I’m Embarrassed, too.                                         July 20, 2021

by Susan Page Coffee

 

Are you proud to be an American?

 

Several Georgetown University coeds answered in an informal campus reporter interview before this past July 4^th that ‘no, they were not proud, and that they even found America embarrassing.’

 

I find something embarrassing, too:  that America has unfortunately produced you.  You, the ignorant, the insipid, the spoiled-rotten, the empty-brained private university students who could fit what you know about America’s history in your airpod cases – with the airpods in them.

 

If you knew anything of the greatness of this country and those who have sacrificed for it - and for you - not the poison that your worthless, leftest professors of history teach - you would hide your face in shame. Or should.

 

I’m embarrassed - and sure - that you will not find America’s greatness in the social media echo chamber where you hang out and look for all answers. Or, in a biased Google search. Or, on the same Wikipedia that its co-founder recently said was distinctly one-sided, left-sided.

 

I’m embarrassed that your shallow proclamations may have disturbed the peace of the thousands of World War I, World War II, Korean and Vietnam War veterans buried beneath the hallowed soil of Arlington National Cemetery. Or across the world in American cemeteries in Europe, the Philippines, and even China. Have you ever even been curious about those Americans who died in some far-off land fighting for the freedom of the French or the Filipinos or the Vietnamese against Hitler’s fascism, Imperial Japan’s aggression, or Mao’s and Stalin’s Communism? Or here at home fighting in the bloodiest war in American history to free slaves?

 

Or the loved ones left behind?

 

Do you find the firefighters and police who died climbing up the stairs of the World Trade Center to rescue people embarrassing? Or, the brave souls who overcame the hijackers on flight 92? How about the men and women in police uniforms who every day put their lives on the line to, among other things, make it safe for you to walk alone to your dorm parking lot to get in your new BMW or to jog along the Potomac at dusk?

 

Is it embarrassing that American men and women in uniform protecting our nation die every day in training accidents – leaving wives and children behind like my late husband John Ditto did while training in a Harrier jet in the Marine Corps? Joy was 10 and Kyle only 6.

 

I guess those almost 600 American Navy and Air Force pilots and airmen held as prisoners of war in North Vietnam in a horrific, filthy prison – some as long as 9 years – being tortured and isolated are an embarrassment to you. Like Navy pilots Everett Alvarez who survived 9 years and Jerry Coffee 7 years as POWs. Their love for this country, the United States of America, its founding principles, its institutions, and its Constitution to which they took an oath of allegiance are what kept them going all those long years of separation, torture, and deprivation. Embarrassing, right? What chumps!

 

Mostly I’m embarrassed that you don’t get this:  people don’t risk life and limb to come to countries that are embarrassing. People aren’t breaking the law to get into Cuba, China, Venezuela, or North Korea. Or, being honest, many other countries in the world – even so-called democracies.

 

I guess embarrassment of your country would have to include your IPhone 12, Apple Watch, Smart TV, internet service, Google, Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, or by flying on American or United to Maui for spring break. And by the car you drive, fast food you eat, clothes you order on Amazon? Your medical care, birth-control pills, and shots to keep you from getting polio – and Covid. All of these inventions, platforms, and discoveries were made possible by the freedom to innovate American Capitalism creates. Capitalism has not only provided the opportunity for a higher standard of living for all Americans, but has exported those opportunities to large and small nations across the world. A starving and failing Communist China with it’s 2 billion people today enjoys a middle class and high living standard due to US trade agreements resulting in almost all our manufacturing being done in China. (And for this gift, China vows to bury us?)

 

I am personally never embarrassed when volunteering in Africa and find thousands of Americans from US churches there year-round serving the poor. Almost 100% American. These generous folks, young and old, give up their time and money to travel halfway across the world to represent the US and their faith-in-action to help the less fortunate.

 

What have you done in that regard?

 

The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development in Paris finds Americans at the very top in generosity compared to other nations. Don and Deyon Stephens, Americans, founded the faith-based, Texas-based Mercy Ships organization in 1978 that now sends hospital ships all over the globe providing free medical care and life-saving surgeries to the world’s neediest populations. Clearly an embarrassing case of American colonialism.

 

I could go on and on about the greatness of the United States of America. But you and your ignorance-based embarrassment are a dead-end waste of thought. You and your allies take up space that could be filled by the freedom-loving immigrants from any dozens of oppressive governments. They are so not embarrassed by the U.S. and don’t get your embarrassment at all.

 

I think I’ll just cancel you, like your generation is so fond of doing. And, I’ll vow that till my dying day I will celebrate, fight for, and pray for the most charitable, free, prosperous, and God-blessed nation in the world. America the beautiful.

 

It’s ironic that America was created from a simple God given desire by immigrants for independence from a big, over powering government – the same kind of government that your generation of airpod heads are now embarrassingly (and dangerously) embracing.

 

 

 

 

Ringing in a New Season

 Midweek -- Coffee Break

September 9th 2013

    I love football. I don’t celebrate New Years on January first, I celebrate on August 15th or whatever August date the NFL schedules it’s first preseason practice games each year. That’s how I measure the passing of another year; out of the darkness into the light.

        I have always loved football. When I was a little kid I drew pictures of football players in the uniforms and colors of all the California teams; the red and gold of the Forty-Niners playing in the old Kezar stadium in Golden Gate Park with my dad and granddad cheering on our quarterback heroes Frankie Albert and Y.A.Tittle. And of course the blue and gold of their nemesis, the L.A. Rams with their distinctive ram horn helmets one of the first truly imaginative helmet designs; what a spectacle in that “huge” L.A. Coliseum built to host the ’32 Olympics.

      And speaking of blue and gold, how about them “mighty Golden Bears” of U.C.  Berkeley,... “the mighty Golden Bear, is loosing all his hair, his teeth fell out, he’s got the gout, he don’t know what it’s all about” remember that song; sung to any tune? Of course just across the bay in Palo Alto we find the Bear’s traditional rivals, Stanford University (the Indians before they became the Cardinals), with the simple understated red “S” on their white helmets.
    
       Heading back down south to that grand Coliseum we see the maroon and gold of the USC Trojans...about whom I shall not speak. And in quaint Westwood bordering poshy Bel Aire, live their across town rivals, the sky blue jerseys, light brown pants and those metalic gold helmets of the UCLA Bruins. I was a  matriculating “bruin” during the heady days of Coach Red Sanders who ran one of the few remaining Single Wing formations. I’ll never forget Sports Illustrated’s centerfold featuring the national champion bruins serpentining out of the huddle with Primo Villanueva at Tailback.

        Every football season of my boyhood, when my best friend and I were not playing pick up touch football on the soft grass of the Junior College lawn, we would play “Photo Electric Football” by the hour. We called  ourselves by the NFL teams of the day; Bears, Giants, Packers, Bengals, Redskins, Chiefs and so on. We kept close track of our Win/Loss records. I guess that was as close to a Fantasy League as we could get in those days.
     
     Later on, I played quarterback for the Modesto High Panthers, but not very successfully. We had the worst team in 28 years, but I still loved it.  I played intramural flag football all through college and during my time in Pre-flight at Pensacola, Florida. After earning my wings, I played intramural flag football again for my squadron team at the Naval Air Station in Jacksonville Florida. I loved playing football, I tell you.

      In the fall of “62 we had an important game so I borrowed a pair of cleats from a friend. The first time I ran with the ball, I planted my foot to turn up field, the cleats dug in as my body pivoted, but my foot didn’t. I heard and felt a pop in my knee as cartilage and ligament tore. As I went to the turf I saw stars of all colors, and my football playing days were over. I was able to rehab the knee in time to deploy to Key West later in October for low level recce flights over Cuba.

     That injury was the beginning of a 53 year relationship with my cranky left knee, the most recent chapters being two consecutive unsuccessful knee replacement surgeries, the outcome of which is still to be determined.

     But you know, I still love football. For me, the beautiful Fall colors are the sky blue and gold of the Bruins, the red and gold of the Niners, and the black and green of the Warriors...my adopted home team.

The First Navy Jack's Significance

Midweek--Coffee Break
August 21st 2013
 
  Two weeks ago I was privileged to attend the “Change of Command” ceremony  whereby the command of all Pacific submarines “Commander Submarine Force US Pacific Fleet” (COMSUBPAC) transitioned from one Naval Officer to the next. All such Naval ceremonies are steeped in tradition, but this one--held on the deck of the submarine USS Jacksonville--in which one Rear Admiral replaces another Rear Admiral is especially so.
     Because the transition of such great responsibility as a Naval Command is so significant, the change is marked by one specific moment of “relief”. After reading his/her orders from the Washington Bureau of Naval Personnel, the incoming officer smartly salutes the outgoing officer and says in a strong clear voice, “I relieve you, Sir”, whereby the outgoing officer returns the salute and says, “I stand relieved.” (and instantly a ten ton weight of responsibility shifts from the shoulders of one to the other).
     Of course there were congratulatory speeches by three and four star officers, introductions of families--several from afar, and praise for the enllisted COMSUBPAC staff, and the crew of the USS Jacksonville.
     There was, however, a new element on the scene, at least one which I had not seen before. Fixed to the Jacksonville’s deck only a few feet from the dias where the ceremony was taking place, was a sturdy flagpole only 10 feet or so high from which flew the “First Navy Jack”, the red and white striped flag superimposed upon which was a straight rattlesnake in a crawling position beneath which was the bold phrase, “Don’t Tread On Me”.
     This DTOM battle flag was used in 1775 by Commodore Esek Hopkins as his fleet gathered in the Delaware river before engaging the British Navy. This Navy Jack signaled that the entire Fleet was to attack the enemy. In May of 2002 the Secretary of the Navy decreed that this flag would be flown by all US Navy ships for the duration of the war on Global Terrorism...”as an historic reminder of the nation’s and the Navy’s origin, and will to persevere and triumph.”
     Indeed, over the decades prior to and during WWII just the thought of treading on a rattle snake in the American wild was enough to strike fear into the hearts of America’s enemies, and America has always been ready to strike back hard when “Tread” upon; from the Bay of Biscay, to the Spanish Maine to the Barbary Coast. From the American Revolution, to the War of 1812, to the Spanish American War the warning remained clear. Then after Pearl Harbor, from Midway Island, to the skies over the Coral Sea, and ultimately to the two ill fated Japanese cities hit by the first two atom bombs
     Then in the early 50s came the United Nations “police action” in Korea which resulted in a stand off, but we did preserve freedom for the South Korean people. Then after winning the Vietnam war militarily, we surrendered politically, literally inviting Communist North Vietnam to “tread” upon us and our Vietnamese allies. Now we have been in and out of Iraq and almost out of Afghanistan with no one even uttering the word victory. So of the four wars America has fought since WWII, none have resulted in clear cut victories. except for the one “decreed” over al Qaida by our President.
      How many times has our President threatend accountability and punishment for various terrorist crimes against American lives and property?  But except for Bin Laden, they have all been empty threats. Not in my lifetime has our foreign policy been so ineffectual, has our world leadership been so weak, has our influence been so low.
Our Commander in Chief should bone up on the origin of the First Navy Jack, and the actual meaning of “Don’t Tread On Me”.

A True American Patriot, Hero

MidWeek-- Coffee Break
August 5th 2013

As a kid’ I saw Gary Cooper in the movie, Sergeant York, the Tennessee sharpshooter of WWI fame. A Pacifist by nature, he became an unlikely hero  when, nearly single-handedly, he took out several German machine gun nests and captured 132 German soldiers.  According to the film, he picked off 17 of the gunners with his “Turkey Shoot” marksmanship.  Harkening back to the tactics of his youth, he made  turkey sounds (“gobble gobble gobble”).  When the curious German gunners raised their heads to check out the gobbling, he picked them off one by one. 

    Ultimately Sergeant York became one of the most decorated soldiers of WWI with the Congressional Medal of Honor (CMH), The Distinguished Service Cross (the Army’s highest), and the French Croix de Guerre.

    He used the money he made on the movie to start a Bible College.

    WWII’s Audie Murphie, product of a poor, Texas share croppin’ family, conned his way into the Army at age sixteen. From the liberation of Rome in 1944, to the invasion of France on “D-Day”, he was seriously wounded several times, and according to Wikipedia, was “awarded every US Military award for valor available from the US Army”. For his unprecedented heroism in battle--he stood unprotected atop a burning tank destroyer and single-handedly killed 50 enemy soldiers from an advancing German unit--he was awarded his CMH. 

    Perhaps even more significantly, his own post war “battle fatigue” or “shell shock”--the precursors of PTSD--actually drew the first attention to that post-combat syndrome for Korea and Vietnam Vets, and is now a well known reality of modern warfare.

     I am drawn to the stories of York and Murphy because we have just lost another hero, actually a hero’s hero, US Air Force Colonel (Ret.) George “Bud” Day, with whom I spent some intense times in North Vietnam. During a part of our overlapping time in the Hanoi Hilton, I had the privilege and honor to serve under his command in a cell bay of 30 or so men. He was the toughest man I’ll ever know, and because of that, our enemy went to extraordinary lengths just to break him.

    Before Vietnam, Bud had served in WWII as a US Marine in the Pacific theatre, and as an Air Force bomber pilot for two tours in Korea. By the time he retired from active duty, his dedication and bravery--especially in Vietnam--had garnered more than seventy medals and decorations. Second only to General Douglas McArthur (another 3 war warrior), Bud Day was the most highly decorated American Military Officer in modern history. 

     His capture and escape story is legendary. Shot down in an Air Force F-100 Super Sabre over North Vietnam, his arm and one knee were broken, and one eye damaged. Thinking he was hurt too badly to escape, his young guard’s inattention allowed him to escape into the country side. He roamed and evaded recapture near the DMZ for several days, was incapacitated by an exploding bomb or artillery shell, subsisted on berries and frogs, eventually swam across the Ben Hai river (the DMZ) into South Vietnam, and then, within sight of a US Army outpost, was shot in the hand and leg by Viet Cong guerrillas, recaptured, and returned to North Vietnam.

     For this heroic escape attempt and for his subsequent five and a half years of unyielding resistance to communist torture and isolation, and for his enduring inspirational leadership, he was awarded the CMH.

     Not content to rest on his laurels, and using his law degree earned between WWII and Korea, Bud spent his “retirement” years crusading for veteran’s benefits, winning expanded health coverage for Vets over 65.

     Last week in his Senate floor eulogy, John McCain said of our mutual friend; “He was the bravest man I’ve ever known, and his fierce resistance and resolute leadership set an example for all of us how to return home with honor.” 

     I last saw Bud a year ago here at Punch Bowl where the CMH society was dedicating a plaque as a part of it’s annual meeting. During our reunion, it was apparent, at age 87, he still intended to “burn out” going up. Colonel Bud Day...still an inspirational leader worth following.

Pilots Must Be Hands On

 Midweek--Coffee Break
July 22nd, 3013


The worst thing a Navy carrier pilot can do is to land short of the landing area on the flight deck. When that happens the airplane either hits the  deck where it curves down behind the ship (called the ramp), or it misses the flight deck altogether and hits the rear-most part of the ship beneath the ramp called the spud-locker. Either way it can ruin your whole day.

     For that reason, the pilot stays totally focused upon the details of landing aboard the ship safely, ie staying aligned with the centerline of the angled flight deck as the ship moves constantly to the right, flying exactly the right approach speed, and, most importantly, controlling the decreasing altitude to stay exactly on the right glide slope (this is the part that keeps you off the ramp and out of the spud-locker). 

     In the early sixties when I was flying the F-8 Crusader from the USS Saratoga in the Mediterranean Sea, we used an ingeneous landing aid consisting of a large concave mirror mounted on the left side of the flight deck. An amber spot light mounted aft of the mirror shown into the center of the mirror to reflect back up the glide slope for the pilot’s reference. The mirror was flanked on either side by a fixed horizontal row of green datum lights. If the pilot kept the reflection of the orange light (called the “meatball”), in line with the row of green datum lights, he was on the proper glide slope to land on the right spot on the deck where his tailhook would catch the arrestring cables. This glide slope could be adjusted for different aircraft types by changing the tilt of the mirror.

     This concept went through several refinements until the gyro-stabilized Fresnel lens beamed colored lights up the glide slope; green for above glide slope, amber for on glide slope, red for below, and flashing red for dangerously below.

     Ultimately, of course, the Automatic Carrier Landing System was developed whereby the planes flight controls and engine power settings are controlled by radar from the ship. Although touted as a “hands off” system, I never knew a pilot...including myself...who didn’t keep one hand loosely on the control stick and the other loosely on the throttle, ready to override the system instantly.

     All of this is pertinent because we have just witnessed Asiana Airline Flight 214 incur the equivalent of a major ramp strike with the entire tail section (along with two young passengers) ending up in the spud-locker of San Francisco Bay. The NTSB has barely commenced

 it’s investigation, but already, it’s not looking good for the pilots.  The flight control recorder indicated the pilots were using “auto-throttle” to maintain proper approach airspeed, but either it hadn’t been properly engaged or had failed and not noticed until the airspeed had dropped 30 knots below where it was supposed to be, and impact with the ground was immenent.

     A career United pilot who had spent over five years as an instructor pilot for Korean Airlines has suggested there could have also been cultural issues in play in the cockpit whereby a junior instructor pilot may have been reluctant to emphatically correct a more senior “student” pilot. He also personally observed the propensity of the Koreans-as he put it-to become overly dependent upon technology.

     Airline Captain “Sully” Sullenberger, who successfully ditched his bird stricken plane into the Hudson River 5 years ago with virtually no casualties said “Pilots must be engaged, aware, and mentally flying the airplane even when it’s actually being flown by a computer.”

     It is becoming more clear that none of the four Asiana pilots was keeping one hand “loosely on the control stick (yoke) and the other loosely on the throttle.”

Coffee Break

 Midweek--Coffee Break
July 17th 2013


“This is the most transparent Administration in history.”      

                              Barack Obama; White House “Fireside Hangout” hosted on line by Google, February 13th, 2013

    As Saturday Night Live’s would be newscaster, Seth Meyers, would say in reply, “REALLY, Mr. President!”

    One of the most basic tenets of good leadership is maintaining--nay, demanding--timely communications with one’s subordinates up and down the chain of command.

    A good leader will have a well promulgated standing policy in place that his/her subordinates will instantly communicate anything that could possibly bring embarrassment to the organization or to the leader. A good leader should never be surprised.

    That Barack Obama would like Americans to believe he knew nothing about the IRS targeting conservative groups..”I first learned about this from the same news reports that I think most people learned about them”...he simply confirms our growing suspicians that his leadership is seriously lacking, OR that he commands no loyalty from his subordinates, OR that his operating MO is to insure denyability of any wrongdoing, OR that he is simply lying.  Yes, lying, not mis-speaking, not skirting the truth, but flat out lying...like it or not.

    Good leaders meet controversy head on and stay out ahead of it, but Mr. Obama, is in such a state of denial he lies even when the truth would serve him better. He is currently so overwhelmed by scandals on every side to the point of near helplessness, all to the worsening plight of our economy, our foreign policy, our national security, and certainly our confidence in government. As the President himself recently prophisized, “when we lose faith in our government, then we have problems”. REALLY, Mr President!

    The whys and wherefores of the Benghazi tragedy are still the subject of an “ongoing investigation” and cannot be discussed; not even the President’s and Secretary of State’s whereabouts throughout that evening after leaving the White House ops center and her State Dept office respectively early on while our Ambassador and three other Americans were murdered by Islamic terrorists, none of whom have been “brought to justice” as our President promised...but then what’s just another Presidential promise?

    In the meantime the leadership of the Justice Department and the IRS mirror the style of their Supreme Leader, Mr Obama himself. Lois Lerner, who headed the Non Profits division of the IRS which targeted only conservative  groups seeking non profit status refused to testify to a congressional hearing by pleading the Fifth Amendment, a rarely used tactic to avoid incrimination. Her lawyer swears she is innocent of any wrong-doing so one wonders just whom she is protecting.

    Eric Holder, the President’s old Chicago Mafia buddy whom he appointed US Attorney General continues his lying habits to Congress by denying any knowlege of or role in the unconstitutional persecution of Newsman James Rosen, which transcripts show he clearly did. He has previously lied under oath about the DOJ process resulting in not prosecuting Black Panthers for flagrant voter intimidation in the election of 2008. He also denyed any knowlege of the ill fated “Fast and Furious” DOJ program shipping guns to Mexico hoping to follow their trail to Cartel kingpins. DOJ records revealed Holder did in fact know of the program. One of the guns was traced to the incident in which Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry was killed.

    Our President is currently watching the riots in Turkey directed against Prime Minister Erdogan who is inexorably (like a frog in gradually boiling water) leading his country (and our NATO ally) toward a more rigid form of anti American Islam. Yet he continues to praise Erdogan as “one of America’s closest friends”. Sayonara Egypt...and soon Turkey. Great foreign policy!

    And in the background of all this is the continuing saga of the Fort Hood terrorist attack (since 2009) by Major Nidal Hasan, who says he was acting in defense of the Taliban. Yet Obama, in deference to his affinity for Islam, continues to call it “workplace violence”, and refuses to put a stop to Hasan’s Army pay, by now in the hundreds of thousands. Must be of great comfort to the families and friends of the 13 innocents slaughtered by Hasan.

    We have a “Leader” who refuses to hold anyone accountable for anything...including himself.

Having A Little Heart-To-Heart

Midweek -- Coffee Break
July 3rd 3013

 Over the past 20 plus years I have had several heart attacks, the first being literally induced by an overly determined Cardiologist during a simple angioplasty to remove an 80% and a 50% blockage of my heart arteries. He left the balloon, which compresses the arterial plaque, inflated too long resulting in the rapid fibrillation of my heart until electrically shocked back into a normal rhythm by the paddles (“CLEAR!”..WHUMP), and then--according to the protocol of the hospital--double bypass surgery. 

    Since then, there have been three more heart attacks, two more angioplasties, four stents, and another (triple) bypass surgery. All of this with none of the usual antecedents of heart disease, ie family history, overweight, smoker, high blood pressure, etc.

However, heart disease (among other health issues) has more recently been presumptively attributed to the effect and circumstances of the Vietnam POW experience. And considering stress and heart disease are related, it makes sense to me.

     In any case, multiple heart attacks of course take a toll on the heart muscle itself. Heart attacks characteristically cut off blood flow through the heart’s arteries depriving much of the heart muscle of the blood it requires to stay healthy and viable. In my case, it has been determined, mostly by an Echocardiogram, that my “Ejection Fraction”, the measure of my heart’s efficiency in pumping blood, is only about 36%. Because I am below the normal of 65% to 75% my Cardiologist recommended an ICD (Implanted Cardio Device); a heart defibrillator (as opposed to a “pacemaker” which regulates the heart’s rhythm).

     The heart defibrillator is a programable, surgically implanted (in the chest to rest just below the clavacle) device about the size of a gentleman’s pocket watch with wire leads that connect through veins to both sides of the heart. If the heart’s rhythm drops below or rises above a certain level (fibrillation), the device delivers a strong shock to the heart returning it to it’s normal rhythm. This device is the result of years of trials and R & D and, considering the first heart defibrillator was the size of a washing machine, it is truly remarkable how far we have come.

  

    Vice President Dick Cheney could be considered the “poster boy” for the advances in cardiac technology. As a high profile/VIP heart patient, he has always had access to the “cutting edge” of life extending innovation. It seems that over the years the technology that has kept him alive--including several years using a defibrillator--has been developed just ahead of his advancing need. His treatment has given reality to the axiom, “necessity is the mother of invention”.

     For me, the use of a life saving device such as the defibrillator will be the source of much peace of mind (for which I am ever so grateful), even though there is a little trepidation about the unknown. It is said that when the device kicks into action, the electrical shock can feel like a kick in the chest from a mule. Talk about mixed emotions!...I can hardly wait.