My favorite Mormon says it again!

Wake up America before it's too late!

Let's all stand together to take it back!

Fuck, this shit gets me so Goddamn angry it's not even funny.

Is this the America I grew up in?

Can anyone say "Police State"?

1st Amendment is going down the toilet along with the rest of the Bill of Rights, and nobody seems to care.

Why isn't this officer being charged with violating this guy's 1st Amendment Right to Free Speech?

What the FUCK, over!

Hat Tip to Doberman at http://iluvsa.blogspot.com/

Another busy week

Week two of my locomotive engineer's training was another busy one. Practicing using the air brakes, train handling and troubleshooting problems with the locomotive. I'm having a blast! It's a huge boost to my confidence that my instructor trusts me and one other guy to run a locomotive by ourselves for the Switchman trainees learn to mount and dismount moving equipment and making cuts and couplings on trains. He just sends us out on the locomotive now, knowing we're not going to tear up shit...

I'm still trying to get my sleep pattern regulated... I've been going to bed early and not spending any time reading my favorite blogs or doing any posting myself. I think I may have screwed that all up yesterday though... I went to the Tiki Bar after work yesterday afternoon with all good intentions of only staying for Happy Hour... Got there around 4:15 PM... And at 9:30 I was still there... I staggered home and feeling no pain I was able to stay up just long enough to watch the Space Shuttle launch at midnight. Crawling out of bed today at the crack of noon with a pounding head I had to remember I'm not 25 anymore and can't hang out and drink all night like I used to! I also vaguely remember being rude to one guy at the bar last night, but that's not going to worry me. The guy in question has pretty thin skin and likes to be a smartass to people, but doesn't like to get the same thing back, so a little tit-for-tat was warranted.

Next week I'm going to try to post more... There's a lot happening in the world that's been pissing me off and I haven't had a chance to vent about it lately.

I'm doing well on my other goal though... I've been able to drop 10 pounds in the last two weeks and have been eating a lot better. More fruits and greens... Less red meat. It's also helped that its been in the mid 90's all week with 100% humidity so I've been able to sweat a lot of it off.

I can now get into my work trousers without having to suck it in and hold my breath to button the fly!

Copyright 2009 Thomas J Wolfenden

Been busy...

The last week found me really busy. By the time I got home in the evening, I had just enough reserve energy to get some dinner, get a shower and crawl into bed. No time to blog. I did get several nice emails from friends wondering where I disappeared to. Thanks guys!

For the next several weeks I'll be working on the locomotives, running in the yard and the main line. This is going to be weekdays, on day work. Once the crop starts though, I don't know what shift I'll be working. Since I'll be going from the the highest~seniority conductor to the 6th lowest seniority engineer, I'll most probably be working nights throughout the sugar harvesting season.

Also, it seems like my idea for "Music Monday" wasn't all that popular, so starting Monday I won't be doing it anymore. I'll still be doing "Funny Foto Friday", so keep an eye out for that! You never know what my warped mind will come up with!

All in all, I'm just really glad to get back to work, as I was starting to go stir-crazy, with really nothing to do every day except play on the interweb and drink beer... Wait, that's not really a bad thing, is it?

I do have a few goals set for myself over the next winter... 1st is the lose about 20 lbs... I'm 210 lbs right now, and being 6'2", that not really a bad weight, mine is all in the middle. I've been getting my balls broken by some of the guys I haven't seen since the end of the crop in April, asking what my Due Date is... So my 1st goal is to lose my gut.

2nd is I'm finally getting some much needed dental work done. I've put it off for too long, and I'm sick of people asking me why I never smile. So in about 6 months, I'm going to have one of those fabulous Robert Redford smiles. My dental plan covers it, so why not? I'll blind the ladies with my pearly whites!

Anyway, not much else going on at the moment...

Copyright 2009 Thomas J Wolfenden

Back to work today!!!!!!!

I'm back to work today, so I'll leave you with this song for Music Monday!

Wake Up America!

And the last word... I want to know why this photo above is racist, hurtful and mean~spirited,

And this one from a few years ago isn't?

Wake Up America!
This might be our last chance!

A Very Long Road...

Several times I've been asked why I changed careers and what inspired me to take the job I'm in now. I did write about it before, but I'll reiterate my story again for those of you who are newcomers to my little slice of Cyberspace.

Pictured above is the Torresdale, PA railroad station. It sits about 3 miles from the house where I grew up, along the Northeast Corridor between Washington DC and New York City. Four tracks of electrified 140 lb. rail linking Washington, Baltimore, Philadelphia & New York, it sees the heaviest passenger and freight traffic in the country.

Once the main line for the Pennsylvania Railroad, then when the New Your Central and Pennsy merged, the Penn~Central railroad. By the early 1970's it was then Amtrak passenger service and ConRail for freight.

When I was about five or six, the big thing for me and my dad to do was on Sunday afternoons after Church (if you've ever been subjected to a 2~hour Latin mass at a Catholic church you'd need an outing to recover...) was to head off for a few hours of train watching. My dad would listen to the Phillies on the radio and I'd sit on the hood of our car, a 1963 Ford Falcon station wagon, and watch the trains go by.

Sometimes I'd even get the engineer to blow his whistle at me!

What a rush for a five year old!

Then one day, I can't tell you exactly when it happened, a HUGE GG-1, (pictured above) still sporting it's old Pennsylvania Railroad colors, pulling a cut of shiny new Budd Company Am coaches, came through the station at a crawling speed. I know now that the train was under a "Slow Order" and was just doing a slow pass through the station obeying the rules, but to this five-year-old, he was slowing down to show off his great machine just for me!

When that huge locomotive came even to where I sat in awe, the engineer leaned out of his open window in the cab, gave me a huge toothy grin and tooted his whistle just for me!

As the train passed, I sat in awe... As the last passenger car slid out of sight heading south to 30th Street Station I said to myself, "Someday, I'm going to do that!"

The dream really never did fade in me, no matter what I did in life. I always had that urge, no matter what I did in life. No matter where I was, I'd find an excuse to go somewhere and watch at least one train go by, that little boy in me still wishing to be up in that cab. I know my father always wanted to be an engineer, and I'm pretty sure, wherever he is, he's proud of me right now.

It took a long time, I'm knocking on 44 this coming December, and an even longer circuitous road to get here, but I'm finally here. A long road for that little five year~old boy sitting on the hood of an old Ford Falcon to the man who is, starting next Monday, after five years of working track gangs, operating ballast regulators, working as a conductor, is finally going to Locomotive Engineer's School.

Dad, I know what you were feeling when you witnessed those K4 Pacific's highball it through Frankford Junction when you were a boy back in the 1930's. I only wish you were around now to see me with my hand on the throttle!

Photos pinched from the Interweb, Melancholy reminiscing Copyright 2009 Thomas J Wolfenden

A few words on Gun Control

Almost everyone her in the US can tell you what was to be the first battle in our War of Independence. The Battle of Lexington Green in Massachusetts in April, 1775. Paul Revere, riding his horse throughout the night spreading the word that the “The British are coming, the British are coming!”

But what’s now conveniently left out of the US History textbooks today is why the British were coming.

And why was that?

Here’s what they’re leaving out: General Thomas Gage, military governor of Massachusetts, under direct orders of King George, decided to counter these moves by sending a force out of Boston to confiscate weapons stored in the village of Concord.

Confiscate the weapons…

And why did the British was the weapons confiscated? Well, to be able to properly control one’s subjects, first you must be able to take away their ability to resist. It’s the main reason our founding Fathers put the Second Amendment into the Bill of Rights, or collectively, the First 10 Amendments to the Constitution. They, of all people knew that any Government could grow to distrust its people, and in time, subjugate them. The only way to really insure that this would never happen is to give the citizens the tools in which to defend themselves from tyranny.

Take away the guns, you have slaves.

Here in the US there’s one insurance policy on “Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness” And along with the First Amendment, the freedom of speech, is the right to keep and bear arms.

"A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed."

The use of the word “Militia” is that every man, from the age of 17 to 60 is the Militia. It doesn’t mean the National Guard.

“A militia, when properly formed, are in fact the people themselves...and include all men capable of bearing arms." (Richard Henry Lee, Additional Letters from the Federal Farmer (1788)

"What, Sir, is the use of a militia? It is to prevent the establishment of a standing army, the bane of liberty.... Whenever Governments mean to invade the rights and liberties of the people, they always attempt to destroy the militia, in order to raise an army upon their ruins." (Rep. Elbridge Gerry of Massachusetts, spoken during floor debate over the Second Amendment, I Annals of Congress at 750 August 17, 1789

“...to disarm the people - that was the best and most effectual way to enslave them." (George Mason, 3 Elliot, Debates at 380)


"Americans have the right and advantage of being armed - unlike the citizens of other countries whose governments are afraid to trust the people with arms." (James Madison, The Federalist Papers #46 at 243-244)

"the ultimate authority ... resides in the people alone," (James Madison, author of the Bill of Rights, in Federalist Paper #46.)

"Before a standing army can rule, the people must be disarmed; as they are in almost every kingdom of Europe. The supreme power in America cannot enforce unjust laws by the sword; because the whole body of the people are armed, and constitute a force superior to any bands of regular troops that can be, on any pretense, raised in the United States" (Noah Webster in `An Examination into the Leading Principles of the Federal Constitution', 1787, a pamphlet aimed at swaying Pennsylvania toward ratification, in Paul Ford, ed., Pamphlets on the Constitution of the United States, at 56(New York, 1888))

"...if raised, whether they could subdue a Nation of freemen, who know how to prize liberty, and who have arms in their hands?" (Delegate Sedgwick, during the Massachusetts Convention, rhetorically asking if an oppressive standing army could prevail, Johnathan Elliot, ed., Debates in the Several State Conventions on the Adoption of the Federal Constitution, Vol.2 at 97 (2d ed., 1888))

"...but if circumstances should at any time oblige the government to form an army of any magnitude, that army can never be formidable to the liberties of the people, while there is a large body of citizens, little if at all inferior to them in discipline and use of arms, who stand ready to defend their rights..." (Alexander Hamilton speaking of standing armies in Federalist 29.)

"Besides the advantage of being armed, which the Americans possess over the people of almost every other nation. . . Notwithstanding the military establishments in the several kingdoms of Europe, which are carried as far as the public resources will bear, the governments are afraid to trust the people with arms." (James Madison, author of the Bill of Rights, in Federalist Paper No. 46.)

"As civil rulers, not having their duty to the people before them, may attempt to tyrannize, and as the military forces which must be occasionally raised to defend our country, might pervert their power to the injury of their fellow citizens, the people are confirmed by the article in their right to keep and bear their private arms." (Tench Coxe in `Remarks on the First Part of the Amendments to the Federal Constitution' under the Pseudonym `A Pennsylvanian' in the Philadelphia Federal Gazette, June 18, 1789 at 2 col. 1)

"Congress have no power to disarm the militia. Their swords, and every other terrible implement of the soldier, are the birthright of an American... The unlimited power of the sword is not in the hands of either the federal or state government, but, where I trust in God it will ever remain, in the hands of the people" (Tench Coxe, Pennsylvania Gazette, Feb. 20, 1788)

"The prohibition is general. No clause in the Constitution could by any rule of construction be conceived to give to Congress a power to disarm the people. Such a flagitious attempt could only be made under some general pretense by a state legislature. But if in any blind pursuit of inordinate power, either should attempt it, this amendment may be appealed to as a restraint on both." [William Rawle, A View of the Constitution 125-6 (2nd ed. 1829)

But the powers that be are right now, and have been for quite some time, slowly taking that one thing, the very key to our Republic and our voice. Because once you’ve taken the tools away to defend ourselves, to rise up against tyranny, all the other Amendments in the Bill of Rights will topple one after the other like a house of cards.

Adolph Hitler disarmed the countries he invaded, even his own people. So did Stalin.

The one freedom I hold the dearest is the ability here in the States to defend my home and family from intruders. While each of the 50 State’s laws vary on the subject, for the most part (for now) if someone is breaking into your home at 3 AM, you can defend your home and family by whatever means is at your disposal. No laws saying you have to see if he’s armed or predetermine what his intentions are.

At 3 AM, or at any time for that matter, if someone is in my home without my permission, I’d have to conclude his reasons are nefarious and he’s not trying to sell me a subscription to the Weekly Standard. He’s getting “X” Ringed in short order.

Like I said before, the Government is slowly taking every last freedom away from us, but to be completely successful they first have to take away our guns.

"The best we can hope for concerning the people at large is that they be properly armed." (Alexander Hamilton, The Federalist Papers at 184-8)

“The strongest reason for people to retain the right to keep and bear arms is, as a last resort, to protect themselves against tyranny in government." (Thomas Jefferson)

And now where does that leave us?

But I hear the argument all the time. “But Tommy, the criminals are getting the guns! We have to stop that!”

Well, here the news for you nimrods who don’t get it. The criminals will Always have guns. Do you really think the criminals are going to obey the laws? Look at Great Britain. Has their gun bans stopped the criminals? You can not own a firearm in Britain and yet the shooting have skyrocketed. And if you are one of the veery lucky few to actually own a legal firearm in Britain, use it to defend yourself and see what happens to you. British police are now arming themselves for the first time. Hmm. Bobbies arming themselves?


Those gun laws are really working out for, aren’t they?

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1334043/Gun-crimes-soaring-despite-ban-brought-in-following-Dunblane.html

Every place here in the States where the gun laws are the most stringent, the crime rates have gone through the roof. Where I lived in Arizona, almost everyone had at least one firearm and carried one regularly and there was almost no violent crime.

And what about Kennesaw, Georgia?

http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1282/is_n15_v46/ai_15729634/

That’s a story the Left doesn’t like to talk about. But then on the other side of the coin, Washington DC has the most restrictive gun laws in the country, yet the homicide rates are though the roof.

The only thing taking away the people rights to own guns achieves is effectively enslaving them.
"The most foolish mistake we could possibly make would be to allow the subject races to possess arms. History shows that all conquerors who have allowed their subject races to carry arms have prepared their own downfall by so doing. Indeed, I would go so far as to say that the supply of arms to the underdogs is a sine qua non for the overthrow of any sovereignty. So let's not have any native militia or native police. German troops alone will bear the sole responsibility for the maintenance of law and order throughout the occupied Russian territories, and a system of military strong-points must be evolved to cover the entire occupied country." --Adolf Hitler, dinner talk on April 11, 1942

Kind of gives you the Warm & Fuzzies, doesn’t it?

Did you know that the Gun Control Act of 1968, the most restrictive legislation on gun ownership to date, is almost verbatim of Nazi Germany’s “Weapons Control Law” of 1938?

It’s far too large to reproduce here, but you can look it up if you don’t believe me.

“But Tommy! What’s wrong with banning machineguns and other military weapons?”

It’s not about the type of weapons. It’s just the slow chipping away of freedoms. They did it with this type of gun today, and they’ll use that rationale in every instance. It was the type, then the magazines, next it’ll be the type or how much ammunition you can buy, then how many guns you can own… Like a single drop of water on a granite boulder. Enough drops of seemingly harmless water over the years will completely erode the rock.

As for machineguns. Did you know it’s still legal to own a fully automatic firearm here in the States? They’re regulated to all hell and expensive, but you can legally own a machinegun here. I have several friends that own them. They’re called “Title III” or “Class III” weapons. You’ll pay as much as the cost of a brand new car for a legally transferable M-16, but you can still legally own one. And not once, ONCE mind you, has one of those legal automatic weapons ever been used in the commission of a crime.

My final words are this;

Gun ownership is not about duck hunting or target shooting.

It’s about your personal freedom.

Copyright 2009 Thomas J Wolfenden

Let's go back to the 80's!

This song brings me back to High School...

Have a great Music Monday!

Photography Lesson #1

When taking snapshots of the kids, be sure to check the background!

Happy Funny Foto Friday!

See you all on Monday!

A New Genocide

The fifteenth anniversary of the "Rwandan Genocide" was this year, and some predict yet another African genocide is about to unfold soon in Sudan. In South Africa, however, where the evil white supremacy of Apartheid was dismantled and black majority rule established, all is happiness, a veritable cakewalk to utopia, a socialist's dream come true...If you believe what's being told by the media here in the US, if South Africa is mentioned at all in the nightly news, which it hardly ever is.

The African National Congress, the terrorist organization run by the Communist Party that took over the country in 1994, is the main political party and shows no sign of losing power. For the foreseeable future, South Africa seems destined to be a one-party democracy run by ANC Party Apparatchiks and crony's to the ANC. I'm not going to sit here and explain it all, because I really don't know it all. I'm still learning about South Africa. What I do know is the ANC is run by a bunch of communists, and back in the early 90's when I was still in Philadelphia I was physically ill when Nelson Mandela came to my city to receive the Freedom Medal from President Clinton. I know then what he really stood for... Something I've fought against my entire life. Communism/socialism that would enslave me.

Of course, here in the US, where we actually have a democracy that (at least in theory) has two whole political parties or more, “democracy” is not quite the term for political systems dominated forever by a single party. For now.

The one thing one ever hears about South Africa is in terms of AIDS and crime. As for the former, it has more HIV-positive people than any other country in the world, and AIDS is expected to reduce life expectancy to the age of 36 by 2015. That's all you here on Fox, CNN, ABC, NBC & CBS, if South Africa gets a short 45-second mention at all.

What one never, ever hears is the truth about the systematic campaign of murder and torture carried out since 1994 against South Africa’s white farmers. Some 1,600 have already been murdered, and while the government claims it’s simply uncontrollable crime, the indications are that it’s a deliberate effort to exterminate whites and drive them off the land.

A White Genocide.

But that’s only farmers. Some estimates put the number of white Afrikaners killed by blacks since 1994 at 30,000 or more.

30,000 murders? Of white south Africans? Why isn't this on the news? Oh, that's right.

They're white.

Silly me for asking.

I beg to ask this. If this was 30,000 black farmers tortured, raped and murdered, what would the media coverage be like here in the good old US of A? And would the ObamaGod be sending Marines in like Bubba Clinton did in Sierra Leone a few years ago?

You all know the answer to that question.

Form my digging around and a little research, I've found that whites in South Africa are becoming economic slaves. They pay 80 % of personal taxes, despite earning only 50 percent of total salaries. Afrikaners as a group pay the highest portion of overall tax in South Africa, 36%, while white English~speakers pay 32 %. When he was in exile in Britain, Thibo Mbeki, South Africa President from 1999 to 2008, is reputed to have said, "We will suck the whites dry" and that is more or less what is happening. South Africa is like a small, First World economy like that of Denmark or Norway, still run by whites, but which must support a welfare state for 40 million blacks.

What is happening in South Africa is simply the deliberate transformation of a Western society, economy and political culture into a Third World Shithole. The transformation is taking place because the dominant race of white Westerners has been pushed out of power by the majority non~white, non~Western race. But as I look at it, what’s happening there is not unique.It's starting to look like it's happening here, in the Good Old US of A.

But getting back to the Genocide... I may not be the smartest man in the world. But I do see what's happening. The trillions of dollars spent in the last six months scare me. The Cap and Trade bill scares me. The Heathcare bill scares me.

But what's really scaring me is the new Socialism coming to us, the genocide of not only the white South Africans, who just want to be left alone, farm their lands and live in the only country they've known... But to us, the every~day Americans who, right under our very noses, our every thread of identity being stripped from us until one day, in the very near future, we may be next for the "Reparations" and "Taking Back" of what's "Owed" to the perceived oppressed.

You, my friends are witnessing the slow Genocide of the United Sates of America.

And the really sad part about this, and I do truly grieve for the slain South Africans, is that even now, even though there's now the slight beginnings of rumblings in the hinterlands...

No one seems to care. About the murdered farmers on the Veld, or the demise of what I really believe is the Greatest Nation on earth.

And that's truly sad.

This is the first time in my life, since their deaths, I'm glad my parents are gone.

They won't have to see this.

Copyright 2009 Thomas J Wolfenden

Grrrr....

I'm still having problems with my connectivity... So I'll leave you guys with this today. This is NOT the America I grew up in.

Ireland sure has changed...

The Shamus O'Granahan clan on their recent family outing in Londonderry to protest John Bull's tyranny again... Singing songs of the IRA like "Patriot Games", it was a heart~felt gathering of true Irish spirit!

Young Timothy Sean McGranahan, alter boy of the local St. Patrick's Catholic church, expresses sadness of the hated Brits trying to draft their loving Irish father into the British Army to fight against his fellow Irish!

I had to look into the mirror today to see if I was really Irish...

What the fuck, over?

Photos pinched from the ILSA blog, Satire copyright 2009 Thomas J Wolfenden ( Really Irish)

Great song

And an inspirational poem that's kept me going even when I've felt like giving up...

Enjoy!

Happy Music Monday!

Problem solved

I think...

I was thinking it wasn't my computer, and it appears it isn't. Looks like my DSL modem is taking a shit. It's working for now, and I'm just waiting on a new one from ISP to arrive in the mail.

So I'm back, sort of...