TECTONIC PLATES ADRIFT? - Wilson, Lenin; Putin, Obama - rUSsiA

                                                    by Hugh Murray
     I was away for two weeks in Asia, and spent less than 3 hours on the net.  The cable TV in my hotel room was quite limited, and I had trouble finding real news of the world.  BBC and CNN seemed to show nothing but homages to Nelson Mandela, the South African radical who was jailed for years and then emerged as a negotiator for the dismantling of apartheid.  Day after day, the funeral seemed to be the only world news on the British and American channels.  Deutsche Welle showed talking heads.  The local Thai stations showed the continuing demonstrations in Bangkok, but I did not understand the language, so quickly changed the channels.  The Fox Sports channel showed little soccer, and then mainly from the Dutch league, which I do  not follow.  I did chance upon one channel, in English, that kept my attention.  Oliver Stone was interviewed for about an hour, with a co-author on the Hidden History of the US.  I generally disagreed with his views, and yet because of his terrific film, JFK, I kept watching.  There was other news from the Washington bureau.  Yet, I had never heard of the channel.
     Then there was a program on army life, but the language was a Slavic one.  The news showed the demos in Thailand, but much more time was devoted to those in the Ukraine.  Then it dawned on me, RT must stand for Russian Television, Russia Today.  The Ukrainian reports were substantial.  American Sen. John McCain was shown as he asserted among the anti-government protestors that the Ukrainian government's decision not to join the European Union was unacceptable.  We were informed that an American State Dept. official was among the crowd handing out food to the protestors.  But there was additional commentary.  One surmised that if the Ukraine joined the EU, it would be among the most impoverished, joining Greece, and Spain in poverty, while the wealth of the country would be sent to EU bankers.  Later, RT stressed that while anti-gov. protestors were in one square, pro-gov. protestors were just a short distance away in another square.  Clearly, many wanted to move closer to the EU and Western Europe; just as clearly, the govt. and many others preferred to stay closely allied to Russia.
     RT also devoted considerable time to Russian leader's State of the Union speech this December, 2013.  When I heard the analysis of his speech on RT, I began to think the tectonic plates of the world may be changing.
     Soon after the Bolshevik revolution of 1917, the new Communist government did many things.  Like Snowden who exposed so many secret documents, the Soviets exposed the double-dealing of the Allies, and how they intended to divide the world into colonies and spheres of influence if the Western nations defeated the Central Powers - i.e, if the UK, France, the US, etc. defeated Germany, Aus.-Hungary, and Turkey.  The Soviets also abolished the supremacy of the church in the new Soviet state, and abolished the anti-homosexual laws that had been on the books.
     The West did win the war, and American President Woodrow Wilson seemed a savior of democracy and the world, for a short time.  The religious man, who demanded racial segregation of the American federal bureaucracy, who was determined that the new League of Nations would not cave to the Japanese demand for a statement of equality of all races, had also used federal troops to close the bordellos in New Orleans where a genre of music had originated.  Unable to find work in the closed cat houses, the musicians moved North to Memphis, St. Louis, Chicago, New York and eventually Paris and the world.  From the houses of jizz and sex, jazz became an international rage.  Under Wilson, the religious strain could also be seen in the enactment of Prohibition, the ban on drinking alcohol.  By 1920, Americans were disillusioned with Wilson and his war.  Wilson's Democratic Party was swept out of office, and the Republicans led the nation to a return to Normalcy.  Not quite.  Women cut their hair, shortened their skirts, began to smoke, and dance ( and even drink, in defiance of the new law).  The new automobiles were becoming bordellos on wheels, according to some preachers.  Yet, even in this relaxed atmosphere in America, with some jazz titles like Masculine Women and Feminine Men, homosexuality was still illegal and strongly stigmatized.  By contrast, homosexuality was no longer illegal in the New Red Russia.  And Communist front-groups, like the League of Militant Athiests in the West, made it clear that they rejected the old morality of the church.  And though illegal in the new Weimar Germany, it was becoming quite open, and even films were made like, Different from the Others, and A Man's Young Girlhood, and Dr. Magnus Hirschfelt's sexual institute and campaign for legalization of homosexuality made Berlin a center of research and agitation on this issue.  Christopher Isherwood would stay at the institute when he moved to Berlin in the early 1930s.  In the 1920s then the new Soviet Union, and to some extent Weimar Germany may have been viewed as gay havens.  Dispite flappers and speakeasy (illegal liquor) in the US, the KKK marched down the streets of Washington DC and traditional values were upheld; religion was popular, and evolution was condemned even in the courts.
     The Depression brought out new demands for morality, to clean up the filth that may have caused such economic misery.  Admittedly, it was not so clear in the US, for with the election of Democrat Franklin Roosevelt, one of the first acts was to end Prohibition, so Americans could drink alcohol legally once again.  But there would be no more immorality portrayed on the silver screen, as the Hays office would censor Hollywood films.  No more homos portrayed in the movies, no more exposure of so much skin by the young starlets, and dialog had to be decent.  Just a few weeks before FDR took the oath as President of the US, Adolf Hitler became German Chancellor, and he too demanded greater morality of the Germans.  Quickly, the Hirschfeld institute was raided and closed, and its books and research volumes were burnt.  Most gay publication were now illegal, as were most gay bars.  And in 1934, when Hitler killed Roehm and other leaders of his Storm Troopers, then homosexuality was utterly condemned in the new Germany.  Hitler's New Germany was to be a Moral Germany.  Not to be outdone, Stalin created a new constitution for his USSR, and each state in that union was now required to ban homosexuality.  The Webb's assured readers that homosexuality had been imported into the USSR by foreigners, anyway.
      In WWII, the various nations went to war expressing their own versions of "morality," and incarcerating, criminalizing, and sometimes exterminating those deemed immoral or unworthy of life.  By the 1950s, there were basically 2 super powers and views of the world, atheistic communism, which still outlawed homosexuality, and free, religious America.  To illustrate the contrast, the American pledge to the flag was changed again.  Initially, one was to raise the right arm to the flag, palm up, and recited the pledge.  But that was to similar to the fascist salute, so the right hand over the heart replaced the outstretched arm.  In the 1950s, the wording was changed: "one nation, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all" was lengthened by the insertion of "under God" after nation.  Judeo-Christian morality against atheistic Communism.
     By 2009 with the election of Barack Obama as Pres. of the US, one can see the enormous changes.  Judeo-Christian morality is no longer on a pedestal in the age of multiculturalism.  Moreover, the foreign policy of Obama and Hillary Clinton is openly pro-Muslim, and helped the fanatical Muslim Brotherhood achieve power in Egypt, and its allies take power in Libya, and almost in Syria.  Europe has ever more Muslim immigrants who achieve a privileged status thanks to liberal judges and bureaucrats in the EU.  Londonstan has areas of sharia law today, as do many cities in the UK, the Netherlands, France.  The Left has allied itself with the most anti-feminist, most anti-gay crowd, the Muslims.  Obama generally accepts this view inside the US.
    Putin's Speech of December 2013 is in some ways amazing.  The former KGB official comes out defending Christian morality, implicitly attacking gays, Muslims, and the cult of the multi.  Meanwhile, America's President Obama has become a champion of gays, illegal aliens, Hispanics, Blacks, single mothers abortions, etc.  While Obama demands a liberal agenda for most nations, Putin now urges nationalism, national traditions, traditional values, religion.  Suddenly, the former KGB Communist seems to have more in common with the right wing in Europe that seeks to preserve national traditions, that opposes liberal judicial edicts from Brussels, that opposes economic diktats from Berlin.  The Left of the KGB seems to be meeting the Right of Marine LePen in France, of UKIP in Britain, and of various right wing parties throughout Europe.  One contrast, some of the Rightwing parties, as those in the Netherlands, have be led by gays who are horrified by the violent hatred of the Muslims.
     In the 1950s, America stood for traditional religion and traditional values and traditional bigotries.  Today, it stands for multiculturalism and persecution of any speech that offends one of the many "favored" minorities or women.  Today, Putin proclaims the New Russia stands for traditional values and religion and (traditional bigotries).
    American Rightwinger Pat Buchanan had long criticized Pres. G W Bush and Obama for meddling in Eastern Europe and antagonizing Russia.  He would not agree with Sen McCain in the Ukraine.  Indeed, in his most recent column, Buchanan sees Russia's Putin as one of "us," a Paleoconservative.
    Bottom Line - In the 1920s America, even with its flappers, represented nationalism and traditional religious values.  In the 1920s the New Soviet Union represented internationalism, and a sexual revolution in which a woman official declared sex was like a "glass of water," (perhaps she should have said like a box of chocolates) with abortion, homosexuality, and more open-type marriages.  Religion in the USSR was persecuted.  Today, there has been a reversal - Putin represents nationalism and traditional religious values; Obama represents internationalism and secularism, feminism, abortion, homosexuality, etc.   How the world has changed?  Or is this just cosmetic?  And how will it continue to change?

He Hurls a Compendium of Facts

IT’S TIME FOR THE TRUTH!  THE JFK COVER-UP:

THE REAL CRIME OF THE CENTURY (2012) by CHARLES E. HURLBURT

Rev. by Hugh Murray

            Hurlburt has written an “overview” of the Kennedy assassination case.  His book is not based on new research, but he has assembled and organized the research of many authors who have delved in the topic.  Hurlburt has deduced a reasonable assessment of the entire case – the murder in Dealey Plaza, the autopsies, the slaying of the accused, the investigation, and the “cover-ups.”  With Hulbert’s numerous footnotes, he guides the inquisitive reader to the sources of his assertions.

            Hurlburt does not pretend to hold all the answers to these crimes; indeed, he asserts that some of the evidence is blatantly contradictory, so one will have to arrive at the most probable conclusions from what we are provided.  Unfortunately there is much that we still do not know, for “the CIA is still refusing to release over a million records…until at least 2017…”(p. 306)  I do not accept all of Hurlburt’s hypotheses.  While he rejects Kennedy’s throat wound as being the exit wound for a bullet fired at the Texas School Book Depository (that in the Warren Report version then travels to injure Gov. Connally in several spots), Hurlburt also rejects the notion that the small throat wound in Kennedy was the result of a shot from the front.  Instead, Hurlburt argues that a bullet from the back cracked Kennedy’s skull, and a small piece of bone might have exited the throat.  Hurlburt also contends that there were seven shots in Dealey Plaza fired at the President from different locations.  Needless to say, Hurlburt believes that the assassination was a conspiracy, and one that reached high levels of government.

            Yet, Hurlburt’s short summary of so much material permits new questions to rise.  For example, he notes that when Oswald was Marine stationed in Japan, he received medical treatment for VD, which he contracted “in the line of duty, not due to in own misconduct.”(115)  Was Oswald having sex with a suspected KGB prostitute for the US Government?  Was Oswald and agent of the US Government?

            Hurlburt spend many pages on “a dirty rumor.”  Beginning in November 1963 rumors circulated that Oswald was employed by the FBI, and possibly the CIA, even earning $200 a month from the FBI.(75-76)  Hurlburt quotes early Warren Commission proceedings as to how they should tackle this “dirty” rumor, and how to resolve the issue.  After considerable discussion, they basically asked FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover about Oswald.  Hoover denied Oswald was either an agent or an informer.  The Warren Commission made no further investigation of the topic.

            Yet, one of the first actions by the FBI in November 1963 was to destroy evidence.  Earlier that month Oswald had left a note at the FBI office in Dallas for Agent Hosty.  Once Oswald was identified as the probable assassin, Hosty was order by his FBI superior to destroy that note.  Hosty flushed it.  In his own book, former FBI Agent Don Adams reveals that his FBI reports of November 1963 were distorted to absolve other possible suspects, and aimed at fulfilling Hoover’s view that Oswald was the lone, nut assassin.  When Oswald was arrested for disturbing the peace in downtown New Orleans in the summer of 1963 – the scuffle he had while distributing pro-Castro leaflets with a group of anti-Castro Cubans – Oswald requested to speak with an FBI agent.  There seems to be no notes of that conversation.  Were those notes ordered to be destroyed by FBI superiors, too?

            Despite the FBI’s distortion and destruction of evidence, the Warren Commission decided to rely chiefly upon the FBI for its investigation into the Kennedy assassination.

            Hurlburt writes how the Establishment sought to smear and destroy those who questioned the official conclusion that Oswald was a lone, nut assassin, who in turn was slain by Jack Ruby who hoped to spare Mrs. Kennedy the trauma of a trial in Dallas.  To maintain the official line, liberal icon, Earl Warren sought to prevent American publication of Mark Lane’s Rush to Judgment, an early, powerful critique of the Warren Commission’s conclusions.

            Hurlburt includes how Lyndon Johnson’s Attorney General, Ramsey Clark, sought to derail the Jim Garrison investigation by appointing a small panel of pro-CIA doctors to review the Kennedy autopsy photographs and x-rays and thereby prevent Garrison from subpoenaing the records.  Unfortunately, Hurlburt does not include the statement Clark made soon after Garrison arrested New Orleans businessman Clay Shaw in connection with a conspiracy to kill Kennedy.  On national television, Clark declared that the federal government had looked into Shaw, and he was not involved in any plot.  Garrison arrests Shaw for involvement; that week, the US Attorney General declares Shaw innocent!  But Clark’s absolution raised other questions at the time.  When was Shaw cleared?  By whom?  Why was he investigated about this case?  Clark’s attempt to smother the Garrison investigation backfired in this particular incident.

            Hurlburt may have been misled by a Garrison article stating his interest in the Kennedy case was spurred by a conversation with Louisiana Sen. Russell Long.  Garrison had acted much earlier.  In November 1963 he had David Ferrie arrested in connection with the murder, and then handed him over to the FBI.  The FBI questioned Ferrie and had him released.  One wonders if those notes were also destroyed.

            Hurlburt is far too harsh on New Orleans DA Jim Garrison, whose investigation brought up for the first time Oswald’s visits to Clinton, Louisiana, his relation to Guy Banister, David Ferrie, pro-Castro Cubans; and Garrison placed Dr. Pierre Finck under oath to testify about the Kennedy autopsy at Bethesda Naval Hospital, and how doctors were ordered by the big brass not to perform basic functions of an autopsy.  Garrison also showed a print of the Zapruder film many times in court so all could see the President’s head knocked to the left and back, presumably by a bullet from the front right.  Garrison failed to prove Shaw guilty of conspiracy to the jury; but interviewed on television soon after, many of the jurors were convinced there was a conspiracy.

            Hurlburt is excellent at taking on the defenders of the Warren Report – the New York Times, CBS, Gerald Posner, and Marquette Prof. John McAdams.  For example, Prof. McAdams emphasized the movement in the Zapruder film of Gov. Connally’s lapel, meaning the bullet hit him earlier than Connally was aware.  Hurlburt shows a photo of the Governor’s coat, and the bullet hole is not by the lapel.  Yet, occasionally Hurlburt’s discussion is unclear, as when he seeks to describe where Oswald was in the lunch room with his Coke on the 2^nd floor of the TSBD shortly after the shooting as a police officer Baker was able to see and confront him.

            Hurlburt reminds the readers of some obvious facts too often overlooked.  For example, the “magic bullet” of the Warren Commission, that entered Kennedy’s back, exited his throat, then hit Connally’s side, wrist, and leg, had no blood or fleshy material on it.  Also, the rifle discovered on the 6^th floor of the TSBD was identified by two weapons experts as a German Mauser.  The rifle bought by Hidell (Oswald) was a Mannlicher-Carcano and had “Made in Italy” clearly stamped on it.  There are many other thought-provoking facts in this book.  Overall, Hurlburt has provided a service with his work.  It is an easy to read compendium of important material.  Even when one disagrees, his argument provokes thought.  The book indicts the government for its long-term and continuing cover-ups of the assassination of Pres. John Kennedy in Dallas.   

LEE OSWALD: PRESIDENT KILLER, or LADY KILLER (or both)?

            We rarely think of Lee Harvey Oswald, accused assassin of Pres. John Kennedy, as a stud.  Perhaps, it is time to reconsider.  The following is part of a page from Charles E. Hurlburt’s It’s Time for the Truth: The JFK Cover-up: The Real Crime of the Century (2012), p. 115.

            “Although Oswald espoused a fondness for the Russian language and political system [while in the Marines] so openly that he was given the name ‘Oswaldskovich’ by his fellow Marines, he was assigned duties that allowed him access to ‘top secret’ areas and data.  Atsugi [US base in Japan] was not far from Tokyo, and Oswald often went into town, like most of the American servicemen, to visit the many nightclubs and meet girls.  One such club, named the Queen Bee, was too expensive for low-paid enlisted men like Oswald (one date there could exceed what Oswald was netting per month).  Nevertheless, he was seen there on several occasions in the company of one of the hostesses who, according to another Marine buddy, was questioning Oswald about his work at Atsugi.  Some researchers hypothesize that Oswald was being funded by his superiors to frequent this over-his-head establishment and feed false information to this ‘KGB spy.’  Fueling suspicion that Oswald was more than he appeared tp be was a Marine medical report showing that he was treated for a venereal disease that he contracted ‘in the line of duty, not to his own misconduct.’  His dates with the ‘KGB spy’ may be the explanation for his being treated for gonorrhea contracted ‘in the line of duty.”

            On this blog, I previously posted “Lee Harvey Oswald – Stud?”  I shall add this to that post.  But because that post is older, I am also posting this separately.  Was the US government subsidizing Oswald’s amorous encounter for his role as a spy?  Was Oswald a lady killer, a stud, a cold-war Chippendaler?  Was he a President killer?  A lady killer?  Or both?  Was he a lone nut?  Or someone who spread such cheer, that the government paid for his romances?  (To avoid confusion, "lady killer" is a phrase for a man whom women find very attractive, and whom they want to bed.  It does not mean a man who murders women.)HUGH MURRAY

CHEERING PRES. KENNEDY'S ASSASSINATION

    I have already written about where I was and what I was doing when Pres. Kennedy was assassinated in Dallas.  I repeat a shortened version of the story to make an important point.  I was teaching at a new school in New Orleans, a private one.  There were 3 classes of 5 grade classes, all near each other.  During time for lunch, Mrs. Flagg had her pupils eat in the classroom (we had no cafeteria) and enjoy a bit of play.  One pupil had brought a small transistor radio, and Mrs. Flagg called me into her room to listen to something special.  The 3 of us craned our necks over the small radio, trying to hear over the din of the rest of the pupils at play.
    I heard the news, and then had to return to my class.  I was absent for only a few minutes, for it is not wise to leave a class unattended for any length of time.  I reentered, closed the door behind me, and announced, "I just heard on the radio that Pres. Kennedy has been shot it Dallas."  Immediately, the kids erupted in cheers and applause.  One girl was the exception; she placed her head on a table and cried.  I was shocked by the reaction, and for once, angry at my pupils.  I said, "You think this is the end of integration.  That segregation in the South is now safe (almost all of us assumed the President had been killed to halt integration.)"  Then I told them of the assassination of Pres. Lincoln at the end of the Civil War, and how some thought that would restore victory to the South.  Instead, it only made the North more determined to destroy slavery and the old Southern way of life.
    I repeat this story because the website vdare has an article by Hugh McInnis who was teaching at a public school in a small town in central Alabama.  When the news came over the loudspeaker that Pres. Kennedy had been killed, his students also cheered.  I recall a guest on a news program earlier this year who was in Florida when Kennedy was killed.  Again, the school children cheered.
    Only with all the news on TV about the 50th anniversary of the assassination did I hear of the story of how CBS reporter Dan Rather was almost fired in November 1963.  Rather, who worked for the Dallas affiliate of CBS, KRLD, reported that school children at a school in Dallas cheered the news of the assassination.  His superiors were outraged.  No.  It must have been that they were cheering the news that they would be dismissed from school early as a result of the assassination.  Apparently, the school officials did not want the reputation of the institution besmirched with such a report about its students.  They were going to fire Rather, when national CBS intervened to save his job.  The pupils WERE cheering the assassination of Kennedy, and then they were happy to be released from school.
    I have heard that there were many schools in the South where students cheered in celebration of the killing of Kennedy and "his integrationist policies."  But there was almost no reporting of this.
    I think that one reason for the silence was that when Oswald was found, and deemed the assassin, he was also labeled a Communist.  And with that news, some people reacted, "Oh, isn't it awful what that Communist did (in killing Kennedy)?  And then they would smile or wink.
    Once the villain was labeled as a Red, those who initially cheered the deed, suddenly pretended to be sad.  The myth was that no one would celebrate the killing of Kennedy and Camelot - except a lone, nut Commie.  I think this refusalt to report the truth about the cheering was one of the first examples of a cover-up in the assassination of Pres. John Kennedy.---------Hugh Murray

PBS FRONTLINE (OFFICIAL LINE): LEE HARVEY OSWALD, 2013

Some Reflections about the program--------Hugh Murray

            There are some obvious questions that rise after viewing the PBS Frontline special on Oswald.  For example, Oswald was arrested in downtown New Orleans in 1963 when several anti-Castroites surrounded him as he distributed his pro-Castro Fair Play for Cuba Committee leaflets.  The program interviewed several NOPD officers who handled Oswald.  They wondered why he simply did not pay the $25 and leave.  Instead, he wanted to be finger-printed and booked.  What the program did not show, is that he also requested to be interviewed by the FBI.  That occurred.  Yet, there is no record in the files of what he said.

            Frontline interviewed Dallas FBI Agent Hosty a number of times on the program.  Yet, no one asked Hosty about the time in November 1963 when Oswald visited and left a note at the Dallas FBI office.  After Oswald’s arrest on November 22, J. Edgar Hoover ordered that all such records be destroyed, and Agent Hosty dutifly flushed Oswald’s note down the toilet.

            Another authority interviewed by Frontline was staunch supporter of the Warren Commission’s basic thesis, Gerald Posner, author of Case Closed.  In that book, Posner showed that because of the different dates of activities, David Ferrie could not have been active in the Civil Air Patrol when Oswald was active.  With the photograph showing Oswald and Ferrie, and testimony of former members, it is clear that Posner can be wrong on some things.  Missing were questions about Ferrie as a powerful influence on some youngsters.  The isolation of the young Oswald in New York (discussed by social workers), may have ceased once the teen joined the CAP in NO.  I knew someone who believed his whole life had been turned around for the better because of Ferrie.  Ferrie was gay, but my friend was quite straight.  Still, Ferrie helped to mold him so he would become a success, and today there is a building named after my old friend.  Might Ferrie’s patriotism have inspired the young Oswald to quit Warren Easton High to join the Marines.

            When Oswald left for the USSR, others have noted he was allegedly going to a university in Europe, he flew to Finland on a plane when there were no commercial flights, and so on.  Yet, the CIA asserts he was not an agent.  Of course, some of the files still under wraps are those of the CIA re Oswald.

            Frontline showed Oswald distributing FPCC leaflets in NO.  He was not alone.  He was paying some to leaflet with him.  How many leftists PAY to have others leaflet?  It is absurd.  Just like religious people distribute literature on the street, the point is also to speak and convert the passers-by.  A church would not have an atheist leafleting.  A leftist, who believes in the cause, would want other believers to leaflet, not simply neutrals.  And where did Oswald get the money for the fellow leafleters?  Why were they not interviewed?  Or, were they possibly some of the gay Latinos who accompanied Oswald to the office of Attorney Dean Andrews?  (The attorney who spoke about a Clem Bertrand, whom some think was Clay Shaw).  And some of the leafleting pictured on Frontline just happens to be in front of the old International Trade Mart, whose leader just happened to be Clay Shaw – not mentioned on Frontline.

            There was no discussion of the possibility that Oswald was at a training camp in 1963 in Louisiana for those planning another invasion of Cuba to oust Castro.

            Once Oswald was arrested, he was paraded occasionally before the reporters.  When someone mistakenly linked Oswald by mistake, not with the FPCC, but with a group that was anti-Castro, who corrected the error?  Jack Ruby, in the police station knew the politics of the Cuban groups, and immediately corrected the speaker, that Oswald was not in the anti-Castro group, but was pro-Castro.

            For much of the proof of Oswald’s guilt, Frontline relied on the words of Priscilla McMillan.  After the assassination, when Marina Oswald was probably one of the most hated women in America, McMillan spent much time with her.  McMillan had been in the Soviet Union, too.  There are many who believe she was CIA.  Marina did not partake in the program, but on other programs, she has stated that Oswald was innocent.  Immediately after the assassination, she may have been so frightened she told McMillan what McMillan and the US government wanted to hear.  Marina’s absence should be considered.

            The grassy knoll hardly exists in Frontline.  When people rushed up the hill, they were met by a Secret Service Agent, showing his credentials.  Later, the Secret Service denied having any agent there.  The autopsy questions were sloughed over; NO District Attorney Jim Garrison’s trial placed one of the autopsy doctors, Pierre Finck, under oath, and he admitted when he went to probe the path of a bullet in Kennedy, he was ordered not to do so by the big brass in the room at Bethesda Hospital.

            Frontline, with its emphasis on the defenders of the official line – Posner, Hosty, McMillan, has produced one more defense of the lone-nut theory.  It ignored most of the major critics.  It was a disappointing program.

Martin Bashir - Base Shit

      Martin Bashir, a British journalist who previously reported on ABC-TV's Nightline, and now has his own program on cable television MSNBC is part of the liberal media establishment.  On Friday 15 November, proving his proper credentials, he declared that someone should shit into the mouth of conservative politician Sarah Palin.  By contrast, nothing but shit comes out of the mouth of Mr. Bashir.
      The following week Bashir apologized to Palin.  He keeps his job.  Had Bashir suggested someone shit into the mouth of Hillary Clinton or Michelle Obama, he would have been fired on the spot.  But it is OK to humiliate a conservative woman.  Like the liberal late-night TV host and comedian, Jimmy Fallon, Bashir keeps his job.  Fallon had invited onto his program conservative Congresswoman Michele Bachmann.  The music that accompanied her introduction on the show as she walked onto the stage was "Lyin Ass Bitch."  Fallon apologized, but no one was fired.  Liberals pretend to be compassionate, yet they are the most vicious people in attacking those with whom they disagree.  They do not debate, they insult and smear and intimidate - and get away with it.
      I am old, and I have never heard in all my years anyone on radio or TV speak of shitting in someone else's mouth.  It is a new low.  Yet, if anyone criticizes Obamacare, or the murders in Benghazi, or the amnesty for invaders proposals, then one is a racist and should be shut up, fired, etc.  Unfortunately, the trend in the West over the past few decades has been away from freedom, away from free speech, and instead toward the humiliation, firing, beating, or worse, for those who oppose the Leftwing orthodoxy.
         Hugh Murray  

OBAMACARE AND THATCHER'S POLL TAX

                                       by Hugh Murray  
      I think there is a comparison to be made between Obamacare, the "Affordable Health Care Act," and the poll tax levied by Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher's Conservative government in the UK some years ago.  We normally do not compare Thatcher and Obama, but in this case, it may be apropos.  Obamacare mandates that all Americans purchase insurance.  If they do not, the fines for the first year are small, but they rise to become quite heavy fines after a few years.  When Obamacare was challenged in court, going all the way to the US Supreme Court, the American high court ruled in 2012 that Obamacare was legal, it was simply another tax.  In reality, it is another poll tax.
     Thatcher's tax was the product of the British Tories, and the Labour Party and the Left responeded with massive riots.  Implementation of the act was also very difficult to enforce, with local councils unable to be certain who was staying in the government houses, and if they were students, employed, unemployed, and therefore what rate of the tax they must pay.  Needless to say, Obamacare is off to a slow start.
     Thatcher's poll tax was to take effect in 1990, but riots, its unpopularity, its difficulty in implementing, all weakened her leadership.  She also had other rivals in the Tory Party who disagreed with her opposition to closer relations with "Europe," the expanding Common Market.  While on a visit by P. M. Thatcher to Europe, her Tory opponents led a coup inside the Conservative Party, and deposed her.  Margaret Thatcher was no longer Tory leader; no longer Prime Minister.  Her Conservative successor, John Major, scrapped the poll tax.
    Obamacare will raise the insurance rates on most middle-class Americans.  For some, the rates will rise sharply, AND the co-pay may now be thousands of dollars instead of the previous $50 or so.  Worse, with millions more in the pool, and the same number, OR FEWER DOCTORS WILLING TO PARTAKE IN THE NEW PLANS, it may take far longer to visit a doctor.  In effect, Obamacare, with new delays, will probably institute death panels, even if there are no panels - just millions of more patients with fewer doctors.
     Will there be riots against the new American poll tax?  Will Obama fall like Thatcher?  We shall see.