More Starry Rivers To Drink In!

My other blog is starry-river.blogspot.com highlighting good stuff happening in my life beneath the milky way. It seems that stars are still being added to the heavens! God's promise to Abraham..."your descendants will be numbered as the stars in the sky and the sand on the shore"...lives on. Here is what I learned:

NASA's Hubble Space Telescope has snapped a stunning image of the Tarantula Nebula, shedding new light on the brightest region of starbirth in our galactic neighborhood. 

Also known as 30 Doradus, the nebula is a large star-forming region of ionized hydrogen gas that lies 161,000 light-years from Earth in the Large Magellanic Cloud.

Its turbulent clouds of gas and dust appear to swirl among the region's newly formed stars.

 

13...

              

David Lee Espinoza, 20, Marines

 from Laredo Texas, Mr. Espinoza joined the military after high school. Mr Espinoza was killed on August 26th, 2021 in Kabul Afghanistan by a suicide bomb which was detonated by Isis terrorists. He was sent to Kabul to assist Americans and Afghans evacuate to safety. He leaves behind a brother, mother and stepfather.

                                                             

Maxton Soviak, 22, US Navy Medic

Soviak, a Navy hospital corpsman, was from Berlin Heights, Ohio, and graduated from 

Edison High School in Milan in 2017. 

His sister wrote on Instagram about him: “He was a medic. There to help people. And now he is gone and my family will never be the same. There is a large Maxton sized hole that will never be filled.” 

                      

Kareem Mikoui, 20 years old, Marines

Kareem was from Norco California and was stationed at Camp Pendelton before deployment to Afghanistan. In an interview his father said, “Kareem really loved the Marine Corps family. He was devoted. No hesitation for him to be called to duty.” He added “I blame my own military leaders...Biden turned his back on him. That’s it.” The day before he was killed, he sent home a video of himself giving candy to Afghan children. 

                         

Rylee McCollum, 20 years old, Marines

Rylee, from Bondurant Wyoming,was on his first deployement, was just married and 3 weeks away from being a new father when he was killed in Kabul Afghanistan by a suicide bomber on August 26, 2021. “He was determined to be in infantry … Rylee wanted to be a history teacher and a wrestling coach when he finished serving his country. He’s a tough, kind, loving kid who made an impact on everyone he met. His jokes and wit brought so much joy.” (Caspar Star Tribune)

                                             

Jared Schmitz, 20 years old, Marines

Jared Schmitz, lance corporal from St Charles, Missouri was on his first deployment when he was killed in Kabul Afghanistan by a terrorist suicide bomb. From his father: “Jared had always dreamed of being a soldier. I am so incredibly devastated that I won’t be able to see the man that he was very quickly growing into becoming.” (KMOX TV)

 

Hunter Lopez, 22, Marine

from Riverside CA

Hunter planed to follow in his parents footsteps and 

become a sheriff’s deputy after deployment.

“Like his parents who serve our community, being a Marine to Hunter wasn’t a job; it was a calling. He loved his family, and as we grieve for Hunter and his fellow Marines taken from us too soon, there are simply no words to express how deeply he will be missed — Semper Fi.” (Statement by Riverside County Deputy Sheriff’s Department)

Daegan William-Tyeler Page

23 years old, Marine Corps

Marine Cpl. Daegan Page was a native of Omaha, Nebraska...he loved hockey and hunting and “will always be remembered for his tough outer shell and giant heart,” his family said Friday August 27, 2021. Daegan joined the Marines out of high school, served with the 2nd Regiment of the 1st Marine Regiment, a unit known as “The Professionals” based at Camp Pendleton in Southern California.

Nicole Gee, 23, Marines “I love my job.”

Marine Sgt. Nicole Gee, a maintenance technician with the 24th Marine Expeditionary Unit, had recently earned meritorious promotion to sergeant and boasted perfect fitness scores. She was from Roseville, Calif. These words were posted by SGT Mallory Harrison her room mate at Camp Lejeune....“I find peace knowing that she left this world doing what she loved,” “She was a Marine’s Marine. She cared about people. She loved fiercely. She was a light in this dark world.” 

Dylan Merola, 20 years old, Marines

Lance Cpl. Dylan Merola arrived in Kabul less than two weeks before he was killed in the suicide bombing attack, according to his older brother. Home for Dylan was Rancho Cucamonga, California where he graduated from Los Osos High School. “He always showed up with a smile and brought energy to everyone he was with,” according to high school friend Benjamin Grunchy.

Humberto Sanchez, 22 years old, Marines

Humberto, from Logansport Indiana, was just four years out of high school when he was killed in Kabul. “Any plans he may have had for his post-military life were given in sacrifice due to the heart he exhibited in putting himself into harm’s way to safeguard the lives of others,” wrote  Chris Martin Mayor of his home town.

Johanny Rosario Pichardo, 25, Marines

Sgt. Johanny Rosario, a native of Lawrence, Massachusetts was a member of the US Marine Corps’ Female Engagement Team. She was a graduate of Lawrence High School and attended Bridgewater State University. In May, Rosario had been honored by the Naval Amphibious Force, Task Force 51/5th Marine Expeditionary Brigade, and was with them on the ground aiding in evacuations at the Kabul airport.

Darin Taylor Hoover Jr., 31, Marines

Staff Sgt. Darin Taylor Hoover, from Midvale, Utah was “One heck of a leader” according to those who served under him. His uncle wrote on social media: “He spent his life doing the hard things that most of us can’t do. He is a hero.” 

His father told Washington Post writers, “He was a high school fottball player who lit up a room...He was the most loving, giving, understanding person you could ever meet.”

Ryan Knauss, 23 years old, Army

Ryan, from Knoxville, Tennesee was the first US Army soldier identified as killed by a suicide bomber on August 26th, 2021.  He joined the Army shortly after graduating from high school, enjoyed building things and helping his wife tend her garden, according to his stepmother. His grandfather described Ryan as a devout Christian,  “He was a believer so we will see him again in God’s heaven.”

9/11/2001...20 years later today

No one alive that day will ever forget. 

But so many stories have never been told. I found this one today on Fox News. It's the story of 2 parents whose daughters were inside the Pentagon Day Care Center the moment it was hit by terrorists who hijacked flight 77. 

The terror was real for every member of the family. 

The daughters caught up in the attack, now 20 and 23, did what makes you so proud and makes you cry...

they joined the military.

Military family describe 9/11 race to rescue daughters from Pentagon day care – and the effects of that day

US service members evacuated infants in cribs from Pentagon day care center on 9/11

To read the story, click below or cut and paste into your browser.

https://www.foxnews.com/us/military-family-911-pentagon-daughters

God bless America and her incredible brave men and women serving in the US Military.

 

13 US Service Members Killed 8/26/21 in Kabul Afghanistan

 8/26/21 will go down as another day that changed the world forever. The Biden Administration  abandoned Bagram Airfield in the middle of the night leaving behind thousands of American citizens and Afghan translators/friendlies to fend for themselves as the Taliban took over the country, weaponized with our billions of dollars of military equipment from Bagram. 

People fled to the airport to try and get out of the country to escape the terrorists, some hanging onto  airplanes and plunging to their deaths while the world watched a chaotic, diabolically led scheme play out. As the country fell to the Taliban terrorists, and few American military members were left to provide safe way to the airport, the Taliban then took over the Kabul airport and access to it, finally chaining the gates closed so no one could leave. They took away American's passports. Americans hid out and pleaded with the President to get them out. Translators pled and admitted they knew they would be killed by Taliban searching for American sympathizers. Fear and chaos everywhere.

For months while the Taliban was taking over the country (since April), the Biden administration did nothing to ensure safety of Americans in country.  And how was the military supposed to keep anyone safe without the military might that was given to the Taliban anyway? Finally on 8/26, with chaos in Kabul, 2 suicide bombers at Kabul airport let go their wrath and killed 13 American military members: 12 Marines and one Navy member along with many Afghan citizens near the crowded airport corridor. Families are grieving. A nation grieves this loss of life. This totally preventable loss of life.

Voices are calling for resignation of everyone from the President, to the VP, to the head of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Mark Milley, to the Secretary of State Blinken. Three days after the murders, no one has been fired by the Biden Administration and no one has resigned  for the treasonous behavior the world is witnessing. 

Questions remain but few answers are being provided for this heinous, incompetent, treasonous behavior by the current administration. Who made the decision to abandon Bagram in the dead of night with no word to the Afghan Army or anyone else? Who made the decision to leave billions of dollars of military equipment behind for the terrorists to take over and use against the world, especially the US? Who made the decision to let thousands of terrorist prisoners out of jail so they could kill innocent men, women and children? Who made the decision to let unvetted Afghanis travel throughout the world now to possibly spill terrorism everywhere? Who made the decision to tear up the conditional withdrawal agreement with the Afghans/Taliban made by the Trump administration...looks like that one belongs to Biden. Biden administration abandoned Bagram and Afghanistan unconditionally. He is worse than a demented fool. He is a traitor. His actions show he has a clear hatred and disrespect for the American citizen. He says he will trust the Taliban to get Americans out of Afghanistan. Biden admitted in a press conference that before the bombing, he/the administration gave names of Americans in Kabul to the Taliban. He admitted this on TV...who would give up American names to terrorists? for what? to help them escape? The people who shout Death to America were going to help Americans escape? Who in their right mind would think that?

Now we have an oil crisis on our hands again. Biden is begging the Middle East for oil while he shut down the Keystone Pipeline, laying off thousands of Americans and destroying our energy independence. Inflation is up the highest in 30 years.

The world now sees the US not as a country who is capable and willing to assist others or to keep its own citizens safe, but as a country who does not keep its word. A coward of a country. A weak country. A lying country. An incompetent country with incompetent leaders who care more about pronouns and LGBT and sex change operations and skin color than they do about national security. This has all happened because of a weak, liar, Communist sympathizer in the White House..A man who has so much to hide that he is willing to sell out Americans to the lowest bidder...this shows he hates America and Americans...He does not deserve to be President of the United States of America. He should be court martialed, removed from office in disgrace for the wanton murder of America's servicemen and the purposeful plan to destroy America.

God save us from this attack by the dominion of darkness.

Memorial Day 2021: Remembering Gary Meyer

 I didn't have an idea of what my Memorial Day would be about until I took a walk through Kottinger Park past the Memorial for the first person from Pleasanton to lose his life in Vietnam. The Memorial is just 200-300 yards from my house. I walk by it every time I take a walk in the park. The Memorial to Gary Meyer. The guy. Our guy. Our Pleasanton hero. Does anyone remember him? We all do when we walk by the Memorial placed there on Memorial Day 1969. I knelt down there tonight and thanked our Vets for putting up the Memorial. I thanked the person who remembered to put a little flag tethered to a beer can on top of the brick memorial to Gary. Someone took the time to do that. I love that. Who was it? I don't know but it made a difference in my life. thank you to that someone and thank you forever to Gary. How I wish you were still here. I graduated high school in 1969. I am still here. Thanks in part to you. God bless and keep you Gary.

We lost our Rush

 

Every morning since his diagnosis, I checked out Rush's site to see if he would be on the air. I did the same today. And it said Mark Steyn would be on. So I turned the radio on and heard Rush's voice. I thought, Oh Mark did that the other day to let us hear Rush's voice like we needed since he hadn't been on since Feb 2. Then the announcer said, "This is the Limbaugh Legacy". 

"No", I said, "you only have a legacy once you are dead." Then I understood. We had lost our Rush. His website always displayed the headlines and scripts from the show...I read them even after I had listened to them on air. Tonight, the page has nothing, only black. I can't even imagine how empty this night feels for Kathryn and Bo and everyone who worked with him everyday for 33 years. 

Rush, we prayed for you every night at dinner, for healing. And now you are healed. And now you know how perfect life can be in the arms of God. I am happy for you beyond words, but how will we live without you on the air? The doctor of democracy, the guy with the sizable heart still beating, the guy to guide us through tumult in times of despair? Well, of course we have our Jesus. 

Enjoy the ride my friend. It won't be long before we see you there. All my love, Candyce

https://www.rushlimbaugh.com

So grateful we can see and listen to archives of Rush's show here

https://www.rushlimbaugh.com/videos/free-video/kathryn-adams-limbaugh-on-our-beloved-rush-free/

MLK Day: "The time is always ripe to do right."

Reverend Martin Luther King Jr.

I received an email today from a publisher about the mission of Martin Luther King Jr., including excerpts from the letter he wrote from Birmingham jail in 1963. The email was beautifully written and perfect for our times as King insisted on nonviolent protest and unconditional love as the way to achieve equal rights for all...I share it with you below:

__________________________________________________________

“We must use time creatively, in the knowledge that the time is always ripe to do right. Now is the time to make real the promise of democracy and transform our pending national elegy into a creative psalm of brotherhood.” 

That was from Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s 1963 “Letter from a Birmingham Jail.” The letter was written while King was detained in solitary confinement for taking part in the Birmingham Campaign against racial segregation. 

 

After reading an article published in a local newspaper about religious leaders condemning his nonviolent demonstrations, Martin Luther King began to put together his response to them, which led to a famous letter. 

 

At first he wrote in the margins of the newspaper he was given; he later moved on to using scraps of paper, and then finally a legal pad provided by his lawyers. After his letter was compiled and typed out by his associates, it was 21 pages of double-spaced type long. 

 

“I can assure you that it would have been much shorter if I had been writing from a comfortable desk, but what else can one do when he is alone in a narrow jail cell, other than write long letters, think long thoughts and pray long prayers?” writes King. 

 

The words that came out of that narrow jail cell were not ones of sorrow. They were filled with a rational hope that drew upon the wisdom of many before him. They were filled with a quiet optimism built upon his steadfast faith in God and the founding principles of our nation.

 

“I have no despair about the future,” he writes near the end of his letter. “I have no fear about the outcome of our struggle in Birmingham, even if our motives are at present misunderstood. We will reach the goal of freedom in Birmingham and all over the nation, because the goal of America is freedom.” 

 

King was arrested 29 times during his fight for civil rights. 

 

But despite this, his rational hope and quiet optimism would produce widespread change. One year after he wrote that letter, Congress passed the Civil Rights Act that outlawed racial segregation, and a year after that, it passed the Voting Rights Act that bolstered African Americans’ right to vote. 

 

When accepting his Nobel Peace Prize in 1964, King’s speech left us with one of his most iconic lines: 

“I believe that unarmed truth and unconditional love will have the final word in reality. This is why right, temporarily defeated, is stronger than evil triumphant.”

 

These words—of goodness, hope, faith, and resilience in the face of injustice—serve as a reminder that, when we call upon our higher nature, it can guide us through the darkest of times.