Saturday, May 28, 2011

Remarkable patriots are everywhere this weekend, but, none so wonderful as Max Cleland.

He was returned to us from Vietnam during Operation Homecoming.  He has never stopped his service to the USA as a Geogia Senator and now with the Kennedy Presidential Libary in an effort by Patrick Kennedy to tackle brain science to improve the quality of life of returning veterans from Iraq and Afghanistan.

My gratitude to him and all those that serves and served the USA.  Thank you.

Kennedy challenges experts to launch ‘new era of brain science’  (click title to entry - thank you)


07:54 AM EDT on Wednesday, May 25, 2011
...Other conference headliners included Max Cleland, disabled Vietnam veteran and former Georgia senator; Gen. Peter W. Chiarelli, the Army’s vice chief of staff; and former Missouri Rep. Richard Gephardt, chairman of the Council for American Medical Innovation. Cleland, who lost an arm and both legs in battle, spoke Monday....

Former Senator Cleland's book is above called "Heart of a Patriot."  (click here)   He has authored other books as well.   "Heart of a Patriot" can be purchased on Amazon for as little as $11.70.

I don't believe the "Gordian Knot" of Pakistan is insolvable. It is profound corruption enforced by violence.

The U.S. should speed its withdrawal of forces from Afghanistan but must remain engaged in Pakistan.

I believe Secretary of State Clinton was brave in entering Pakistan after the operation to remove Osama bin Laden.  I am confident, given the current climate between the USA and Pakistan, the Pakistani government was extremely concerned for her safety.  But, Fearless Hillary wasn't going to be intimidated into staying out of the country.  She is committed in every sense to resolution of tensions between the USA and Pakistan.  I am confident she sees this as an opportunity to focus on the corruption within Pakistan and help resolve it.

..."Our counterparts (click here) in the government were very forthcoming in saying that somebody somewhere was providing some kind of support, and they are carrying out an investigation," she said....

I don't see the USA operations in Pakistan to extract bin Laden and weaken al Qaeda as a blatant disregard of Pakistani sovereignty at all, actually.  It was obvious Pakistan either didn't have the will to rid the world of bin Laden and al Qaeda or simply couldn't.  Either way the 'precision' EXERCISE was carried out without engaging Pakistan troops or police officers and with complete secrecy to insure the safety of USA military experts. 

...Secretary of State Hillary Clinton (click here) visited Islamabad on Friday in a bid to ease the mistrust deepened by the secret May 2 raid that killed the al-Qaida chief.

Pakistani leaders see the raid as a blatant violation of their country's sovereignty, and Washington's decision to not inform Islamabad in advance as an example of a glaring lack of trust....

It is time for Pakistan to rid themselves of the corruption that allows such violence within their country, especially considering the assassination of Former Prime Minister Bhutto.  She was very interested in the tribal areas and the security of the people there.  She knew it was a haven for the 'untouchables' within the country.  The comfortable existence of bin Laden within the military complex of Pakistan is simply a reality no major power in the world should accept as 'normal' or an intelligence oversight.  This is an extremely dangerous posture for Pakistan in a Middle East under change at every turn and now Iran is sending troops to Syria to enforce the current government infrastructure.  Pakistan is too vulnerable to internal conflict to allow this covert extremist network to operate within their borders.  They should be commending the USA forces that assisted them in removing one of the most wanted international criminals on the planet.

The work of the USA State Department must go on uninterrupted, but, then so should the intelligence agencies to insure Pakistan is secure enough to conduct a vital investigation the protection of this heinous crimnial and his associaites throughout the country.

Public employees attacked again. Florida's Scott vetoes essential monies to provide added space for training essential personnel.

...Included in the governor's cuts was $750,000 (click title to entry - thank you) for an expansion of Santa Fe's Kirkpatrick Center.
The center holds classes for law enforcement and corrections officers, emergency medical technicians and paramedics. College officials say it is so cramped students must be turned away....

This is the contorted logic of the Republican Party these days.  Scott figures if Florida expands the training facility to accommodate more students for police and emergency workers, the public works of any city or state agency will hire them.  If the employees can't be hired, the public doesn't have to pay them and they can find other ways of fill a community needs or NOT.

Currently, the Florida State Police have ongoing hiring processes.  The attack on public employees by Governor Scott should be met with recall elections. 

The inability to be trained for a profession and enter the work force is a direct assault on the USA economic recovery.  Basically Governor Scott is undermining Florida's recovery by not empowering new public employees from taking their place to protect tourists in an essential role.  Businesses throughout Florida, with an area of 58,560 Square Miles, will have to rely more and more on private emergency and police services if they were counting on public employees to fill that need.  With the assault on the public training facilities it is doubtful even private employees will be sufficient in numbers to hire.  If the idea is to have private education academies, they probably already exist and if they don’t that is more delay in providing essential services.  This is crazy.  A Governor should never just stop increasing the education potential of so many for the jobs of police and emergency workers.