I'm closing down our
new, magnificent office that we just built together in NYC.

I'm responsible for credit cards that were his, but he named me as a secondary cardholder, BUT they can't tell me details of the accounts as I'm not his "spouse". “

It’s bad enough that my friend lost the love of his life, but the nightmare won’t end for him because he has all the trauma and drama, but none of the rights that help attain closure or at least ease the situation.

I’m not saying that you have to conform to my opinions on these matters. You’re all entitled to your opinions and beliefs. Last month the media and the world at large was bashing Miss California for not kissing Perez Hilton’s ass and saying she was okay with same-sex marriages. She believes that marriage is strictly a male/female thing. That’s her opinion, and last I knew it was still a free country. But I hope she would be open to civil unions at the very least so that there can be fair access to health insurance, life insurance, and survivor benefits.

Life is too short to deny people the same freedoms that you enjoy as a heterosexual, based solely on the fact that they aren’t. Be a little more open-minded about things.


In memory of Dr. Gervais Frechette, MD 1961-2008

Can leeches feed off plastic?

Y’know, I was just gonna let the whole Michael Jackson thing die a quicker death than the mainstream media will. But holy shit, I’m absolutely sick of hearing about it already. Five days after his death, they were still running a non-stop marathon of Jackson videos on VH1 Classic as of 8:00 PM Eastern on Sunday, and every 15 minutes there’s a new headline over at FoxNews’ website, highlighting some new and improved macabre aspect to the death of someone who lived a rather strange life.

Are they only treating his death as a circus because his life was a circus? His last number one single was in 1995. His last single was in 2003, and that made it to 83. Granted, he was a pioneer of pop music and music videos, but his relevance to pop music had seriously waned. Let’s say, for example, that if it had been Jackson’s idol Liz Taylor who passed away, would there be a non-stop marathon of her movies for 5 days straight and everyone making it a spectacle? I mean, she’s a legendary icon and has had her bouts of media circus chicanery too, no?

Is it because he was only 50? Are we that shocked that someone died so young? Noted TV pitchman Billy Mays passed away this morning at the same age of 50, but I really doubt that HSN or QVC will be holding any 24-hour infomercial Billy Mays tributes.

I think what bothers me the most though about the media hypefest is that those two noted leeches of the black community, Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton, have crawled out from the woodwork to get their faces in front of the TV cameras. Who appointed these two media whores the Official Spokesmen of All That Is Black in America? I mean, shit, anytime something happens to anyone of African descent in America, and providing that it’ll get them 15 more minutes on TV, there they are.

Granted, I think that Jesse is an old family friend of the Jackson clan, but he can’t have been a friend to everyone else he has to get on TV for.

No, I fear that neither of them have completely altruistic motives here. I think that both of them are rabble-rousers on the scene to point fingers and babble for the media. No sooner was Jackson's death announced than Sharpton was on the streets of Harlem, waving an old black and white photograph of himself with Michael and then off to Los Angeles to consult the Jackson family about plans for simultaneous worldwide commemorations, and the hugely profitable television rights that are likely to be sold with it.



Jesse might actually be trying to help the family sort things out, but I really think Al is just there because of his almost OCD-like need to be in the spotlight. I bet his ass has a team of straphangers to photoshop his face into pictures of famous people so that when they die he can wave around a picture of them together and call a press conference.


Al Sharpton with Queen Elizabeth II of England


Al Sharpton with Korean nutbag Kim Jong Il


Al Sharpton crosses the Delaware with his homeboy G-W


Al Sharpton at the last supper with Jesus. They was tight!

The Passing of a REAL Icon...

Oi, what the hell? Celebrities are dropping like flies these days. Would that terrorists would fall off in such droves.

I’m sad to say that at the end of a week that saw the deaths of Ed McMahon, Farrah Fawcett, and Captain Plastic Fantastic Himself. And now, Billy Mays has shuffled off his mortal coil.

You name it, Billy pitched it to you, verily yelling at you through the TV to buy semi-worthless shit that, while you could live without it, your life would be exponentially better off if you purchased it. OxiClean. Magic Putty. The Grater Plater. OrangeGlo. Zorbeez. Kaboom. QuickChop. ToolBandit. Mighty Mendit. The Hercules Hook. The Gopher grabby thingie. The Steam Buddy. The Awesome Auger. Samurai Shark. Impact Gel insoles. You name it, he was in your face urging you to buy it before your life collapsed into ruination.


Bill seemed like a decent enough guy. He did what he did and did it well and amassed a small fortune doing it. He and his wife lived a rather comfortable life in Odessa, Florida in a 1.8 million dollar home. At one time he had a nice black Bentley in his garage. And while I’m a big fan of Vince from ShamWow and SlapChop fame, you never saw Billy Mays on TMZ for beating up a hooker.

You’ll be missed, Billy. We may not have had Paris, but we’ll always have The Big City Slider Station.

The Final Act of Derailment in a 50-Year Train Wreck

Yeah, I get it. Michael Jackson died. It’s a shock, and it’s a shame, since the dude was only ten years older than me. I know that some of you were fans and that you think I’m being crass about it. However, let’s keep shit in perspective…

He was a singer and entertainer, and that was really about it, unless you count Train Wreck as a resume point. He hadn’t had a hit single in years, and had pretty much passed from his King of Pop relevance into Comeback Tour status, almost bankrupt, and a twice-accused pedophile who wore pajamas to court and danced on the roof of his limo after complaining to the judge about back pain.

However, here we are at 9:00 Eastern time on a Thursday night, and the media is milking the Death Tit like he was an assassinated President. NBC and ABC are running retrospectives, reminding us of his poor little rich guy story replete with sad childhood, sad adulthood, mental and physical health maladies, and praise for his genius.

In a rare move that reminds us old folks that they used to be about music and playing videos, there’s a news broadcast being simulcast on MTV, MTV2, and VH1 that is so serious and somber it’s actually funny. They interrupted their usual shitfest of faux reality shows to make an attempt at serious music journalism, hoping to be relevant again and just coming off rather stale and fake. They even dragged Kurt Loder out of his nursing home to make a report.

Of course there’s non-stop coverage on E! Entertainment, and BET is interviewing people in the streets and playing his videos hoping to remind us all that once, Jackson was black. In about 45 minutes, the nightly TMZ show will be on Fox, and they’ll get to take a bow and pat themselves on the ass for scooping this. Yeah, really…..TMZ had the news up before CNN, MSNBC, or FoxNews did.

There's thousands dying on the streets of Iran, the economy is still in shambles, unemployment is at record highs, North Korea wants to nuke Hawaii, and there's minute-by-minute scrutiny of the final act of a pop-star's train wreck on every channel.

Poor Farrah Fawcett…her death gets kicked to the curb and relegated to the back page of the paper. I guess there wasn’t enough of a circus spectacle in dying from cancer.

Who's gonna dangle Blanket from a Berlin balcony now?

Marky Mark Sanford: Bad Vibrations

Mark, Mark, Mark…you ASS.

*sigh*

I was pretty impressed when we met at The Heritage Classic a few years ago. You were cordial and took a few minutes to actually talk to me instead of just shaking hands and walking on. I’ve supported you. I’ve voted for you. I was looking forward to you seeking the nomination for President in 2012.

Now? You’re just an ass.

Ya’ll had me fooled. I was willing to believe that you were actually off hiking along the App-Trail to clear your head after a tough legislative session, like your wife and spokespeople said. I was willing to even overlook the no phone calls and no contact with your family on Father’s Day; hell, it was your day so you were spending it out in the woods, right?

When everyone was doing the Chicken Little and panicking because you were incommunicado and left no clear transfer of gubernatorial powers to Andre Bauer, I was still behind you. They were just being alarmist, said I. When the aforementioned Poultry People cried about “What if there was a hurricane or a terrorist attack? Who would call out the National Guard?”, I scoffed. A hurricane would give us a week’s warning at the very least; they don’t pop up over Charleston harbor like an afternoon thunderboomer. If we were attacked, Bauer and the Adjutant General could begin the recalls and sort it out later; better safe than sorry, right?

And now we find out that you skipped country for a piece of ass? Dude….that’s just foul. It’s one thing to go underground for a couple days to chill in the woods, hike a bit, and if the crapple hits the fan blades, we can at least get to you in a couple hours……but to skip country, nay, skip continents, to shag up on a long-term booty-call is just bullshit.


You were a potential front-runner to seek the Presidency. Now, you’ll be lucky to get appointed third-shift grocery bagger or apprentice dog-catcher in this state. On the plus side, at least you didn’t knock up some chick while your wife was dying; John “$400 Haircuts” Edwards has that dubious distinction. You didn’t shag a hooker in your black dress socks after making a name for yourself busting prostitution rings. That was Spitzer. You went to her country, so you didn’t diddle her with a cigar at the State House in Columbia like Bubba Clinton.

In a word, Mark……FAIL.

Collossal, magnitude 10, complete and utter EPIC FAIL.

Right Here, Right Now...

Back in 1990 or so, there was a song by Jesus Jones called "Right Here, Right Now" that took a look at the sweeping changes in Europe with the downfall of Communism and the fall of the Berlin Wall and how amazing it was to be alive to see history being made....

And here we are, at the end of another decade watching the world change as Iranians are finally waking up and starting to take back their country from Islamist dictators and radical imams.

Allow me to be the first to coin the phrase Teheranenmen Square™ to commemorate the bravery of those willing to stand up to the regime.

Casual Jihad Fridays at Crazy Achmed's Carpet Kingdom!

Care to venture a guess as to why I’m not exactly keen on the idea of releasing Gitmo detainees pell-mell into the free world at large? Care to fancy a notion as to why I’m just a bit worried about the consequences of tossing released terror suspects out onto the pristine beaches of Palau and Bermuda? Wanna know why I was more than a little concerned about the release of Khalid Duhham Al-Jawary back in January? ( http://mojosteve.blogspot.com/2009/01/as-we-look-at-closing-gitmo-another.html )

Maybe it’s because there was a guy we let loose from Gitmo and returned to Saudi Arabia, a former carpet salesman named Said al-Shihiri…

Sa'id Ali Jabir Al Khathim Al Shihri is a Saudi who was captured at the Pakistani border with Afghanistan in December of 2001 and was one of the first detainees at Guantanamo Bay. He was held in American custody for almost six years before being released.

Following his repatriation to Saudi custody he was enrolled in a rehabilitation and reintegration program. Following his release, he traveled to Yemen, where he was soon after described as a deputy leader in a press release from al-Qaeda. Yeah, you read that right; we let his ass go, then the Saudis let his ass go, and now he’s the Number 2 guy in al-Qaeda in Yemen. Smooth guys…really smooth.

"By Allah, imprisonment only increased our persistence in our principles for which we went out, did jihad for, and were imprisoned for." Said al-Shihiri, on his time in Gitmo

Well, it seems that the fate of three of nine foreigners abducted in Yemen last week is known because their bodies were found, shot execution style. But the whereabouts of the other six, including three children under the age of 6, remain a mystery. Or they’ll remain a mystery until their bodies turn up, or some al-Jazeera newsfeed shows them being decapitated by adherents of The Religion of Peace…

The nine foreigners (and by foreigners we mean non-Muslims) — four German adults, three small German children, a British man and a South Korean woman — were abducted on June 12 after they ventured outside the city of Saada without their required police escorts, according to a spokesman from the Yemeni Embassy in Washington. Admittedly, not a smart thing to do, and since when did Yemen become a cool tourist destination?

Days later the bodies of Rita Stumpp and Anita Gruenwald, German nurses in training, and Eom Young-sun of South Korea were found shot execution style in the Noshour Valley, an area known to be a hotbed of Al Qaeda activity. Killing women and children is considered off-limits among many Jihadist groups, though not to al-Shihri.

Yeah, two nurses certainly look like a threat to Islam...


“This bears the marks of al-Shihri’s activity and bears the signs of his beliefs and assumptions of his behavior that are not viewed by other Jihadists,” said Robert Spencer, terror expert and director of Jihad Watch, referring to the killing of women and presumed killing of the three small children. “If he believed that these people picnicking in Yemen were aiding in the war against Islam, then he can justify these killings as legitimate — it’s this kind of perspective that this guy holds to, that it’s right to kill people who would normally be considered off-limits,” Spencer said.

"All carpets are 20% off. Just bring in the head of a Zionist to get your discount!"


Al-Shihiri is also suspected to be behind the bombing of the U.S. Embassy in Yemen in 2008, a year after being released. Among the 16 people killed in the attack were Susan Elbaneh, 18, of Lackawanna, New York, and her Yemeni husband.

And hey, I bet ya’ll didn’t know that the biggest group of Gitmo Gang members are Yemeni, right? So let’s cut ‘em loose and let ‘em make their way back to Yemen and the open arms of Uncle Said and see what sort of mischief they get into. After all, Obammy sez there’s no more terrizm, and Nappy Napolitano says it’s all just man-caused disasters and what not anyways. And on the last week of every month, we can have Casual Jihad Fridays!

And now, a word from California's OTHER idiot...

It never ceases to astonish me how self-absorbed, self-important, and just plain narcissistic some assholes people are.

Learning at the feet of her master, UberWench Nasty Pelosi, today we got a glimpse at the true nature of California’s Other Talking Turd, Barbara “Babs the Bitch” Boxer.

Not content with being spoken to in a deferentially polite manner, Boxer felt the need to remind an Army Brigadier General of that fact Tuesday during a hearing before her Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works, where the good general testifying had the apparent gall to call her "ma'am."

Brigadier General Michael Walsh, with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, was testifying on the coastal restoration process in Louisiana in the wake of Hurricane Katrina. He began to answer one of Boxer's questions with "ma'am" when Boxer immediately cut him off.

"You know, do me a favor," an irritated Boxer said. "Could say 'Senator' instead of 'ma'am?'"

"Yes, ma'am," Walsh interjected.

"It's just a thing…I worked so hard to get that title, so I'd appreciate it, yes, thank you," she said.

"Yes, senator," he responded.

Thing is, General Walsh meant no disrespect, as military protocol advises that officers may use "sir" or "ma'am" when addressing anybody higher than them on the chain of command.

"We would call them 'sir' or 'ma'am' or 'Senator such-and-such'," Army spokesman Lieutenant Colonel Nathan Banks said. Colonel Banks said any of those terms would be "appropriate" when addressing a senator.

As an enlisted soldier, I encountered officers all the time, and rest assured, I called them “sir” and “Ma’am” respectfully, as it would actually have been snide to say, “Yes, Major.” Or “No, Lieutenant”, unless you followed their rank title with their last name. That rank is just that, a rank, a title. It would actually have been seen as disrespectful to do it the way Boxer wanted, since it would imply that you’re simply showing respect to the title and not to the person holding it.

Hey, little miss junior senator from Kellyfawnya…you’ve been a Senator since 1993 and for ten years before that, a member of the House. You’re pretty much a career bureaucrat, while the man you chose to belittle commands the Mississippi Valley Division of the Army Corps of Engineers. The boundaries of the Mississippi Valley Division extend from Canada to the Gulf of Mexico, include portions of 12 states, and encompass 370,000 square miles. His awards include two Bronze Stars, four Legions of Merit, and numerous lesser awards. He is parachute and Ranger qualified, and has been soldiering since shortly after graduating the Polytechnic Institute of New York in 1977. He’s spent his career of soldiering using his engineering skills to help people worldwide. Perhaps you should offer the General some respect as well?

Tell Babs how you feel about her shitty attitude:
senator@boxer.senate.gov
Office phone number: (202) 224-3553


That's Senator Bitch to you, buster!

Terror: It ain't just for Muslims anymore

Much as I rail against radical Islamist extremists and the terrorism they use, and having recently gone on in much detail about home-grown American terrorists, and as much as I shake my head incredulously at the farcicality of left-wing extremists, on the opposite end of the spectrum there is also right-wing extremism and home-grown American terrorists who aren’t Muslim converts.

Of course, I’m talking about neo-Nazi white supremacist scumbag James von Brunn. The 88-year old hate-monger and crackpot “author” of anti-Semitic diatribes on his website decided that it was somehow in his best interest to walk into the packed Holocaust Museum in Washington with a rifle in hand and proceed to open fire, killing a security guard before taking fire himself and being critically wounded. In fact the guard, 39-year old Stephen Johns, was kind enough to hold the door open for what he thought was an elderly visitor, and as he held the door, our homegrown Hitler fired at him.

Steve Johns, killed by the man he held the door for.

Look, I’ll call a spade a spade. Guys like this make Conservatives look bad. They’re past right-wing; so far to the right in their twisted extremism that I claim absolutely nothing in common with them whatsoever. It galls me that assholes like this (and like Ahmedinijad) can deny that the Holocaust ever happened.

When my grandparents came to the States in 1960, my grandfather worked awhile for a friend of his that he’d met back home in Toronto who had moved to America to set up a locksmith business. The young couple he worked for and who were kind enough to help him out with a job both had tattoos on their arms from having been in a concentration camp.

Ever been to Dachau? It’s creepy. Really creepy. You feel like you wanna go take a hot shower afterwards to wash the ghosts and the shame and the fear and the hate and the death off of your very soul. You can be in a great mood rolling down the Autobahn and then you see the exit for the town of Dachau and you can’t help but think of what happened there and it really knocks the wind out of your sails.

It’s been a few days now; the Holocaust Museum has reopened, and Steve Johns has been laid to rest. Iranians are rioting in the street to protest the fraudulent reelection of their leader, who still wants to raze Israel to rubble. There’s been remarkably little news surrounding the condition of our little old Hitlerite. Part of me wonders if he wanted to do a suicide-by-cop thing and tried to make a statement by doing so. Sadly, his website traffic shot up but I’m sure most of that was just from people who simply had to see his ranting bullshit for themselves.

Why is it that so many people in this world feel so threatened by a religion that only has 13.2 million adherents worldwide out of over 4 BILLION people on Earth? Forgive my crappity math skills, but isn’t that like 0.3% of the world? According to a 2007 study I found, Judaism was the 12th ranked religion worldwide. And out of that 13.2 million, just about only 5.3 million Jews live in Israel (and are 75% of the population there, not 100% as everyone thinks) which is a little bit bigger than the state of Massachusetts.

Iran, whose leader wants to drive Israel into the sea and kill every Jew a thousand times over, is three times larger than Arizona and has about 66 million people, most of whom actually like the USA and would really rather be living in a free society.

Come on, Iran…overthrow that asstard and come join the 21st century. You can lead the way and show the rest of the Islamic world that it’s okay to be friends with Israel. And since Iranians are ethnically Aryan and not Arabs, wouldn’t that be a delicious irony to all those asshole white supremacists, neo-Nazis, and other Aryan-wannabe douchebags?


He hates everyone....except naked kids. Or hadn't you heard that the FBI found child pornography on this asshole's computer?

June 18th: Remembering the 9

Firefighter Brandon Thompson


Engineer Bradford "Brad" Baity


Captain Louis Mulkey


Engineer Mark Kelsey


Captain Mike Benke


Captain William "Billy" Hutchinson


Firefighter Melvin Champaign


Assistant Engineer Michael French


Firefighter James "Earl" Drayton

If it's June 14th....

Most Americans, ignorant of their history or just choosing to ignore it, had no idea that today is Flag Day. It commemorates the adoption of the flag of the United States, by resolution of the Second Continental Congress in 1777. In 1916, President Woodrow Wilson issued a proclamation that officially established June 14 as Flag Day; in August 1949, National Flag Day was established by an Act of Congress.

However, two years before the Continental Congress adopted the flag, they established the Continental Army. Thus, today is the 234th birthday of The United States Army.

I send special birthday greetings today to all members of the Army family past & present, especially my brothers & sisters in the Military Police Corps.