Philosophically Speaking the World in Motion
She stumbled, twice from her bedroom to the kitchen. Rubbing sleep from her eyes, she grabbed the pot while punching the grinder. The smell of ground coffee filled the air.
Looking down, she noted she was still dressed from the night before. Never mind, coffee first then solve the mystery.
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This week’s word is Coffee. The word limit is 50 words. This one comes in at 50.
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The fans swirled overhead, yet the air was overheated. She felt desiccated, confused by her presence in the diner straight from a bad 50’s movie. Looking in the window, she saw herself a vision straight from pinup art.
“What the hell, “she thought, “you would never catch me dead in this get up.”
Suddenly the door swung open and with the tall man who came through the door came an underlying scent of rotten eggs.
“Waitress, coffee dammit!”
She looked again, noticed the tail twitching beneath the long coat.
“Oh, no. I am a waitress in Hell.”
Flash in the Pan is brought to you by the amazing Red of M3 fame
This week’s word is Waitress. The word limit is 100 words. This one comes in at 97.
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This is dedicated to all those people in the service industry who believe they are doing you a favor by waiting on you, answering your questions, answering the phone, bringing your food, taking your order or any of the other sundry things they are paid to do. Yes, I know there are many in the service industry that do a great job, unfortunately there are far too many who do not.
And so, my fellow Americans: ask not what your country can do for you – ask what you can do for your country.
My fellow citizens of the world: ask not what America will do for you, but what together we can do for the freedom of man.
Inaugural Address, John F. Kennedy, 20-January-19611
They called it Camelot, the brilliant 1,022 days of the Kennedy Presidency. The young president with his beautiful wife and young children entered the White House full of the hope and dreams of a nation, the baton was passed from old guard to new. It was a new dawn where politicians, actors and artists mingled over meals and danced together into the dawn. The nation was mesmerized, as they watched on their televisions this young and handsome president, his brothers and friends take Washington by storm.
Inarguration Day
JFK was the youngest president ever elected; he was also the first Roman Catholic. His campaign was the first ever televised his speeches the first seen by more than those in the room with him, the four presidential debates the first both seen and heard. Though his Catholicism was considered a deterrent by many he was able to deflect questions about his religion when asked, ultimately this became a non-issue with many voters though not with all especially among Southern Protestants. The one thing to keep in mind when considering the Kennedy Presidency, he barely beat Nixon, it was a neck-and-neck race right down to the end with the electoral vote finally deciding the presidency and even this being questionable due to the unpledged Southern Segregationist Electors who refused to cast their vote for the Kennedy ticket. Ultimately, this is what both the popular and Electoral College vote looked like:
| Candidate | Popular Vote | Electoral College | % of Vote |
| Kennedy / Johnson | 34,220,984 | 303 | 49.72% |
| Nixon / Lodge | 34,108,157 | 219 | 49.55% |
| Byrd / ThurmondByrd / Goldwater | Never on ballot, no popular vote | 15 (1)15 (1) |
So now, we come to it 1,022 days of Camelot. What did he accomplish and during this time what nefarious acts, scandals and outrages was the Office of the President or those around him involved in? Surely, given the advent of television and the hunger of the American public for gossip we know what went on in the inner circle of this damned near American Royal family inhabiting the White House.
Of political scandals, poorly managed foreign affairs there have been much written over the years. The question becomes, why was so much so closely held for so many years? What drove this Administration to muck up relationships with USSR Premier Khrushchev was it simply generational and language barriers? Or, as some who witnessed the Summit of 1961, both public and private the egos of both men that played large parts in their inability to find any common ground. It is likely we will never know however certainly we can consider the cocktail of drugs the young president relied upon for pain management as one possible reason for his inability to process information, think quickly on his feet and act pragmatically rather than emotionally.
There are key political issues that haunt the Kennedy tenure in the White House; these were all driven by the Cold War and the legacy of the Eisenhower administration. All were failures in their execution though not all were considered failures at the time or even today, all have been white washed by press and biographers alike.
failed invasion and attempted overthrow of Fidel Castro. Many consider this a failure of Eisenhower plan rather than of JFK.The beleaguered JFK was not originally intended for political office, upon the untimely death of his brother Joe Jr. he was queued up to fulfill the family ambitions. Jack was plagued by health problems from an early age; over time, these would be exacerbated by his reliance on cocktails of drugs including painkillers and amphetamines. He was also what today we would call a sex addict, though frankly this is simply an easy out for someone lacking self-control. His womanizing was well known within his inner circle and included both the famous and infamous; many of those who were tasked with protecting him extended their protection to include his reputation, even the press corps of the day kept his secrets.
The ambiguities of JFK the man versus JFK the public figure, father and husband were kept or was it simply that as a nation we were not interested in the personal lives of those in power? That the President cheated regularly on his young wife with stars the likes of Marilyn Monroe did not cause us to raise our moral hackles in outrage so long as he continued to do the work of President. One can only wonder why this President with known ties to Sam Giancana the Chicago Godfather, Frank Sinatra leader of the Hollywood Rat Pack and his many lovers was not in the eye of the storm for his many indiscretions.
Did this young president during the course of his 1,022 days in office do good? He set the stage to do good in some arenas certainly. He set the foundation for Civil Rights to move forward. He established the Peace Corps, which continues to this day. He signed the first Nuclear Test Ban treaty. Many of the Kennedy proposals for domestic policy including those for the New Frontier would not be carried out prior to his assassination in Dallas, Texas on 22-November-1963 but would ultimately be signed by his successor Lyndon B. Johnson.
How would we, as a nation have viewed this young and morally challenged President had he lived? Would his indiscretions come to light? Would the nation have cared? Would Vietnam continue to escalate; there are some who believe he would have pulled our troops out but for re-election concerns; “We don’t have a prayer of staying in Vietnam. Those people hate us. They are going to throw our asses out of there at any point. But I can’t give up that territory to the communists and get the American people to re-elect me”.3
I know many deify JFK, frankly seen through the prism of history; he is not my favorite president. My personal opinion is he was without a moral compass, he was arrogant and self-centered, drugs impaired his cognitive abilities and he had a tendency to be ruled by his emotions, including his feeling of not being ‘good enough’ based on his relationship with his overbearing father. JFK frequently did what was right, not because he believed in it, not because it was the right thing to do but instead because of the political consequence, he had to have his hand forced.
I thought I would be able to write both the Kennedy and Johnson tenures into a single post, I was wrong. Thus, I bring to an end part two of the High Crimes and Misdemeanors series.
1http://www.powerfulwords.info/speeches/John_F_Kennedy/5.htm
2http://history.state.gov/historicaldocuments/frus1961-63v02/d26
3Reeves, Thomas. A Question of Character: A Life of John F. Kennedy (1991)
http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/?pid=24146
http://www.infoplease.com/t/hist/state-of-the-union/176.html
http://www.infoplease.com/t/hist/state-of-the-union/175.html
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/features/primary-resources/jfk-nyliberal/
Under the flickering candlelight, she drew pure silver thread through her fingers, creating intricate knots. Each knot leading to the next, a web of silver and when it was done, she attached silver fringe along the edge. She spread the silver masterpiece gently across the table she had been working at; a tablecloth fit for a king, her smile was incandescent as she considered her work.
The full moon was radiant tonight, lighting the room. The wolf song surrounded her cabin as she waited by the open door with her net of silver, fit for king or an alpha wolf.
Flash in the Pan is brought to you by the amazing Red of M3 fame
This week’s word is Tablecloth. The word limit is 100 words. This one comes in at 100.
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One of my bud’s Tom Nardone of I Am Tom Nardone sent me something he wrote and said he thought of me when he was writing it. I read it a couple of times; I understand why he thought of me so asked if he would like me to publish on my site.
Tom is a funny guy with ambitions to be Awesome, I think he already is. He writes mostly very funny stuff. He also writes about growing up with undiagnosed ADD and how this affected him and his family. He is a great advocate for the ADD community, thought I think he hides his light all too often.
So without further ado, let me introduce you to Tom Nardone and his thoughts on society, crime and punishment.
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Some people think it is our value of Human life that defines us as a nation. I don’t hear about the Capital punishment debate so much anymore because I do not watch the news, or discuss the issues with those that do. What if we took some lessons from the American manufacturing community concerning the merits of this issue? What would that be like?
A part is born. It is a wonderful day. It makes its first trip down the assembly line. It is treated with care, just the same as all the other parts, of its kind. It goes through the various cycles, processes, and changes, and then onto the next phase in its development. This part will find other parts on its journey that are different than it is. Shortly after this union, they will now head down the assembly line being cared for again at yet another stage of their growth. All of these parts will make up the end product. All of these parts will have a function. It is this end product that the part was built for. This end product is the purpose for which all the parts exist.
Now! The end product is here. It has been a long journey for them all, they have changed so much, and been exposed to different parts and on this glorious day, they are sent out into the world to do what they were born to do.
But now there is an end product, there are expectations. All of the parts will have to work together and get along. There is no room for a part that doesn’t work. They are all expected to function, and while there is some degree of tolerance for errors, in the end it is about the whole machine. This is something that every part knows.
I suspect some of you made the comparison to a child growing up and entering the world as I told this story of parts. While I am pleased with myself for having written this beautiful analogy, I won’t say it is perfect, but for our purposes, it will do.
So this machine (earth) is going along fine and then one of its parts (you) decide to rob a liquor store. Well that is certainly not the function of that part. This cannot be tolerated by the machine because it effects too many other parts and hurts the machines ability to function.
Earth has been having a short period of error free operation, and then one of its parts decide to damage or rob the resources of another random part so that its job will be less strenuous. This is also not within the tolerance level of the machine. The machine needs all its parts to function properly.
Earth is rotating as usual without incident for a few days and then one of its parts decide to sabotage itself while still in the process of doing its job, and endangers the performance of any or all of the parts in the whole machine. This is not within the machines operating tolerance either. This is unacceptable behavior from a working part.
Let’s explore what the American manufacturing community does with the defective parts in their machine
Well there is really no need to explore this. It’s simple. All of their defective units get “SHIT-CANNED!” Let me tell you what they don’t do with their defective units. They do not put them back in the system to rework them for admittance to the assembly line where they can try again. They don’t lock them in a warehouse for a specific period of time with other bad parts. They “SHITCAN” them. They disregard their presence and never consider them again.
Is that what we should do?
In my examples we had represented by “The Machine”, three people who committed three separate crimes; armed robbery, breaking and entering and a DUI were introduced. In this country, we currently do not execute people for these crimes, but we are only aware of what they did from our narrow point of view.
If we look at the armed robbery guy, that person caused a man to be afraid for the rest of his life. Nightmares could possibly render him unable to sleep for who knows how long.
If we look at the people who had their home broken into, they have lost the comfort of peace of mind. They will worry for the rest of their life if someone is in their home while they are away.
In these two examples something was taken that can never be restored not ever.
The worst of the bunch, the DUI guy; Drinking and driving. Well what form of justice would you give to man who took a revolver and put four bullets into it, and then spun the wheel and fired into a daycare center where children were playing? Are their crimes not the same?
I hold human life as dear and as precious as the next guy. It is truly a tragedy when people die at a young age, or when people have to have a life of fear placed upon them. It is hard on the families, and friends.
In our current system, the good guys have more to fear than the bad guys.
Friday nights were always the same, he dragged in stinking of beer, she expected it even left the porch light on too prevent falls. He was an easy drunk, never making it down the hall instead passing out on the floor where she would throw a blanket over him after the requisite 20-minute wait time.
Tonight was different; she smelled the sour tang of blood and vomit as soon as the door opened. She heard him howling in pain. He stumbled into the bedroom, head lolling to the side, teeth blackened as if by scurvy, weeping.
Who was he?
Flash in the Pan is brought to you by the amazing Red of M3 fame
This week’s word is Scurvy. The word limit is 100 words. This one comes in at 99.
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There has been a great deal of bitching, whining and otherwise raising the roof regarding the loss of our civil liberties lately. I am all over this issue, I don’t like it and neither should you. In fact, we should be storming the halls of Congress, raising our voices on the lawn of the White House in protest; demanding a reinstatement of our Constitution. Power once given is difficult to take back, authority once ceded is nearly impossible to demand returned to the powerless.
Let us all admit it, when the planes flew into the towers on September 11, 2001 we were all shocked and dismayed. We had been attacked, successfully by what we considered unsophisticated enemies. American lives were lost and we mourned, it was a terrible day. In the midst of our mourning, we were bombarded by fear mongering, more attacks were coming and none of us were safe not in our homes, not in our places of work, nowhere. The ‘Terrorists’, they were coming to kill us all!
Enter The Patriot Act of 2001, signed by President George W. Bush on October 26. Approved by a nearly unanimous House (357 to 66) on October 23, with Democrats the largest portion of the dissenters. The
Bill moved onto the Senate where it passed on October 25, with a vote of 98-1. This Act opened the floodgates, giving law enforcement the right to search, seize, listen and otherwise trample your civil liberties granted under the Fourth Amendment of the US Constitution.
“The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.”
The Patriot Act has been reauthorized twice, once in 2005 by George W. Bush, once by Barack H. Obama. Those who are screeching about FISA, undue seizures, wiretapping and the loss of privacy must go all the way back to 2001 and remember their willingness to give up their civil liberties for the bullshit idea of safety from those terrible terrorist hiding behind every corner and down every dark alley.
The reality is this; you are more likely to die in one of the following ways:
Falling in Bathtub, Drowning or other injury since 20021 – 3,000
Talking, Texting and otherwise acting in ignorance on your phone while driving2 – 54,000
2nd Amendment Homicides (1 decade of carnage 2001 – 2011)3 – 130,347
2nd Amendment Justifiable Homicides – 5,924
2nd Amendment Unintentional Homicides – 4,764
2nd Amendment Suicides (1 decade of why not leave this mess) – 195,096
Death by Lightening (2003 – 2012)4 – 418
Here you go a picture just to put it in perspective –
If you remove the horrible September 11, 2001 event from the average on Terrorism, this number is reduced to two (2) per year. Even lightning has a better chance to kill you if you are stupid enough to stand out in a storm.
I loved the idea of death by weather; well I had to give you this one –
Weather Kills, certainly more on average than Terrorist but still not more than Azzhats with Guns
Amazing isn’t it? On the 6-month anniversary of Sandy Hook today, we haven’t done a damned thing at a federal level on Gun Sanity. Those morons in Congress, couldn’t even pass a Federal Background Check, not even that in 6 months, yet look at the numbers.
Some state governors’ struggle, weighing their party line with the will of the people of their state. Only yesterday Governor Brian Sandavol of Nevada vetoed a bill sent to his desk to strengthen background checks, call in support indicated the people of Nevada supported this bill overwhelmingly 86% to 13%, didn’t matter he chose party politics and vetoed.
Since Newtown, there have been 5,047 gun deaths in the US. These are what we know about, sometimes these numbers are hard to get. I love this chart:
Despite the Boston Marathon bombing, which was tragic you are more likely to be murdered by a toddler than killed by a terrorist in the US (list provided by Opposing Views).
April 8: 4-year-old shoots and kills 6-year-old friend Brandon Holt, Toms River, N.J.Should we be worried? We absolutely should be worried, we should be damned worried for our own future and future generations and more Civil Liberties are eroded, more economic opportunities are lost and Civil Rights are contracted rather than expanded. We should be shaking in our boots. Then, when we are done with our whining about what we have given away, we should put on our big girl and boy panties and get to work.
We created the Tyrants currently filling up Washington and spewing the bile. We continue to elect them. We allow them to abuse this nation with their arrogance and ignorance. We do this with our failure to take action and thus we have no one to blame but ourselves for the outcome. Our legacy to future generations?
We are well on our way to all of these. In some cases, we are already there. Is this the legacy we want for our children? So FISA courts through the continued reauthorization of The Patriot Act, allow your e-mail, phone records and all sorts of other personal information to be combed. The Second Amendment seems to be the only piece of the Constitution anyone gives a good damn about, I mean really who doesn’t want to shoot’um up in the streets just cause you look different, strange, odd, or by damned you might by an f’ng terrorist or a kid with skittles.
Worried? I know I am and so should all the rest of us be. I have a far better chance of being shot in the street by an azzhat with an attitude than being killed by a terrorist attack, but this nation spends $750 billion on The War on Terrorism while bridges are falling down.
Think about it, when will we be marching again to regain what is being stolen from us?
1 Bathtub accidents statistics gathered from a variety of sites, used 300 per year as the average.
2 Statistic gathered from a variety of sites, texting has been available since 2004. Included standard phone use in calculation, which has been available far longer. It is estimated accident rate is increasing by 4% per year. Used 6,000 per year as the fatality rate.
3 http://www.gunpolicy.org/firearms/region/united-states
4 http://www.lightningsafety.noaa.gov/stats/03-12_deaths_by_state.pdf
Almighty God created the races white, black, yellow, malay and red, and he placed them on separate continents. And but for the interference with his arrangement there would be no cause for such marriages. The fact that he separated the races shows that he did not intend for the races to mix.
Judge Leon M. Bazile, Indictment for Felony
Those infamous words were uttered from the bench on 6 January 1959 by that despicable and without redeeming qualities macaroon, Leon Bazile. The two people he was addressing were Mildred and Richard Loving a married couple, who had been charged with a felony under Virginia’s miscegenation laws, or, as they liked to call it The Racial Integrity Act of 1924.
What made Mildred and Richard special?
Mildred was of African-American and Native-American descent.
Mildred & Richard Loving
Richard was just a plain old American white boy, special cause he was pure don’t you know.
No one there ‘bouts in Central Point, Virginia where they had grown up, dated and fallen in love thought too much about their carousing. Apparently, this happened quite often, white boys sowing their oats and all. The problem was, when 18 year old Mildred became pregnant Richard wanted to do the right thing, not just do the right thing because there was a baby on the way, but because they honestly loved one another. Knowing there was no way to marry in Virginia, the two of them headed over to Washington, D.C. and married, in June of 1958. They returned to their home in Central Point and someone, not liking they were now co-habitating and oh no, they actually made it legal and all, so like all good white folks will do when purity is involved, well they complained to the sheriff.
From this point on, their life becomes hell. After they were found guilty by that asshat of a Judge, they received a one-year jail sentence that was suspended on the condition they leave Virginia for 25 years. Terrible for the young couple, not able to travel home together to see family, transplanted to the big city and unable to find work, plagued by money problems and lonely finally they wrote to then Attorney General Robert Kennedy. AG Kennedy passes their letter to ACLU and Attorney Bernard Cohen. From here history is made.
Richard greets his wife Mildred
The Loving’s were simple people, simple in their desires and wants. They wanted to be married, raise their children in safety and in the embrace of their family. They wanted nothing more than to return to the small town in Virginia they had been raised, where they had met and fell in love. The Loving’s didn’t attend oral arguments, despite living in Washington. Their attorney asked Mr. Loving if there was anything he should say to the judges, any message he should deliver; in reply Mr. Loving said this,
“Mr. Cohen, tell the Court I love my wife, and it is just unfair that I can’t live with her in Virginia.”
His attorney delivered that message to the court. This ultimately was the courts response.
Marriage is one of the “basic civil rights of man,” fundamental to our very existence and survival…. To deny this fundamental freedom on so unsupportable a basis as the racial classifications embodied in these statutes, classifications so directly subversive of the principle of equality at the heart of the Fourteenth Amendment, is surely to deprive all the State’s citizens of liberty without due process of law. The Fourteenth Amendment requires that the freedom of choice to marry not be restricted by invidious racial discrimination. Under our Constitution, the freedom to marry, or not marry, a person of another race resides with the individual and cannot be infringed by the State.
Chief Justice Earl Warren, writing for the Unanimous Supreme Court of the United States
Forty-six years ago today the Supreme Court of the United States ruled anti-miscegenation laws violated both the Equal Protection Clause and the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. This ruling not only affected Virginia but all states that continued to carry these laws on their books.
It took nine long years, ultimately the Loving’s returned to their beloved Central Point. They didn’t intend to become activist, they only intended to be married and spend a lifetime loving each other, raising their children.
Mildred & Richard Loving
Their sacrifice changed history and created legal precedent. Their choice to fight for what was right swept away one piece of ignorance, it didn’t change hearts, it didn’t change minds but it prevented ignorant hearts and minds from legislating their petty ignorance.
Perhaps we can take a page from their book, remember their sacrifice and start sweeping some more petty ignorance off the table and out of the law books.
What say you?
Food for thought, without Loving -v- Virginia I could not have done this on 10-July-1999 and I certainly could not live in Texas while continuing to to do it.
The verdant hillside rippled with the last of the day’s heat, the scent of fresh turned earth and olive trees carried on the breeze. Lizza sat alone in the cantina, sipping wine and watching as both tourists and workers arrived, taking seats throughout the patio.
As the sun set a delicate fragrance caught her attention, Jasmine, one of her favorites; she hadn’t noticed before True Jasmine planted throughout the courtyard. She considered the rest of the courtyard, Oleander out front, Belladonna and Foxglove in planters on all the windows.
What had she stepped into? Just then, her dinner was served.
Flash in the Pan is brought to you by the amazing Red of M3 fame
This week’s word is Cantina. The word limit is 100 words. This one comes in at 100.
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The current POTUS (President of the United States) is chased by scandal, whether ridiculous conspiracies ginned up by those too simple-minded too accept the nation has moved beyond their narrow views or alternatively they might indeed have some meat. The truth of the matter since the election of Barack H. Obama, our government seems incapable of doing the work of the people, the work we pay them to do, the work we send them to Washington to do. Instead, we are fed a constant barrage of trash talk, conspiracy theories and Committee Investigations, most leading nowhere; most frankly an insult to the intelligence of any person of normal intellect.
With this in mind, let’s investigate the Administrations since Dwight D. Eisenhower, who in my opinion (humble or otherwise) was the last great Republican President. So lets us together pull the curtain back, we seem to have very short memories.
Dwight D. Eisenhower, POTUS January 20, 1953 – January 20, 1961
The years of President Eisenhower’s administration were comparatively scandal free, sure his Vice President embarrassed him a time or two, most specifically when VP candidate Richard Nixon had to explain away his acceptance of personal gifts, the Checkers Speech is classic in response to this charge.
Also during his Administration his Chief of Staff, Sherman Adams was forced to resign under a cloud, including Contempt of Congress, they were investing whether his wife received personal gifts. There were a few scattered personal scandals within the legislative branch, nothing that could be tied back to the President. Interestingly, there was never an investigation whether the President was receiving nookie on the side during his service as Supreme Commander of Allied Forces, though his relationship to Kay Summersby was well known and questionable. I suppose people, including press and his political adversaries simply thought this was none of their business, funny how that worked in the far more conventional 1950’s.
What happened during the Eisenhower presidency of note?
The presidency of Dwight D. Eisenhower, the last of the moderate and reasonable Republicans wasn’t without its detractors. In fact, because President Eisenhower was a moderate, even progressive Republican many of the Old Guard were tactically against his policies. President Eisenhower continued many of the policies of the New Deal, even strengthening Social Security and creating a new cabinet level agency, The Department of Health, Education and Welfare. He finished what the previous administration of Truman had started, the integration of the Armed Forces, over the objection of those in command. He declared segregation of the military a National Security Risk.
What did President Eisenhower consider his personal failures? Good question, one I suspect he would be hard pressed to answer today in retrospect of fifty-two years, however based upon easily found quotes of the time, here are my suppositions or assumptions:
It is unfortunate, despite some of his personal failures the Republican party of today do not look back on this humble man, this war hero and truly great American and hold him in better regard. As we will see, his tenancy in the White House was the last of the scandal free Administrations, of either party. Though certainly many of the scandals of the Left tend to be more manufactured and those on the Right tend toward high-crimes. But don’t let me sway you stick around for the next in the series, John F. Kennedy and Lyndon B. Johnson years.
First Inauguration Address: http://bartleby.com/124/pres54.html
Second Inauguration Address: http://bartleby.com/124/pres55.html
Farewell Address: http://www.eisenhower.archives.gov/research/online_documents/farewell_address/1961_01_17_Press_Release.pdf
QBG_Tilted Tiara 