Come join us for a slice of Americana with a helping of conservative politics on the side.
"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed"
I still haven't received my recovery discs from Dell so my computer is still in its broken mode at least a buddy is nice enough to let me use his machine so I can stay semi in touch with the cyber world. The problem is that he has dial up service only and its slow as Christmas to a four year old and he uses AOL which I absolutely despise, oh well thats life.
He does at least get FOX news and a gazillion other channels I don't so I have something to look at while pages load. I also don't have access to my favorites list so surfing is limited to the few sites I can remember the URLs for.
I should be back to regular posting early next week unless my computer is in worse condition than just a couple corrupted files in Windows XP but I will lose all my files at least most of my pictures have been backed up. I use Blogger's Picassa service to save all the pictures I have posted here so that's a big chunk of them right there and most of the rest are on disc. I guess I should have gotten Carbonite's back up services long ago but stupid me kept putting it off and now I am paying the price for my inaction so be smart and spend $5 a month for their service. I wish I had.
I am alive and well but my computer is unfortunately not so well, it crashed Friday and I won't have it back up and running till later this week. I had to come over to a buddy's house to use his machine.
Anyway, I am also busy closing down my business and preparing to move back to Alabama after the California legislature was so kind as to raise our taxes even more. I have loved living here but they are absolutely killing the business environment here with taxes and regulation and the bottom has completely fallen out of the construction industry with no end in sight.
Today is the first yarzheit of the 8 bochurim who were murdered in the attack on Merkaz HaRav last year. On Rosh Chodesh Adar of last year, an East Jerusalem Arab gunman entered the library of the yeshiva and gunned down 8 students in cold-blood. These holy boys were killed while studying Torah, their sole crime to have been born Jews. Aged 15-21, they were committed and completely involved in Torah. As their families were plunged into the depths of mourning and sorrow, dancing and jubilation broke out in East Jerusalem, in Arab-controlled Judea and Samaria, and in Gaza. There was dancing in the streets and sweets were distributed, in celebration of the vile deed. As the Jewish nation felt the pain of this cruel attack, our enemies rejoiced in the massacre of teenagers.
The attack took place on Rosh Chodesh Adar, the first day of the month of Adar, associated with the festival of Purim. Purim commemorates the downfall of the Haman, the Persian vizier, and the foiling of his Final Solution against the Jewish people. Haman was a descendant of Amalek, the implacable enemy of the Jews. One week before Purim, on Shabbat Zachor, the Sabbath of Remembrance, we read the Torah's command to remember the evil of Amalek. The Torah commands us: "Remember what Amalek did to you on the road, on your way out of Egypt. That he encountered you on the way and cut off those lagging to your rear, when you were tired and exhausted; he did not fear G-d. And it shall come to pass, when the L-rd your G-d has given you rest from all your enemies round about, in the land which the L-rd your G-d is giving you for an inheritance to possess it, that you shall obliterate the memory of Amalek from under the heavens. Do not forget." (Deut. 25:17-19). It is an obligation to recall daily Amalek's cowardly attack on Israel.
Throughout history, thousands of nations have oppressed and persecuted Israel yet only Amalek is singled out for eternal remembrance and ultimate destruction. Why is Amalek alone to be remembered forever? Amalek was a nomadic tribe that lived in the desert. Its land was not a part of the Land of Israel and they were not threatened by Israel's advancement to Canaan. Despite this, they attacked Israel simply out of hatred and malice. They did not confront Israel head on but ambushed the rearguard, attacking the weakest and most vulnerable in the camp of Israel. This same spirit of Amalek has manifested itself time and time again in various nations throughout history, in their implacable desire to destroy Israel. The murderer, may his name be accursed, was from the seed of Amalek. His attack was so barbaric, so cruel and evil as to defy belief. To walk into a library in a house of study, a place of worship, on a holy day, and to systematically murder teenagers is an act motivated by the purest of hatred. It was not just an attack on a yeshiva, but on every synagogue and house of study, on every Jew and on the values of life and holiness which the books in that library represent.
It is a positive commandment to completely obliterate Amalek. Such a commandment seems jarring to the modern mind. Wipe out an entire people? We fail to understand that Amalek is not a physical entity but rather a concept, a national spirit. Amalek represents evil, denial of G-d and hatred of the Jewish people. Its warlike culture makes it antithetical to the message of the Torah and necessitates its destruction. The spirit of Amalek manifests itself so clearly in the gunman, the suicide bombers, the worship and glorification of death in Islamic society. To dance, give out candies and celebrate when teenagers are shot can only happen in a society completely steeped in hatred and violence. Such a savage society cannot co-exist with the Jewish people, the nation that loves and desires life and seeks peace.
Amalek shares the same numerical value as safek, meaning doubt. Amalek seeks to cause us to doubt G-d's Omnipotence, to doubt ourselves. our rights and claims to our land. When the emergency response teams entered the library, they found blood covering the pages of the Talmud. This demonstrates Amalek's utter contempt for G-d, for His commandment of life and its sanctity. The only way to overcome Amalek is by strengthening our connection to G-d and to His Torah. We must combat the doubt that Amalek seeks to sow by adding light. In the words of the Rav Kook, the founder of the yeshiva:
"The purely righteous do not complain about evil, rather they add justice. They do not complain about heresy, rather they add faith. They do not complain about ignorance, rather they add wisdom. "
The gunman stifled the voices of 8 young men. He tried to silence their Torah study and their good deeds. They have left behind a void of mitzvot that we need to fill, in order to defeat the darkness spread by Amalek. Let us all commit to performing an extra mitzvah such as laying tefillin, studying more Torah or giving tzedakah le'ilui nishmatam.
Remember what Amalek did to us! Evil cannot be compromised with or tolerated. It can only be wiped out. Let us remember:
Doron Mehereta, 26, of Ashdod Ro'i Rote, 18, of Elkanah in Samaria (Shomron) Yonadav Haim Hirschfeld, 19, of Kokhav HaShachar (Shomron) Yochai Lipshitz, 18, of the Old City of Jerusalem Yonatan Yitzchak Eldar, 16, of Shilo (Shomron) Neriah Cohen, 15, of Jerusalem Segev Pniel Avichayil, 15, of N'vei Daniel in Gush Etzion Avraham David Moses, 16, of Efrat, Gush Etzion
May their memories be a blessing and may HaShem avenge their holy blood speedily in our days. Yehi Zichram Baruch.
I know you have seen the commercials with Montel Williams peddling coins with Obama's face on them for twenty bucks. Well it turns out suckers are buying a couple dollars worth of coins with cheap stickers stuck on them.
It seems the perfect metaphor for people that bought into the fake messiah hype to have bought into this scam.
As usual Newt Gingrich has come out with a list of policies that if inacted would work very quickly to jumpstart our economy now and into the future and I can't argue with anything on this list of twelve solid proposals.
1. Payroll Tax Stimulus. With a temporary new tax credit to offset 50% of the payroll tax, every small business would have more money, and all Americans would take home more of what they earn. 2. Real Middle-Income Tax Relief. Reduce the marginal tax rate of 25% down to 15%, in effect establishing a flat-rate tax of 15% for close to 9 out of 10 American workers. 3. Reduce the Business Tax Rate. Match Ireland’s rate of 12.5% to keep more jobs in America. 4. Homeowner’s Assistance. Provide tax credit incentives to responsible home buyers so they can keep their homes. 5. Control Spending So We Can Move to a Balanced Budget. This begins with eliminating congressional earmarks and wasteful pork-barrel spending. 6. No State Aid Without Protection From Fraud. Require state governments to adopt anti-fraud and anti-theft policies before giving them more money. 7. More American Energy Now. Explore for more American oil and gas and invest in affordable energy for the future, including clean coal, ethanol, nuclear power and renewable fuels. 8. Abolish Taxes on Capital Gains. Match China, Singapore and many other competitors. More investment in America means more jobs in America. 9. Protect the Rights of American Workers. We must protect a worker’s right to decide by secret ballot whether to join a union, and the worker’s right to freely negotiate. Forced unionism will kill jobs in America at a time when we can’t afford to lose them. 10. Replace Sarbanes-Oxley. This failed law is crippling entrepreneurial startups. Replace it with affordable rules that help create jobs, not destroy them. 11. Abolish the Death Tax. Americans should work for their families, not for Washington. 12. Invest in Energy and Transportation Infrastructure. This includes a new, expanded electric power grid and a 21st Century air traffic control system that will reduce delays in air travel and save passengers, employees and airlines billions of dollars per year.
Jim at Gateway Pudit has more with this from the clip.
Rep. Paul Kanjorski of Pennsylvania explains what former Treasury Secretary Paulson and Fed Chairman Bernanke told congress during the September 2008 closed door session. During the first third of the video an enraged caller is ranting to Rep. Kanjorski about how wasteful the first $700 billion bailout was. The best part is 2 minutes and 15 seconds into the tape where Rep. Kanjorski reveals what Paulson and Bernanke told congress that shocked them into supporting the first $700 billion bailout.
On Thursday Sept 15, 2008 at roughly 11 AM The Federal Reserve noticed a tremendous draw down of money market accounts in the USA to the tune of $550 Billion dollars in a matter of an hour or two. Money was being removed electronically.
The Treasury tried to help, opened their window and pumped in $150 Billion but quickly realized they could not stem the tide. We were having an electronic run on the banks. So they decided to closed down the accounts.
Had they not closed down the accounts they estimated that by 2 PM that afternoon. Within 3 hours. $5.5 Trillion would have been withdrawn and the entire economy of the United States would have collapsed, and within 24 hours the world economy would have collapsed.
If true this goes a long ways to explaining why the TARP bailout was needed but not the porkulus the Dems just shoved down out throats. If so who was behind these electronic transfers from US banks and why? Was it the unions here or foreign investors that believe Obama to be a total squish? Very few entities have the ability to cause a run on the banks of that magnitude and I damn sure hope the Obama team investigates it even if it helped get him elected.
A whole lot of stink has been raised after GOP Senators Spectre, Snowe and Collins bucked our caucus and voted for the Obama-Pelosi-Reid omnibus porkulus and rightly so. They deserve all the scorn they are receiving and not one penny of future support from the RNC or the NRSC. However I don't support kicking them out of the caucus at this point since they at at least keep in range of a filibuster, well sort of.
Instead we need to concentrate our fire at Democrat Senators that represent the red states or even purple states and are up for reelection next year. Those states are Arkansas, South and North Dakota, Missouri, Nebraska, Nevada, West Virginia, Indiana, Montana and a few more I'm sure. I don't know who is up for reelection next year other then Blanche Lincoln of Arkansas and Harry Reid of Nevada. Boy would I love to see Senate Majority leader and chief idiot Reid get booted.
Our new RNC leader has his work cut out for him and he should make sure he has solid challengers for these seats that get plenty of backing from the national committees. He needs to concentrate his focus there and not worry about blue state rinos, let them live or die on their own merits but don't waste needed funds on them. The same goes for generally conservative congressional districts that had been in GOP control that the Democrats made gains in the last two cycles, we can take those seats back.
The Democrats have given us two silver bullets already in the porkubus spending package and blocking domestic oil and natural gas production, see the two posts below this one for more. I am sure they will give us plenty more ammunition as time goes by and they continue to push the failed New Deal/Great Society policies of the past.
The GOP can survive this setback and come back stronger as a result, just remember, Yes We Can and that our ideas and policies actually work to stimulate economic growth.
Yesterday Sec. of the Interior Ken Salazar decided to delay opening up areas off the East and West coasts and in the Gulf that President Bush had opened up. With Obama and the Democrats trying to push their non-stimulus job creation bill this effectively removes a potential 160,000 new high paying jobs from the equation along with enough potential government revenue stream to pay for their bloated porkulus, 1.7 trillion in leases and royalty payments. The American Petroleum Institute sent out this press statement yesterday.
WASHINGTON – American Petroleum Institute President Jack Gerard today issued the following statement on Interior Secretary Ken Salazar’s announcement that he would extend the Outer Continental Shelf Five-Year Plan comment period by 180 days:
“Congress made the American people wait nearly 30 years to address our immediate energy challenges. Secretary Salazar today told the American people they must continue to wait – even though more than two-thirds of them want to tap our vast domestic resources for the benefit of all Americans.
“The accelerated Outer Continental Shelf five-year plan process, which the secretary placed on hold today, was designed to address the critical energy concerns facing Americans. The draft plan already received a record 120,000 comments from states, environmental groups, industry, labor groups and members of the public – with 87,000 of those comments supporting expanded and expeditious development.
Secretary Salazar’s announcement means that development of our offshore resources could be stalled indefinitely. That would delay Americans’ access to nearly 160,000 new, well-paying jobs, $1.7 trillion in revenues to federal, state and local governments and greater energy security.
We share Secretary Salazar’s view that America needs a comprehensive energy policy that includes alternatives. In these tough economic times, Salazar’s delay does a disservice to all Americans. We should be moving as quickly as possible to develop more of our own oil and natural gas to benefit all Americans.”
Granted Salazar just extended the comment period for the five year plan so if you favor tapping our domestic resources of oil and natural gas make sure you make your voice heard. You can comment at the Mineral Management Service website so take a few minutes and make your feelings known.
This comes on the heels of the Democrats shutting down lease sales on over 100,000 acres of land in Utah along with efforts to permanently lock up ANWR and even more land in the Omnibus Public Lands Management Act,s22. Americans for Tax Relief sent me this last night.
While many of you have probably been focusing on the passage of the Pelosi-Obama-Reid Spending Package, Congress is also actively trying to restrict your property rights by passing the Omnibus Public Land Management Act of 2009.
This bill is being pushed by left-wing environmentalists to purposely block public lands to prevent fossil fuel extraction and exploration. This bill will undercut current progress toward affordable domestic energy by essentially "stealing" 300 million barrels of proven oil and 8.8 trillion cubic feet of natural gas from any future use. Tell your member of Congress to Vote against the Omnibus Public Land Management Act of 2009!
So much for all those promises they made to get off foreign oil this will only exacerbate the problem while we continue to remove hundreds of billions of dollars from our economy to send over seas, not to mention the losses in potential jobs and government revenue. We are nowhere near having any viable alternatives to oil and natural gas for at least a couple decades so we desperately need access to those vast resources untill then.
I guess a bankrupt energy less America is the change we can believe in.
Buried deep in the Obama-Pelosi-Reid non-Stimulus act is a provision that would effectively ration the type and quality of health care you receive from your doctor. Rep. Michelle Bachmann points out how this is a major move towards the government taking over health care decisions.
Believe it or not, Congressional Democrats proposed a radical revision of health care policy as part of their economic "stimulus" bill. “Comparative effectiveness," as it is called, not only lays the groundwork for a full-fledged government take-over of Americans’ health care system, but seriously limits the choices for patients and doctors in pursuing treatment.
What it does is put in place a National Coordinator of Health Information Technology that will “monitor treatments to make sure your doctor is doing what the federal government deems appropriate and cost effective.” Your medical treatments will be tracked electronically by the government to decide whether you're "too sick" to receive health care treatment. They will decide for you what scope of treatments should be made available to deal with your current ailment.
This will create a few government bureaucrat jobs but what does it have to do with stimulating the economy or job creation? It may very well hurt research and development in the medical field. Would this mean that terminally ill patients may not be able to get life extending treatment or that little old lady won't be able to get her hip replacement when a wheel chair costs less?
There are also provisions in it that basically end the welfare reform of the 90's by linking money given to the states to the numbers of folks on their welfare rolls, the more people that are on them the more money they get. Plus other massive expansions of entitlement spending on medicare, foodstamps and unemployment payments.
Barack Obama took over the airwaves the other night to claim there is no "pork" or earmarks in this porkubus generational theft act and in at least one respect he is correct. Pork is meat and there is no meat in this bill that would actually stimulate the economy. It is full of pure lard, pure artery clogging fat that is more likely to give the economy a heart attack while passing the bill on to our children's children and beyond.
Khaled Abu Toameh gave a talk recently to various Western journalists about Gaza and what the truth really is and his is a very interesting perspective since he hears both sides. Michael Totten was there and has posted it in full, I encourage you to go read it to learn what you never will from our press.
He speaks about the elections that brought Hamas to power in Gaza and why. He blames the West and even Israel for propping up and even legitimizing the openly corrupt PLO and Fatah which drove palestinians into the open arms of Hamas. I can see a lot of truth in what he is saying but you need to go read it for yourselves. He doesn't give cover for Hamas and doesn't blame Israel for wanting to protect their citizens he just tells the truth as he sees it from both sides of the fence.
Liberals and their allies in the green movement love to rail against oil companies and their seemingly enormous profits while threatening to impose additional taxes on them. The truth is oil companies pay about $3 in taxes for every after tax dollar they earn in profit and that is passed on to the consumer in the form of higher prices which are also taxed at the pump. My friend Jane at the American Petroleum Institute sent along this study they commissioned about the other affects higher taxes on them would bring on the American public. Not only would it cause the loss of hundreds of thousands of jobs it would burden the American people with higher energy bills but it would send an additional hundreds of billions of dollars to foreign suppliers of that oil and natural gas. Why not keep those jobs and that money here?
This comes along with news that the Obama team is stopping the exploration for oil and NG in Utah that Bush opened up, bad move, at the cost of jobs and government revenue from one of the few sources that is not from taxes. Why not open our vast reserves of oil and natural gas, by some estimates more than Saudi Arabia, to exploitation since it will create jobs and actually grow the economy.
I am not against green technology and future energy sources but until we get there we are going to need oil and natural gas till those technologies are developed and perfected to a cost sensible point without government subsidies to keep them going. There is one thing that all the greenies seem to miss is that even their alternatives have a cost to the environment equal to or greater than the use of fossil fuels.
Batteries for hybrid/electric cars, wind and solar power require metals that must be mined and refined often with far greater environmental impact and energy use than fossil fuels. Biofuels even of the the non-food based variety also require vast land resources that could be put to better uses than providing fuel, like parks and such or growing food. Wind power is unreliable, unattractive and very expensive to maintain and set up. Solar power is slowly getting very close to the cost/benefit line for certain parts of the country but still would be better for individual households and businesses than to run a grid on any large scale. Nuclear power remains the cleanest and most efficient producer of power there is and we need to expand its development.
The point is we need to expand our energy options not shrink them while at the same time expanding our economy not hamstringing it with excessive regulation and taxation that will only do more harm than good. That is just good old Barnyard common horse er goat sense.
Chaim Weizman once famously said that no state is given to a people on a silver salver. He was of course referring to the toil and effort of the early Zionist pioneers and to the thousands of Jewish soldiers who gave their lives in defense of their country. Many people erroneously believe that Israel was magnanimously handed to the Jewish people by the UN. They fail to recognize the hundred years prior in which Jews came from all over the world to establish themselves in Israel. Jews worked to raise money to purchase land through the Jewish National Fund. The Zionist leaders established schools and hospitals, and built the political infrastructure that would later become the Israeli Knesset.
The zeitgeist of the time, and the newest method of destroying Israel, is "the two-state solution". The UN has declared negotiations "irrevocable", and the US and the Mid-East Quartet have committed themselves fully to advancing this policy. It is an accepted dogma that the solution to the current problem is a sovereign state for "the Palestinian people". Billions of dollars have been poured into this project, as well as countless summits, meetings, UN resolutions and diplomatic tours. Anyone who is a "moderate" accepts the necessity of such a solution.
Especially due to the fact that the "Palestinian" narrative is largely a product of historical revisionism, there is little reason why the "Palestinians" are deserving of a state. In the 60 years since the so-called "Nakba", the Arabs of Gaza, Judea and Samaria have produced or contributed little to the world at large, besides terror and hatred. The Arabs have languished in camps, hotbeds of fundamentalism and extremism, and have never sought to improve their situations. Rather, they use their own desperation, actual and imagined, as a weapon against Israel. They justify their repeated murderous attacks on Jewish civilians and refusal to come to a peace agreement as a result of Israeli aggression, occupation or supposed war-crimes. Somehow, the world has come to accept that "Palestinians" are entitled to depraved behaviour as a result of what they believe to be historical crimes against them. Incredibly, the Jews who founded Israel never resorted to this. Israel arose out of the ashes of Auschwitz. The evil the Jews suffered at the hands of the Nazis far outweighs any indignities the Arabs have ever suffered. The survivors of the Nazi death camps did not turn to suicide bombings and murder, but rather re-built their lives in Israel. Having lost their entire families, with barely any possessions, they became doctors, professors, artists, writers and contributed to society. Similarly, the close to a million Sephardic Jews who were expelled from Arab countries were not permitted to languish in camps. They are now an integral part of Israeli society.
Various UN organizations, as well as the US and EU, have spent billions of dollars on the "Palestinians". None of this has been used to build schools or hospitals. Children in Gaza barely know how to read and write, yet their are all experts at explosives and handling weapons. They may not be familiar with literature, math or history, but they will all proudly proclaim their deepest desire to grow up to be a shaheed, to kill Jews, the highest honour. When Israel left Gaza in 2005, it transfered to the Arabs billions to built their society. Instead, they used this money to buy rockets and missiles. The Jews of Gush Katif left behind greenhouses for the Arabs to use. Rather than creating a flourishing economy, they destroyed the greenhouses in a fanatical frenzy. This is a civilization that does not create, but destroys. It is a perverse culture which dances in the streets and gives out candy as Jews are murdered, as they did on 9/11.
It has been said that the Arabs never miss an opportunity to miss an opportunity. Despite the efforts of the international community, the "Palestinians" have never shown themselves deserving of a state. There is little central government in Judea, Samaria and Gaza. When given the choice to vote for a government to represent them, they voted overwhelmingly for a terrorist organization committed to the destruction of Israel and the genocide of the Jews. This says a lot about the type of society in which they live. Would it be the wisest move to give such a people a country? Has there ever been a moment in "Palestinian" history when they have rejected terrorism and violence? Given the Islamic regime in Hamastan, it would be hard to argue that the world needs another Taliban-style Islamic country. If one looks at Gaza, Judea and Samaria, they will see the self-inflicted squalor of the Arabs. They will see a pseudo-state whose streets are overflowing with sewage because the pipes have been used for rockets.
The Zionist pioneers found a deserted wasteland, uninhabited for thousands of years. They proclaimed it a land without people for a people without a land. These self-sacrificing chaluztim made the deserts bloom, built cities in desolate land, and created life where there was none. The Arabs, on the other hand, have done nothing. They are not the sons of the desert, but rather its fathers. The corrupt leaders of the "Palestinians" pocketed international aid at the expense of their people. They raised generations of children on a steady diet of death and anti-semitism, instead of giving them basic skills necessary to running a country. They prefer to whine about what they endured 60 years ago instead of planning for their future. Looking at the tragic failure of the "Palestinians" in Gaza, Judea and Samaria, there is not reason to believe that they can sustain a state. Such a state will undoubtably be used as a launching pad for terror attacks against Israel and a bastion of repression and fundamentalism. They are a culture that worships death and is addicted to martyrdom. Generations of Arabs have been taught how to die for their faith, but they have not been taught how to live for it.
No state is given to a people of a silver salver. The "Palestinians" have certainly not earned the right to a state. They blame Israel for their current situation instead of taking responsibility for the poor choices they have made as a society: multiple wars against Israel, endless terror attacks, creating a culture of fanaticism and hatred. In the recent conflict in Gaza, they could not accept that the Israeli onslaught was because of 8 years of rocket bombardment from Gaza. This juvenile mindset cannot maintain a country. It would be one of the greatest human tragedies to uproot 100 000 Jews from their homes in Judea and Samaria, only to hand their land over to terrorists and their sympathizers. The Arabs simply do not deserve another state, especially one handed to them on the silver salver of UN humanitarian aid. "Palestine" has no industry, no infrastructure and is an assured failure. Israel will be forced to clean up the mess that the international community created in its backyard. Israel's leaders must have the courage to say no to what will assuredly be a Final Solution.
No this isn't another post about the congressional porkfest but rather one that involves real pork that sounds really really very tasty. I simply must try it someday.
The recipe is here and read through the comments at Hot Air to find some great ideas for variations. I would just add some caramelized onions to the original and baste it with honey while its smoking like I do my ribs. They use regular BBQ sauce though I bet a honey-mustard BBQ sauce would be awesome as well.
Contemplate the mangled bodies of your countrymen, and then say, 'What should be the reward of such sacrifices?' Bid us and our posterity to bow the knee, supplicate the friendship, and plough, and sow, and reap, to glut the avarice of the men who have let loose on us the dogs of war, to riot in our blood and hunt us from the face of the earth? If ye love wealth better than liberty, the tranquility of servitude than the animating contest of freedom, go from us in peace. We ask not your counsels or arms. Crouch down and lick the hands which feed you. May your chains sit lightly upon you, and may posterity forget that ye were our countrymen!"- Samuel Adams
