“If there must be trouble, let it be in my day, that my child may have peace.”
Author: Redactor
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Henry David Thoreau
“How vain it is to sit down to write when you have not stood up to live.”
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Arab Spring
One year ago, on Dec. 18, 2010, protests broke out in Tunisia following Mohamed Bouazizi’s self-immolation death in protest of police corruption and ill treatment. This began what came to be known as the Arab Spring, protests throughout the Arab world and the toppling of regimes in Egypt, Libya and Tunisia.
On Dec. 18, 1620, the British ship Mayflower docked at modern-day Plymouth, Massachusetts, and its passengers prepared to begin their new settlement, Plymouth Colony.
On Dec. 18, 1777, the United States celebrated its first national day of thanksgiving, commemorating the American victory at the Battle of Saratoga in October 1777.
Last year at this time, I was in Omaha, Nebraska, testifying at a court challenge to the petition drive I had run to put a recall of Omaha Mayor Jim Suttle on the ballot. Recall opponents had hurled baseless charges of “fraud” throughout our signature drive, an increasingly common smear used by the professional left. In the court case, their attorney also tried the old racist tactic of demonizing me as an evil outside agitator. The judge found their charges meritless, writing in his opinion, “Plaintiff introduced evidence to attack the credibility of certain circulators and a Paul Jacob, the coordinator for the paid circulators.… This Court found Paul Jacob credible and accepted his testimony as truthful.”
Those powerful political forces opposed to citizens having a say on the ballot, whether through recalls or initiatives or referendums, have made a habit of using nasty, scorched-earth, character-assassinating tactics. They think they can keep good, decent people away from any effort to hold government accountable by being especially dishonest and despicable. We have to prove them wrong at every turn – as we did in Omaha last year.
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Benjamin Franklin
“Where liberty dwells, there is my country.”
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France recognizes independent USA
On Dec 17, 1777, France officially recognized the United States of America as an independent nation. News of the Continental Army’s victory against the British at Saratoga in October reached France in early December, giving Benjamin Franklin new leverage in rallying French support for the American rebels.
On Dec. 17, 1903, Orville and Wilbur Wright made the first successful flight in history of a self-propelled, heavier-than-air aircraft. The biplane stayed aloft for 12 seconds and covered 120 feet. The Wright Brothers received no federal funding.
On Dec. 17, 1991, after a meeting between Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev and Russian Federation President Boris Yeltsin, a Yeltsin spokesman announced that the Soviet Union would officially cease to exist by New Year’s Eve.