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[Please listen to him below on this video... I can guarantee you won't regret it for a second!:]

Please listen to him below on this video... I can guarantee you won't regret it for a second!:

Well said, Trey. Well said, indeed. It's good to know you have America's back.

[How? Who is behind this invasion of Illegal Children Immigrants?]

 

How?  Who is behind this invasion of Illegal Children Immigrants?

Puzzle One:  Imagine you are a 3 year old to 8 year old child.  You are on your own without adults.  You are asked to walk from Houston, Texas to Minneapolis, Minnesota on your own with no food or belongings to sustain you.  Then you are asked to walk an addition 100 miles past Minnesota.

Could you do it?

· How long would it take you as a 6 year old?  That is the minimum distance these poor, helpless little ones have supposedly walked from Central America to the border of Texas, again, on their own.  They didn't get lost.

· And they survived the journey without help (unless you buy in to the notion that a destitute out-of-work family, run out of their homes by gangs and living in squalor somehow came up with $8,000 to $10,000 for EACH child to pay a coyote to take them to the border).

Puzzle Two: Now, on the map above, you must start somewhere in the Grey area.  Let's make it easy and start where Guatemala  meets Mexico, so that you had the least mileage by not having to cover the whole grey area.  Blue, of course, is water.

· Your task is to figure a route from the Grey area to the White (U.S.) area without going into the blue area and while avoiding towns and cities in the Grey area.  1220 miles across desert and mountains with no equipment or food, water or help.

· If Grey had stopped these innocents where Grey touches White, problem would not have occurred.  However... what six year old do you know who could walk 1220 miles (minimum), probably more like 1500 miles on their own without dying?

· How many days would it take for a 6 year old to walk 1220 miles without help, directions, food, sun protection, etc.?

I don't think the whole truth is being given to us, folks.  Someone created and assisted this, and the media should be figuring out who it is.

[Shootouts erupt in Nuevo Progresso, Reynosa and Rio Bravo Tamaulipas]

Shootouts erupt in Nuevo Progresso, Reynosa and Rio Bravo Tamaulipas

Tuesday, July 22, 2014

Violence erupted tonight the result of clashes between cells of organized crime in the town of Nuevo Progreso, resulting in a flurry of shootouts and blockades generated in several block of this border town.

The first shooting occurred at 19:00 hours on side streets of the of Nuevo Progreso, the neighboring town of Progreso, Texas. According to unofficial reports, the shootings were continuous at first, but then became more sporadic, the persecutions alerted the inhabitants of this town of 25,000 residents.

Shootouts also ensued in neighboring Rio Bravo and Reynosa municipalities. 

The confrontation between criminal cells has intensified after the arrest last week of "El Comandante Alemán", the leader of the Gulf Cartel in that municipality.

Miguel Angel Alemán Salinas was the presumed successor of Juan Manuel Rodríguez Rodríguez, aka "Juan Perros", who had just been arrested a month prior.
 
Authorities are yet to report numbers of injured or killed in the shootings between criminal groups.

Blockages were reported at the junction of the Reynosa-Rio Bravo highway, access to Reynosa International Airport, access to the Reynosa-Matamoros highway, the Rio Bravo to Reynosa highway and near the Pharr-Reynosa International bridge.

Dolphins are one of the smartest creatures on earth, and they sure prove it in this video. These Georgia bottlenose dolphins use teamwork to do something so smart that it hardly seems possible. This behavior has never been seen anywhere else. Watch now!

[Jimmy Stewart Reads a Touching Poem About His Dog Beau on Johnny Carson's Tonight Show]

Jimmy Stewart Reads a Touching Poem About His Dog Beau
on Johnny Carson's Tonight Show

[Ring, Ring, Ring..."Hello, this is Warph.""Hello, Warph, this is the federal government. We are going to audit your taxes and want to see all of your records for 2011.""Sorry, federal government, but my computer crashed in 2011. All of my emails, electronic receipts and financial records were lost.""We're not buying that, Warph. Anybody with half a brain would back up his data to a backup drive. And many people pay a measly 60 bucks a year to a service that automatically backs up the data online. Surely your 2011 data still exist.""Nope, sorry, no backups were ever done. When my computer crashed I lost all the data I created from 2009 to 2011.""Then give us the crashed hard drive, Warph. We have experts here who know how to retrieve data from crashed drives.""I'd love to help you, but it is my policy to recycle crashed hard drives.""Well, what about emails you sent to your accountant, Warph? They surely exist. Email exists not just on hard drives but on the networks of the email providers.""Nope, sorry, the emails are gone forever, too. My accountant's computer also crashed. And the email provider we were using went out of business.""That sounds awfully fishy to us, Warph.""Why should it? It is the very same defense the IRS is using. The IRS says it is unable to retrieve specific information and emails from specific IRS employees who are accused of using the IRS to target conservative groups.""What are you talking about, Warph?""According to Politico, the IRS told congressional investigators 'that the emails of (Lois) Lerner, the former head of the tax exempt division that was found to have singled out conservative groups for additional scrutiny, were lost from 2009 to 2011 in a computer hard drive crash in early summer 2011.' ""So what of it, Warph? Computer crashes happen all the time.""Politico says 'the time frame is significant because the Tea Party targeting began in the spring of 2010, and Republicans think if there was a smoking gun connecting the Obama administration to the IRS treatment of conservative groups, it could be found during that period.' ""Come now, Warph. Government agencies follow specific processes for disposing of broken hard drives. Bad drives are sent to companies that recycle them. There is absolutely no evidence that operatives in the White House had anything to do with the targeting of conservative groups.""This is a matter of grave importance, I hope you agree. Using the IRS to attack or persecute political opponents is what every single American fears. And many Americans think that our government is not coming clean on the entire Tea Party matter.""That may be what you think, Warph, but we think that many Americans are more concerned with Kim Kardashian than they are about confusing government scandals.""Look, it is hard to believe that the email records of six people involved in this scandal are somehow lost forever due to a series of convenient hard-drive crashes. It's awfully coincidental, don't you think?""You sound paranoid, Warph. You must be one of those conservative kooks. Besides, none of the IRS scandal with conservative groups has anything to do with you.""Sure it does. For starters, it speaks to the integrity of our government. Has our government gotten so big and messy that citizens now have to live in fear of it? Besides, if government officials can defend themselves by stonewalling on information and records, then why can't an average American do likewise?""Nice try, Warph! Why don't you go ahead and attempt the same defense during an IRS audit and see what happens to you?"]

Ring, Ring, Ring...

"Hello, this is Warph."

"Hello, Warph, this is the federal government.  We are going to audit your taxes and want to see all of your records for 2011."

"Sorry, federal government, but my computer crashed in 2011.  All of my emails, electronic receipts and financial records were lost."

"We're not buying that, Warph.  Anybody with half a brain would back up his data to a backup drive.  And many people pay a measly 60 bucks a year to a service that automatically backs up the data online.  Surely your 2011 data still exist."

"Nope, sorry, no backups were ever done. When my computer crashed I lost all the data I created from 2009 to 2011."

"Then give us the crashed hard drive, Warph.  We have experts here who know how to retrieve data from crashed drives."

"I'd love to help you, but it is my policy to recycle crashed hard drives."

"Well, what about emails you sent to your accountant, Warph?  They surely exist. Email exists not just on hard drives but on the networks of the email providers."

"Nope, sorry, the emails are gone forever, too.  My accountant's computer also crashed.  And the email provider we were using went out of business."

"That sounds awfully fishy to us, Warph."

"Why should it?  It is the very same defense the IRS is using.  The IRS says it is unable to retrieve specific information and emails from specific IRS employees who are accused of using the IRS to target conservative groups."

"What are you talking about, Warph?"

"According to Politico, the IRS told congressional investigators 'that the emails of (Lois) Lerner, the former head of the tax exempt division that was found to have singled out conservative groups for additional scrutiny, were lost from 2009 to 2011 in a computer hard drive crash in early summer 2011.' "

"So what of it, Warph?  Computer crashes happen all the time."

"Politico says 'the time frame is significant because the Tea Party targeting began in the spring of 2010, and Republicans think if there was a smoking gun connecting the Obama administration to the IRS treatment of conservative groups, it could be found during that period.' "

"Come now, Warph.  Government agencies follow specific processes for disposing of broken hard drives.  Bad drives are sent to companies that recycle them.  There is absolutely no evidence that operatives in the White House had anything to do with the targeting of conservative groups."

"This is a matter of grave importance, I hope you agree.  Using the IRS to attack or persecute political opponents is what every single American fears.  And many Americans think that our government is not coming clean on the entire Tea Party matter."

"That may be what you think, Warph, but we think that many Americans are more concerned with Kim Kardashian than they are about confusing government scandals."

"Look, it is hard to believe that the email records of six people involved in this scandal are somehow lost forever due to a series of convenient hard-drive crashes. It's awfully coincidental, don't you think?"

"You sound paranoid, Warph.  You must be one of those conservative kooks.  Besides, none of the IRS scandal with conservative groups has anything to do with you."

"Sure it does.  For starters, it speaks to the integrity of our government.  Has our government gotten so big and messy that citizens now have to live in fear of it?  Besides, if government officials can defend themselves by stonewalling on information and records, then why can't an average American do likewise?"

"Nice try, Warph!  Why don't you go ahead and attempt the same defense during an IRS audit and see what happens to you?"

[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TTA2buWlNyM&list=RDQ65KZIqay4E&index=22]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TTA2buWlNyM&list=RDQ65KZIqay4E&index=22

Remember When . . ??
Aahh, the memories!

Let's go back . . . Close our eyes . . .
And go back . . .

Before the Internet or the PC or MAC.
Before the drug war and crack.
Before chronic and ritalin and dysfunctional.
Before SEGA or Super Nintendo.
Before..... Way back . . .

I'm talkin' bout hide and go seek at dusk.
Sittin' on the porch, HOT fresh from the oven bread or bisquits and butter. A time when mom or grandma would make bread and biscuits from scratch, not just scratch them out of a box of store-bought mix. (And we could snitch pieces of dough, or help push down and knead the bread, or cut the bisquits with a mason jar ring and plop them on the cooking sheet. Didn't it smell good??)

A time when the biggest thrill of the year was when Barnum and Bailey's wagons were unloaded from the train, and the Fireman's Volunteer Band came marching down the street ahead of them, on the way to the vacant lots where we watched the elephants put up the tents.

Remember . . .
Red light, Green light. Chocolate milk, Lunch tickets. Penny candy in a brown paper bag. Hopscotch, butterscotch, doubledutch, jacks, kickball, dodgeball, y'all!??

Mother May I?
Hula Hoops and Sunflower Seeds, Jolly Ranchers, blowpops, Mary Janes, Grape and Watermelon Now-Laters? (What about "Alexander the Grape," "Lemonheads"?)

When the ice cream man came jingling down the street, kids coming running from blocks around, and eatin' a 'super dooper sandwich' for a nickel.

Running through the sprinkler . . . The smell of the sun and lickin' salty lips . . .?

Watchin' Saturday Morning cartoons at the Rialto, all day for 10¢. And if your allowance was a quarter, you had enough left over for 2 bags of popcorn and a soda!!

The National Anthem was played and we all stood, hands on our heart, as the curtains opened before the NewsReel and the first movie, Our Gang, the Bowery Boys, The Three Stooges.

Intermission... for all the kids to go running for whatever they needed to do most... The best part was the cartoons, Mickey Mouse, Road Runner, Porky Pig, ------ and Bugs.

Then THE REAL DEAL... Tarzan, Jungle Jim, Tom Mix, Gene Autry, Roy and Trigger, Wild Bill Hickok, Errol Flynn, The Lone Ranger, Sky King, The Invisible Man, Lon Chaney, Bela Lugosi and Boris Karloff -- OOOHHH BOY!!!

Do You Remember That???

And a pocket full of dried peas and a peashooter??

Catchin' lightening bugs in a jar, playin sling shot and crack the whip?

When around the corner seemed far away,
And going downtown seemed like really going somewhere?

Climbing trees and getting sticky fingers, and a million mosquito bites?

Cops and Robbers, Cowboys and Indians. Runnin till you were out of breath, then sittin on the curb and watching the stars? (You could see them then, 'cause the nearest street light was two blocks away at the trolley stop.)

Sitting in an old apple tree and eating as many green apples as you could without worrying about the green apple trots.

Going shoe skating (without real ice skates) with friends on the old slough that froze over in winter.

Bedtime... Jumping on the bed, pillow fights, being tickled to death, laughing so hard that your stomach hurt?

Being tired from playin'.... Remember that?

Crowding in a circle around the 'after school fight', then running when the teacher came?

What about the girl that had the big bubbly hand writing??

Do you remember each of the many loves you have had through life?

Eating Kool-aid powder with sugar... didn't that taste good?


Just to go back and say... yeah, I remember that!
There's nothing like the good old days!  They were good then, and they're good now when we think about them.  One can't be serious ALL the time, eh?

Remember...
When there were two types of sneakers for girls and boys (Keds & PF Flyers), and the only time you wore them at school, was for "gym?"

When it took five minutes for the TV to warm up? (How about before TV, when almost all families had a radio, usually in the living room? . . . Or tickling the crystal to find the hot spot?)

When nearly everyone's mom was at home when the kids got there?

When nobody owned a purebred dog?

When a quarter was a decent allowance, and another quarter a huge bonus? When you'd reach into a muddy gutter for a penny?

When girls neither dated nor kissed until late high school, if then?

When your Mom wore nylons that came in two pieces?

When all of your male teachers wore neckties and female teachers had their hair done up, everyday?

When you got your windshield cleaned, oil checked, and gas pumped, without asking, for free, every time? And, you didn't pay for air? And, you got trading stamps to boot!

When nobody was prettier than Mom. And scrapes and bruises were kissed and made better.

When laundry detergent had free glasses, dishes or towels hidden inside the box? When flour came in 50lb. and 100lb. printed cotton sacks for Mom to make pretty new dresses and blouses for your sisters? (And your boxer shorts?) {{frown}}
Mom still has some of those flour sacks saved after all these years, more than half a century later, and she just told me she would make me some new shorts .... ARGGGGGHHHH!!! .... Mom is 95 now!!!  And still beautiful and going dancing three times a week!!! )

When any parent could discipline any kid, or feed him, or use him to carry groceries, and nobody, not even the kid, thought a thing of it.

When it was considered a great privilege to be taken out to dinner at a real restaurant with your parents.

When they threatened to keep kids back a grade if they failed.... and did!

When being sent to the principal's office was nothing compared to the fate that awaited a misbehaving student at home? Basically, we were in fear for our lives but it wasn't because of drive by shootings, drugs, gangs, etc. Our parents and grandparents were a much bigger threat!!

When we were taught the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution for United States in school and knew what they meant, and we said the Pledge of Allegiance every day in the first class of the morning.

When a hobo came to your door, you'd open the door and help them, never fearing for your life.... you were just helping another who was experiencing rough times.

I want to go back to the time when....
Decisions were made by going eeny-meeny-miney-mo and mistakes were corrected by simply exclaiming, "Do it over!"

"Race issues" meant arguing about who ran the fastest.

Money issues were handled by whoever was the banker in Monopoly.

Catching lightning bugs could happily occupy an entire evening.

It wasn't odd to have two or three "best" friends.

Being old referred to anyone over 20.

The net on a tennis court or the neighbor's fence was the perfect height to play volleyball and rules didn't matter.

The worst thing you could catch from the opposite sex was cooties.

It was magic when Dad would "remove" his thumb.

It was unbelievable that dodgeball wasn't an Olympic event.

Having a weapon in school meant being caught with a slingshot.

It was a big deal to finally be tall enough to ride the "big people" rides at the amusement park.

Getting a foot of snow was a dream come true.

Grampa said "Pull my finger."

Grandma would hide cookies for you.

Abilities you didn't know you had were discovered because of a "double-dog-dare".

Saturday morning cartoons weren't 30-minute ads for action figures.

Do you remember when... "Oly-oly-oxen-free" made perfect sense?

Spinning around, getting dizzy, and falling down was cause for giggles?

The worst embarrassment was being picked last for a team?

War was a card game?

Water balloons were the ultimate weapon?

Baseball cards in the spokes transformed any bike into a motorcycle?

Taking drugs meant orange-flavored chewable aspirin?

Home-made fresh peach or strawberry ice cream from real thick cream skimmed off the top of the bottles was considered a basic food group? (You mean it isn't???!!!?)

Your older siblings were your worst tormentors, but also your fiercest protectors?

Feeling the unrelenting love and warmth that comes from hugging a fuzzy puppy while it happily licks your face away... and all you can do is just giggle.

Being really thankful for all the good things in life that you've experienced, and having the knowledge to know that bad things were secondary and temporary, and they only came along to make you appreciate the good things more.


If you can remember most or all of these, then you have LIVED!!

And We, the Older Generation, have Survived!!!

Consider the changes we have witnessed.....

We were born before television, before penicillin, before polio shots, frozen foods, Xerox, plastic, contact lenses, Frisbees and the Pill.

We were before radar, credit cards, split atoms, lazer beams and ball point pens, before pantyhose, dishwashers, clothes dryers, electric blankets, air conditioners, drip-dry clothes and long before man walked on the moon.

In our time, closets were for clothes, not for "coming out of." Bunnies were small rabbits, or dust balls under the bed, not Volkswagons, or Playboy girls. Designer Jeans were scheming girls named Jean or Jeanne, and having a meaningful relationship meant getting along well with our cousins.

Fast food was what you ate during Lent, and Outer Space was the balcony of the Rialto Theater.

We were before house-husbands, gay rights, computer dating, dual careers, and commuter marriages, day-care centers, group therapy and nursing homes. We never heard of FM radio, tape decks, electric typewriters, artificial hearts, word processors, yogurt, and guys wearing earrings.

For us, time-sharing meant togetherness -- not computers or condominiums, a "chip" meant a piece of wood, hardware meant hardware, and software wasn't even a word.

In our time, "Made in Japan" meant junk, and the term "making out" referred to how you did on your exams. Pizzas, MacDonalds and instant coffee were unheard of.

We hit the scene when there were 5¢ and 10¢ stores, where you bought things for 5¢ and 10¢. BiRite and Tripenys sold ice cream cones for a nickel or a dime, for a single or a double. For one nickel you could ride a bus, make a phone call, buy a Pepsi or a Coke, or enough stamps to mail one letter and two postcards. You could buy a new Chevy Coupe for $600 (but who could afford one?)..and gas was 11¢ a gallon for regular and Ethyl was 13¢ a gallon.

We could recognize the "make and year" of a car from a distance, be it a Ford, Lincoln, Mercury, Cadillac, LaSalle, Chevy, Pontiac, Buick, Chrysler, DeSoto, Plymouth, Dodge, Packard, Graham-Paige, Hupmobile, Cord, Auburn, Hudson, Nash, Studebaker, Willys, a host of others now gone, and of course, the Crosley. We could sit on the running boards, fenders or the bumpers. The bumpers could really withstand a bump, and an "air bag" referred to "somebody's mother-in-law," or a congressman or senator.

All the boys wanted a roadster, and if you didn't have a Duece or A-bone, you weren't "in". And the best place to be with your gal was in the rumble seat when you double dated.

You could get a FULL breakfast of coffee, juice, 2 eggs, hash browns, a slab of ham or sausage or four pieces of bacon, toast and jelly for 39¢ !!!

In our day, cigarette smoking was fashionable, GRASS was mowed, Coke was a cold drink and POT was something you cooked in. ROCK MUSIC was Grandma's lullaby and AIDS were helpers in the Principal's office.

We certainly were not before the difference between the sexes was discovered, but we surely were before the sex change, we made do with what we had. And we were probably the last generation that thought you needed a husband to have a baby... We got married first, then lived together! How quaint can you be??

It is no wonder the younger generations are so confused and there is such a generation gap today!!

But WE HAVE SURVIVED !!!! What Better Reason To Celebrate???  


And last of all, remember this:

Dear God,

So far today, God, I've done alright. I haven't gossiped, haven't lost my temper, haven't been greedy, grumpy, nasty, selfish, or over-indulgent. I am very thankful for that.

But in a few minutes, God, I am going to get out of bed, And from then on, I'm probably going to need a lot more help.

Amen.....

["I'm confused. I thought July 4 was the day our country declared independence from King George III of Great Britain.""Actually, according to ConstitutionFacts.com, that's not so. The Continental Congress declared independence from Great Britain on July 2, 1776.""Then why do we celebrate our independence on the Fourth every year? Is that when we started the American Revolution?""That is a common misunderstanding, as well. The American Revolution began in April 1775, more than a year earlier.""I'm stumped. Was the Fourth the day Thomas Jefferson wrote the first draft of the Declaration of Independence?""Nope. Thomas Jefferson wrote the first draft in June 1776. Also, Jefferson didn't write the Declaration alone.""He didn't? I always thought he was the sole author.""A common misconception. In fact, the Continental Congress appointed a five-person to write the Declaration. It included Jefferson, Benjamin Franklin, John Adams, Robert Livingston and Roger Sherman.""How about that.""Though Jefferson wrote the first draft, it was changed 86 times by other members of the committee and other members of the Continental Congress.""Interesting, but what the heck happened on July 4?""That was the day that the Continental Congress, after two days of discussion and debate, agreed on the final wording of the Declaration of Independence.""And that was also the day members of the Continental Congress signed the document and sent it off to old Georgie?""Actually, they didn't sign the Declaration until Aug. 2, 1776. Nonetheless, July 4, 1776, became the date that was included on the final handwritten draft, and that is the date people associate most with our independence.""Interesting stuff, but when did the Fourth of July become a national holiday?""Well, for the first few decades after the Declaration was signed, our young nation didn't celebrate its independence on any date. Believe it or not, by the 1790s, the Declaration would become controversial, and some had no desire to celebrate it.""Two decades after it was signed, it became controversial?""Bitter partisan conflicts existed then, as they do now. ConstitutionFacts.com says that the Democratic-Republicans, who admired Jefferson and the Declaration, argued with the other party, the Federalists, who thought the Declaration was too pro-French and too anti-British.""Our politicians haven't changed much, have they?""In 1817, 41 years after the Declaration, John Adams complained that Americans were uninterested in their past. By the 1820s and 1830s, however, new parties rose to power that 'considered themselves inheritors of Jefferson and the Democratic-Republicans,' says ConstitutionFacts.com . They circulated copies of the Declaration, which featured July 4, 1776, as the day it was finalized.""The sound like modern-day tea partyers!""Then something else happened that would further cement 'July 4′ in the minds of many. Both Thomas Jefferson and John Adams would die on July 4, 1826, exactly 50 years after July 4, 1776.""That's some interesting stuff!""In any event, over the years, Americans began celebrating America's independence on the Fourth. Finally, in 1870, almost 100 years after the Declaration was written, the Congress declared July 4 to be a national holiday.""Things sure do move slowly in Washington.""This Fourth of July will mark the 238th anniversary of the Declaration, a fascinating document that opened our country's doors to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness — and tremendous opportunity for millions.""We surely have had a good run. I hope we can keep it going.""We can keep it going so long as all Americans understand the uniqueness of the American experiment and what makes it work. It all begins with our Declaration, which we can all learn more about."]

"I'm confused. I thought July 4 was the day our country declared independence from King George III of Great Britain."

"Actually, according to ConstitutionFacts.com, that's not so. The Continental Congress declared independence from Great Britain on July 2, 1776."

"Then why do we celebrate our independence on the Fourth every year? Is that when we started the American Revolution?"


"That is a common misunderstanding, as well. The American Revolution began in April 1775, more than a year earlier."

"I'm stumped. Was the Fourth the day Thomas Jefferson wrote the first draft of the Declaration of Independence?"

"Nope. Thomas Jefferson wrote the first draft in June 1776. Also, Jefferson didn't write the Declaration alone."

"He didn't? I always thought he was the sole author."

"A common misconception. In fact, the Continental Congress appointed a five-person to write the Declaration. It included Jefferson, Benjamin Franklin, John Adams, Robert Livingston and Roger Sherman."

"How about that."

"Though Jefferson wrote the first draft, it was changed 86 times by other members of the committee and other members of the Continental Congress."

"Interesting, but what the heck happened on July 4?"

"That was the day that the Continental Congress, after two days of discussion and debate, agreed on the final wording of the Declaration of Independence."

"And that was also the day members of the Continental Congress signed the document and sent it off to old Georgie?"

"Actually, they didn't sign the Declaration until Aug. 2, 1776. Nonetheless, July 4, 1776, became the date that was included on the final handwritten draft, and that is the date people associate most with our independence."

"Interesting stuff, but when did the Fourth of July become a national holiday?"

"Well, for the first few decades after the Declaration was signed, our young nation didn't celebrate its independence on any date. Believe it or not, by the 1790s, the Declaration would become controversial, and some had no desire to celebrate it."

"Two decades after it was signed, it became controversial?"

"Bitter partisan conflicts existed then, as they do now. ConstitutionFacts.com says that the Democratic-Republicans, who admired Jefferson and the Declaration, argued with the other party, the Federalists, who thought the Declaration was too pro-French and too anti-British."

"Our politicians haven't changed much, have they?"

"In 1817, 41 years after the Declaration, John Adams complained that Americans were uninterested in their past. By the 1820s and 1830s, however, new parties rose to power that 'considered themselves inheritors of Jefferson and the Democratic-Republicans,' says ConstitutionFacts.com . They circulated copies of the Declaration, which featured July 4, 1776, as the day it was finalized."

"The sound like modern-day tea partyers!"

"Then something else happened that would further cement 'July 4′ in the minds of many. Both Thomas Jefferson and John Adams would die on July 4, 1826, exactly 50 years after July 4, 1776."

"That's some interesting stuff!"

"In any event, over the years, Americans began celebrating America's independence on the Fourth. Finally, in 1870, almost 100 years after the Declaration was written, the Congress declared July 4 to be a national holiday."

"Things sure do move slowly in Washington."

"This Fourth of July will mark the 238th anniversary of the Declaration, a fascinating document that opened our country's doors to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness — and tremendous opportunity for millions."

"We surely have had a good run. I hope we can keep it going."

"We can keep it going so long as all Americans understand the uniqueness of the American experiment and what makes it work. It all begins with our Declaration, which we can all learn more about."

[Facts Suggest Vets delayed Own Tests To Make King Obuma Look Bad]

Facts Suggest Vets delayed Own Tests To Make King Obuma Look Bad

After the recent revelation of long wait times and delays in care at VA hospitals shocked the nation, congressional Democrats from both houses and independent journalists undertook their own investigation to determine the cause of the problem.

What they found was shocking: evidence of a coordinated conspiracy among numerous ill veterans to avoid seeking medical care and blame their subsequent problems on President Obama.

"It's racism pure and simple." said one congressional staffer who played a tape recording of a VA patient telling an undercover investigator "I'm supposed to go for a colonoscopy next week but I'm gonna skip it and blame it on Obama if I get sick."

"I know it sounds an awful lot like me," the staffer said of the tape, "but it is a VA patient. Trust me."

While on the surface, it seems incredible and even bizarre that anyone would go to such lengths to embarrass a politician they dislike, it is consistent with the pattern of racism that has emerged since the coronation of the country's first black president in January 2009.

Recently for example, Senator Jay Rockefeller (D-WV) revealed that while the Affordable Care Act aka ObamaCare has been wildly successful beyond anyone's dreams; it would be even more so if not for a concerted effort by racists who desire it to fail:


"I'll be able to dig up some emails that make part of the Affordable Care Act that doesn't look good - especially from people who made up their mind that they don't want it to work because they don't like the president. Maybe he's of the wrong color, something of that sort. I've seen a lot of that and I know a lot of that to be true. It's not something you're meant to talk about in public but it's something I'm talking about in public because that is very true."

"If they're writing emails, you know they're serious about sabotaging it, those are prima facie evidence," a well-paid intern on the senator's staff told us. "I mean, people don't take the trouble to email if they're just kidding around. That's what Twitter and Facebook are for."

"I can just see them racists sitting there and hitting RESET and ENTER over and over again on the healthcare.gov website, and cursing President Obama each time they get a 404. They're vicious, I tell ya!"

Frighteningly enough, it appears these latest trumped-up scandals are part of an intense, multi-front racist effort to discredit the president. The opening shot was the revival of the stale two-year-old already-explained Benghazi fiasco last month.

Rep. James Clyburn (D-SC) put this "scandal" in its proper perspective for all reasonable people:


"I seem to remember our history. After reconstruction, when people of color gained political presence throughout the south, they drummed up all kinds of things, indictments and accusations, they drove these people out of the south. Some went to Chicago, some came here to Washington D.C. And I see the same kind of efforts to discredit this president and this administration."


Famous investigative journalist and perpetual victim of bad hairstyling Eleanor Clift recently once again debunked the Benghazi accusations against the president:


"I'd like to point out that Ambassador Stevens was not 'murdered'," she said, bending her fingers in the air to suggest the drawing of quote marks, "but died of smoke inhalation in a CIA safe room."


Another journalist put it more bluntly: "It's safe to say racists in the CIA murdered him to make Obama look bad."

Even more startling, however, is the realization that the efforts to make Barack Obama look bad did not start in 2009 or even in the 21st century, but actually began in the 1780s. Investigative blogger Ezra Klein explains the facts to readers of low intelligence:

Klein makes the argument that it is unfair to expect Obama to succeed when the presidency is designed to be ineffective. In Klein's view, instead of blaming Obama for being an absentee president, we should be scolding James Madison and Alexander Hamilton for crafting a Constitution that didn't provide a president with the ability to govern because of the checks and balances incorporated into the system.


"The racism in this country is sickening!" chanted all living MSNBC commentators in unison. "It's obvious the Tea Party was plotting against Barack Obama nearly two centuries before he was born. If that's not racism, what is?"

Experts are at a loss to explain why so many seemingly normal people are consumed by such hatred for President Obama.

"You take former President Bush," said one psychologist wearing a "Buck Fush" T-shirt. "On the surface, he seems like a nice guy, always smiling like a chimp. So you tell me why he started two unnecessary wars to ensure that 10 years later the VA hospitals would be overloaded and make America's first black president look bad! How do you explain that, huh?"

"I don't understand what drives people to irrational hatred, but I'm sure it has something to do with the Koch Brothers," mused Senator Harry Reid (D-NV).

"I don't know what the next phony scandal to arise around Barack Obama will be," said future House Majority Leader Nancy Pelosi, "but one thing I know for sure: racist hatred of the president will be behind it. It always is."

[BullWinkle's Comment On Soccer:]

BullWinkle's Comment On Soccer:

Overheard at Toot's... Diane and Bullwinkle sharing a fried bologna sandwich and talking about the World Cup of Soccer:

BullWinkle: "So who the heck cares about a bunch of guys playing footsie with a little ball?"

Diane: "Ah, you speak of the World Cup.  The fact is billions care.  It's the most-watched sporting event in the world.  And the Wall Street Journal reports that Americans are increasingly developing a taste for the sport, at least when their own team is playing."

Bull: "Yeah, well, lots of Americans aren't tuning in."

Diane:"Perhaps if you knew more about football... what Americans refer to as soccer... you'd understand why so many countries are so passionate about it."

Bull: "You're going to lecture me, aren't you?"

Diane; "According to about.com, soccer has been played around the world for 3,000 years.  Organized soccer dates to England in 1863, when various teams formed an association and began to standardize the rules of the game."

Bull: "How exciting."

Diane: "Each game is referred to as a 'match.' A match is comprised of two 45-minute halves.  The field is called a 'pitch.'  And cleats are referred to as 'boots.'"

Bull: "How do the players insult each other?  'Your mother wears army cleats?'"

Diane: "Each football team has 11 players, with 10 on the field and one protecting the goal.  Players may use any part of their bodies but their hands and arms.  The object is to kick the ball into the other team's goal.  The team with the most goals wins."

Bull: "No kidding?  I thought the team that put the most people to sleep was the winner."

Diane: "As a result of the beauty and simplicity of the game... all you need is a ball and a makeshift field and you can play anywhere.. the sport's popularity spread all over the world."

Bull: "Kind of like the bird flu!"

Diane: "In 1930, to celebrate its world-wide reach, the World Cup was born.  It's an international competition that takes place every four years.  During the three years leading up to the event, teams compete to qualify for 32 World Cup spots."

Bull: "OK, you educated me.  But I'd still rather watch third-graders playing badminton."

Diane: "Perhaps you're uninterested in this sport because you're angry about America's poor performance in prior World Cups?"

Bull: "They got beat pretty bad in the past, but I hear they have shown some promise this year."

Diane: "I know there are other reasons the sport hasn't caught on in America.  With football, baseball, basketball and hockey, there's simply no room to fit in another sport."

Bull: "You left out the female roller derby, an American classic."

Diane: "Michael Mandelbaum, author of 'The Meaning of Sports,' says a key reason Americans do not embrace soccer is because it is so similar to basketball.  Both are simple games that seek to put a ball into a goal.  He says it's not possible for both to prosper in the same place."

Bull: "At least there's lots of scoring in basketball.  And you don't have to walk as far to get a beer."

Diane; "You raise an interesting point.  Mandelbaum says Americans are very results-oriented.  We like lots of activity and scoring.  There is very little scoring throughout the World Cup event."

Bull: "Yeah, and what's with the falling down and writhing in pain every two minutes?  I'd rather spend five seconds watching an NFL running back pound through a bunch of beefy guys to score six points than spend 90 minutes watching a bunch of skinny, crafty guys moan every time somebody touches them."

Diane: "As an American, then, you prefer force and power and lots of action and results?"

Bull: "Now you're talking.  In fact, if the World Cup people wanted more Americans to tune in, they ought to turn their cameras away from the field and point them on the stands."

Diane: "The stands?"

Bull: "Yeah, watching a bunch of guys trying to brawl after sucking down a dozen Heinekens is more entertaining that what is happening on the field.  Americans would pay good money to see that."

[The white student population is receding and is being replaced with fast-growing numbers of poor students and children of immigrants for whom English is a second language]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/in-fairfax-county-kindergarten-classes-school-systems-future-comes-into-focus/2014/06/28/1ced10d2-f25e-11e3-914c-1fbd0614e2d4_story.html


The kindergartners of the Class of 2026, who finished their first year in Fairfax County schools Wednesday, constitute the largest and one of the most ethnically, culturally and socioeconomically diverse groups of students the county has seen, a fact that school system administrators say could pose significant challenges in the decade to come. 

Long an enclave of predominantly white, middle-class families with a top-class school system, Fairfax has experienced a dramatic demographic shift in recent years that is nowhere more obvious than in the county's kindergarten classrooms. The white student population is receding and is being replaced with fast-growing numbers of poor students and children of immigrants for whom English is a second language. 

More than one-third of the 13,424 kindergartners in the county this year qualified for free or reduced-price meals, a federal measure of poverty, and close to 40 percent of the Class of 2026 requires additional English instruction, among the most ever for a Fairfax kindergarten class.

The demographic changes in Fairfax are likely to have long-term implications for the school system: Most of this year's kindergarten class will spend the next 12 years in county schools. Schools officials believe that the challenges that come with a less-affluent and less-prepared population will exacerbate the system's struggles with a widening achievement gap for minorities and ballooning class sizes.

The rising enrollment — the overall student body has surged by more than 22,000 since 2004 — is not sustainable at the current funding level, schools officials said, which could intensify already contentious battles for tax dollars with the county's Board of Supervisors. School Board member Ted Velkoff (At Large), chairman of its Budget Committee, said the increasing number of immigrant families in Fairfax has affected — and will continue to affect — the school system's bottom line.

"We are required to educate their children, and we want to. But there is a cost," Velkoff said. "There is a cost to having these children in the system. . . . And I think the thing that is troubling is that the Fairfax County taxpayer has to take a disproportionate part of this bill."

During the past five years, costs for English language instruction increased by more than $18 million, and elementary school teachers say they spend an increasing amount of their time on remedial education.

School Superintendent Karen Garza, who fought for budget increases this year and got less than she believes the schools need to maintain their excellence, said she expects these trends to continue.

"There are additional costs associated with these changes that will continue to challenge our budgeting in the years ahead," Garza said. "We view these demographic shifts and our growing diversity as a strength that we will continue to celebrate."

Like Fairfax, school systems across the region have experienced rapid increases in the number of Hispanic students as well as the number of pupils who qualify for subsidized meals. In Montgomery County, more than 35 percent of students receive free or reduced-priced meals, compared with 22 percent in 2000. Poor students now account for 68 percent of the kindergarten class in Prince George's County, and 3 in 10 kindergartners this year received additional English instruction.

The shifts are clearly evident in Fairfax's elementary schools, where more students are arriving less prepared for kindergarten, putting them at an immediate disadvantage.

At London Towne Elementary in Centreville, teachers see a distinct difference between low-income students and their peers from middle-class families: their vocabularies.

Grace Choi, a kindergarten language teacher at London Towne, said children from poor families often arrive for the first day of school not knowing the alphabet, a standard lesson in preschool. Many cannot differentiate animal words such as cat, lion and cheetah or food words such as potato, eggs and tomato.

"The things you think are a given, they don't know," Choi said, noting that simple tasks such as zipping a coat can be puzzling to students who have never worn one.

At Springfield's Lynbrook Elementary, 502 out of the 637 students speak Spanish at home, school records show, and 89 percent of those Spanish-speaking children were born in the United States.

"We're all ESOL teachers here," said Principal Mary McNamee, noting that literacy has become central to the school's curriculum.

In the school's front office, the administrative staff primarily speaks Spanish to the students and their families. Most parents are not literate in their own language, McNamee said. Meredith Hopkins, a third-year kindergarten teacher at Lynbrook, said she has never had a native English speaker in her classes.

Velkoff, the School Board member, attributes part of the rapid growth of Hispanic families in Fairfax to controversial policies in neighboring jurisdictions that he said were hostile to immigrants.

The 2010 documentary "9500 Liberty" highlighted the contentious debate surrounding immigration in Northern Virginia. The film focused on a law enacted in 2008 in Prince William County that allowed police to question a person's immigration status during routine traffic stops. The strict aspects of the law were rolled back after the county's chief of police came out against the policy.

School officials said there is evidence that some immigrant families moved to Fairfax after Prince William's law took effect; the Fairfax school system experienced an increase of 14,000 Hispanic students between 2008 and 2014.

"People were driven out of Prince William by the intolerance shown in that film," Velkoff said. "In Fairfax, our feeling is we welcome everybody here with open arms. I'm happy to be a magnet for people who want to live in a tolerant society."

Louise Epstein, a longtime Fairfax education activist, said some parents have watched with concern as the county has shifted resources away from affluent neighborhoods to schools with rising populations of poor and immigrant students.

As a result, class sizes have grown in certain areas of the county, frustrating parents, Epstein said.

Such families "are getting fed up and sending their children to private schools," she said.

According to county budget documents, the surging enrollment is attributed to higher birthrates among Asian and Hispanic families, who account for one of every four births in Fairfax. The percentage of white students in the schools is steadily declining. In 2002, more than half of the student population was white; today, white students account for 41.4 percent of enrollment.

Kevin Sneed, director of construction and planning for the school system, said the rise in enrollment in recent years has created capacity issues, leading the schools to use more than 990 trailers for extra classroom space. At many schools, supply closets have been transformed into miniature food banks for children who come to school hungry and return home at the end of the day to homes with bare cupboards.

At Mason Crest Elementary in Annandale, more than half of the 580 students live in poverty, said Assistant Principal Diane Kerr.

"What people think about is a yuppie Fairfax family experience, where the kids go home and go to soccer practice," Kerr said. "Our kids don't have those opportunities. They go home to babysit siblings. Older siblings go to work."

Understanding what the children face at home, Mason Crest teachers do not require homework, Kerr said.

For some students, home is a trailer park. At Audubon Estates near Alexandria, the 700 trailers house more than 1,500 children, many of whom attend nearby Hybla Valley Elementary, one of the poorest schools in the county.

Edelmira Moran, an Audubon resident and mother of a kindergartner at Hybla Valley, said she wished her child attended school with more affluent students who could inspire others to perform better.

"In other schools . . . they can see the other students and want to make a difference in themselves," said Moran, 32, who came to the United States from Mexico 10 years ago. "In Hybla Valley, it's 90 percent Hispanic. What the problem is, I think, is the style of life is all the same."

Velkoff said it is a revenue issue. He said immigration reform could help families more easily attain legal status and begin adding to the tax base, noting that the rising percentage of students who qualify for subsidized meals and extra English instruction has put pressure on the schools budget.

"It's a cost driver," Velkoff said. "That is pure fact."

[This is PRICELESS ..............]

This is PRICELESS ..............

A little old lady from Wisconsin had worked in and around her family dairy farms since
she was old enough to walk, with hours of hard work and little compensation.

When canned Carnation Milk became available in grocery stores in the 1940s,
she read an advertisement offering $5,000 for the best slogan.

The producers wanted a rhyme beginning With 'Carnation Milk is best of all.'

She thought to herself, I know everything there is to know about milk and
dairy farms. I can do this! She sent in her entry, and several weeks later, a black
car pulled up in front of her house. A large man got out, knocked on her door and
said,

"Ma'am,.....The president of Carnation milk absolutely LOVED your entry.....So much, in fact, that we are here to award you $1,000 even though we will not be able to use it for our advertisements!"

He did, however, have one printed up to hang on his office wall.

(Here it is:)

[Before The Revolution 1648 - 1763]

Before The Revolution 1648 - 1763

By the time they had established themselves in the Tidewater region of what is now Virginia in the early 1600s, the English were relative latecomers to the world of exploration and empire. Both the Portugese, Spanish and the French were already quite well established in the region— not to mention many millions of natives who'd lived in North America for as much as 15,000 years. But following their successful settlements at Jamestown, Virginia in 1607 and Plymouth, Massachusetts in 1620, the British would eventually establish themselves as the leading cultural and political force in North America. By the Revolutionary period in the 1770s, there was an estimated 2.5 million European colonists living in British North America, which included about 500,000 people of color—most of whom were enslaved. Some of the most significant events in this period before the War for Independence that led to revolution and the creation of the American Constitution include:



1648

The Peace of Westphalia in Europe marked a profound turning point in the history of western civilization. Many historians recognize the Peace of Westphalia as the "official" end of the middle ages and the beginning of the modern period and the creation of an international order under which we still live— in which individual nation states are considered autonomous and equal entitles on the world's stage, and that no state should determine the political or religious character of another. When combined with the principles of the enlightenment and natural rights which were starting to gain a real following in France and America, the 1648 Peace of Westphalia directly led to the democratic revolutions that began in the 18th century and continue until this day.



1649

Charles I was beheaded in England, ending royal rule (for a few years at least ). Charles was the son of King James, for whom Jamestown had been named. Part of the ongoing English Civil War, Charles I was captured, tried and executed for being a tyrannical monarch. The Protestant English Puritans in Parliament took control under the leadership of Oliver Cromwell, who essentially ruled as a dictator of the English Commonwealth.



1651

British Parliament passed the first in a series of protectionist Navigation Acts to try and control trade in the American colonies. A result of the 1648 Peace of Westphalia, the Dutch had finally won their independence from Spain, which freed Holland from a Spanish embargo and quickly led to a boom in Dutch trading on the high seas— all of which made merchants in London quite nervous about the competition. Their solution was a legislated monopoly: use the power of Parliament to pass laws that would force American merchants in the colonies to trade only with the British. But the colonial economies depended on free maritime trade routes with a variety of ports throughout Europe. Smuggling goods in and out of American ports became more common— to which Parliament responded by passing Writs of Assistance. The series of British Navigation Acts that began in 1651, and the on and off again efforts to enforce the Acts, increasingly angered the colonists and was a powerful factor that led to Revolution.



1688

After a series of struggles for power, the monarchy was restored in the "Glorious Revolution" of 1688 with the ascension of Queen Mary and her husband (and first cousin) the Dutch King William III. The significance of the Glorious Revolution was to establish the precedence that a monarch could only govern with the consent of an elected representative government of the people. The American colonists would point to this established principle time and time again during their revolution.



1689

As part of the "Glorious Revolution," Parliament adopted the English Bill of Rights, which established the power of the people over the monarchy. The Bill identified specific rights that would always be held by Englishmen including: the right to bear arms, the right to oversee the courts and laws, the right to petition the monarch without fear of retribution, the right to resist taxes unless they have been approved by Parliament, the right to free speech, and the right to be free of cruel or unusual punishments. During the American Revolution, the colonists vociferously objected to the repeated violation of these very rights that they insisted they held as Englishmen.



1733

Parliament adopted the Molasses Act, putting a six-penny per-gallon tax on any molasses imported to America from all colonies other than British ones. This was a tariff that Parliament enacted to purposefully make molasses coming from the British West Indies cheaper than the then-preferred inexpensive molasses coming out of the French West Indies. The Molasses Act (which expired in 1763) was yet another in a series of moves by well-connected business interests in Britain to use the power of the state to monopolize and control commerce in the American colonies.



1763

The French and Indian War in North America came to an end with the signing of the Treaty of Paris on February 10. This effectively ended the Seven Years War, which had been the World War of the 18th century, fought between a number of sovereign state powers across the globe. The North American theater of that larger conflict saw the British and French— with shifting alliances of native tribes— vying for control of the interior of the continent. Unintended consequences of a British victory in the war included both the American and French revolutions in the coming decades.

[Paul Harvey - An Open Letter From God]

Paul Harvey - An Open Letter From God

[I'm not sure what kind of revolution is happening here, but I think it's safe to say we've highly underestimated the rallying power of our feathered friends. Batten down the hatches, mallardgeddon is coming.]

I'm not sure what kind of revolution is happening here, but I think it's safe to say we've highly underestimated the rallying power of our feathered friends. Batten down the hatches, mallardgeddon is coming.

[William "Billy The Kid" Bonney]

William "Billy The Kid" Bonney

Henry McCarty, aka, William Henry Bonney, aka, Billy the Kid, was born on November 23, 1859, most likely in New York City. His parents' names are not known for certain but his mother was thought to be Katherine and his father perhaps Patrick. History then traces Billy to Indiana in the late 1860s and Wichita, Kansas in 1870. His father died around the end of the Civil War and at about the same time, Billy's mother contracted Tuberculosis and was told to move to a drier climate. On March 1, 1873, Catherine McCarty married a man named William Antrim, who moved the family to Silver City, New Mexico.

His stepfather worked as a bartender and carpenter but soon got the prospecting bug and virtually ignored his wife and stepsons. Faced with an indigent husband, McCarty's mother took in boarders in order to provide for her sons. Despite the better climate, Billy's mother continued to worsen and on September 16, 1874, she died of her condition. 

After her death, Antrim placed Billy and his younger brother Joseph in separate foster homes and left Silver City for Arizona.

At the age of 14, the smooth-cheeked, blue-eyed McCarty was forced to find work in a hotel, washing dishes and waiting tables at the restaurant. The boy was reported to be very friendly.

The manager was impressed by the young boy, boasting that he was the only kid who ever worked for him that didn't steal anything. His school teachers thought that the young orphan was "no more of a problem than any other boy, always quite willing to help with chores around the schoolhouse".

However, on September 23, 1875 McCarty was arrested for hiding a bundle of stolen clothes for a man playing a prank on a Chinese laundryman. Two days after Billy was thrown in jail, the scrawny teen escaped by worming his way up the jailhouse chimney. From that point onward McCarty would be a fugitive.

He eventually found work as an itinerant ranch hand and sheepherder in southeastern Arizona. In 1877 he became a civilian teamster at Camp Grant Army Post with the duty of hauling logs from a timber camp to a sawmill. The civilian blacksmith at the camp, Frank "Windy" Cahill, took pleasure in bullying young Billy. On August 17 Cahill attacked McCarty after a verbal exchange and threw him to the ground. Billy retaliated by drawing his gun and shooting Cahill, who died the next day. Once again McCarty was in custody, this time in the Camp's guardhouse awaiting the arrival of the local marshal. Before the marshal could arrive, however, Billy escaped.

Again on the run, Billy next turned up in the house of Heiskell Jones in Pecos Valley, New Mexico. Apaches had stolen McCarty's horse which forced him to walk many miles to the nearest settlement, which was Mrs. Jones' house. She nursed the young man, who was near death, back to health. The Jones' family developed a strong attachment to Billy and gave him one of their horses.

Now an outlaw and unable to find honest work, the Kid met up with another bandit named Jesse Evans, who was the leader of a gang of rustlers called "The Boys." The Kid didn't have anywhere else to go and since it was suicide to be alone in the hostile and lawless territory, the Kid reluctantly joined the gang.

He later became embroiled in the infamous Lincoln County War in which his newest friend and employer, John Tunstall, was killed on February 18, 1878.  Billy the Kid was deeply affected by the murder, claiming that Tunstall was one of the only men that treated him like he was "free-born and white."  At Tunstall's funeral Billy swore: "I'll get every son-of-a-bitch who helped kill John if it's the last thing I do."

Billy would enact revenge by gunning-down the deputy who killed his friend, as well as another deputy and the County Sheriff, William Brady. Now an even more wanted man than before, McCarty went into hiding but soon started to steal livestock from white ranchers and Apaches on the Mescalero reservation.

In the fall of 1878, retired Union General Lew Wallace became the new territorial governor of New Mexico. In order to restore peace to Lincoln County, Wallace proclaimed an amnesty for any man involved in the Lincoln County War that was not already under indictment.

Billy was, of course, under several indictments (some of which unrelated to the Lincoln County War) but Wallace was intrigued by rumors that McCarty was willing to surrender himself and testify against other combatants if amnesty could be extended to him. In March of 1879 Wallace and Billy met to discuss the possibility of a deal. True to form, McCarty greeted the governor with a revolver in one hand and a Winchester rifle in the other. After several days to think the issue over, Billy agreed to testify in return for an amnesty.

Part of the agreement was for McCarty to submit to a show arrest and a short stay in jail until the conclusion of his courtroom testimony. Even though his testimony helped to indict one of the powerful House faction leaders, John Dolan, the district attorney defied Wallace's order to set Billy free after testifying. However, Billy was a skilled escape artist and slipped out of his handcuffs and fled.

For the next year he hung around Fort Sumner on the Pecos River and developed a fateful friendship with a local bartender named Pat Garrett who was later elected sheriff of Lincoln County. As sheriff, Garrett was charged with arresting his friend Henry McCarty, who by now was almost exclusively known as "Billy the Kid".

At about the same time, Billy had formed a gang, referred to as the "Rustlers" or simply Billy the Kid's Gang who he survived by stealing and rustling as he did before. The core members of the gang were Tom O'Folliard, Charlie Bowdre, Tom Pickett, Billy the Kid, "Dirty Dave" Rudabaugh, and Billy Wilson.

On December 15, 1880, Governor Wallace put a $500 reward on Billy's head and Pat Garrett began the relentless pursuit of the outlaw. Garrett set-up many traps and ambushes in an attempt to apprehend Billy but the Kid seemed to have an animal instinct that warned him of danger, but that was not to last.

On November 30, 1880, Billy the Kid's Gang, David Anderson, aka: Billy Wilson; and Dirty Dave Rudabaugh rode into White Oaks, New Mexico and ran into Deputy Sheriff James Redman. Taking shots at the deputy, Redman hid behind a saloon as several local citizens ran into the street, chasing the fugitives out of town.

As a posse gave chase, the outlaws hid out at the ranch of a man named Jim Greathouse, who they held hostage. Accosted at dawn by a posse, they traded their hostage, Jim Greathouse, for Deputy Sheriff James Carlyle who was volunteered to negotiate with the outlaws in attempt to give themselves up. Continuing to surround the house, the posse waited for hours.

Around midnight, the posse called out that they were going to storm the house. Just then a crash came through a window and a man came tumbling out. Shots ripped through the air and Carlyle lay dead. The bullet could have come from either the outlaws or the posse, but many suspect that the posse killed their own man. With this accident, the posse abandoned the siege and the outlaws escaped. Later Billy the Kid would be blamed for killing Carlyle.

Trailed by the resolute Pat Garrett, Billy the Kid, Billy Wilson, Rudabaugh, Tom O'Folliard, Charlie Bowdre, and Tom Pickett rode wearily into Fort Sumner, New Mexico on December 19, 1880 and were confronted by Garrett's's posse which had been hiding in an old post hospital building. Pat Garrett, Lon chambers, and several others leaped from cover as Garrett ordered the outlaws to halt.

However, several of the posse members didn't wait for the outlaws to respond to Garrett's demand, instead, opening fire on Pickett and O'Folliard, who were riding in front. Though Pickett survived to escape, O'Folliard lie dead in the dusty street. Rudabaugh's horse caught a bullet and collapsed. Rudabaugh managed to jump onto Wilson's horse and he and the other outlaws escaped, holing up in an abandoned cabin near Stinking Springs, New Mexico.

Soon, the determined Garrett's posse tracked the outlaws down to Stinking Springs and surrounded the hideout. Inside of the house were Billy, Charlie Bowdre, Rudabaugh, Tom Pickett and Billy Wilson. When Bowdre passed before an open window, he was shot in the chest. The siege continued until the next day, when Rudabaugh finally waved a white flag and the bandits surrendered. Billy the Kid and his gang of "Rustlers" were captured on December 23, 1880 and taken to Santa Fe, New Mexico.

Billy was jailed in the town of Mesilla, south of Santa Fe, while waiting for his April, 1881 trial. Deliberation took exactly one day and Billy was convicted of murdering Sheriff William Brady and sentenced to hang by Judge Warren Bristol. His execution was scheduled for May 13th and he was sent to Lincoln to await this date. He was under guard by James Bell and Robert Ollinger on the top floor of the building formerly known as the "House" before and during the Lincoln County War. On April 28th Billy somehow escaped and killed both of his guards while Garrett was out of town. It is not known how Billy was able to do this, but, it is widely believed that a friend or Regulator sympathizer left a pistol in the privy that one of the guards escorted Billy to daily. After shooting Deputy Bell with the pistol, Billy stole Ollinger's 10-gauge double barrel shotgun and waited for Ollinger by the window in the room he was being held in.

Ollinger obliged by running immediately from the hotel upon hearing the shots. When he was directly under the window of the courthouse, he heard his prisoner say, "Hello, Bob." Ollinger then looked up and saw the Kid gun in hand. It was the last thing he ever saw as Billy blasted him with his own shotgun killing him instantly.

This would be, however, Billy's last escape. When Pat Garrett was questioning Billy's friend, Peter Maxwell on July 14, 1881 in Maxwell's darkened bedroom in Old Fort Sumner, Billy unexpectedly entered the room. The Kid didn't recognize Garrett in the poor lighting conditions and asked "¿Quien es? ¿Quien es?" (Spanish for "Who is it? Who is it?), to which Garrett responded with two shots from his revolver, the first striking Billy's heart.

Henry McCarty, the infamous "Billy the Kid", was buried in a plot in-between his dead friends Tom O'Folliard and Charlie Bowdre the next day at Fort Sumner's cemetery.

In his short life, Billy the Kid was reputed to have killed 21 men, one for each year of his life. However, many historians calculate the figure closer to nine (four on his own and five with the help of others).  Over 100 years later, in 2010 New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson considered honoring the 1879 promise of pardon for the Kid, made by then Governor Lew Wallace.  Richardson backed off of the idea though citing "historical ambiguity" surrounding Wallace's pardon.

[Sergeant Stubby, a short brindle bull terrier mutt, was officially decorated a hero of World War I. Regarded as the greatest war dog in the nation's history, he earned one wound stripe and three service stripes.]

Sergeant Stubby, a short brindle bull terrier mutt, was officially decorated a hero of World War I. Regarded as the greatest war dog in the nation's history, he earned one wound stripe and three service stripes.

Courtesy of Division of Armed Forces/Smithsonian National Museum of American History

http://www.stripes.com/news/us/the-story-of-sergeant-stubby-wwi-s-most-decorated-dog-1.285051

On July 6, 1921, a curious gathering took place at the State, War, and Navy Building on Pennsylvania Avenue in Washington. The occasion was a ceremony honoring veterans of the 102nd Infantry of the American Expeditionary Forces' 26th "Yankee" Division, who had seen action in France during the Great War. The hall was packed with dozens of members of the 102nd — field clerks, infantrymen, generals — but one soldier in particular commanded the spotlight. The attention seemed to bother him; The New York Times reported that the soldier was "a trifle gun shy, and showed some symptoms of nervous excitement." When photographers snapped his picture, he flinched.

The ceremony was presided over by Gen. John J. Pershing, commander of the American forces in Europe during the war. Pershing made a short speech, noting the soldier's "heroism of highest caliber" and "bravery under fire." The general solemnly lifted an engraved solid gold medal from its case and pinned it to the hero's uniform. In response, the Times reported, the solider "licked his chops and wagged his diminutive tail."

Sergeant Stubby, a short brindle bull terrier mutt, was officially a decorated hero of World War I. The award was not a formal U.S. military commendation, but it symbolically confirmed Stubby, who'd also earned one wound stripe and three service stripes, as the greatest war dog in the nation's history. According to the Smithsonian National Museum of American History, he was the first dog ever given rank in the U.S. Army. His glory was even hailed in France, which also presented him with a medal.

Millions of Americans heard tales of Stubby's courage. He had reportedly comforted wounded warriors on bullet-strafed battlefields. It was said he could sniff out poison gas, barking warnings to doughboys in the trenches. He even captured a German soldier. These exploits made the dog nothing less than a celebrity. He met three sitting presidents, traveled the nation to veterans' commemorations, and performed in vaudeville shows, earning $62.50 for three days of theatrical appearances, more than twice the weekly salary of the average American. For nearly a decade after the war until his death in 1926, Stubby was the most famous animal in the United States.

"Stubby's history overseas," a Waterbury, Connecticut, newspaper wrote in 1922, "is the story of almost any average doughboy." But of course Stubby was not a doughboy, and his renown was anything but average. Despite his postwar stardom, Stubby has faded from memory in the century since the war commenced. But his story is worth revisiting, and not just as a cute, curious footnote. Stubby's tale offers a glimpse of the American Army as it prepared to fight its first modern war — and later, of a bruised nation as it commemorated a victory obtained at unthinkable human costs.

A mutt goes to Yale
Stubby's provenance is unknown. According to several news reports, he first enters the historical record in July 1917 as an ownerless stray. The journey to the theater of war has the quality of legend — a scruffy, peculiarly American brand of myth. Stubby was like a character out of Horatio Alger, or a sentimental one-reel silent movie: an orphan who made his way in the world with perseverance and pluck.

The setting for Stubby's debut was the Yale Bowl in New Haven, Conn. Yale University's football stadium was the site of Camp Yale, where the soldiers of the 102nd Infantry, part of the New England-based 26th "Yankee" Division, were doing basic training prior to their deployment.

On a steamy summer morning, news reports would later recount, Stubby wandered onto the massive field, where the soldiers were doing exercises. He was not an impressive sight: short, barrel-shaped, a bit homely, with brown and white brindled stripes. Stubby lingered around Camp Yale after that first appearance. Ann Bausum, author of "Stubby the War Dog: The True Story of World War I's Bravest Dog," writes that J. Robert Conroy, a 25-old private from New Britain, Connecticut, forged the closest bond with the mutt. The two were soon inseparable.

In September 1917, a few months after Stubby first embedded with the troops at the Yale Bowl, the 102nd prepared to ship out. Conroy faced a problem: What to do about the dog he had adopted and named Stubby? Dogs were forbidden in the U.S. military, but Conroy had managed to keep the stray as a pet throughout his three-month training in Connecticut. Getting Stubby to Europe would be a more daunting challenge.

The troops traveled by rail to Newport News, Va.,, a newly designated port of embarkation for soldiers heading to France. Here the 26th Division was slated to board one of the largest freighters navigating the Atlantic, the SS Minnesota. The New York Times describes how Conroy eluded the ship guards by concealing Stubby in his Army-issue greatcoat. He then spirited the dog down to the hold and hid him in the ship's coal bin.

At some point during the turbulent Atlantic crossing, Stubby was found out. Here the lore of Stubby, as reported by various newspapers, takes on a suspiciously cutesy cast: The story goes that the dog charmed his way into the good graces of the officers who discovered him by lifting his right paw in a salute. Out of hiding and free to roam the freighter, Stubby proved popular with the crew. A machinist onboard fashioned Stubby his own set of metal "dog tags." By the time the troops disembarked in the port of Saint-Nazaire on France's western coast, Stubby was the 102nd Infantry's unofficial mascot.

Dogs in the trenches
The story of dogs in warfare is an old one, stretching back to antiquity. Persians, Greeks, Assyrians, and Babylonians all used dogs in battle. Dogs were part of Attila the Hun's forces in his fifth-century European conquests. In the Middle Ages, knights outfitted dogs with canine armor; Napoleon used trained dogs as sentinels in the French campaign in Egypt.

Many of the countries involved in World War I had war dog training schools in place prior to the conflict. France, Britain, Belgium, Germany, and Russia all recognized the value of trained dogs on the battlefield. The conventional wisdom favored pedigreed dogs: Jack Russell terriers for chasing rats out of trenches; German shepherds, Chiens de Brie, and Alsatian sheep dogs for sentry duty. Airedale terriers were considered good messenger dogs. Siberian huskies, naturally, were relied on for transport.

Dogs were also a key part of the Red Cross' aid efforts, and every country had its own unit. Red Cross dogs, also called sanitary dogs, or Sanitätshunde by the Germans, negotiated battlefields and no-man's lands to aide wounded men. Saddlebags stocked with water and medical supplies were strapped to their backs. Because they wore the Red Cross symbol, these dogs were, in theory, protected from being shot by the enemy. Often, the dogs simply provided comfort and a warm body to dying men on battlefields.

Many dogs, including Red Cross dogs, performed heroically. In one battle, Prusco, a French dog, located and dragged more than 100 wounded men to safety. In 1915, the French government asked Allan Alexander Allan, a Scotsman living in Alaska, to provide its army with sled dogs.

Heavy winter snows in the Vosges Mountains were holding back French supply lines; mules and horses couldn't breach the impasse to move artillery and ammunition. Allan managed to transport, in secret, more than 400 sled dogs from Alaska to Quebec, where he and the dogs boarded a cargo ship bound for France. Once there, the dogs hauled ammunition, aided soldiers in the work of laying communication lines, and helped transport wounded soldiers to field hospitals.

"It was enough to make one forget all about the war," Allan recalled later. "Even when the shells were singing, to see a line half a mile long of dog teams tearing down the mountain to the base depot, every blue devil whooping and yelling and trying to pass the one ahead."

Germany had a long tradition of military dogs and had the war's best-trained canine force. In the 1870s, the German military began coordinating with local dog clubs, training and breeding dogs for combat. They established the first military dog school in 1884, and by the start of the Great War, they had almost 7,000 trained dogs. At the peak of the war, Germany's dog forces numbered more than 30,000: messengers, Sanitätshunde, draught animals, guards.

Among the allies, France had the largest and most diverse dog units. At one point, the U.S. Army borrowed French-trained dogs for sentry duty, but the plan was eventually aborted because the dogs only responded to commands in French. At the start of the war, the United States was one of the few participants in World War I that did not maintain a canine force.

War dogs weren't the only area in which the U.S. military was wanting. The Army lagged behind its allies in both recruiting and preparedness.

"We came into this war without an army ... so now must build an entire new organization," said Gen. Pershing in 1917. Stubby, the foundling mutt, was thus an apt mascot for the U.S. forces: unpedigreed, untrained, an underdog.

Stubby in action
In October 1917, one month after landing in France, the American Expeditionary Forces entered the Western Front. The raw troops of the 26th Division were brought to Neufchâteau, in the Lorraine region of northeastern France, to train with more experienced French forces.

The 26th would end the war as one of America's most battle-scarred. They took part in four major offensives — Aisne-Marne, Champagne-Marne, Saint-Mihiel, and Meuse-Argonne — and 17 engagements. They saw more fighting than any other American infantry division: 210 days in total. Stubby was there for the duration.

The regiment's leader, Col. John Henry Parker, was a gruff, intimidating man, a veteran of the Spanish-American War and an expert machine gun tactician who eventually received a Silver Star for extraordinary heroism. It was Parker who gave special orders that Stubby remain with the 26th. The dog, it was said, "was the only member of his regiment that could talk back to [Parker] and get away with it."

Stubby remained with the 102nd throughout the training period in Neufchâteau. Initially, he didn't serve in an official capacity, but the dog was allowed stay with Conroy, even when he went on assignment as a dispatch rider delivering messages to command posts on horseback.

By February 1918, the 102nd was bunkering along the lines of Chemin des Dames, the French-held "ladies path" on the Western Front, nervously anticipating the Germans' launch of a spring offensive. On St. Patrick's Day, bells and klaxons, the signal of a poison gas attack, rang out along the hillside in the Marne where Stubby and Conroy were stationed.

For a full 24 hours, German gas shells rained down. Somehow, the dog and his master survived. (Perhaps gas masks were to thank — man and dog alike were issued masks, though The New York Times reported that "Stubby's physiognomy was of such peculiar contour that no mask could afford real satisfaction.")

It was at Chemin des Dames that Stubby reportedly saved the 102nd from a gas attack. The Times describes how one morning, while most of the troops were sleeping, the division was assaulted by an early morning gas launch. Stubby first smelled the gas then ran up and down the trenches barking and biting soldiers, working to rouse them from slumber and getting them to safety. On April 5 Stubby became a private first class, his first military rank.

The 26th Division soon moved from Chemin des Dames to nearby towns of Saint-Mihiel and Seicheprey. The 102nd Infantry headquarters were set up near a dangerous spot 1 1/2 miles north of Mandres-aux-Quatre-Tours. Known as "Dead Man's Curve" because the hazardous turn required oncoming vehicles to slow down, the location made easy prey for the German artillery. Stubby and company were placed in support positions to wait for a German breakthrough.

On April 20, near Seicheprey, the Germany infantry led one of its first attacks against American troops. Almost 3,000 German Stoßtruppen (shock troops) fired on, and overwhelmed, a small contingent of 600 American soldiers from the 26th. Fighting was so intense that Maj. George Rau, commander of the 102nd, ordered his cooks, truck drivers, and even the marching band into the fray.

The Germans claimed victory, leaving 81 Allied troops killed, 424 wounded, and 130 captured. Seicheprey sustained the heaviest losses in the Saint-Mihiel sector. Stubby got his first war wound at Seicheprey, when a German shell fragment lodged in his left foreleg.

By June, however, Stubby had recovered and was back in action. When the 102nd reached Chateâu Thierry in July, the dog had evidently learned to distinguish a khaki doughboy uniform from gray serge Germany garb: He recognized a uniformed enemy soldier. Stubby's rage at the sight of a German was reportedly so "savage," in the words of an Associated Press account, that "it was found necessary to tie him up when batches of prisoners were being brought back, for fear that trouserless Germans would be reaching the prison pens."

In the Argonne, Stubby sniffed out a lost German soldier hiding in nearby bushes. The dog gave chase, eventually dragging the soldier back to the 102nd. To the victor go the spoils: The Iron Cross medal that had been pinned to the German's uniform thereafter adorned Stubby's Army "coat."

Stubby later took part in the brutal offensives of Saint-Mihiel, Aisne-Marne, and the Champagne-Marne. When the war ended on Nov. 11, 1918, Stubby was in Meuse-Argonne. The process of demobilization was protracted, and troops stayed on for several months after Armistice. While waiting out the trip home from France, Stubby met his first of three presidents, Woodrow Wilson, on Christmas Day 1918 in Mandres en Bassigny. According to Bausum, the two reportedly shook "hands." Four months later, on April 29, 1919, Stubby and Conroy were demobilized at Camp Devens, Massachusetts.

The perfect war hero

After the war, Stubby was ubiquitous. He attended the 1920 Republican National Convention, which culminated in the nomination of Warren G. Harding. Harding officially received Stubby at the White House in 1921; in 1924, the dog passed review for Harding's successor, Calvin Coolidge, three times. When Conroy went to study law at Georgetown, Stubby became the university's official mascot, a predecessor to the Hoya bulldog of the present day.

Usually closed doors were flung open for Stubby. In December 1922, The New York Times reported that for the first time, the exclusive Hotel Majestic on Central Park had broken its own rules and allowed the dog to stay overnight. Stubby was made a member of the Red Cross and the American Legion. The YMCA conferred a lifetime membership on the dog, stipulating that he was entitled to "three bones a day and a place to sleep" for as long as he lived.

In the division of armed forces history at the Smithsonian National Museum of America History in Washington, there is a fascinating artifact, a testament to Stubby's fame and the swath he cut across American popular culture in the immediate postwar years. It is a leather-bound scrapbook, kept by Conroy.

The book is crammed with documents and ephemera: fan letters, poems, drawings, an invitation to the White House from President Wilson. And there are newspaper clippings, the closest we have to a comprehensive anthology of the press coverage of Stubby. The accounts collected in Conroy's scrapbook broadly sketch the narrative of Stubby's service that became familiar in the immediate postwar years.

The clippings in Conroy's scrapbook conflict on many particulars of Stubby's story: Was he wounded in the chest or in the left foreleg in Seicheprey? Was he mostly a Boston bull terrier or a bulldog or a fox terrier? The stories are mostly written in a breathless tabloid tone that suggests the truth was less important to their authors than a good yarn:

Over the top he went with the boys on many occasions, and the sight of the enemy was like a red flag to a bull. On one trip "over" he sank his teeth in the seat of a fleeing Hun's trousers and did not let go. "Kamerad," howled the Hun; but Stubby paid no attention, hanging on until the foe laid down and gave up to the Yanks.

We can feel confident about certain details that emerge from the journalistic record: Stubby served in France, he was the beloved mascot for the 102nd, he was wounded at Seicheprey. There are sepia-toned photographs showing the dog in the French countryside, surrounded by soldiers on a wooden Ford Model T ambulance.

Another photo, dated February 1919, captures Stubby in the town of Mandres-aux-Quatre-Tours, in Lorraine in northeastern France. The dog sits in dappled sunlight, in a reflective pose on a wooden chair against a brick wall backdrop. But given the documentation that has survived, it is difficult at times to separate the actions of the real dog from the mythology that sprung up around him upon his triumphant return with the victorious American Army.

But the very fact of Stubby's celebrity itself enlightens our understanding of the war and its aftermath. Surely some measure of his popularity in the postwar period was due to the novelty of a canine hero. But the dog was also the perfect mascot for a war that had introduced human carnage on a scale never previously seen. While Stubby was hailed with newspaper encomiums and ceremonial pomp, something was being glossed over: the grim details of life in the trenches, poison gas attacks, debilitating war injuries, death.

It is a truism that World War I was the first modern war, but it's easy to forget what that meant 100 years ago. The scale and nature of World War I was unprecedented, shocking even to Americans who had lived through the Civil War a half-century earlier. Many veterans were haunted by their experiences in the trenches, but American and military culture did not encourage the airing of battlefield traumas. Shellshock was regarded as a mental illness, the result of cowardice, a shameful disease. In this environment, Sergeant Stubby was an ideal World War I hero, because he was ideally stoic. He was the jaunty little creature who could be trotted out for parades, appear with politicians and military brass in photo opportunities, and was guaranteed to stay on message.

It's impossible to say if Stubby's celebrity was cultivated by the U.S. government or if it was the result of an organic groundswell. While there is very little written record about Stubby's keeper, J. Robert Conroy, we do know that from 1913 on, his life was very much intertwined with the U.S. government. After the war, he worked as a bureaucrat, first for the Bureau of Investigation (predecessor to the FBI) at the Justice Department, then with military intelligence and finally on Capitol Hill as secretary for a Connecticut congressman.

Still, not everyone was captive to Stubby's charms. The most revealing page in the Stubby scrapbook may be the one in which we find a note, inscribed in Conroy's handwriting: "Criticism of Stubby which proves he is famous." It is a single page, but its contents show that Stubby-mania wasn't embraced by all Army veterans. And much of the criticism illustrates that commemorating Stubby did often mean neglecting the story of human veterans.

The page includes an infuriated letter to the editor by Richard L. Richardson, a Great War veteran from San Angelo, Texas. Richardson writes:

If this Boston bull did so much and the boys didn't do anything, why not send an army of bull pups the next time and see who is entitled to these honors? I think the whole thing is nothing but a disgrace to the U.S. Army. I feel that I am insulted ... the thousands of real heroes, the red-blooded American boys who left gallons of their blood and maybe an arm or a leg on the battlefields don't get these honors bestowed on them. They didn't do anything to receive a medal or the name "a real hero." But a dog did.

Stubby died in his sleep in Conroy's arms in 1926. Today, he may be the last decorated World War I veteran that you can still see in the flesh. His taxidermied remains are on view at the Smithsonian, in a crowded display case alongside a mannequin doughboy and another World War I military animal celebrity, the carrier pigeon Cher Ami. Stubby's ears are pointed up, and he wears a gruff expression. He looks like a ramrod sergeant: tough, unsmiling, no nonsense, with a coat covered in medals.

[1. Your Stomach Secretes Corrosive Acid -]

1. Your Stomach Secretes Corrosive Acid - There's one dangerous liquid no airport security can confiscate from you: It's in your gut. Your stomach cells secrete hydrochloric acid, a corrosive compound used to treat metals in the industrial world. It can pickle steel, but mucous lining the stomach wall keeps this poisonous liquid safely in the digestive system, breaking down lunch.


2. Body Position Affects Your Memory - Can't remember your anniversary, hubby? Try getting down on one knee. Memories are highly embodied in our senses. A scent or sound may evoke a distant episode from one's childhood. The connections can be obvious (a bicycle bell makes you remember your old paper route) or inscrutable. A recent study helps decipher some of this embodiment. An article in the January 2007 issue of Cognition reports that episodes from your past are remembered faster and better while in a body position similar to the pose struck during the event.


3. Bones Break (Down) to Balance Minerals - In addition to supporting the bag of organs and muscles that is our body, bones help regulate our calcium levels. Bones contain both phosphorus and calcium, the latter of which is needed by muscles and nerves. If the element is in short supply, certain hormones will cause bones to break down�upping calcium levels in the body�until the appropriate extracellular concentration is reached.


4. Much of a Meal is Food For Thought - Though it makes up only 2 percent of our total body weight, the brain demands 20 percent of the body's oxygen and calories. To keep our noggin well-stocked with resources, three major cerebral arteries are constantly pumping in oxygen. A blockage or break in one of them starves brain cells of the energy they require to function, impairing the functions controlled by that region. This is a stroke.


5. Thousands of Eggs Unused by Ovaries - When a woman reaches her late 40s or early 50s, the monthly menstrual cycle that controls her hormone levels and readies ova for insemination ceases. Her ovaries have been producing less and less estrogen, inciting physical and emotional changes across her body. Her underdeveloped egg follicles begin to fail to release ova as regularly as before. The average adolescent girl has 34,000 underdeveloped egg follicles, although only 350 or so mature during her life (at the rate of about one per month). The unused egg follicles then deteriorate. With no potential pregnancy on the horizon, the brain can stop managing the release of ova.


6. Puberty Reshapes Brain Structure, Makes for Missed Curfews - We know that hormone-fueled changes in the body are necessary to encourage growth and ready the body for reproduction. But why is adolescence so emotionally unpleasant? Hormones like testosterone actually influence the development of neurons in the brain, and the changes made to brain structure have many behavioral consequences. Expect emotional awkwardness, apathy and poor decision-making skills as regions in the frontal cortex mature.


7. Cell Hairs Move Mucus - Most cells in our bodies sport hair-like organelles called cilia that help out with a variety of functions, from digestion to hearing. In the nose, cilia help to drain mucus from the nasal cavity down to the throat. Cold weather slows down the draining process, causing a mucus backup that can leave you with snotty sleeves. Swollen nasal membranes or condensation can also cause a stuffed schnozzle.


8. Big Brains Cause Cramped Mouths - Evolution isn't perfect. If it were, we might have wings instead of wisdom teeth. Sometimes useless features stick around in a species simply because they're not doing much harm. But wisdom teeth weren't always a cash crop for oral surgeons. Long ago, they served as a useful third set of meat-mashing molars. But as our brains grew our jawbone structure changed, leaving us with expensively overcrowded mouths.


9. The World Laughs With You - Just as watching someone yawn can induce the behavior in yourself, recent evidence suggests that laughter is a social cue for mimicry. Hearing a laugh actually stimulates the brain region associated with facial movements. Mimicry plays an important role in social interaction. Cues like sneezing, laughing, crying and yawning may be ways of creating strong social bonds within a group.


10. Your Skin Has Four Colors - All skin, without coloring, would appear creamy white. Near-surface blood vessels add a blush of red. A yellow pigment also tints the canvas. Lastly, sepia-toned melanin, created in response to ultraviolet rays, appears black in large amounts. These four hues mix in different proportions to create the skin colors of all the peoples of Earth.

[Advantame is 20,000 times sweeter than regular table sugar]

Just like its five previously approved counterparts, advantame is said by the FDA to be low-calorie and doesn't generally raise blood sugar.

The FDA gave the green light to the new artificial sweetener on Monday.

It is a white crystalline that dissolves in water, and does not break down under heat.

Advantame is 20,000 times sweeter than regular table sugar, gram per gram.