COLLECTIVE MADNESS


“Soft despotism is a term coined by Alexis de Tocqueville describing the state into which a country overrun by "a network of small complicated rules" might degrade. Soft despotism is different from despotism (also called 'hard despotism') in the sense that it is not obvious to the people."

Sunday, July 19, 2009

The Forgotten Man of Apollo 11, Michael Collins




How Michael Collins became the forgotten astronaut of Apollo 11
As Armstrong and Aldrin took their famous walk on the moon, a third member of the team sat alone in the mothership plagued by terrors of returning to Earth alone. Robin McKie reports

The Observer, Sunday 19 July 2009

It was the secret terror that gripped astronaut Michael Collins throughout the Apollo 11 project 40 years ago. As his spacecraft, Columbia, swept over the lunar surface, Collins - the mission's third and largely forgotten crewman - waited for a call from fellow astronauts Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin to say their lander craft had successfully blasted off from the Moon.

The message would banish Collins's deepest fear: that he would be the only survivor of an Apollo 11 disaster and that he was destined to return on his own to the United States as "a marked man".

The realisation that the normally icy-cool astronaut was so obsessed by such an outcome puts a fresh perspective on the celebrations that will, this weekend, absorb the United States as it commemorates the moment, on 21 July 1969, that an American first walked on another world. Apollo 11 will be presented as a flawless technological triumph at jamborees across the nation, including a special reception at the National Air and Space Museum in Washington, which all three Apollo 11 astronauts are scheduled to attend.

Yet at the time, worries that the mission would end in disaster consumed nearly all of those involved in the programme - despite their apparent calm. And no one was more stressed than Collins, it appears.

In his case, the astronaut was obsessed with the reliability of the ascent engine of Armstrong and Aldrin's lander, Eagle. It had never been fired on the Moon's surface before and many astronauts had serious doubts about its reliability. Should the engine fail to ignite, Armstrong and Aldrin would be stranded on the Moon - where they would die when their oxygen ran out. Or if it failed to burn for at least seven minutes, then the two astronauts would either crash back on to the Moon or be stranded in low orbit around it, beyond the reach of Collins in his mothership, Columbia.

All three astronauts believed there was a real chance such a disaster would occur. Armstrong thought his prospects were only 50-50 of making it back to Earth. And so did Collins, the pilot of Columbia and one of the world's most experienced aviators.

Nor were the astronauts alone. Richard Nixon, then US president, had even prepared a speech that he would deliver in the event of the Eagle's engine failing. "Fate has ordained that the men who went to the Moon to explore in peace will stay on the Moon to rest in peace," it ran. "These brave men, Neil Armstrong and Edwin Aldrin, know that there is no hope for their recovery. But they also know that there is hope for mankind in their sacrifice."

Thus Collins - alone in Columbia as the world focused on Armstrong and Aldrin walking on the lunar surface - fretted about his two companions below him on the Moon and revealed, in a note written at the time, that he was now "sweating like a nervous bride" as he waited to hear from the Eagle.

"My secret terror for the last six months has been leaving them on the Moon and returning to Earth alone; now I am within minutes of finding out the truth of the matter," he wrote. "If they fail to rise from the surface, or crash back into it, I am not going to commit suicide; I am coming home, forthwith, but I will be a marked man for life and I know it."

Then Armstrong and Aldrin prepared their lander for its launch. Armstrong pressed the engine's firing button and Eagle soared perfectly above the lunar surface towards the waiting Collins. His worst fear had not materialised and he returned safely to Earth in the company of Armstrong and Aldrin, unmarked by the experience. He would not suffer a fate of global notoriety.

In fact, the opposite happened. Collins was forgotten. Today most people still know the names of the two first men on the Moon and recall the words, delivered by Armstrong, about taking a giant leap for mankind. But the name Michael Collins is rarely recalled, despite his critical role in the historic flight of Apollo 11. Not that he holds grudges. "It was an honour," he said last week.

In fact, he was - in many ways - the unsung hero of the Apollo 11 mission, a point that was underlined at the time by the great American aviator Charles Lindbergh. He wrote to Collins, not long after his safe return, to tell him that his part of the mission was one of "greater profundity ... you have experienced an aloneness unknown to man before".

It is an intriguing remark and an apposite one, it turns out - a point that can be appreciated by looking at the very set-up of the mission. Apollo 11 consisted of a spindly lunar lander, Eagle, and an orbiting mothership, Columbia, that were both blasted into space on a giant Saturn V rocket on 16 July 1969. For three days, Armstrong, Aldrin and Collins cruised towards the Moon inside Columbia and spent their time gazing "out the window at the Earth getting smaller and smaller and checking the spacecraft", according to Aldrin.

Then, on 20 July, Armstrong and Aldrin crawled into Eagle and flew it down to the Moon's surface. "Keep talking to me, guys," radioed an initially panicky Collins as the pair drifted away from his ship.

Minutes later, Columbia swept behind the Moon and Collins became Earth's most distant solo traveller, separated from the rest of humanity by 250,000 miles of space and by the bulk of the Moon, which blocked all radio transmissions to and from mission control. He was out of sight and out of contact with his home planet.

"I am now truly alone and absolutely alone from any known life. I am it," he wrote in his capsule. Lindbergh's remarks were certainly accurate.

Such solitude would have unnerved most people. But not Collins. He says the emotion that he experienced most during his day alone in lunar orbit was that of exultation. And certainly he appears to have relished his time as the loneliest member of his species. He also emerged from the post-Apollo years relatively unscathed. Aldrin lapsed into alcoholism and depression, while Armstrong became a virtual recluse. Both men subsequently divorced. By contrast, Collins - shaded from the glare of publicity - has avoided such personal traumas and is still with his wife, Patricia, whom he married in 1958. The couple have three grown-up children.

Collins was born in Rome on 31 October 1930. His father, Major-General James Lawton Collins, was then serving overseas with the US army. Collins later graduated from West Point and joined the US air force. An early assignment was to the 21st Fighter-Bomber Wing at George Air Force Base, where he learned how to drop nuclear weapons. He joined the astronaut corps in 1962 and flew on one of America's two-man Gemini capsules with veteran astronaut John Young, who flew on a later Apollo mission. Then came his selection for Apollo 11.

After his return to Earth, Collins gave up space travel and pursued a career in bureaucracy and business. He was director of the National Air and Space Museum until 1978, before being appointed vice-president of LTV Aerospace in Arlington, Virginia. He resigned in 1985 to start his own business.

Today he remains cheerful about his role on Apollo 11, although he describes himself as becoming increasingly grumpy. "At age 78, some things about current society irritate me, such as the adulation of celebrities and inflation of heroism," he said last week. Neither description fits him, he added. "Heroes abound, but don't count astronauts among them. We worked very hard, we did our jobs to near perfection, but that is what we had been hired to do."

He describes himself today as moderately busy, "running, biking, swimming, fishing, painting, cooking, reading, worrying about the stock market and searching for a really good bottle of cabernet for under $10".

As to his claim to fame, that was simple fate, he added. "Neil Armstrong was born in 1930. Buzz Aldrin was born in 1930, and Mike Collins, 1930. We came along at exactly the right time. We survived hazardous careers and were successful in them.

"But in my own case at least, it was 10% shrewd planning and 90% blind luck. Put Lucky on my tombstone."




Hey, they were fighter pilots, not poets.

54 comments:

  1. Too much commentary about a man who read the news and not enough about men that made the news.

    Collins makes an interesting observation:

    "At age 78, some things about current society irritate me, such as the adulation of celebrities and inflation of heroism," he said last week. Neither description fits him, he added. "Heroes abound, but don't count astronauts among them. We worked very hard, we did our jobs to near perfection, but that is what we had been hired to do."

    Please don't thank Michael Collins for his service. He did his job, damn well at that.

    ReplyDelete
  2. I agree...

    the concept of "cult of personality" and the celebration of celebrity is a curse...

    Noting wrong with good old fashioned respect for those that did a above average job...

    But today we celebrate empty suits that can look good...

    ReplyDelete
  3. Incredible Testimony... I have a good hunting friend who is a retired Navy Aviator. Flew U2s out of Sacramento and Seoul. Exact same personality and demeanor as Mr. Collins.

    ReplyDelete
  4. I keep forgetting what I want on my tombstone.
    What's up with that?
    How About:

    I FORGOT!
    ?

    ReplyDelete
  5. Cernan was on Miller Show:
    The list of things that went wrong while he was in the Soviet Rattletrap (Miller called it the '69 Dodge Dart) for 6 months made Apollo 13 seem like a walk in the park.
    Biggest Fire in Space one of many.
    Loss of attitude control and failure of Urine System and CO2 recycler another!

    ReplyDelete
  6. Cernan has a book, btw.

    Think it is:

    LAST MAN ON THE MOON

    ReplyDelete
  7. (Discussion relates to Deuce and WIO comments above)

    ReplyDelete
  8. off topic

    Larry Summers cites Google search as progress

    Of all the statistics pouring into the White House every day, top economic adviser Larry Summers highlighted one Friday to make his case that the economic free-fall has ended.

    The number of people searching for the term “economic depression” on Google is down to normal levels, Summers said.

    Searches for the term were up four-fold when the recession deepened in the earlier part of the year, and the recent shift goes to show consumer confidence is higher, Summers told the Peterson Institute for International Economics.


    Read more:

    http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0709/25083.html#ixzz0LkWRKGTz


    I personally will google "economic depression" at least 15 times an hour for the next 3 days...

    I advocate everyone else doing the same

    ReplyDelete
  9. WiO:

    But today we celebrate empty suits that can look good...

    Reminds me of something a respected cousin said a few years ago...we celebrate stupidity.

    I still respect him even though he's a professed liberal, a LINO in my opinion, going along to get along in a marriage to a real one.

    Only the shadow knows what happens in the privacy of the voting booth.

    ReplyDelete
  10. Wonder which of the two are the most alone, Michael Collins, orbiting he moon, or that young soldier from the last thread, on the far side of the earth.

    Collins did not fall into dispair, let us hope that is also true in Afpakistan, too.

    ReplyDelete
  11. That soldier has a name, just released:
    Private Bowe R. Bergdahl, 23, of Ketchum, Idaho.

    ReplyDelete
  12. By Paritosh Bansal

    NEW YORK, July 19 (Reuters) - CIT Group Inc (CIT.N) has reached a tentative deal with a bondholder group for $3 billion in rescue financing, which the lender hopes will help it avoid bankruptcy, sources close to the situation said on Sunday.

    The bondholder group, which includes Pacific Investment Management Company (Pimco) and some other top CIT holders, is expected to provide the financing with a 2 1/2-year term, the sources said.

    CIT's board plans to meet later on Sunday to discuss the terms of the deal, and the lender is expected to announce the deal on Monday if the board approves it, according to one source, who declined to be identified because talks are private.

    The deal is part of a larger restructuring plan, the source said.

    The $3 billion rescue financing plan will be backed by remaining unsecuritized assets which likely exceed $10 billion, another source familiar with the matter said.

    "The $3 billion is new money but securitized by all the remaining unsecuritized assets which probably exceed $10 billion," that source said
    .

    ReplyDelete
  13. Who'd have ever guessed:

    Bailout Overseer Says Banks Misused TARP Funds

    Washington Post - Binyamin Appelbaum - ‎1 hour ago‎

    Many of the banks that got federal aid to support increased lending have instead used some of the money to make investments, repay debts or buy other banks, according to a new report from the special inspector general overseeing ..
    .

    ReplyDelete
  14. Countering Riots, China Snatches Hundreds From Their Homes .

    ... The livery driver went out to get a drink of water and did not come home.

    Tuer Shunjal, a vegetable vendor, was bundled off with four of his neighbors when he made the mistake of peering out from a hallway bathroom when the police swept through the building he was in. “They threw a shirt over his head and led him away without saying a word,” said his wife, Resuangul.

    In the two weeks since ethnic riots tore through Urumqi, the regional capital of Xinjiang, killing more than 190 people and injuring more than 1,700, security forces have been combing the city and detaining hundreds of people, many of them Uighur men whom the authorities blame for much of the slaughter
    .

    ReplyDelete
  15. This article begs the important question, will the US beat Honduras when they meet in Dallas, on the level field of international sports competion?

    Talks mediated by Costa Rica's Oscar Arias collapse after Honduras' de facto government rejects his proposal, which called for reinstating ousted President Manuel Zelaya.

    By Tracy Wilkinson and Alex Renderos
    July 20, 2009
    .

    Reporting from Tegucigalpa, Honduras, and San Salvador -- Talks to resolve the coup crisis in Honduras collapsed Sunday after the de facto government refused a mediator's proposal to reinstate ousted President Manuel Zelaya.

    The failure of negotiations under the direction of Costa Rican President Oscar Arias dashed the most promising diplomatic effort aimed at ending the crisis and raised the specter of more violence
    .

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  16. Mr. Chávez understands that Mr. Zelaya's star is fading, which is why he called Tom Shannon, the State Department's assistant secretary for the Western Hemisphere at home at 11:15 p.m on July 9. Mr. Shannon told me that Mr. Chávez "again made the case for the unconditional return of Mr. Zelaya, though he did so in a less bombastic manner than he has in the past."

    Mr. Shannon says that in response he "suggested to him that Venezuela and its [allies] address the fear factor by calling for free and fair elections and a peaceful transition to a new government." That, Mr. Shannon, says, "hasn't happened."

    Nor is it likely to. Yet the U.S. continues exerting enormous pressure for the return of Mr. Zelaya.


    Left on Honduras

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  17. "Yet the U.S. continues exerting enormous pressure for the return of Mr. Zelaya."

    What pressure is the US exerting?
    A little hot air over the Potomac?

    Which many claim has had no effect any where else in the wide whirled, since President obama has taken office.
    So why would mere rhetoric be considered pressure on Honduras?

    Has the US threatened to withdraw its' military presence from Honduras?

    Has the US threatened to suspend the lease payments for that base?

    Has the US threatened an economic embargo?

    What is this "enormous pressure", what does it really amount to?

    ReplyDelete
  18. Netanyahu: Jerusalem is Ours, Not Up for Debate.

    by Maayana Miskin

    Bibi: Jerusalem Ours Forever.

    Sunday, Jul 19 '09

    Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu issued a sharp response Sunday to United States pressure to stop Jews from building in parts of Jerusalem claimed by the Palestinian Authority. Israel's sovereignty in Jerusalem is “not up for debate,” Netanyahu said, and Jews are permitted to build in any part of the capital city, as are Arabs.

    Netanyahu implied that the U.S. request was racist, saying before the weekly Cabinet meeting, “Imagine what would happen if Jews were forbidden to live or to buy apartments in certain parts of London, New York, Paris or Rome. There would be an international outcry."
    ...
    Over the weekend, the U.S. State Department summoned Israeli envoy Michael Oren and demanded that Israel halt construction of Jewish homes in the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood, near the ancient grave of Shimon HaTzaddik (Simon the Just). The property on which the homes are to be built has been owned by Jewish activist Dr. Irving Moskowitz for more than 20 years.

    Oren told U.S. officials that Israel would not agree to stop building in the area
    .
    ...

    Obama policy is racist? Imagine that.

    ReplyDelete
  19. The next Presidental election, in Honduras, is 27JAN09.

    So the course is clear, for the Hondurans. Stall until the election and a new, legal, President is elected.

    Hopefully it will not be the current President, Mr Micheletti.
    He should, if he has not already, pledge not to run in that election.

    On 28Jan09 Mannie's ouster is a mute point. If there are "free and fair" elections.

    ReplyDelete
  20. off topic

    Jews outwit Iran and Obama: Find cure for radiation sickness

    Those darned Jews are so smart, they've outwitted Ahmadinejad and Obama: They have found a cure for radiation sickness.

    http://israelmatzav.blogspot.com/

    ReplyDelete
  21. But reverse discriminaton, used in an effort to level the playing field, is not racist, lineman.

    Even though race, religion or ethnicity are used in the matrix of measurables.

    You should have become versed in that, while with the Forest.

    Much as the beating of Rondey King was portrayed as racist, even a hate crime, but the battey of the white truck driver, in LA during the resulting riots, by black hooligans was not.

    Well, we all know that driver shouldn't have been down in the 'hood. He shoulda known better. Those hooligans were just full of rage, at the machine.

    No racism, there.

    You know the story, they're stickin to it.

    ReplyDelete
  22. The dirty little secret about Israel?

    20 % of the population are ARABS...

    Who buy and sell land all over the damed shitty little country...

    and in the West Bank? Arabs have settled and created hundreds of villages SINCE Israel liberated it in 1967.

    Aint it a crime that Joos BUY land and build homes ANYWHERE!

    How dare those stinkin Joos have the balls to actually conduct real estate transactions and dare to BUILD on land anywhere?

    dont they KNOW that 649/650th of the middle east is JUDEN FREE? and it's a matter of time when Israel is no more and Jews will be forced to either go back to where they came from or die...

    A note to all the so called "christians" out there..

    If your right and your "Jesus" comes back for a 2nd coming? He would never be allowed to build a home in Bethlehem, Hebron or Jerusalem according to B Hussein, Prez of the Socialist Republic of America

    ReplyDelete
  23. It was only nine or ten months ago that Mr Obama said the Israeli would have to be "Nuts" not to take the deal being presented.

    Nuts it what seems to be indicated by Bibi's behaviour, by President Obama's previously stated standard.

    What will Obama do, to ratchet up some "enormous pressure"? Rhetoric will be less effective upon Israel than Honduras, that is a given.

    ReplyDelete
  24. The property is in the neighborhood of Sheikh Jarrah, a predominantly Palestinian area that also has foreign consulates and Israeli government buildings.

    At Sunday’s weekly cabinet meeting, the head of the Shin Bet security services, Yuval Diskin, said that Hamas, the Islamist movement that rules in Gaza and opposes Israel’s existence, has been buying property in East Jerusalem and broadening its base here and that the Palestinian Authority had set up an intelligence network aimed at preventing Palestinians from selling their property to Israelis.

    The chief Palestinian negotiator, Saeb Erekat, told Israel Radio that instead of defending the Moskowitz development, Mr. Netanyahu should be preparing Israel to make peace. “He knows very well that there will never be peace between Palestinians and Israelis without East Jerusalem being the capital of the Palestinian state,” Mr. Erekat said.


    Rejects Call

    ReplyDelete
  25. ...“He knows very well that there will never be peace between Palestinians and Israelis without East Jerusalem being the capital of the Palestinian state,” Mr. Erekat said.

    He should have stopped at "He knows very well that there will never be peace between Palestinians and Israelis."

    ReplyDelete
  26. Would the Israeli buying land on the West Bank and the disputed areas of Jerusalem willingly take the loyalty oath to the Islamic Republic of Palistine that Mr Lieberman wants the Arabs living in Israel to take to the Jewish State of Israel?

    ReplyDelete
  27. ...If your right and your "Jesus" comes back for a 2nd coming? He would never be allowed to build a home in Bethlehem, Hebron or Jerusalem according to B Hussein, Prez of the Socialist Republic of America.

    Smiling here, WiO.

    Only because if that day arrives, BHO will have his hands full without telling Jesus he's in violation of US zoning ordinances.

    ReplyDelete
  28. Will those Israeli admit that they have immigrated into the Palistinian State and out of Israel?

    That they no longer reside in Israel, but Palistine?

    I do not think they will, but I could be mistaken.

    ReplyDelete
  29. The United States' military says it is doing all it can to find an American soldier captured a few weeks ago by the Taliban while on patrol in Afghanistan.

    ...

    US military spokesman Colonel Greg Julian has publicly ruled out any concessions to the more militant elements of the Taliban.

    ...

    Private Bergdahl disappeared while on patrol in Eastern Paktika province, near Afghanistan's border with Pakistan.


    US Captive

    ReplyDelete
  30. Around 17,000 people have been forced to evacuate their homes in the Kelowna region of Canada's British Columbia province, where forest fires have already devastated 300 hectares (741 acres) of land.

    ...

    The cause of the fires, which were declared Saturday and Sunday morning, remains unknown, but a combination of low humidity, high temperatures and strong winds have stoked the flames.

    The evacuees have gathered at an ice rink and a nearby school, according to local newspaper the Vancouver Sun.


    Evacuation in Canada

    ReplyDelete
  31. Caroline Glick addresses your concerns in Commentary, June, 2009, rat. Look it up. "No More Peace Plans!"

    In the meantime, I wouldn't hold my breath waiting for the Palestinian State, regardless of how breathlessly Obama, Hillary, et al, tell us it's the solution to all the problems in the ME.

    ReplyDelete
  32. desert rat said...
    Would the Israeli buying land on the West Bank and the disputed areas of Jerusalem willingly take the loyalty oath to the Islamic Republic of Palistine that Mr Lieberman wants the Arabs living in Israel to take to the Jewish State of Israel?

    well rat...

    Jews LIVED in the middle east for thousands of years BEFORE the arabs crawled out of arabia..

    and in 1948 MORE Jews were exiled/thrown out of their homes in the arab world (than arabs left israel) so today, 33 million square miles of the middle east have been ethnically cleansed of jews... whereas in the 1/649th of the rest of the middle east, 20% of israels are citizens and are not asked to leave...

    A loyalty pledge by all citizens of Israel is not out of line when today israeli arabs are trying to murder israel from the inside...

    Please show me any real example of any arab state that actually has minority rights for their coptics, jews, druze, christians, berbers et al?

    Jews have been forced to leave Jewish areas of the west bank by arab pograms in the 1920's, why should they have to pledge shit to a fascist islamic state of palestine that infact tosses their own off of roof tops?

    ReplyDelete
  33. Breaking the deadlock looks as impossible a task as it has proved at every attempt since the Oslo accords. Yet this is the game that most matters for Obama.

    In this respect, the simultaneous chess analogy is inexact.

    For chess masters each board represents a discrete challenge, disconnected from the next. For Obama what happens in the Middle East could well tip the outcome of many other games.


    Chess Game

    ReplyDelete
  34. Six million Isreali, means that there are 1.2 million amonst them, according to wi"o".

    There are around 3.7 million Palis, in the territories, a million + in Gaza and shy of 3 million on the West Bank.

    SOURCE: Central Bureau of Statistics, Statistical Abstract of Israel, 2002, Table 2.9.

    Puts the population of the settlements at 208,000, in 2001.

    There has obviously been an expansion since then, to say 250,000?

    6.5% of the Palistinian population of the Territories and the disputed areas is Jewish.

    That'd be reasonable I bet.

    Is the Arab population of Israel mostly segregated into their own communities or fully integrated into Israel society and communities?

    Are they in seperate enclaves and villages from the Jewish residents?

    ReplyDelete
  35. God Speed to the Americans searching for Pfc Bergdahl.

    ReplyDelete
  36. What the other countries are doing, wi"o" is not the issue, there are not equivalencies.

    Ancient history is meaningless to most of the US electorate.

    Would those Israel admit they no longer resided in Israel?

    It is a yes or no, perhaps some but not many kind of an answer.

    Trying to look forward to the next step, not back to the injustices of Babylonian Kings.

    ReplyDelete
  37. The National Beverage Co., which distributes Coca-Cola and other soft drinks, also has problems. General manager Imad Hindi said it has taken months to get spare parts out of Israeli ports and that Israel has banned a chemical needed to sanitize a production line.

    Hindi estimated that the company pays three times more for logistics than similar businesses elsewhere.

    Israel's border blockade of the Gaza Strip, imposed after the violent Hamas takeover in 2007, has further hurt sales. The company, which employs 350 people, used to sell one-third of its products in Gaza, but has been barred from doing so since August, said Hindi.


    More Needed

    ReplyDelete
  38. Ketchum, Idaho.
    Private Bergdahl's home town.

    Before I read he had walked away from the base camp with a couple of Afghani, now he's been reported lost on patrol.

    Maybe it was a patrol base camp.

    Let's hope they all come home.
    Carrying their shields.

    ReplyDelete
  39. “I go to the police station every day, but they just tell me to be patient and wait,” said Patiguli Palachi, whose husband, an electronics repairman, was taken in his pajamas with four other occupants of their courtyard house. Ms. Palachi said they might have been detained because a Han man was killed outside their building, but she insisted that her husband was not involved.

    “We were hiding inside at the time, terrified like everyone else,” she said.

    Although it was impossible to verify the accounts of the residents, as Ms. Palachi spoke, more than 10 people gathered to share similar accounts.


    Rounding Up 100's

    ReplyDelete
  40. A giant panda at a breeding center in China's Sichuan Province has given birth to twin female cubs, the first twin giant panda cubs born this year, according to Xinhua News Agency.

    ...

    The unnamed twins, one weighing 122 grams and the other 100 grams, were in good health, Li was quoted as saying.

    It was the first time that the 17-year-old Li Li has given birth to healthy baby pandas, after several stillbirths and the births of premature cubs that soon died, he said.


    1st Case This Year

    ReplyDelete
  41. desert rat said...
    What the other countries are doing, wi"o" is not the issue, there are not equivalencies.


    actually that is the story... it starts in 1948 with the State of Israel accepting the creation of 2 states and the arab world collectively say NO...


    dr: Ancient history is meaningless to most of the US electorate.

    Most of the US electorate voted for a closet moslem with domestic terrorists friends. who really cares what the michael jackson lovers actually think, we live in a republic not a democracy.

    dr: Would those Israel admit they no longer resided in Israel?

    It is a yes or no, perhaps some but not many kind of an answer.


    jerusalem is the eternal capital of the state of israel, regardless if the non-democratic nations of the world agree or disagree. Israelis have every right to LIBERATE historic lands just as every other people on the planet, and if that liberation happens due to the other side's aggressive genocidal attempts this confirms Israel right to the west bank.

    DR: Trying to look forward to the next step, not back to the injustices of Babylonian Kings.

    No one is talking about the Kings of Bavel... In 1948 the arabs threw out of 649/650th the almost one million jews that had lived in those lands for thousands of years, this is modern history

    If the arabs had accepted the UN partition?

    different story..

    but the arabs are a greedy murderous people and they want it all..

    I thoughts for peace?

    All arabs around the entire globe be expelled back to arabia...

    Yep you heard me straight...

    Complete and total removal of all arabs from all lands except arabia...

    Or keep them and watch (one by one) each nation destroy it'sself by keeping them...

    Just as B Hussein is doing as we speak resettling so called "palestinians" from Iraq to LA....

    The Arabs as a people, will never be content on 649/650th of the middle east... Nor will they be happy with 649/650th of the world...

    Live with them if you wish... I choose not to be a dhimmi...

    ReplyDelete
  42. Of course we live in a Republic, wi"o".
    :ook at the representitives that constitute the Government.
    They are the republicans
    A majority in the House and sixty seats strong in the Senate.

    Representing a vast and widely distributed majority, for now.

    You try to protray the Israeli as the victims, when that is not the publicly percieved case, at all.

    The Israeli maintain the preponderance of power, which you remind us of often enough.

    What does Obama do next?
    Give another speech or take some type of action?

    ReplyDelete
  43. What will the US do?

    Not the moral justification for or against that action, but the action.

    Now that Bibi is considered nuts?

    ReplyDelete
  44. dr: You try to protray the Israeli as the victims, when that is not the publicly percieved case, at all.

    and just what is a "publicly percieved case" other than a bullshit smokescreen?

    ReplyDelete
  45. In 1940, Cronkite married Mary Elizabeth "Betsy" Maxwell, whom he met when they both worked at KCMO. They had three children, Nancy, Mary Kathleen and Walter Leland III.

    Betsy Cronkite died in 2005.

    In his book, he paid tribute to her "extraordinarily keen sense of humor, which saw us over many bumps (mostly of my making), and her tolerance, even support, for the uncertain schedule and wanderings of a newsman."


    An Icon

    ReplyDelete
  46. desert rat said...
    What will the US do?

    Not the moral justification for or against that action, but the action.

    Now that Bibi is considered nuts?




    Nuts by whom? Hmas, Fatah, the Current potus?

    really...

    who cares... America is steering it's self off a cliff...

    regional war is going to break out across the globe now that america is a ball-less, spineless, appeasing ship adrift with no moral compass...

    f*ck human rights, f*ck sudan, israel, poland, south korea, japan, georgia....

    We now have a president more focused on stopping jews from building 20 apartments in Jerusalem and promoting moslem women's rights to wear burka's in the west...

    we are in the shitter, get used to the stank... it's our nation

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  47. This is the second chopper crashed in Kandahar over the past two days and the fourth in the country over the past three weeks.

    In Sunday's incident, also in Kandahar, a Russian-made helicopter under NATO contract crashed and left 16 aboard dead.

    Taliban militants fighting Afghan and international troops have yet to claim responsibility.


    2 Wounded

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  48. oh yeah while I am at it...

    America, a nation that now believes in identity politics

    12 million illegals getting free health care (not to mention the 1st round of making citizens out of illegals)

    Child molesting celeb's are now being hailed as heroes.

    More Americans have more interest in M Jackson's hair burning than innocents in Iran being stoned to death...

    Things such as the rape of our country's treasure to giving our wealth to the the looters....

    Yep our Nation is heading for a melt down...

    Maybe after it breaks we can fix it...

    til then?

    I'm going Galt...

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  49. The Supreme Court is well served with intellectual opposites like Antonin Scalia and Stephen Breyer, both of whom reflect where they come from.

    Judge Sotomayor may not achieve that intellectual pinnacle, but with the bright mind and ready charm she demonstrated last week and with her unique perspectives and personal biography, she will add to the richness of the court’s deliberations.

    She is expected to be confirmed with support from close to half the Senate’s Republicans, mirroring the backing Chief Justice John Roberts received from Democrats four years ago.


    Top Court

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  50. thanks
    --
    http://miriadafilms.ru/

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