The Stuff of Legends

Peter Claydon, Flight Lieutenant in the RAF, nearly walked in on an SS beating and murder of a British radar technician.  A French Nazi collaborator with access to top secret radar technology and two German thugs were attempting to beat classified information from the hapless Englishman.  Claydon stumbles upon the scene seconds after the shooting—nearly getting himself shot—and receives a message from the dying man.  The message excites a great deal of interest in the intelligence community.  Then, a week later, Claydon spots the same French turncoat in the background of a photograph taken from the body of a Luftwaffe pilot.  Being the only person able to recognize this dangerous traitor, Claydon is assigned the task of assassinating M. Passy.  He is then sent back to France in the company of the daring M. Carnac to locate and eliminate this threat to the secret of that vital new defensive weapon, radar.

This extraordinary story has an equally extraordinary history. D.M. Crook was the grandfather of the modern day publisher of Pursuit of Passy. He has chosen to offer this magnificent book for free which deeply puzzles this reviewer. It is a noteworthy piece of fiction with intrinsic value and I would have been happy to pay for it. In league with Fredrick Forsythe and Ken Follet, Pursuit of Passy is a great book that deserves commensurate attention.

76,610 Words

Free at Smashwords / $.99 at Amazon

Download from Smashwords 

Horse Sense

Riley Grannan was a bookie. He so excelled at his craft that he could earn a fortune in an afternoon, or lose one.
Eleven-year-old Dayton Shannon was the motherless son of an abusive father until his Uncle Tom agreed to teach him the ropes of bookmaking. Dayton had a natural affinity and his uncle taught him well enough that the renowned Riley Grannan hired him to assist in his betting operation. At the age of twelve Day got to travel the racing circuit, see the world and earn more in a year than in a lifetime of shining shoes at the train station.

This is the most peculiar book that I ever enjoyed. Many years ago I learned that horseracing is not only a beautiful spectacle, but it is a beautiful way to lose money. Since I shun the odds makers much of the bookmakers’ jargon was lost on me—I don’t even fully understand the title—and I can’t deny that one-hundred and twenty year old racing statistics are an arcane topic, but this story is irresistible. It is told from multiple viewpoints that at times made it hard to remember who was telling the story, and it is not conventionally edited, but none of that detracted from my enjoyment. The characters carry this tale of high stakes, fast living, corruption and redemption in the 1890’s. It is a nostalgic look at racing from the standpoint of that often-unsavory character, the bookie.

117,980 Words
Price $3.99 / $1.99 at Amazon
 Buy at Smashwords 
Buy at Amazon

The River War, an Account of the Reconquest of the Soudan by Winston Churchill

A war, with little popular support, perpetrated by the strongest military force on earth, utilizing indigenous troops, for the purpose of liberating an Arab country from radical Islamists sounds like current events.  And certainly it is, but it is also old news.  Sudan (spelled ‘Soudan’ in this text) languished under the heel of the self-proclaimed Mahdi, Muhammad Ahmad.  Even the false prophet’s sudden death did not spare the long suffering land from abuse at the hands of greedy, brutal, slave trading emirs.  After years of hand wringing Britain could no longer stand idly on the Egyptian border.  Their solution has become a familiar tactic: send a small expeditionary force, recruit local battalions, deploy state of the art weaponry, and then they did something unique to the late nineteenth century—they built a railroad.  In northern Sudan the Nile makes a tremendous loop adding hundreds of miles to it course, and river traffic is further delayed by a series of cataracts, so Sir H. Kitchener, moved his troops and matériel twenty miles per day on newly laid tracks, in a direct line across the desert, while the Kalipha and his emirs watched their doom approach from behind the walls of Omdurman.  The allied combatants consisted of Egyptian and Sudanese infantry, cavalry and camelry (yes, there is such a word even if Microsoft disagrees).  One member of the British cavalry was a young subaltern named Winston Spencer Churchill who participated in a sabre charge against Sudanese Dervishes and survived to become the leader of a nuclear power.

The River War, an Account of the Reconquest of the Soudan, is an extraordinary period piece and a lesson that generation after generation of world leaders cannot learn.  When radical Islam becomes entrenched, it must be annihilated.  Wherever Islam is unchecked will be terrorism, slavery, imperialism and brutal misogyny.  Copyrighted in 1902, Churchill was only four years beyond his participation in this rather sanguine conflict, thus his meticulous detail and transporting description draws the reader into this fight on the Nile.  This remarkable book can be found in all electronic formats, absolutely free, at the Gutenberg Project.  Of course, donations are appreciated.

Limelight Literature

 LE Fitzpatrick, a blogger from Wales, was kind enough to give Face of the Angel shot in the arm today by publishing a character interview with the much misunderstood Doctor Josef Mengele.

Limelight Literature features unique content from self-published authors.  Check it out.

Limelight Literature

See what the good doctor had to say then scroll down and see who else Lynzie Fitzpatrick is featuring.

Doctor Josef Mengele, medical researcher, surgeon, anthropologist, geneticist and Auschwitz Angel of Death, hid in plain sight for forty years while dozens of professional Nazi hunters blundered around the world trying to capture him. Face of the Angel tells how an educated man of wit, charm and mayhem languished for decades in fear, loneliness and delusion in South America while his pursuers invented preposterous tales about him.

Only $2.99

Buy at Smashwords 

Buy at Amazon 

In Paperback at Createspace

13 Hours in Benghazi

Since the embassy is in Tripoli, the United States Diplomatic Compound in Benghazi did not fall under the guidelines of the State Department’s standards for embassy security; therefore, the niceties of bulletproof glass and secure air supply went overlooked in the main residential villa used by Ambassador Chris Stevens during his stay in Libya’s second city.  That was the first blunder.  The second was keeping the American security contractors at a second compound, known as the Annex and controlled by the CIA, ten minutes distant.  Probably the most fatal security breach was employing Libyans as guards.  Most sentient persons know of the storming of the diplomatic compound and the killing of Ambassador Stevens, and three other Americans, on September 11, 2012, but the truthful details of what happened are less clear.  While six heavily armed, expertly trained and highly motivated American security men chafed under the temporizing yoke of the mysterious CIA operative, “Bob,” Islamic terrorists had free range to set alight the Ambassador’s villa with himself and communications officer, Sean Smith, trapped inside the “safe haven.”

13 Hours in Benghazi lifts the cloud of political obfuscation from the facts of this American tragedy.  Mr. Zuckoff’s collaboration with five of the surviving security contractors is an even handed, if gritty, depiction of that catastrophic night in Benghazi.  Failing to do the right things, from the President to the Secretary of State to the embassy staff in Tripoli to the CIA head of station, Benghazi, is a national disgrace.  Furthermore, the still ongoing denials and cover-ups by Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama and their spokespersons, is nothing less than calling five American heroes liars and denigrating the memory of the four deceased.

This should be required reading for all Americans.  The story is told through the various viewpoints of the participants.  It is concise and well paced.  Sadly, the prose is, shall I say pedestrian—no, I should say atrocious.  One has the sense that a race to market took precedence over good writing.

Buy at Amazon

Will there be Life After Obama?

On September 10, 2014, the president of the United States wasted twenty-one hundred perfectly good words to tell the world that he is not going to do anything new about the Islamic terrorist group, ISIL.  This same president who was perfectly willing to tell the Taliban to lay low until 2015, was unable to say specifically what he is going to do to prevent these Muslim miscreants from establishing a Sharia state from Iran to the Mediterranean.  We will make air strikes, he says.  Well, we are already making air strikes.  We will get somebody else to do the dirty work on the ground.  We are already browbeating the Iraqis and the Kurds to do the dirty work.  We will give them support and training.  Really?  Like what?  How much and when?

Could ever a speech have been less thinly veiled political hogwash?  The gist of the plan is to do nothing to alarm the electorate before Tuesday, November 4.  This twinkle toes commander-in-chief sees votes in the Senate as more urgent than annihilating an ascendant army of rabid jihadists, who may very well succeed in their goal before the 2016 elections, which is the soonest we can hope—and only hope—for a viable leader.

In deconstructing what he said and did not say, permit me to start with the phrase: “...drawing down our forces in Afghanistan, where our combat mission will end later this year.”  Our combat mission will certainly not end on December 31, 2014.  Obama is simply pulling the plug and thus negating the unfinished work of twelve years of painful warfare.  A BBC correspondent recently interviewed a band Taliban fighters who candidly admitted that they were interested in joining ISIL.  Who is going to prevent them?  The Afghans can’t even count their ballots.  No one has pacified Afghanistan since Alexander the Great.  The British couldn’t do it, the Russians couldn’t do, and now, we are going to simply say, after more than three-thousand deaths and close to twenty-thousand wounded, that it is just too hard.

Consider Obama’s observation: “...small groups of killers have the capacity to do great harm.”  This is especially true when they have U.S. tanks and machineguns that they wrested from an impotent Iraqi army.  Reportedly ISIL took Mosul, Iraq's second city, with one-hundred and fifty men.  Then we were told,  “At this moment, the greatest threats come from the Middle East and North Africa...”  Although this may have seemed to be the ‘Duh! Moment,’ it gives no weight to Muslim depredations in South Asia and the Philippines.  I guess the fact that Indonesia is the most populous Muslim state should be overlooked because of Obama’s fond memories of boyhood there.

By far the most enlightening thing that he said was: “Now let’s make two things clear:”  What he proceeded to make clear is that he takes us for fools.  The two clarifications he made are: “ISIL is not ‘Islamic.’” and, “ISIL is certainly not a state.”  So does he think they might be Jews on holiday?  That our president is a Muslim apologist is a national embarrassment, but it is not half as demeaning to our country as him standing in front of the world making such a ridiculous statement.  If they are indeed not a state and no one recognizes them, how does Obama account for the territory they control, the taxes they collect and the nine-thousand barrels of oil that the BBC claims they export every day?  Those who are buying that oil recognize them as something.  Obama’s justification for denying the Islamic heart of ISIL, “No religion condones the killing of innocents, and the vast majority of ISIL’s victims have been Muslim.” not only indicates that Barry Soetoro did not pay attention when he attended Islamic school in Indonesia, but the second half of the sentence even denigrates the value of the life of a Muslim.  Is he saying that we shouldn’t worry about ISIL because they mainly kill Muslims?  Perhaps we should give arms to ISIL.

“And it has no vision other than the slaughter of all who stand in its way.”  Again the President of the United States showed his ignorance.  ISIL—formerly ISIS, the ‘IL’ indicates growing designs on the Levant—has a clearly stated goal of establishing a caliphate in the territories of Iraq and Syria.  Still he wouldn’t stop.  “...these terrorists are unique in their brutality.  They execute captured prisoners.  They kill children.  They enslave, rape, and force women into marriage.”  Barack, this is what the Koran tells Muslims to do.  You really were asleep back at the madrasa, weren’t you?  Furthermore, if you believe atrocities are unique to ISIL, try to remember who beheaded Daniel Pearl, and who dragged the defiled body of Ambassador Stevens through the streets of Benghazi, and who beheaded eight Afghan police officers last spring.  Evidently ISIL really gets around.

“...these fighters could try to return to their home countries and carry out deadly attacks.”  Gee, do you really think so?  Not only is it their mandate, they have financial motivation.  “Jihad is one of the meritorious acts in the eye of Islam and it is the best source of earnings.” (Mishkat al-Masabih, Sunni holy book).  “Fight and slay the pagans wherever ye find them and seize them, beleaguer them, and lie in wait for them in every stratagem.” (Koran, Surah 9:5)  As for the tepid ‘could try to return,’ I’d like to remind everyone that the United States can’t keep little kids from crossing the border, and these homegrown jihadi jackasses have U.S. passports.

The great Bush basher missed an opportunity when he said, “...we cannot do for the Iraqis what they must do for themselves...”  If I recall correctly, we put Iraq into its present condition and it was Obama’s arch fiend, George Bush who instigated it.  Then blithely skipping alone the revisionist trail he claims, “...we will degrade, and ultimately destroy, ISIL through a comprehensive and sustained counter-terrorism strategy.”  This will no doubt will occur the same way we destroyed the Taliban and al-Qaida.  Let us not forget that al-Qaida, which is very much alive, spawned ISIL.

I was particularly moved by: "This is a core principle of my presidency: if you threaten America, you will find no safe haven.”  That is unless you happen to be Edward Snowden or Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, who confessed to beheading Daniel Pearl and is still comfortably ensconced at Guantanamo Bay awaiting prosecution which is not likely to come on Obama’s watch.

Our beloved president herein indulged in much self-congratulation.  ”I deployed several hundred American service members to Iraq...”  Well, it was two-hundred and seventy-five.  In fact, the last five-hundred words had little to do with ISIL and were heavily slathered with self-love.  “I will chair a meeting of the UN...”; “My administration has also secured bipartisan support...”; “I have the authority...”; “I welcome congressional support...”; “I outlined earlier this year...”; “I want the American people to understand how this effort will be different...”  Why didn’t he make this speech at the Reflecting Pool so he could have made his exit by walking across it?

Backtracking slightly, we also had to endure this: “This is American leadership at its best: we stand with people who fight for the own freedom; and we rally other nations on behalf of our common security and common humanity.”  A few sentences later he said, “Abroad, American leadership is the one constant in an uncertain world.”  I hope Ukraine got a copy of this.

Let us hope that the Kurds and the Iraqis weren’t listening when he said, “This counter-terrorism campaign will be waged through a steady, relentless effort to take out ISIL wherever they exist, using our air power and our support for partner forces on the ground. This strategy of taking out terrorists who threaten us, while supporting partners on the front lines, is one that we have successfully pursued in Yemen and Somalia for years. And it is consistent with the approach I outlined earlier this year: to use force against anyone who threatens America’s core interests, but to mobilize partners wherever possible to address broader challenges to international order.”  It would have been more succinct to say, “We’ll throw you to the wolves while we buzz around at thirty-thousand feet.”  Using the word ‘successful’ in the same sentence with Yemen and Somalia simply defies belief.

In the subsequent “How great I am” section he tells us, “...America is better positioned to seize the future than any other country on Earth.”  Well, maybe, but we certainly aren’t seizing much of anything.  Who do we pay to carry astronauts to the Space Station?  Then, “Energy independence is closer than it’s been in decades.”  It is?  Even if it might be, that doesn’t mean we will ever achieve it.  God forbid we should drill a hole or build a pipeline.

I choked when he had the gall to say, “It is America that has rallied the world against Russian aggression, and in support of the Ukrainian peoples’ right to determine their own destiny.”  So, Poroshenko old man, how is the rally working for you?  Right after that we had to listen to: “It is America that helped remove and destroy Syria’s declared chemical weapons.”  Unfortunately it was Putin who floated the idea, the program is woefully behind schedule and that little word ‘declared’ wafts the scent of chlorine across the Syrian sky.

By far the most depressing sentence in the fourteen minute, thirty second stammer session was, “And it is America that is helping Muslim communities around the world not just in the fight against terrorism, but in the fight for opportunity, tolerance, and a more hopeful future.”  When he says ‘around the world’ does he mean Dearborn?  And what’s that ‘opportunity?’  EBT cards?  This is referring to Obama’s personal pro-Islamic agenda, not anything the American people are clamoring to do.

There is no doubt in my mind that ISIL will thrive and entrench themselves until at least 2016, at which time, if we know what is good for us, we could conceivably elect a real president. 

Final Victory

Wade Brogan, Jr., hard-bitten San Francisco detective, suspects that dementia is the source of his failing father’s fanciful tales about his career in the Army’s Counter Intelligence Corps during the development of the atom bomb.  Then a Russian derelict, well-padded with years, is found dead in a Tenderloin flophouse.  His room is stacked with shoeboxes full of yellowed documents, many of which bear the fading red stamp, “Top Secret.”  The shroud of skepticism drops from his father’s ramblings about his mother having been a Soviet spy.  Over an evening of beers he shares with his fellow cops the story of how the Japanese and the Russians nearly vaporized the City by the Bay but for the frantic scrambling of Wade Brogan, Sr.

It is a little known fact that the Manhattan Project assembled four nuclear weapons before the end of the Second World War.  One, of course, was tested at Trinity Site, New Mexico, and one each were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, as we all know.  The last was held in secrecy for use in the event that Japan did not unconditionally surrender.  Phillip Bosshardt postulates how close to catastrophe we might have come if the Russians and the Japanese had cooperated on information gleaned from the sieve-like security surrounding America’s mad dash to perfect an atom bomb.  This epic length saga tells a chilling tale that rings true at each convolution of plot.  The historical backdrop is expertly woven, the characters fully developed and the pace nearly perfect.  All fans of historical fiction and alternative history are going to love Final Victory. 

251,570 Words (A long one!) 

Price $4.99

Buy at Smashwords 

I didn't find it at Amazon.

The White Prisoner

Galabin Boevski was too small and not well enough connected for acceptance on the football team at Plaven’s sport school so he opted to try weightlifting.  It was a propitious decision.  He proceeded to set records, earn prizes, wealth and win medals—including Olympic Gold.  Officials both rightly and wrongly accused him of doping, coaches and authorities stabbed him in the back, and when he made the foolish mistake of buying new luggage in São Paulo, he was busted with nine kilos of coke surreptitiously sewn into the lining of the suitcase.  Hefting the bulk of a weightlifter then kept him alive for two years in a Brazilian prison.

The world of Bulgarian weightlifting is certainly an esoteric topic and not one I had given much thought, but sports writer, Ognian Georgiev’s journalistic style lends this story—which is based on fact—a kind of urgency that keeps the pages turning.  Boevski’s rise from obscurity, his financial and professional insecurity; physical setbacks, and ultimately, legal struggles, present a compelling story that could unfold anywhere in any sport.  This book has the earmarks of the Louis Zamperini story, Unbroken.  Whether you are a sports enthusiast or not, this is a great read.  

Price $3.99

Buy at Amazon

A Dalliance Back into the Mainstream

When art dealer, Julian Isherwood, is duped into discovering the tortured body of a spy turned dirty art dealer, Gabriel Allon is strong-armed into investigating by the director of the Italian Art Squad.  Once again Gabriel has to suspend the restoration of a famous alter piece, and abandon his pregnant wife in Venice, to go into the field.  The investigation segues into a quest for a Caravaggio that has been missing for decades and the trail leads to the civil war raging on Israel’s northern border with a chance to deprive the Syrian president of his looted assets.

All of Daniel Silva’s tales involve intricate, twisted plots, but The Heist may well be the most convoluted to date.  The impetus of the story changes directions so many times it leaves the reader with vertigo and throughout is woven the subplot of Gabriel Allon’s pending ascension to the directorship of the Israeli Intelligence Service.  As always The Heist is filled with Allon’s dry wit and his tortured past.  I promise that if you weren’t a follower of Gabriel Allon, after you read The Heist, you will return to read the previous thirteen installments in the series.



Buy at Amazon


I'm afraid you won't find this one at Smashwords.

The Declaration: Tales From a Revolution-South Carolina

Katie Harris, near modern day Charleston, is helping her grandmother clear her house in preparation for moving into a nursing home.  Starting in the attic Katie finds an ancient trunk bearing the name ‘Elizabeth Harris.’  Inside she finds letters and documents dating to the Revolutionary period.  An historian from the university arrives to authenticate them and uncovers an even more earth-shattering and plan changing discovery.  Nearly two-hundred and fifty years earlier Justin Harris ekes a living on his tobacco farm on the same piece of land that Katie’s Gram occupies today, however, his dreams of peace and prosperity are haunted by the growing rebellion.  Risking all by joining the Whigs’ cause, Justin earns a commendation for his heroism in defense of Charles Town, but it comes with hefty price.

This homey tale continues relating the stories of two generations of the Harris family separated by more than two centuries.  Being a fan of both history and genealogy, this book had much appeal for me.  I am also greatly enamored of Charleston and the Low Country in general, so all aspects of The Declaration were calling me.  However, I must offer a constructive criticism: the dialogue is unconvincing.  The characters never speak to one another without referring to each other by name.  If a husband and wife are talking, how frequently do they call each other by their proper names?  I was particularly bothered by the conversation of the slave, Terrance, who spoke like he had been educated at Eton and referred to Justin as “Mister Harris” instead of “Massa.”  Ignoring the overly formal speech and the political correctness, Lar D.H. Hedbor’s Declaration is worthy of attention. 

Price $4.99

52,140 words

Buy at Smashwords 

Buy at Amazon

The Half-Hanged Man

Thomas Page was not finished being hanged when a would-be campaigner bought his indenture and saved his life with the condition that he join his band of mercenaries on the Continent.  Page not only excelled at pillaging, he became the leader of a company of plunderers—known as the Wolves—who made their living sacking castles and towns from Navarre to Burgundy.  Enter the Raven, a black haired Spanish courtesan with a grudge toward King Pedro of Castile. Page and the Raven are lethal pair but are compelled to stay one-step ahead of Hugh Calveley who is determined to avenge Page’s killing of his cowardly cousin, William Calveley, the misguided general who saved Page from the gallows.

The Half-Hanged Man is a fine story told in the format of eyewitnesses relating their tales to a well-known chronicler.  There are three parts and points of view that come together in a jarring climax.  The context is the fourteenth century Europe and David Pilling’s knowledge of contemporary terms and trappings is impressive.  He transports the reader to the time and place with his excellent prose and use of language from the late 1300’s.  All fans of history will enjoy The Half-Hanged Man.

I've only found this book at Amazon, but the good news is it's free.

Download from Amazon

The Legend of Henry Berry Lowery

Henry Berry Lowrie was a very wily blue-eyed Indian.  In the final days of the Civil War when all of the South sat on the brink of starvation, Henry Berry and his Lumbee Indian friends and relatives waged a war of plundering the rich and sharing with the needy of Robeson County, North Carolina.  The Lumbee knew the swamps around the Lumber River better than anyone else, having taken refuge there from the depredations of white encroachers since colonial times.  At the war’s end when the outrages of Reconstruction were heaped upon the genteel white community they became indignant at the effrontery of the Lowrie gang and offered irresistible bounties for their capture.  Henry Berry was nothing if not an upright man—his thieving and revenge killings aside—and because he lived boldly and openly, captured he was, and escape he did.  Then he and his gang members were captured by treachery, and craftily escaped.  Enter on the scene, two vengeful widows, victims of Henry Berry’s murderous side and downtrodden by the insults of Reconstruction, then the blood money reaches a staggering sum.  Armies of bounty hunters swarm the swamp and most are never seen again.

Astoundingly, this story is true.  Warren Reichel’s research and descriptive skills combine to make the kind of a tale that one wants to stay with to the end.  This is the kind of lovable rogue saga that everyone treasures, but unlike Robin Hood, this man was real.  The determination to preserve the community, protect friends and family, extract justice and to enjoy life in the face of adversity is as inspiring as entertaining.  The author has told his story brilliantly and delivers the astonishing climax with aplomb.  This is exactly the kind of book I love to read, and although I had not known of Henry Berry Lowrie, I am familiar with the Lumbee culture and the region, and in fact, I claim a Lumbee ancestor, so this was a double delight for me.  I think everyone will enjoy it, too.

So far it is only available via Amazon in paperback for $17.99.

Buy at Amazon

Virtual Conflict

A Chechen assassin fulfills a contract on a cyber-security software executive, while on the opposite side of the world, a North Korean cyber-warfare expert is recruited to work with a team of Chinese students being paid to hack into the data bases of major corporations by a mysterious Russian-American billionaire.  Oddly, when the attack occurs, no real damage is done except to the  stock market.  Subsequently, there are a series of mischievous hacking incidents against Chinese government websites that intend to embarrass the regime.  As all this is transpiring, North Korea is plotting to turn upcoming war games into the real thing.

Virtual Conflict is a multilayer, complex and intriguing story with loads of action. Terence Flyntz’ technical knowledge of his subject is vast, and the turns and surprises never stop coming.  Unfortunately the prose is a little stiff and repetitive in places.  This is a story that is more told than shown,  plus the dialogue is often multiple paragraph soliloquies that don’t sound like normal conversations.  I rate this tale  at five stars for content but only three for execution.  Nevertheless, the plot is in league with The Hunt for Red October and I did enjoy reading it.

142,590 words

Price $4.99

Buy at Smashwords 

Buy at Amazon

Thoughts on the Secretary of Defense and the Constitution

During a House Armed Services Committee hearing on Wednesday, June 11, Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel said, "The President has constitutional responsibilities and constitutional authorities to protect American citizens and members of our armed forces.  That's what he did.  America does not leave its soldiers behind.  We made the right decision, and we did it for the right reasons—to bring home one of our own people."

Apparently the Secretary of Defense has never read the Constitution.  Hagel’s remark did not sound familiar, so to be certain, I reread Article II of the Constitution concerning the executive branch of government. Sure enough, Hagel is full of crap.  Article II in its entirety is attached to the end of this post in case you don’t believe me.  The President is the Commander in Chief and is responsible for seeing that all laws are enforced—including immigration—but he is not the babysitter of the American people.  He is also supposed to defend the Constitution, but clearly Obama has forgotten that part of his oath.

What I can’t understand is why no Congressman challenged Hagel on his absurd claim.  I can only guess that none of those present had ever read the Constitution.  I’m will to bet Obama has never read the Constitution.  Furthermore, shouldn’t someone have remarked that it’s not right to leave ambassadors behind either?

This Bergdahl business more than stinks.  Hagel contends that he is still in Germany because he needs more psychological evaluation. Don’t we have any shrinks at the VA?  Or is it because he would have to wait six months to get an appointment?  Maybe he needs more time to memorize the official story.

The rumors flying around this case, viz: Bergdahl has not called his parents and his father was heard to say, “Allah akbar,” in the Whitehouse Rose Garden, not to mention that Muslim looking beard he is sporting, lead one to wonder just what we got for five Taliban jihadists.  Snopes is silent on the Bergdahl rumors.

Let’s address the other ridiculous thing Hagel said.  “We complied with the law.”  What part of ‘Congress is to be notified before any of the Guantanamo prisoners are released’ do Hagel and Obama not understand?  I don’t know if that is a high crime or a misdemeanor, but either is an impeachable offense.  Is it going to happen?  Of course not, because Congress is every bit as inept and wrongheaded as the President.

The most insulting remark the half-breed jackass has said is, “We didn’t negotiate with terrorists.”
Give me a break.  The Taliban has an office in Qatar.  Are the American people stupid enough to believe these five Muslim miscreants are going to be held incommunicado?  Well, maybe they are that stupid, after all, they elected the bastard twice.  Let’s say those pillars of western idealism in Qatar turn them loose in less than a year, what are we going to do to Qatar—sanctions?  Even if they do hold them for a year, isn’t that coincidental with the pull-out from Afghanistan?  Five more jihadists is just what the doctor ordered in the vacuum of US involvement.  I guess Obama hadn’t heard about Fallujah and subsequently Mosel and Tikrit.

When we are faced with an Islamic state from Syria to Iraq that is receiving nuclear weapons from Iran and North Korea, and we are forced—I repeat forced—to defend Israel, are we going to look back at this shrug our shoulders and say, “Well, it seemed like a good idea at the time?”

This is a very sad time to be an American.

The US Constitution, including the Bill of Rights, is a brilliant, concise and elegant device.  Contrary to the beliefs of far too many politicians and their minions, it is not a living document to be tweaked at will by the likes of Obama, Pelosi, Reid, Waxman, Waters and all the rest of their ilk.  Here is Article II:

Article. II.

Section. 1.

The executive Power shall be vested in a President of the United States of America. He shall hold his Office during the Term of four Years, and, together with the Vice President, chosen for the same Term, be elected, as follows: Each State shall appoint, in such Manneras the Legislature thereof may direct, a Number of Electors, equal to the whole Number of Senators and Representatives to which the State may be entitled in the Congress: but no Senator or Representative, or Person holding an Office of Trust or Profit under the United States, shall be appointed an Elector. The Electors shall meet in their

respective States, and vote by Ballot for two Persons, of whom one at least shall not be an Inhabitant of the same State with themselves. And they shall make a List of all the Persons voted for, and of the Number of Votes for each; which List they shall sign and certify, and transmit sealed to the Seat of the Government of the United States, directed to the President of the Senate. The President of the Senate shall, in the Presence of the Senate and House of Representatives, open all the Certificates, and the Votes shall then be counted. The Person having the greatest Number of Votes shall be the President, if such Number be a Majority of the whole Number of Electors appointed; and if there be more than one who have such Majority, and have an equal Number of Votes, then the House of Representatives shall immediately chuse by Ballot one of them for President; and if no Person have a Majority, then from the five highest on the List the said House shall in like Manner chuse the President.  But in chusing the President, the Votes shall be taken by States, the Representation from each State having one Vote; A quorum for this purpose shall consist of a Member or Members from two thirds of the States, and a Majority of all the States shall be necessary to a Choice. In every Case, after the Choice of the President, the Person having the greatest Number of Votes of the Electors shall be the Vice President. But if there should remain two or more who have equal Votes, the Senate shall chuse from them by Ballot the Vice President. The Congress may determine the Time of chusing the Electors, and the Day on which they shall give their Votes;which Day shall be the same throughout the United States. 

No Person except a natural born Citizen, or a Citizen of the United States, at the time of the Adoption of this Constitution, shall be eligible to the Office of President; neither shall any Person be eligible to that Office who shall not have attained to the Age of thirty five Years, and been fourteen Years a Resident within the United States. In Case of the Removal of the President from Office, or of his Death, Resignation, or Inability to discharge the Powers and Duties of the said Office, the Same shall devolve on the Vice President, and the Congress may by Law provide for the Case of Removal, Death, Resignation or Inability, both of the President and Vice President, declaring what Officer shall then act as President, and such Officer shall act accordingly, until the Disability be removed, or a President shall be elected. The President shall, at stated Times, receive for his Services, a Compensation, which shall neither be increased nor diminished during the Period for which he shall have been elected, and he shall not receive within that Period any other Emolument from the United States, or any of them. 

Before he enter on the Execution of his Office, he shall take the following Oath or Affirmation:--"I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will faithfully execute the Office of President of the United States, and will to the best of my Ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States."

Section. 2.

The President shall be Commander in Chief of the Army and Navy of the United States, and of the Militia of the several States, when called into the actual Service of the United States; he may require the Opinion, in writing, of the principal Officer in each of the executive Departments, upon any Subject relating to the Duties of their respective Offices, and he shall have Power to grant Reprieves and Pardons for Offences against the United States, except in Cases of Impeachment. He shall have Power, by and with the Advice and Consent of the Senate, to make Treaties, provided two thirds of the Senators present concur; and he shall nominate, and by and with the Advice and Consent of the Senate, shall appoint Ambassadors, other public Ministers and Consuls, Judges of the supreme Court, and all other Officers of the United States, whose Appointments are not herein otherwise provided for, and which shall be established by Law: but the Congress may by Law vest the Appointment of such inferior Officers, as they think proper, in the President alone, in the Courts of Law, or in the Heads of Departments. The President shall have Power to fill up all Vacancies that may happen during the Recess of the Senate, by granting Commissions which shall expire at the End of their next Session. 

Section. 3.

He shall from time to time give to the Congress Information of the State of the Union, and recommend to their Consideration such Measures as he shall judge necessary and expedient; he may, on extraordinary Occasions, convene both Houses, or either of them, and in Case of Disagreement between them, with Respect to the Time of Adjournment, he may adjourn them to such Time as he shall think proper; he shall receive Ambassadors and other public Ministers; he shall take Care that the Laws be faithfully executed, and shall Commission all the Officers of the United States.

Section. 4.

The President, Vice President and all civil Officers of the United States, shall be removed from Office on Impeachment for, and Conviction of, Treason, Bribery, or other high Crimes and Misdemeanors.