OLD GLORY

March 12, 2002 - There was an old 48 star flag in the storage room in our office building. It had lain there along one wall since it was retired from active service when Alaska and Hawaii became states a half-century ago. It had flown when the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor and day and night thereafter. It had flown when the bunker fell in Berlin and when the bombs fell on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. It had flown when Americans landed at Pusan and defended the perimeter and while that war wound down to talking at Pyongyang. Then it lay in the dust, in a basement, retired and nearly forgotten.

It seemed right that it would again feel the breeze and gleam in the light on September 11th. It was the flag to which I learned to pledge allegiance "and to the Republic for which it stands, one nation, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all." So it was that the flag of my childhood stood proudly outside our office door. It was a symbol of the nation that had sacrificed so much through the years of bitter war and that would not be vanquished. It flew as my symbol that a nation dedicated to each life, to liberty for mankind and the right of each to pursue happiness would not be brought low by those who could send men out to waste their precious lives on a fools errand of destruction. It flew there out side a lawyer's door to say to all who saw it that America was not crippled, not dismayed and never cowed. It flew there day and night for more than a month when the winds of an October storm lifted its staff from its socket and carried it away. Where it came to earth no one knows. We only know that it is gone, blown away on the winds of October.....click here for entire article

DUBYA'S CONVICTS II
JOHN POINDEXTER

March 11, 2002 - In 1990 Vice Admiral stood trial on charges stemming from the Reagan-Bush Administration's Iran-Contra Affair he was convicted of five felonies including conspiracy, obstruction of the Congress' investigations into the matter and making false statements to Congress. His appeal was successful and the convictions thrown out, not because of a deficiency in the evidence but because Congress had compelled his testimony by granting him use immunity. The prosecution did not adequately show an independent discovery of the evidence it marshaled against the former Reagan National Security Advisor. It was on that basis that the Court set aside the convictions of Poindexter and Oliver North. In order to insure that the case would not be re-tried President George H. W. Bush granted a pardon to Poindexter before leaving office.....click here for entire article

Mar. 10, 2002 - Former Assistant Secretary of State Eliot Abrams sued the D.C. Bar to lift the suspension of his law license following his guilty plea to giving false testimony to Congress. President George H. W. Bush issued a full and complete pardon to him as one of the last acts of his Presidency. The D.C. Court of Appeals ruled against him saying that a pardon "…cannot work such moral changes as to warrant the assertion that a pardoned convict is just as reliable as one who has constantly maintained the character of a good citizen." President George W. Bush appointed this pardoned convict as director of the National Security Council's office for democracy, human rights and international operations.....click here for entire article

Mar. 3, 2002 - It is as clear as crystal that the United States, with the support of the British government, if not the British people, is about to embark on the Second US-Iraq war. In the First US-Iraq war, conducted by the President's father a decade ago, the justification for the United States to act was clear and unequivocal. The Iraqi army had invaded one country and was poised to invade another. Still it took the United States 6 months to marshal the overwhelming force that made it possible to achieve the limited objective set out for General Swartzkopf in 6 short weeks.....click here for entire article

OLD MEN - YOUNG MEN

Mar. 2, 2002 - Almost a century and a half ago one Union soldier called the war he was in an old man's war but a young man's fight. His description still rings true today. Old men and women in the government decide when to invest young lives in a cause. Old men in sharply pressed fatigues send young lives into harms way and then stand bravely before the cameras to take the glory of victory or spin out excuses for defeat. Old men posture while young lives bleed. That is the nature of war.....click here for entire article