Posted on 10/25/2001 12:19:43 AM PDT by Snow Bunny
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George W Bush, President of the United States
For those who missed Secretary Rumsfeld's prayer to the Cabinet yesterday, here it is:
Ever faithful God, in death we are reminded of the precious birthrights of life and liberty you endowed in your American people. You have shown once again that these gifts must never be taken for granted.
We pledge to those whom you have called home, and ask of you -
Patience, to measure our lust for action;
Resolve, to strengthen our obligation to lead;
Wisdom, to illuminate our pursuit of justice, and;
Strength, in defense of liberty.
We seek your special blessing today for those who stand as sword and shield, protecting the many from the tyranny of the few. Our enduring prayer is that you shall always guide our labors and that our battles shall always be just.
We pray this day, heavenly father, the prayer our nation learned at another time of righteous struggle and noble cause -- America's enduring prayer: Not that God will be on our side, but always, O Lord, that America will be on your side.
Q: Mr. Secretary, there are some in the Middle East who are saying that the United States does not have the belly to do the kind of response to this attack on the United States, that this administration, the previous administration don't have it to go after them in the kind of way that they have to be gone after. Without any specifics whatsoever, help us with the attitude that should go into this process.
Rumsfeld: Well, I guess time will tell. My -- I guess I'm kind of old-fashioned. I'm inclined to think that if you're going to cock it, you throw it, and you don't talk about it a lot. So my instinct is that what you do, you should go about your business and do what you think you have to do. I think anyone who thinks it's easy is wrong. I think that it will require a sustained and broadly based effort. And I don't think that people ought to judge outcomes until a sufficient time is passed to address what is clearly a very serious problem for the world. And it's not restricted to a single entity, state or non-state entity. It is an attack on a way of life.
The purpose of terrorism is to terrorize. It is to alter behavior. It is to force people who believe in freedom to be less free by altering their behavior and redressing a balance between freedom and security. Anyone who's ever been in a war zone, as I know most of you have, you know that when you walk out of a building you don't walk out with your head high whistling, you look around the corner and see what's out there. And that's not the way Americans live, and it's not the way we want to live.
The Legend of Fiddlers Green
Half way down the trail to Hell,
In a shady meadow green.
Are the souls of all dead troopers camped,
Near a good old time canteen.
And this eternal resting place,
Is known as Fiddlers' Green.
Marching past straight through to Hell,
The Infantry are seen.
Accompanied by Engineers,
Artillery and Marines.
For none but shades of the Cavalrymen,
Dismount at Fiddlers' Green.
Though some go curving down the trail,
To seek a warmer scene.
No Trooper ever gets to Hell,
Ere he's emptied his canteen.
And so goes back to drink again,
With friends again at Fiddlers' Green.
And so when man and horse go down,
Beneath a sabre keen.
Or in a roaring charge of feirce melee,
You stop a bullet clean.
And the hostiles come to get your scalp,
Just empty your canteen,
And put your pistol to your head,
And go to Fiddlers' Green.
Scouts Out!
Long may she wave in freedom!
Norb
Stay well - Stay safe - Stay armed - Yorktown
That is WONDERFUL!
God Bless Our Military!
So proud to see the salt of the earth Americans here doing what they can to support our troops.
Here is something that might have been posted before but in case it wasn't I'll put here now. Takes a while to load but be sure and wait for John Wayne's reading.
Be sure to check out the other links on the site - inspirational songs, boogie, funny, etc.
LOL!! That makes me positively ancient since there was no tv when I was little!!
We relied on radio and publications - newspapers, magazines - and Foxtone newsreels at the movie theater for information.
Television sets were not generally in homes until the 1950's.
In 1947, I was a contestant representing Florida in the National Spelling Bee - the very first time it was televised - but no one in my family could watch it! Few Americans had sets yet.
When I won the state contest in Jacksonville, however, my grandparents in South Carolina had listened to the contest on the radio.
USA Today Interview with Sec. of Def. Donald Rumsfeld, 10/24/01
Earlier in the interview, he said, You should be in the Pentagon press corps. You always ask two questions in one. (Laughter)Q: Mr. Secretary, the American people, civilians, are now being forced to think about things that we kind of used to leave to the military, namely how to prepare for the next threat without knowing what the next threat is.
What advice can you give to us, to Americans on how to do this?
A: I wish I had a good, simple, easy answer that fit on a bumper sticker, but I don't. The answer is unbumperstickerable. (Laughter)
We are what we are. We are free people. And our whole society is structured and arranged and built and organized around freedom, so people can say what they want and do what they want and go where they want and not worry about someone killing them, and not worry about some unseen things.
Today if a person has to worry about the water they drink and the air they drink and their physical safety if they're working in a building somewhere and for their children, then we're not what we are. And yet the proliferation of these technologies and the existence of these networks have created an environment, a connection between the willingness to kill large numbers of human beings regardless of their religion or their race or their sex, and simultaneously the availability of these kinds of technologies that enable you to do large numbers of people simultaneously.
What all people can do is to, in my view, recognize that. As the president said, live with a sense of heightened awareness. Know that mail can be bad. Know that things can happen and yet not stop living. You can't stop living. We have to go out and do what we do. The terrorists win if we stop living. And furthermore, there's not a whole lot that any single individual can do other than use good judgment.
The other thing we can do is to support a government that's decided that that's not the way we want to live, and we choose to live as free people and therefore we've got to change the way other people are living, the terrorists, and be supportive of that.
Ha, ha, ha, Rummy rules!
I guess I could really care less though.
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