Since 1789 we have inaugurated a President every four years (Notable exceptions being John Tyler (1841), Andrew Johnson (1865), Chester A. Arthur (1881), Theodore Roosevelt (1901), Calvin Coolidge (1923), Harry S. Truman (1945), Lyndon B. Johnson (1963) and Gerald R. Ford (1974).) and endowed them with the authority to lead the Executive Branch of the Federal Government, to act on our behalf with the leaders of foreign nations, to perform the duties of Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces and with other powers specifically granted to the President by our Constitution.

We are now inaugurating Barack H. Obama as our 44th President. This in and of itself is not unusual as we've inaugurated Presidents 43 times before. What sets this inauguration apart. What makes it historic in its own right is that, for the first time in American history, our new President is black.

Many see his swearing in as the culmination of the dreams of people like Phyllis Wheatley, Frederick Douglass, Harriet Beecher Stowe, Jackie Robinson, Dr. Martin Luther King and many others.

America, first as colonies of Britain, Spain and France and then as a confederation of independant sovereign states, has slavery as part of its social and economic history. The first African slaves arrived in the British colonies of the eastern coast of America in the early 17th Century. In the years following their arrival, though there would be parts of the growing nation where slavery was either abolished or never began, and exceptional people who escaped it or fought it, it would take another 260+ years, and the forcible reintegration of 11 sovereign states into the confederation, to end slavery in the United States of America.

In the 144 years since, between 1865 and today, blacks in America have gone from being slaves to being whatever their talents and industriousness makes of them. Many are now trades people, business owners, educators, professionals, atheletes, performers, managers, scientists, military officers, executives and even ... politicians.

Which brings us to the doubly historic Presidential inauguration of 2009. First, there can be only one 44th President and Barack H. Obama will forever hold that title. But the second and far more singularly historic part is that, at the same moment, he becomes the first President of African descent.

Is his Presidency the culmination of peoples dreams for black success in America? History will decide that. And when all of the pomp and circumstance of Inauguration Day is done. When the speakers have spoken and the bands have played. When the real work begins the next day what I think that we really need to hope for the Presidency of Barack H. Obama is that he will work not with an eye towards his place in history for he has already made that.

There are those who say they wish for his failure. This is short sighted and does no good for the country. I personally expect that he will work ceaselessly and effectively with both eyes always towards what should be his one goal. That which is best for America.

Congratulations to President Barack H. Obama. Please do us prowd.

11 November, 2008, is the 90th anniversary of the day that the guns fell silent all along the battlefront that stretched from the Flanders region (located in parts of present day Belgium, France and The Netherlands) to the Vosges Mountains in Eastern France. On that day in 1918, at "the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month" the Great War, The War of the Nations, The War to End All Wars, World War 1 came to a close in Europe. Armistice Day marks only the symbolic end of WW1, as while the conflict ceased on the Western Front, hostilities continued in other areas. It wasn't until 28 June 1919 that the war officially ended with the signing of the Treaty of Versailles by the defeated Germany.

65.3 million men were mobilized among all of the combatants. At the end of the war 7.3 million were dead and another 14.6 million had been wounded.

The end of World War 1 also brought about a speeding up of the collapse of the worlds empires. The German Empire was dissolved by the victors. The British Empire gained some territories from the treaty but, because of the strains of the war, by 1964 the empire was a ghost of its former glory. The The Ottoman Empire disappeared by 1923. The French Empire, like the British, made territorial gains after the war but, by 1962, had ceased to exist. The Russian Empire ended with the 1st Russian Revolution in February of 1917 (This was followed in October of 1917 by the 2nd Russian, or Bolshevik, Revolution) and gave birth to the Soviet Empire which in turn died by 1991. The Japanese Empire saw immense gains during and after the War but ceased to exist by 1945. The Italian Empire gained a few meager territories but, by 1960, dissolved completely. The Portuguese Empire neither gained nor lost territories but by 1999 had divested itself of all of its imperial territories.

Why do I mention empires that have crumbled to a well earned dust? Because many great changes in the world have been brought about as the result of terrible circumstances. As a result of the aftermaths of World War 1 (and also World War 2) far more people enjoy freedom and liberty today than they could have under the empires in existence in the early decades of the 20th century. Great upheavals often bring about great things. And these great things are often bought at great price.

The men who fought and died. The men who left home whole only to return damaged. The men who, on that November morning in 1918, heard the boom of the cannon and the crack of the rifle fall silent and heard, instead, the powerful roar of silence across the land. They all paid a great price.

And many more have done the same in the decades since in places the world over so that more people can enjoy the blessings of freedom and liberty.

But we must also recall the words of the inimitable Thomas Jefferson who said that the price of freedom is eternal vigilance. There are nations still today who are ruled by those with the same visions of grandeur and power that were found in the leaders of the old empires. And those leaders must be watched. They must be corralled. They must be made powerless to stop the flowering of true democracy. And tasks like this are usually completed by those who take up arms.

And so, on this day, we honor the men who have taken up arms for freedom and liberty in the world. This Veterans Day. Because to do otherwise is unthinkable.

Popular conservative commentator Dean Barnett has died at the age of 41.

Anyone who read Mr. Barnett's work at The Weekly Standard, at Soxblog, at Townhall or who heard him on The Hugh Hewitt Show knows what a great voice for Liberty he was. The nation, and the world, is a poorer place for his passing.

Here is the announcement that was posted earlier today at The Weekly Standard.

Tributes to Mr. Barnett may be found here.

Labor Day is denigrated by some as a commercialized version of a Communist holiday. Those that say this are, of course, at liberty to make this claim but, should they actually look at the facts, will find that they are correct only about labor Day being much more commercial these days.

As the Industrial Revolution took hold of the nation, the average American in the late 19th Century worked 12-hour days, seven days a week in order to make a basic living. Children were also working, as they provided cheap labor to employers and laws against child labor were not strongly enforced. With the long hours and terrible working conditions, American unions became more prominent and voiced their demands for a better way of life.

The first Labor Day holiday was celebrated on Tuesday, September 5, 1882, in New York City, in accordance with the plans of the Central Labor Union when 10,000 workers marched from city hall to Union Square in New York City, holding the first-ever Labor Day parade. Participants took an unpaid day-off to honor the workers of America, as well as vocalize issues they had with employers. The Central Labor Union held its second Labor Day holiday in New York City just a year later, on September 5, 1883.

In 1884 the first Monday in September was selected by the Central Labor Union as the day each year that they would celebrate from then on and they urged similar organizations in other cities to follow the example of New York and celebrate a "workingman's holiday" on that date. The idea spread with the growth of labor organizations, and in 1885 Labor Day was celebrated in many industrial centers of the country.

As years passed more cities and states permitted labor organizations to hold celebrations. In 1887 the first states declared it a state holiday. These were Oregon, Colorado, New York, Massachusetts, and New Jersey. By the end of the decade Connecticut, Nebraska, and Pennsylvania had followed suit. By 1894, 23 other states had adopted the holiday in honor of workers.

On May 11, 1894, workers of the Pullman Palace Car Company in Chicago struck to protest wage cuts and the firing of union representatives. They sought support from their union, the American Railroad Union led by Eugene V. Debs, and on June 26 the union called a boycott of all Pullman railway cars. Within days, 50,000 rail workers complied and railroad traffic out of Chicago came to a halt. On July 4, President Grover Cleveland dispatched troops to Chicago. Much rioting and bloodshed ensued, but government action broke the strike and the boycott soon collapsed. Debs and three other union officials were jailed for interfering with the U.S. Mails, presenting a threat to public safety and disobeying a Federal injunction to cease all strike activities.

The strike brought worker's rights to the public eye and on June 28 of 1894 Congress passed an act making the first Monday in September of each year a legal holiday in the District of Columbia and the territories.

Communists and Socialists the world over have held a similar celebration of the working class every May 1st. This date eventually became known as May Day. It is because of this that, in the U.S., the first Monday in September was selected. So to prevent any identification with Communism and Socialism.

More than a Century after the first Labor Day observance there is still some doubt as to who first proposed the holiday for workers.

Some historical records show that Peter J. McGuire, general secretary of the Brotherhood of Carpenters and Joiners and a co-founder of the American Federation of Labor, was first in suggesting a day to honor those "who from rude nature have delved and carved all the grandeur we behold."

But Peter McGuire's place in Labor Day history has not gone unchallenged. Many historians believe that Matthew Maguire, a machinist, not Peter McGuire, founded the holiday. Recent research seems to support the contention that Matthew Maguire, later the secretary of Local 344 of the International Association of Machinists in Paterson, N.J., proposed the holiday in 1882 while serving as secretary of the Central Labor Union in New York.

The form that the observance and celebration of Labor Day should take were outlined in the first proposal of the holiday. It was to be "a street parade to exhibit to the public the strength and esprit-de-corps of the trade and labor organizations of the community, followed by a festival for the recreation and amusement of the workers and their families". This became the pattern for the celebrations of Labor Day. Speeches by prominent men and women were introduced later, as more emphasis was placed upon the economic and civic significance of the holiday. Still later, by a resolution of the American Federation of Labor convention of 1909, the Sunday preceding Labor Day was adopted as Labor Sunday and dedicated to the spiritual and educational aspects of the labor movement.

The character of the Labor Day celebration has undergone changes over the years. Today Labor Day is often regarded as a day of rest. And parades, speeches or political demonstrations are more low-key although, especially in election years, events held by labor organizations often feature political themes and appearances by candidates for office.

Celebrations include picnics, barbecues, fireworks displays, water sports, and public art events. Families with school-age children take it as the last chance to travel before the end of summer. Some teenagers and young adults view it as the last weekend for parties before returning to school.

A few of the more notable Labor Day events enjoyed by Americans are:

• Mackinac Bridge Walk is an annual event that has been held in Northern Michigan every Labor Day since 1958.
• The annual telethon of the Muscular Dystrophy Association has been held on Labor Day weekend since 1966.
• Taste of Polonia is, since 1979, a Labor Day celebration of Polish cultural heritage, traditions, and customs held on the grounds of the Copernicus Foundation in Jefferson Park in Chicago, IL.
• Boomsday, one of the biggest fireworks displays in the Southeastern United States, has been held annually on Labor Day since 1986 in Knoxville, TN.
• In 2004, NASCAR began racing the Pepsi 500 on Labor Day weekend at the Auto Club Speedway in Fontana, CA.

So enjoy your Liberties this Labor Day. And to those who still claim it is Communist I say "enjoy a burger, a beer and your ignorance".

There are times when, given the relentless perniciousness of the leftists in our midst and their unabashed contempt for real freedom and liberty, I despair for the future of liberty in the world. I read the scrawlings of scribes, see the posturing of potentates and hear the odium of orators who’ve naught better to say about liberty than there’s just too damned much of it and it should be taxed, regulated or legislated out of existence.

This past weekend I was reminded that all is far from lost in this great nation. That liberty and the freedom to enjoy it are, while fervently sought by those in parts of the world that are far from free, still exercised here by people with a joy for life.

The Ink and Iron Festival is a celebration that merges what some would call Body Art (Tattooing, Piercing, etc) with displays of colorful custom and great classic cars and motorcycles along with musical performances and fantastic food was held at the Queen Mary in Long Beach, California.

The variety of people that were there to enjoy the sights, sounds, smells, tastes and general camaraderie often found when people gather to share an experience was a pleasant escape from daily life.I saw booths and tables where people displayed their skills and plied their trades. I saw a carnival for people to experience thrills and joy. I heard musicians exhibit their talents (or the lack thereof) to the applause or disdain of the assemblage.

I saw people of all types show off the cars, bikes and/or bodies that they had put so much time and expense into. There were Bikers and Punks, Goths and "Gangstas", Cowboys and Metalheads and much variety in between.

I saw sellers hawking leather goods, vehicle parts, videos, bikinis, retro memorabilia, automotive tools, vacations, tattoo/body piercing paraphernalia, jewelry, food and clothing. I saw booths full of merchandise extolling uniqueness and beauty. I saw rebellion and individuality packaged and marketed for mass consumption and I gloried in the irony of it.

And it all reminded me that, as President Franklin Roosevelt said in his 1st inaugural address, "this great nation will endure as it has endured".

While the fight goes on to preserve and advance liberty here and elsewhere, we as a nation still have very far to fall before finding ourselves in the pits of fascism and living in the statist utopia (there’s a contradiction in terms for you) that is so ardently striven for by those most rabidly on the left.

Memorial Day is a United States Federal holiday that is observed annually on the last Monday of May. Formerly known as Decoration Day, it commemorates U.S. men and women who perished while in military service to their country.

Memorial Day was officially proclaimed on 5 May 1868 by General John Logan, national commander of the Grand Army of the Republic, in his General Order No. 11, and was first observed on 30 May 1868, when flowers were placed on the graves of Union and Confederate soldiers at Arlington National Cemetery. The first state to officially recognize the holiday was New York in 1873. By 1890 it was recognized by all of the northern states. The South refused to acknowledge the day, honoring their dead on separate days until after World War I (when the holiday changed from honoring just those who died fighting in the Civil War to honoring Americans who died fighting in any war).

It is now celebrated in almost every State on the last Monday in May (passed by Congress with the National Holiday Act of 1971 (P.L. 90 - 363) to ensure a three day weekend for Federal holidays), though several southern states have an additional separate day for honoring the Confederate war dead: January 19 in Texas, April 26 in Alabama, Florida, Georgia, and Mississippi; May 10 in South Carolina; and June 3 (Jefferson Davis' birthday) in Louisiana and Tennessee.

Traditional observance of Memorial Day has diminished over the years. Many Americans nowadays have forgotten the meaning and traditions of Memorial Day. At many cemeteries, the graves of the fallen are increasingly ignored, neglected. Most people no longer remember the proper flag etiquette for the day. While there are towns and cities that still hold Memorial Day parades, many have not held a parade in decades. Some people think the day is for honoring any and all dead, and not just those fallen in service to our country.

To help re-educate and remind Americans of the true meaning of Memorial Day, the "National Moment of Remembrance" resolution was passed on Dec 2000 which asks that at 3 p.m. local time, for all Americans "To voluntarily and informally observe in their own way a Moment of remembrance and respect, pausing from whatever they are doing for a moment of silence or listening to 'Taps."

The Moment of Remembrance is a step in the right direction to returning the meaning back to the day. What is needed is a full return to the original day of observance. Set aside one day out of the year for the nation to get together to remember, reflect and honor those who have given their all in service to their country.

On January 4, 2007 Senator Inouye introduced bill S 80 to the Senate which proposes to restore the traditional day of observance of Memorial Day back to May 30th instead of "the last Monday in May". At present there are no co-sponsors. On the same day it was introduced, the bill was read referred to the Committee on the Judiciary. As of today there has been no further major action taken by the Committee on this bill.

William Jennings Bryan was once severely criticized because, while he was a staunch anti-imperialist and spoke against the imperial designs of the worlds major powers of the time, he supported the ratification by the United States of the Treaty of Paris which ended the Spanish-American War and placed Cuba, Puerto Rico, Guam and the Philippines under U.S. control (Cuba became independent in 1902, the Philippines became independent in 1946, Puerto Rico and Guam remain U.S. territories by choice.).

When accepting the nomination to be the Democratic candidate in the Presidential elections of 1900 Bryan addressed such criticism by stating "I thought it safer to trust the American people to give independence to the Filipinos than to trust the accomplishment of that purpose to diplomacy with an unfriendly nation (Spain)."

Let's fast forward to the present day. The United States is now engaged in battle with unfriendly forces, in the form of Islamic terrorists, for the continued freedom and the eventual full independence of the people of Afghanistan and of Iraq.

There are those who say that the U.S. conquered two sovereign nations in the names of oil and of imperialism. But at no time do those who make that claim present evidence of any policy, plan or legislation of the U.S. Government to do anything other than to turn full control of those nations over to the Governments that were freely elected (Afghanistan's first free election was in June of 2002. Iraq's was in January of 2005) by the people of those nations once those Governments state that they are ready to take control.

Contrary to the opinions of those who would prefer to see nefarious purpose in the presence of American troops in Afghanistan and Iraq it is quite readily evident that the intention of the United States and of the other members of the multinational coalition is to "pick up our toys and leave" once the home team says they're ready to run solo with the ball. It is true that there may be some U.S. or NATO military presence left in those nations after their Governments take full control but it will only be with the permission of those Governments just the same as it is in Germany or South Korea.

I think it is far "safer to trust the American people" to support and to recognize the freedom and independence of the Afghanis and Iraqis than to trust the accomplishment of that purpose to the good will and peaceful intentions of Islamic Terrorists.

At its core liberty is what grants to each of us the possibility of being able to act in a way that enables us to take control of our own life and realize, to the best of our ability, our potential.

Liberty, though it can come in many forms, is absolutely vital to the health of a society. Without liberty people are stifled, life is oppressive, industry stagnates, nations collapse and cultures are stunted.

Liberty is not something to be granted by any Government, potentate or religious leader. Liberty can be curtailed for one, for a few or for all for a number of reasons. But your intrinsic right to liberty can only be taken by he who gives it. Our right to liberty is granted to us solely by our creator.

It's because the liberty of a nation can be curtailed by a Government, a potentate or a religious leader and the effect such curtailment has on that nation that liberty must be resolutely defended and never willingly surrendered or blithely cast aside.