All Eyes Are Upon You

Today our British cousins will vote on whether they will stand as Free Men or be forever the slaves of the globalist EU puppeteers. Stand strong cousins!

A New Direction

Here is the foreign policy speech that Jourdan mentioned.




Comments? Criticisms?

Coming Soon...

Trip to Israel, how I fractured my elbow, the Israeli health care system, things you never knew about Annie (hint: she lives in Israel!)

The whole of Israel is kosher (who knew?)

Everything closes on Shabbat, even the elevators.

Wine is cheaper than water in Israel (seems fitting somehow, no?)

Cobra Dane. Up and Operational.

THIS is interesting:

A missile-detecting radar array on the remote Aleutian island of Shemya has been spared from sequestration.

Facing half a billion dollars in budget cuts, Reuters reports the Air Force decided earlier this year to reduce operating time for the system in order to save roughly $5 million a year. But last week, General William Shelton announced a reversal of that plan, citing concerns over North Korea.

The 120-foot tall, 95-foot wide Cobra Dane radar can detect objects up to 2,000 miles away.

Girl On The Scene

As many of you know our much loved airforcewife and family have taken up residence in deepest, darkest Africa (where there is no cheese, sacrebleu!)
Those of us who facebook have been keeping up with their fascinating and hilarious adventures of every day life in Africa.  For those of you who don't facebook, good news, airforcewife has started a new blog called "Girl On The Scene"

I have also included a link to her blog (with her permission) in the sidebar under Pure Gold Blogs.

Enjoy!

Where Your Donation To The Haiti Earthquake Relief Fund Went

This report is devastating.

I have read other reports that were less than complimentary about the methods the Red Cross uses to collect and distribute aid. I decided a number of years ago not to make any contributions through them. We made our Haiti Relief donation through our local Jewish Federation, I trust them to use the money to aid those in need.

Gaetan Drossart, its head of mission, said it was wrong for charities to raise more than they could spend. ‘Organisations want to be in front of the cameras in an emergency to attract attention since this gets the money,’ he said. ‘The humanitarian business is no different to any other business.’
Drossart wants limits placed on the numbers of groups allowed in to disaster zones given the chaos and poor co-ordination he witnessed in the earthquake’s aftermath.

Just down the road from his office colourful wooden sheds called Transitional Shelters dot the landscape. These tiny temporary homes were built not because survivors wanted them — they would have preferred to have ruined properties rebuilt or new homes — but because donors wanted visible signs of progress.

They are taking twice as long and — at £345 million — nearly three times as much money to build as planned. The flagship community was Corail, about ten miles outside Port-au-Prince. Families were lured here with promises of clean water, medical care, education and jobs in proposed garment factories. The actor Sean Penn, who spent several months in Haiti after the quake, was among those who persuaded people to move. (emphasis mine)

Now these unfortunate people are marooned on a rocky patch of land: the factories have not materialised, there are no hospitals, the schools are inadequate and they have started being charged for water at more than twice the cost in the camps. Vast squatter camps have sprung up on the hillsides around them.

‘They promised us when we came here we would find everything we needed,’ said Marjorie Saint Hilaire, a mother of three boys whose husband was killed in the quake. ‘Now we are living in a desert.’

Chiquita Are Bananas

The Canadian oil sands industry is facing an unlikely adversary in Chiquita Brands International, the banana company.

The Ohio-based company said it will work with environmental organization ForestEthics to eliminate shipping of Chiquita bananas with fuel from refineries that use Canada’s oil sands.

Bwahahaha...let's see how that works out for you Chiquita.

Ethicaloil.org, an advocacy group that says Americans should choose Canada’s ‘ethical’ oil over crude from dictatorial regimes in the Middle East, says it will launch a Chiquita boycott campaign soon.

“We will be launching a radio ad campaign urging Canadians not to buy Chiquita products. Canada’s oil is the most ethical in the world,” said Kathryn Marshall, spokesperson from EthicalOil.org.

“And Chiquita is a company with a terrible human rights record — just four years ago they were fined for giving money to terrorist groups in South America, and now they want to discriminate against Canadian oil?”

Don't Stop Believin'

I'm not a "Glee" fan. But if miming & dancing to the show song arrangements brings humour and joy to our* troops I'm all for it.

Herewith, the 7 Commando Battery of the British Army amusing themselves in Afganistan.

You go guys, and stay safe, and most of all THANK YOU!



*By "our" I mean all the Western alliance soldiers, especially British, Canadian & American.

Hearts be still ladies!

"Too Big To Win"

The latest Mark Steyn's article on America's policies. Long, but worth it.