History
When we look at the different nationalities and cultural groups, one thing that seems always to stay the same…difference. These groups always have their own ideas about milestones that should be celebrated. Where many people might celebrate things like the baby’s first tooth, rolling over, smile, word, crawling, steps, and such, the Navaho Indian tribes in the Southwestern United States, who call themselves Diné, have a very different idea of what should be celebrated. This tribe have picked up on the most fun part of life, as the reason for celebration…that first laugh.
We all know how great it is to hear a baby laugh for the first time. It’s great fun, and if you happened to be the one to coax that first laugh out of the baby, it’s even more fun. The Navajo believe that a baby’s first laugh demonstrates their readiness and willingness to fully join their families in life and love. The Navajo people believe that the person who makes the child laugh is also very special. That person is given a great gift…they get to plan the party. It is that tradition, and it stipulates that the person who provoked the baby’s laugh hosts a ceremony and dinner to mark the occasion. The party is called a First Laugh Ceremony (A’wee Chi’deedloh). According to Navajo national Jaclyn Roessel, “This whole ceremony is really meant to show the baby how we’re supposed to be as Diné, as very generous people.”
When I first learned about the tradition, I thought…naïvely so, that it could almost be viewed as a “punishment” for being the one that made the child laugh…depending on the financial status of the person or the size of the family that would be invited. Of course, that is silly. The Navajo people consider it an honor to be that one that brought the laughter. They become very special. I suppose it could almost be like becoming the child’s godparent. In the Navajo tradition, it goes deeper than that. The Navajo believe that newborn babies first live in the world of the Diyin Dine’e, the Holy People. Tradition has it that they stay in this temporary place before they can join their earthly families. As the tradition continues, the Diyin Dine’e are the first people, subjects of the most important myths and stories in Navajo culture. When a baby is first born, the Navajo believe the child lives among the Holy People, until the first time the baby laughs. The act of laughing is a sign the child is transitioning from the spirit world with the Diyin Dine’e and is ready to fully join his or her family in life. This might seem far-fetched, but many people believe that babies and children have the unique ability to see Jesus and the angels. In fact, in Christian belief, many people believe that these children, when they are seen specking to an “imaginary” friend, are actually speaking to Jesus or to their angels. The two beliefs are not really that different. I believe that the “holy people” are, in fact, Jesus and his angels.
Because of the significance that a baby’s first laugh holds in Navajo tradition, family members watch, wait, and listen intently to hear that first utterance of a giggle. Parents, siblings, cousins, grandparents, and just about anyone who is close to the family will try their best to get that first laugh, from silly faces to tickles, and everything in between. I guess they have already planned fo any cost and are already planning the whole thing in their heads. Then, when that special time arrives, when that precious first laugh comes, it’s time to celebrate the journey to their earthly family and welcome this new life into the community with a Navajo First Laugh Ceremony!!
A full year before Nevado del Ruiz, the highest active volcano in the Andes Mountains of Colombia, erupted on November 13, 1985, the mountain began to show warning signs. The people living in the surrounding area, especially the town of Armero, were warned of a pending eruption, but a year is a long time to wait for a predicted eruption to occur, and after a while, the people began to consider the warnings to be false alarms. After a time, life went back to “business as usual” as the people believed the warnings were like a predicted blizzard that never materializes.
When the predicted eruption began on November 13, 1985, the people though they had been right, and the area had dodged a bullet, because the eruption was actually considered a mild one. The eruption produced a series of lava flows that surged over the volcano’s broad ice-covered summit. the super-heated lave became flowing mixtures of water, ice, pumice, and 
other rock debris that poured off the summit and sides of the volcano, forming “lahars” that flooded into the river valleys surrounding Ruiz. A lahar is a destructive mudflow on the slopes of a volcano. The lahars joined normal river channels, filling them to flood levels. To make matters worse the situation was exacerbated by heavy rain. Within four hours of the eruption, the lahars had traveled over 60 miles, killing more than 23,000 people, injuring over 5,000, and destroying more than 5,000 homes. The town of Armero was the hardest hit, losing three quarters of its 28,700 inhabitants. The lahars destroyed everything in their paths: roads, bridges, farm fields, aqueducts and telephone lines. They wiped out 50 schools, two hospitals, in addition to the more than 5,000 homes. The region lost 60 percent of its livestock, 30 percent of grain and rice crops, and half a million bags of coffee. 7,500 people were left homeless.
Because there had been ample warning, the losses could have been minimal, if the people living in the river valley had moved to higher ground. It’s not completely their fault. We humans, have a tendency to lose faith in what we have been told, when thing don’t happen immediately. After a year of hearing that the volcano was going to erupt, people began to think that the vulcanologists were wrong. Then, when it did start, it didn’t seem to be the horrendous eruption that had been predicted. All this led to a lack of a feeling of urgency, and thereby, they death of 23,000 people. So very sad that we could so carelessly refuse to take heed.
One day in 1917, a stray pit bull mix wandered onto the Yale University campus. Normally this would have meant a call to the local dog pound, but the dog rather attached himself to members of the 102nd Infantry Regiment, who were training at the school that day. While it was a bit unorthodox, the lost pup fit right in. He “volunteered” to participate in drills and quickly learned to salute with his right paw. He really seemed to want to enlist in the Army. The antics and intelligence of the dog quickly won the heart of Private James Robert Conroy, who decided to adopt the dog. He named the dog Stubby, because of his short, stubby tail. When it came time for the unit to ship out, Private Conroy couldn’t leave Stubby behind, so he smuggled him on board the troop ship. As they were getting off the ship in France, he hid Stubby under his overcoat…somehow without detection again. When Conroy’s commanding officer finally did discover Stubby, there might have been trouble, but Stubby saluted him, just as he had been trained to in camp, and the commanding officer couldn’t resist. He allowed the dog to stay on board.
Stubby was a soldier all the way. He didn’t enlist to sit around and do nothing. While in France, in the trenches, Stubby was exposed to mustard gas. “Mustard gas or sulfur mustard is a chemical compound belonging to the sulfur-based family of cytotoxic and blister agent chemical warfare agents known as sulfur-mustards or mustard agents. The name mustard gas is widely used, but it is technically incorrect: the substance does not actually vaporize into a gas, but instead disperses as a fine mist of liquid droplets.” After Stubby recovered, he returned to the frontlines with his own specially-designed gas mask. The exposure to the mustard gas, combined with a dog’s heightened sense of smell, allowed Stubby to warn the 102nd of imminent poison gas attacks. Stubby also learned how to locate wounded soldiers during patrols, a very important part of his job. While technically a mascot, Stubby earned the rank of sergeant after he spotted a German spy and attacked the stunned man until reinforcements arrived. In his 18 months of service, Stubby participated in 17 battles, survived a series of wounds, and provided a much-needed boost to the morale of his fellow soldiers.
When World War I was over, Sergeant Stubby, as a decorated hero made his way back to the United States with Conroy. By this time, the dog now outranked his owner, and had become a national icon. Sergeant Stubby was invited to lead parades and was given awards until his death in 1926. Stubby died in his sleep on March 16, 1926. After his death he was preserved via taxidermy and his cremains were sealed inside of the mount. In 1956, Conroy decided to present Stubby to the Smithsonian. The taxidermy mount of the dog is part of the permanent collection at the Smithsonian National Museum of American History. It is currently on display in their “Price of Freedom: Americans at War” exhibit.
Our Veterans…the cream of the crop. The strong and the brave. Those ones, with courage to last for days. We really cannot say enough about our brave fighting mem and women, who are willing to give up time with family and friends, to go out and fight, sometimes giving their lives so that other people…often unknown to them can live free. There should be a day to honor them. How could we not have such a day? It would be unthinkable. And so, today, we honor them. Those who served and came home again…some to face disability, PTSD, and sadness over the ones who didn’t make it home. We honor them, because they did what we were unable to do. While we sit at home, hopefully praying for our fighting men and women, they bravely took to the battleground, in the air, on land, and sea. Yes, not all served in wartime, but at any moment, all of them knew that it could become wartime.
I can’t say what it is that makes a soldier, because each probably has their own reasons for enlisting, but 
before they become a soldier, each has to make a decision that they will serve their country and willingly go wherever they are told, often without having a say in the matter. Some assignments are great, taking the soldier and family to exotic places, but some are so dangerous that the soldier cannot take his/her family along because it would be unsafe for them. Still, dangerous or not, the soldier bravely goes, and tries to be a credit to his/her uniform.
I am very proud of our veterans. They have served this country proudly. They took orders when they knew it could mean they lose their lives. That is a rare thing these days, when civil unrest is the norm. Many people would never consider a life or even an enlistment period, because they don’t think they would be appreciated. They don’t want to risk coming home only to be vilified, when in reality, they are the heroes. Veterans Day is a day to celebrate the soldiers who faced it all, and came back home to their families. To all of you…thank you for your service, and Happy Veterans Day!!
In reality, they gave science a bad name. The calculations made by German scientists before the invasion of Leningrad was launched in September of 1941, estimated that as many as 30 million Russian civilians would succumb to starvation. Hitler’s plan was to annihilate the Russian population and establish new German colonies in Eastern Europe. Hitler had a very specific idea of “the perfect race” and he would stop at nothing to achieve his goal.
The people of Leningrad would experience Hitler’s cold German indifference to suffering firsthand. I suppose “German indifference” isn’t totally fair, because many of the German people were against the cruelty Hitler was so comfortable with. When the city was surrounded by September 1941, the Axis forces chose not to close in and engage in costly urban fighting, but to pound Leningrad from a safe distance and let hunger do the rest. They planned to block all transportation of vehicles in and out of the city, until all food ran out, and the people died from starvation.
Hitler’s plan left out one thing…a Surrender Option. The people could not surrender and live. They wanted then to die, and that was going to be their only option. Hitler’s direct order was to ignore the offer to surrender, saying “Requests for surrender resulting from the city’s encirclement will be denied, since the problem of relocating and feeding the population cannot and should not be solved by us.”
Hitler was ruthless. The city’s water and food supplies were cut off, and extreme famine soon set in. The siege of Leningrad began on September 8, 1941, and ended after a grueling two-year period on January 27, 1944. Yes, the siege produced starvation and disease, but Hitler took it a step further…to psychological torment. On Hitler’s orders, Leningrad suffered a daily barrage of artillery attacks from the German and Finnish forces that encircled it. The people were already starving, and lack of food or drink for long periods of time, can make something like an artillery attack, be that much more unsettling…even to the point of more than terror. They are dealing with gnawing hunger, and the terror of wondering if the artillery will hit them, and they should be, because Hitler would not care if he hit a civilian, accidently or on purpose. The people had no recourse, and no way out. After 872 days of starvation, disease, and the artillery attacks, the citizens of Leningrad…the ones who 
were left anyway, were freed, but to what. Their city had been overtaken, many had family members who had died, their businesses were gone, their homes were gone…they had lost it all. In total, roughly 1.5 million people were killed during the siege of Leningrad while some 1.4 million were evacuated. I’m sure Hitler was still disappointed with the outcome, because he wanted them all dead.
There were a number of events that took place on June 6, 1944, also known as D-Day. The areas of the Allied attack were miles away from each other. Early that morning, the Allies dropped thousands of allied paratroopers behind enemy lines in anticipation of the invasion of Normandy. It seems a strange idea to drop them behind enemy lines…like it was a big mistake. Nevertheless, one of the main objectives of the 101st Airborne was to capture the small village of Angoville-au-Plain. Then, when intense fighting broke out over the village, they dropped two American medics, Robert Wright and Kenneth Moore, in to set up a medical station in the tiny town 
church. So, now they had not only had troops behind the lines, but they have medics…without guns behind the lines too.
The plan to take over the village worked quickly and well. United States paratroopers established control of Angoville-au-Plain, but just as quickly, German units counterattacked and forced American troops back. Because of multiple injuries, Wright and Moore stayed behind. Suddenly they found themselves in danger when German soldiers entered the church. At first the German soldiers were hostile to the Americans, but then they realized that the medics were treating their wounded, as well the Allied wounded. The German troops could have attacked the men, and walked away without penalty, but instead, they left, posting a Red Cross flag at the entrance.
The fighting in the area raged on for three days, and the village changed hands several times, but the two medics never missed a beat. Over the course of the three days, they saved 80 lives, including a local teenager. The amazing part of the whole thing wasn’t just that they saved the lives, but also that the German soldiers didn’t kill them 
in the first place. I’m sure the medics thought that was an amazing thing. The little village of Angoville-au-Plain thought is was amazing too…not just the work of the medics, but also the work of the 101st Airborne. They thought it was amazing enough to make sure it was remembered
Today, all of the stained glass windows in the church (the originals were destroyed in the battle) are tributes to Wright, Moore, and the 101st Airborne. Wright visited the church in 2004, and some of his ashes were spread in Angoville-au-Plain’s cemetery as per his request, following his death on December 21, 2013. Moore passed away on December 7, 2014.
Most people believe that a there was always a two term limit on the office of the President of the United States, but that wasn’t always so. On November 5, 1940 Franklin D Roosevelt broke a long-held precedent, but not a law. The precedent was one that started with George Washington, when he became the first president elected to a third term. Roosevelt would go on to vie for, and win a fourth term, taking office again on January 20, 1945.
Roosevelt was the first president to win four terms, and the last president to win more than two consecutive presidential elections. His exclusive four terms were in part a consequence of timing. His election for a third term took place as the United States remained in the throws of the Great Depression and World War II had just begun. FDR (as he was known) was not the first president to try for multiple terms, but the instability of the times allowed him to make a strong case for stability…and how he, alone, could make that happen.
Says Barbara Perry, professor and director of presidential studies at the University of Virginia’s Miller Center, “You have economic-domestic issues and you have foreign policy with the outbreak of World War II in 1939. And then you have his own political viability—he had won the 1936 election with more than two-thirds of the popular vote.” It wasn’t that FDR’s policies were necessarily good for the country, and in fact, it is my opinion that most were disastrous, but since I was not born during FDR’s time in office, I suppose my only proof is history, and there are two sides to every story. All we can do is to look back at just how long it took to pull this nation out of the Great Depression, and draw our own conclusion from there. Anytime economic policies bring about big government, they hurt the American people.
The fact remains that any politician who is in office too long is a danger to this nation. I believe that we need to have term limits in every office there is. When a politician is in office too long, they begin to act like a dictator, and think that they don’t have to answer to anyone. Too much power in any one person’s hands creates greed and evil. Eventually, the United States lawmakers began to argue that term limits were necessary to keep abuse of power in check. FDR passed away on April 12, 1945, less than 3 months into his fourth term. Two years after FDR’s death, Congress passed the 22nd Amendment, limiting presidents to two terms. Then amendment was then ratified in 1951. At the time of FDR’s third presidential run, however, “There was nothing but precedent standing in his way, but, still, precedent, especially as it relates to the presidency, can be pretty powerful,” said Perry. A third consecutive run had been tried by other presidents, but they had failed. People really don’t want that.
The idea of needing term limits was not found among the framers of the Constitution, most of whom did not see the need. I’m sure they never considered man’s ability to be greedy and power-hungry, but Washington saw the importance, thus the precedent in not seeking re-election for a third time. Still, some had tried. 
Ulysses S Grant lost a third campaign in 1880, when James Garfield clinched the Republican nomination. Theodore Roosevelt lost his bid at a third nonconsecutive term in 1912 to William Howard Taft (he had previously served out the remainder of President William McKinley’s term and then won reelection). And Woodrow Wilson lost the Democratic nomination in 1920. Harry Truman, who succeeded FDR after his death, was president when the 22nd Amendment passed and so was exempt from the new rule. Truman campaigned for a third term in 1952, but withdrew after losing in the New Hampshire primary. Roosevelt’s campaign for a third term took place as the United States had not yet entered World War II, and the president was still trying to hold the line in an isolationist pattern…another of his disastrous policies. And just one more reason to make term limits in all public offices mandatory.
Those who support Socialism, Marxism, and Communism have simply never lived under these forms of government, or they are a part of the upper echelon of such a government. People who have been forced to live under these types of government, will ultimately try to find a way of escape or will participate in a national uprising, such as the one that happened in Hungary in 1956.
Sadly, by the time the people realize that they are in serious trouble, the government often has such a chokehold on the nation that the only way out if to have an uprising. Nevertheless, people will eventually fight for their rights, or fight to escape. While the uprising in Hungary began in October 1956, when thousands of protesters took to the streets demanding a more democratic political system and freedom from Soviet oppression, the real problem started long before that. It started when the Communist Party took over and began to systematically take away the rights of the people. There were a few people within the party who could see through the Communist Party’s ideas. When party officials appointed Imre Nagy, a former premier who had been dismissed from the party for his criticisms of Stalinist policies, as the new premier, he began to try to restore peace and asked the Soviets to withdraw their troops. The Soviets did so, but Nagy then tried to push the Hungarian revolt forward by abolishing one-party rule. He also announced that Hungary was withdrawing from the Warsaw Pact (the Soviet bloc’s equivalent of NATO).
This forced the hand of the Soviet government. On November 4, 1956, Soviet tanks rolled into Budapest to 
crush the national uprising, once and for all. Te fighting in the streets was vicious, but the Soviets’ greater power ensured their victory. The people had long been stripped of their weapons, and anything else that might have helped the achieve victory. At 5:20am Hungarian Prime Minister Imre Nagy announced the invasion to the nation in a grim, 35-second broadcast, declaring: “Our troops are fighting. The Government is in place.” He tried to reassure the people and keep hope alive, but within hours, Nagy sought asylum at the Yugoslav Embassy in Budapest. He was captured shortly thereafter and executed two years later. Nagy’s former colleague and imminent replacement, János Kádár, who had been flown secretly from Moscow to the city of Szolnok, 60 miles southeast of the capital, prepared to take power with Moscow’s backing. The conspiracy was complete, and the people had been betrayed…even their leader.
The people of the West were stunned by the Soviet action. Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev had promised to retreat from the Stalinist policies and repression of the past, but the violent actions in Budapest told of a different plan. An out of control government will always chose its own greedy ways over the good of the people it is supposed to serve. On that day, an estimated 2,500 Hungarians died and 200,000 more fled as refugees. Sporadic armed resistance, strikes, and mass arrests continued for months thereafter, causing substantial economic disruption. The spontaneous national uprising that began 12 days before in Hungary was viciously crushed by Soviet tanks and troops on November 4, 1956.
Many Hungarians were angered and frustrated by the inaction on the part of the United States. Voice of America radio broadcasts and speeches by President Dwight D Eisenhower and Secretary of State John Foster Dulles had recently suggested that the United States supported the “liberation” of “captive peoples” in communist nations, but they didn’t see that playing out in their situation. During that time, approximately 30,000 Hungarian refugees were allowed to enter the United States. Yet, as Soviet tanks bore down on the protesters, the United States did nothing beyond issuing public statements of sympathy for their plight.
Politics is always a dirty game. That is probably why most of us don’t like career politicians. They will do or say anything to win or further their careers. “Dirty politics” has been around as long as there have been politicians…and politics isn’t even limited to just politicians. There’s office politics, military politics, law enforcement politics, and more.
General George Washington wasn’t even exempt. In October 1777, while serving as the commander of the Continental Army, Washington was informed of a conspiracy to discredit him with Congress and have him replaced by General Horatio Gates. The loosely organized attempt was supposedly led by Brigadier General Thomas Conway, who was an Irish member of the French army. Conway commanded a brigade in Washington’s army, and he was unhappy with Washington’s performance in the Battle of Brandywine. Conway was also bragging about his own feats at the same operation. Conway was even so bold as to request a promotion for himself, to the rank of major general…based on the merits of his “performance” in the battle. Washington protested Conway’s promotion and was irritated by the request, believing it would have disastrous effects on the morale of more senior officers. I think the biggest problem was the arrogance of Conway. It just isn’t right to brag on yourslf so much.
Thomas Conway, would be made inspector general of the United States less than two months later on December 14, but it is my belief that it was in an effort to pigeon-hole hime, because he was an embarrassment. Conway, was born in Ireland, but raised in France. He entered the French army in 1749. Silas Deane, the American ambassador to France, recruited Conway to the Patriot cause. Conway met with Washington at Morristown in May 1777, after which, he was appointed brigadier general and assigned to Major General John Sullivan’s division. Conway served admirably under Sullivan at the battles of Brandywine, in September 1777, and Germantown, in October 1777, before becoming involved in an unconfirmed conspiracy to remove General Washington from command of the Continental Army. It ruined his military career.
Conway wasn’t alone in the cabal. The Continental Army had suffered several defeats in the fall of 1777, and some members of Congress felt it was Washington’s leadership that was to blame. Conway began writing letters to prominent leaders, including General Horatio Gates, that were critical of Washington. After Washington got wind of Conway’s letter to General Gates, he wrote his own letter to Congress in January 1778. Conway was embarrassed, and in March 1778, he offered his resignation as an apology. Nevertheless, he was surprised and humiliated when Congress accepted. After General John Cadwalader wounded him in a duel defending Washington’s honor, Conway returned to France, where he died in exile in 1800…unable to recover his dignity after the horrific Conway Cabal.
For a number of years Israel had no place to call home. That sounds like a strange thing, but for the nation of Israel, it was not a new thing. Biblical history tells us of a number of times that Israel’s God-given land was taken from them for a time, and they were taken into captivity. Even after the captivity the Jewish people were displaced from their promised land. They were also persecuted and subject to racial discrimination.
That began to change when on November 2, 1917, Foreign Secretary Arthur James Balfour wrote an important letter to Britain’s most illustrious Jewish citizen, Baron Lionel Walter Rothschild, expressing the British government’s support for a Jewish homeland in Palestine. I can only imagine how the Baron felt. This was like having someone offer you the moon. It was something the Jew never thought they would see again. Many didn’t think they would live long enough to see it. The letter would eventually become known as the Balfour Declaration, and it was the start of something good.
Because of concerns over the direction World War I was going, the British were very supportive of the Zionist movement. Lloyd George among others, held a genuine belief in the righteousness of Zionism, but Britain’s leaders also hoped that a statement supporting Zionism would help gain Jewish support for the Allies. On November 2, Balfour sent his letter to Baron Rothschild, who was a prominent Zionist and a friend of Chaim Weizmann, stating that: “His Majesty’s Government view with favor the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people.”
The influence of the Balfour Declaration on the course of post-war events was immediate: According to the “mandate” system created by the Versailles Treaty of 1919, Britain was entrusted with the administration of Palestine, with the understanding that it would work on behalf of both its Jewish and Arab inhabitants. In 1948, the Balfour Declaration was scheduled to expire and Great Britain would no longer rule Palestine. The future of the Jewish people was at stake. The question over what to do with the 
turbulent country was turned over to the United Nations. They, at the insistence of President Harry Truman, eventually decided to create the new country of Israel, specifically as a promised homeland for Jewish people. The new country was to be located across the various holy locations in which many events of the Old Testament occurred. The Jewish people were back in the promised land.
That was when United States President Harry Truman became the first world leader to officially recognize Israel as a legitimate Jewish state. On May 14, 1948, only eleven minutes after its creation the decree was delivered. His decision came after much discussion and advice from the White House staff, all of whom had differing viewpoints. Some advisors felt that creating a Jewish state was the only proper response to the Holocaust and would benefit American interests. Others took the opposite view, concerned about that the creation of a Jewish state would create more conflict in an already tumultuous region. No matter what happens, it was the right thing to do.
