It all started off so nicely: There was a bit of real work done around here Saturday. Panama had the big orange noise and dust-maker out, so the area looks like a golf course.
Elaine come through with perfectly sautéed mushrooms to top a perfect steak and baked Yukon Gold’s on the BBQ.
A movie capped off a perfect day; my snoring wasn’t bad during the second half.
Yet with the reports coming in Sunday morning, it was clear America was passing another epoch. I decided to enjoy what would be left of the passing period – a time when “the War of civilizations” was still dawning on most Americans….
The weather hasn’t been all that bad this year. Sure, a couple of days with the comfort indicators over 90+ but it’s nothing like the heat waves in India…so we count our blessings.
As Sunday morning rolled around, I had promised myself I’d get Elaine’s audio cassette series on investing in the stock market (an oldie but goody from Louis Rukeyser picked up on eBay). But somewhere around 9 AM, the day ran completely off the rails.
Since the four eye surgeries (another exam is due Wednesday) I’ve been inching back to sight – 20-80 at the last check.
Still, the computer in the music room has been down with hard drive disease, and before I could even begin thinking about loading up the cassettes for a roll-over to MP3, I had to (gulp!) replace the hard drive.
Turns out, taking hard drives out of an old main computer was a fair chunk of work: There we three 1 TB drives…two of which are now awaiting execution by Mr. and Mrs. Bates down on the rifle range. The third is disconnected but spared termination by pure laziness.
Putting in the new drive, even sight-impaired, wasn’t too bad. But then I got around to installing Windows 10 – and by the time the updates were loaded…well, you get the picture.
Time flew by to 10:30 AM, and one thing led to another…where’s that FireWire driver? Then at 11-something, it was time to move the music from the 4 TB network attached storage onto the newley refurb’ed machine.
I gotta learn to read the fine print: 2+ hours even on a fast network. I didn’t realize the size of the MP3 collection.
Once that was done, I figured I might as well add Amazon Music which had been working fine with Win 7 updated to Win 10…until it didn’t. Kiss off a more time there, too.
Hint: It seems to make a difference whether you download the Amazon music app first and then bring in the backups, or bring in the backups first and then install the app. Don’t ask me why.
Somewhere about here, it got to be lunchtime, so while playing a fine assortment of music from the 80s, a bowl of chili and a glass of milk later, I ran across the recording software for the studio. The self-talk began.
“Well George, as long as you’ve gone this far, why don’t you just install Samplitude now so you don’t have to do it later…besides there’s a good CD burner in there…”
“Yeah…what the hell…”
This short task was blown out of schedule compliance when a 96 mb update had to be downloaded installed three times – nowhere did anyone mention that it would need to congitate for 5-minutes to sort of what was where on the drive. If you quit the app when you think it’s done…sheesh.
At last…no, wait: As long as I had Samplitude X2 up and running, why not just in the additional 12 GB of samples from Independence for MIDI because composiing music is something that…
Ooops.
Elaine came in from outside about 3:30 just as I finally got Independence installed correcly.
With martini time fast-approaching, I skipped the reinstallation of Garritan Personal Orchestra and swore I’d get to it later.
This was not difficult…just damn time-consuming. Problems I had figured out a couple of years back, but solving them now seems just a little bit slower.
The lesson from all this: Henceforth I will no longer make a To-Do list on Weekends. Sound Reasoning is this:
I didn’t have that glow of personal accomplishment that should come with the end of a weekend. I didn’t get a single project off the list. Future projects? A few avoided.
Panama takes the bow for the yard, Elaine for nursing her tomato plants, and I still hadn’t gotten the MP3’s rolled off.
I did damn near everything else you can do to a computer, but the one action point that comprised the Sunday To-Do list?
I was up late last night.
But it never ends… I’ve got this morning’s To-Do List and it’ll never all get done today.
Perhaps I think of it as a personal reason to get up on Monday.
The good news is I won’t die today: The Programmer in Chief wouldn’t let a tortured soul die with such a long To-Do list.
I’ll be sure to put a couple of more items on the list for today, just in case. Don’t want to take any chances…
As the death toll from Orlando passed 50, it became clear that in the larger scheme of things, Sunday had been a meaningless day, at least as measured by history.
Yet to me, it wasn’t. It wasn’t the end of the weekend. It was the end of a time. It marked the end of America being somewhat safe. In a sense, it marked the end of America’s leader’s contract with the electorate. That has been breached.
They had misjudged the seriousness – and even today, Trump and others -point to high office holders including the president for refusing to say “radical Islamic terrorism.”
But events have spoken clearly and anyone who denies it now is but a liar and deceiver. The war of civilizations I’ve been writing about for more than a decade has taken another (and decidedly major) turn for the worse.
Now, not only will we face the resource depletion issue, the unavoidable crack-up-to-come due to compound interest on cumulative debt, bit now we have death squads as well. One (San Bernardino) could have been a fluke, but two and we have a pattern.
America’s leadership has failed to get it right; it has failed to paint the honest picture o0f the threats, and we are now sliding into the morass of our own making. Unwilling to “win” we are forced into loss. Slow loss, perhaps, but clashes of civilizations take a while.
Western war-making has forced the Middle East wars to our homeland and the original mission – keeping America safe from all enemies, foreign and domestic – has been ground-up into a useless stew of political correctness and mindless genderism. In case you haven’t noticed, this is failing us in the end.
Mission creep? Or was it the mission all along?
I don’t expect to hear from many liberals this week, because I hold them largely to account: How in the wake of Orlando can they continue to promote the Obamanation’s massive immigration (largely illegal and with sanctuary cities) on the one hand, and persist in the mass marketing of genderism?
Even the melting pot has capacity limits. Mission creep needs to be dialed back and the basics of nationhood taught and understood.
So do the dynamics of market differentiation: When you create new classes, you create new opportunity for conflict. The inevitable result of marketing of wars and genders has just collided and only a pitiful few will see this in the broader context of civilizations at war.
In the banal word of sports, it would be high-time to get back to basics, work on the fundamentals, and do some blocking and tackling.
But the revealed reality is that mission creep has sold us a bill of goods.
Write when you get rich,
So Reagan builds the Taliban, which later transmutes into al qaeda, and attacks Afghanistan. As a result millions of Afghanis flee. Mateens parents arrive in the US and while Reagan is still president give birth to their son Omar in 1986 who is a US citizen.
Now how is this a result of Obama?
You have utterly missed the point: We have had a succession of presidents who have bought into the same “immigration is good for the economy” paradigm. Now, with 8 years of Obama and his lack of hard borders, large numbers of anti-US persons have arrived and they are now mobilizing soft-headed American kids. And, said kids can even work for a major Homeland contractor.
And at the same time, we have a hundred a day, or more, from Syria coming in (all Muslims, not Christians)…again the agenda.
So yes, it is a succession of presidents, each getting weaker and more malleable to the political correctness agenda that apologizes for America at every turn.
So this sets the stage for the mental infections to follow.
I expect that without the recently imported foreigners, the catch and release program, and the dismantling of the warrior culture in the military, that the perp in Orlando would not have acted as he did. However, act he did: He believed, no doubt, that his side would win – and given the deterioration in US core values and strengths promoted even now by Obama, how would he expect anything other than success in terror – waged against a weakened and disarmed America – and we note in passing how the Administration is shamelessly pivoting off this tragedy into gun control.
You a desperately trying to excuse Obama, aren’t you?
This is why we have become easy pickings and a global joke. Lost our manufacturing capability as we are now just a corporate sock-puppet. And all the while, O keeps selling us further down the road with crooked trade deals (secret!) and (off the runway) here comes another jetload of people for you to pay for.
Sucka!
Very well put!
The crazy thing about the pivot to gun control is that it just doesn’t make any sense…
First current gun control failed at the FBI check (similar to how it failed for the shooting at the church guy).
Even after that though this was a person who was determined to kill people. One of the following would have occurred:
1) He obtains the gun illegally
2) He goes in with a big knife which, from passed night club experience, may have yielded slightly less death toll with how noisy they are and how quiet a knife/yelling is in relation to the ambient noise.
3) He goes in with a bomb which probably would have yielded a higher death toll.
Determined people will figure out how to get something done.
A further agenda point to consider here is this: Could this be an effort to discredit the FBI chief who still holds Hillary’s future in his Dept?
This is all true. Immigration of those with very high economic value, with families, and after proper vetting and sponsorship vetting does make sense. Random “immigration”, better known as asylum, of so-called refugees without vetting is stupid, un-American, and illegal, though I’m at a loss to figure out how to stop obvious crimes in progress by the so-called “leaders” of our country.
Obviously the military needs to be of the warrior class. Their mission is to break things and kill people. They are, or should be, disciplined attack dogs, and to pretend otherwise is to define away the reason for having and paying for a military at all.
Good luck with the eyes, George, we are all pulling for you!
Well played and well stated , George
It’s not just immigration,as this fiend was born right here in the good old USA.We first need a new President and a new Attorney General.Then revive the House Committee on Un American Activities to highlight the dangers emanating from these mosques.
Liberals are STUPID immoral irresponsible SICK twisted
George, some people have a job jar. I have a job barrel. I tell people that if you know someone who doesn’t have enough to do and who is a masochist have them buy a fixer-upper hobby farm. They will then have a second full time job and all the aggravation they can stand.
On a more serious note, I think we are in the declining years of our empire. I think I understand how the more enlightened Romans felt at around 450 AD. We who are awake are too few and cultural momentum is too strong. It would take an extreme traumatic emotional event to wake most people up. Unfortunately I think that will happen only when the end comes.
I say Bingo George – the FBI had 3 chances to put this guy on a “hard” list and forbid him from owning any kind of firearm – his Mosque was under watch while Clinton was Secretary of War and she scrubbed it – The security Co is under contract with DHS headed by Jeh Johnson another Black Muslim Brotherhood guy in the Administration – Yeah right these guys are being vetted my AS_.
Well, I think the Obama administrations “Active Shooter Program” is doing just fine.
The corporate media are asking few questions and pushing the anti-gun message quite well. In the age of cameras everywhere we find little usable footage. In the age of phones everywhere and selfies, there is nothing to see here save what the Media 6 present their viewers.
There are only 2 or 3 mourners for the 50 people killed, so Media 6 needs to provide more mourners for their imaging of the events. I do think the lack of ambulances is an issue, and the ASP op commander needs to realize that 4 ambulances carrying 2 bodies each is insufficient – up the ambulance count for improved realism.
Chalk this one right up there with the successes of San Bernadino and Boston soon.
Right on the money Oilman! Today I was on MSN and clicked on the photos of the victims in the Orlando shooting. I was surprised to come upon photos of 6 and 7 year olds, since what would they be doing in a gay bar after last call? Then I recognized them as the Sandy Hook kids who supposedly died but performed in a chorus at the Super Bowl halftime show three weeks later. Obama is not so much president as carnival barker…our False Flag leader. No one died at Sandy Hook, and probably no one died in Orlando either. I predict that fewer and fewer people in the US will believe the mainstream media anymore. Lots of Sanders supporters got their eyes opened during Bernie’s campaign when he packed stadiums across the country, but the media just talked Clinton and her lock on the nomination. Probably over half the country sees the mainstream media for what it truly is now. Maybe there is hope.
Sir, you really need to rethink your comments. First, media outlets have been getting increased negative comments about too much attention to grieving families and loved ones. It is sufficient for the purpose of a story to show a few distressed people, not entire crowds. Secondly – regarding the removal of deceased persons at a crime scene – and in particular at this crime scene – not all of the fifty people who died were at the location of the shooting. According to the police, thirty-nine were deceased at the club, while the rest passed away in hospital. Concerning the thirty-nine, as the evidence was collected – the bodies were removed by techs in white coroner’s vans not ambulances which may have been for critically injured people who needed to be transported in that fashion. Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) can be confusing for people who don’t understand how law enforcement and evidence collecting works. You just don’t haul bodies away willy-nilly; it was necessary to figure out what exactly happened and when . . .
I am sometimes amazed by how desperately some people need to believe what the media tells them to believe, even if they have to suspend logic and reality. It reminds me of what the psychologists say about Santa Clause. When little boys find out there is no Santa, they are mad about it. But when little girls find out there is no Santa, they pretend like there is, because they want the presents to continue. The US seems divided in this way too. There is the camp that knows the truth and is mad about it, and the camp that is determined to believe the lies because they need to believe in the American Dream. They rely on the main stream media to tell them what to think. But this group seems to be getting smaller and smaller as it gets harder and harder to ignore the obvious. For example, I have MSN as my homepage, and if you read the articles you get one opinion, but if you look at the results of their daily polls the readers believe the opposite. Today: Ban on Muslims entering the US=63%. Should President Obama use the phrase ‘radical Islamic terrorism’? =69%. Who do you think would be more effective at stopping terror attacks? =64% Trump. You would NEVER get that impression from reading the main stream media articles. It makes for an interesting study from the peanut gallery here in South America…
“I don’t expect to hear from many liberals this week, because I hold them largely to account: How in the wake of Orlando can they continue to promote the Obamanation’s massive immigration (largely illegal and with sanctuary cities) on the one hand, and persist in the mass marketing of genderism?”
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Welocme to the NWO george. the ‘new world odor’ Been comin’ a long time now. No borders, go anywhere you want, do anythins you want. just fell free…or is it feel? Everyone seems knows the back of the dollar bill, and NOVUS ORDO SECLORUM, or NWO, but noone wants to admit that its actually happening before thier eyes. When in rome, do as the romans do, and right now, all that will be left it seems is bread and circus and the colosseum for gladiator fights.
These staged events will continue to happen in order to keep the populace from noticing empire decay and corruption, and to further the idea that we are under attack and there are just too many for our poor, underfunded and porn surfing intelligence department(s) to track them. The only way to fix it (soon to be read, heard and espoused in Media 6 outlets) will be martial law, chipping of citizens, “papers please” coming soon and even more funding for the various alphabet soup mix of incompetent idiots and leeches.
I honestly have ceased watching or listening to any broadcast news – I no longer need to! The script is now etched into my brain – wash, rinse, repeat…
I wonder why it took the police 3 HOURS to go in and take this guy out? It was a gun free zone, no armed citizens to do the right thing, but 3 HOURS? Did swat stop for breakfast on the way or what?
I’m not even sure it is a “radical” Islamic problem. Isn’t homosexuality punishable by death in, like, ten Islamic countries?
In Paris, they used more and just as deadly guns. Illegal ones. In London, I am told, illegal guns are a major source of criminal income. And gun murders are wildly underreported in certain areas, and rarely investigated. Immigrant dominated areas.
Making things illegal makes them profitable to outlaws and the law enforcement/legal/prison/political complex. Yet authority worshipers seem to believe that if we pass a law, the goal of the law will magically be be achieved by “government”. Another faith based delusion contradicted daily by reality.
What I wonder about is why nobody in Florida shot back for three hours. Probably we could start with it being a gun free zone.
Finally, there are many, many ways to kill lots of people. Most are impossible to regulate and much cheaper. I won’t draw pictures, because it might give somebody some stupid ideas, but armed citizens are able to resist as well as attack authority, and citizens with homemade bombs etc. are only able to attack, and mainly attack innocents in soft targets. A recipe for terrorism as the only way to resist tyranny.
Drunk driving is far more dangerous than gun ownership. Or even terrorism, unless they up their game. We are just so used to it that we ignore the constant death toll. And authority correctly sees armed citizens as a threat to total tyranny. I reckon a lot more than fifty innocent people were killed by drunks on Saturday night and Sunday morning. It just doesn’t get sheeple to watch TV news.
And if I hear one more person say: “This is not Islam” I may scream. Look at the sword on the Saudi flag. Then look up what it means. What it is named, and why. Then do some reading on female genital mutilation, what it is, how it is done, and who does it, and what percentages of girls have it done to them as infants, in various countries, and why. And what happens when the victims bear children, and why. Do this on an empty stomach. Then let’s chat about unrestricted immigration some more. A “phobia” is by definition an irrational fear. Thus a rational fear or concern is not a phobia, political correctspeak to the contrary notwithstanding.
Well said!
Agreed – well said, indeed.
The average citizen has zero awareness of the information you outlined, and so their emotional buttons & behavioral response is easily predicted and manipulated. This is evident to the informed consumer of the news such as you’ll find around here and in other corners of the internet where free thought is yet encouraged. Most are quiet, unassuming folks.
George – edit as you see appropriate. I may have had too much caffeine this morning and an overdose of cynicism!
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“A further agenda point to consider here is this: Could this be an effort to discredit the FBI chief who still holds Hillary’s future in his Dept?”
George your thinking cap is on nice and tight this morning!
Allow me to step a bit deeper into the rabbit-hole…
The idea that this attack (and/or the official response to it) is intended to discredit the FBI will be labelled as a conspiracy theory, but I’d bet that in time it will be discovered that the attacker had on multiple occasions quietly met with some supervisor or manager at his DHS contract company and later with some DHS folks – and possibly others that had no good reason to have been in contact with him. While pure conjecture at this point, it’s certainly in the realm of possibility – especially considering he was yet another attacker that was “on the FBI’s radar”. Seems to be a common theme lately.
I can say with confidence that when those in power (from mid-level managers to political appointees and elected officials, and certainly business entities) feel their positions, power, or income (or potential windfall) are threatened, it’s no longer a rarity to use anything or anyone imaginable to help shore up defenses – and to actively attack the perceived threat. Sometimes it seems those used to “help the cause” is someone that’s about to commit an illegal or heinous act, and they’re simply allowed to proceed.
There are HUGE amounts of current and potential profit to be made or lost depending upon who’s sworn-in next January. It could be estimated in the trillions if one calculates actual funds plus secondary and tertiary transactions. Based upon the last 24 years (and possibly going back to the Nixon era) no one should be surprised by high profile events that may be headed our way this summer and into late October.
I suspect we won’t have an October Surprise this year – more likely a steady stream of unthinkable events that will traumatize and then numb the populace so effectively that even if Clinton is charged, indicted, and possibly convicted, it’ll appear to be small potatoes in comparison to the other things being posted and printed in big bold letters on the front page of newspapers, websites, and on-air shows.
But even that may not the be ultimate goal. Billions to trillions in contracts and profits, big changes in regulations and new laws, and certainly more “fundamental change” to our culture may simply be a prelude to something completely unimaginable as of today.
Or, it may be as simple as the current Administration (more likely those that pull their strings) willing to do whatever it takes to remove any obstacle to placing another Clinton in the WH so as to maintain their professional and personal status quo. There’s simply too much money and power in the balance to allow an “outsider” to change the game in DC and NYC (and London) at this point. Interesting times indeed.
I suspect that the 2016 election cycle (or more accurately the 2016 power/influence/contract cycle) has now officially swung into high gear and this is just the opening salvo. I’d say expect a huge black swan event, but that may not come close to the magnitude of events that could realistically be on the horizon. “Expect the completely unexpected” may be the best mental outlook to adopt for a while.
Hi George, I know the gun control advocates will make a big deal out of Orlando, but your point about other ways to create mass slaughter are valid. Still, the problem would be simpler if there just weren’t any semi-automatic weapons. So how about a two-fer. Have the gov. outlaw ALL semi-autos with a buy back grace period. Buy back at a fair value. That will dump a lot of money into the economy and most of it will not go to the liberals. Then crack down will some nasty punishment for semi-auto possession and even stronger punishment for use in a crime. And while we’re at it, lets come up with some more faster more effective form of punishment than simple incarceration. I don’t know about you, but I grew up in Texas, lots of hunting, and never felt the need for a semi-auto. Police only went away from revolvers to keep up with the fire power they were up against.
“Shall not infringe” is not open for debate, or translation into what you want it to mean ……. anyway a witness said someone in there had an “automatic” weapon – you either have a license to purchase such a weapon or you obtain them illegally…..
so,let’s have wide open carry for everyone…as long as they carry a gun made before 1777!
I cannot be convinced this is not all by design.
Strategy at the highest levels.
S**t rolls down hill always
unless it is thrown up against a wall to see what sticks, which seems to be the pattern.
It isn’t prejudice, it is awakening to reality.
The wool over our eyes no long suffices to keep the masses stupid…or does it?
Here is another ingredient in the recipe for civil unrest stew-
For any of the +94,000,000 unemployed/underemployed who got laid off to have their jobs reassigned to visa carrying immigrants and no space to complain as they had to sign a contract to stay silent-
Did they make you sign one of these?
Ever thought you would be displaced by a visa carrying immigrant? No prejudice here- just a little domestic balance needed.
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/06/12/us/laid-off-americans-required-to-zip-lips-on-way-out-grow-bolder.html?_r=0
l heard someone being interviewed yesterday(apropos of Orlando shootings) declare something like “it is time for Americans to realize that many of their civil liberties may soon be taken away, (just as they were during WW2)for the sake of the nation’s safety”…..huhhhh? ls this really unfolding before our eyes? l am going out to buy more tomatoes and chickens today….
George, eye problems and all, you seem to see what is happening pretty well.
Interesting counter current observation: Long ago, 1950’s, while I was growing up, I knew many who hunted. And there were many places to hunt. But I never saw anyone carry a handgun openly. Last week, in Walmart, I saw a man packing a pistol on his hip in the open. Nobody, except me seemed to notice.
So, years ago, the common man hunted with a rifle out in the country and was the predator. Now the man’s decendant carries a pistol inside the city and is prey.
George, as I recall the invasion of the Middle East by the USA got rolling with the “W” administration and last I heard he wasn’t/isn’t a “liberal”. Granted Obama/Clinton have only extended the stupidity of the “Wolfowitz doctrine”.
One more news flash; even with a CC permit, bringing a firearm into a nightclub in FL is prohibited. Maybe now would be a good time to change that law.
Please, take a step back, and judge — not by propaganda or spin, but by deed. By today’s (admittedly, quite Liberal) standards, Reagan was conservative, so was Kennedy (although he was a Liberal by 1960 standards.) The U.S. has only seen five conservative Presidents during the last half of its existence, none of whom were named Bush…
I’m lost as to why the discussion doesn’t include mental illness nor the multiple U.S. shooting massacres perpetrated by white males. How many mass shooters have been inspired by Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold?
The USA bombs a hospital or drones a wedding and kills 50 people, it’s just ho-hum for America. Somebody shows up in a gun free zone and kills 50, it’s the end of the world.
My son recently remarked that I don’t like the USA government. I told him that I thought Americans were getting the government they deserved, and we’re about to get at least another 4 years of it.
That’s how it looks from Ecuador.
On March 25, 1990, in New York, a jilted lover carrying a grudge and a dollar’s worth of gasoline, chained the doors and torched the Happy Land Social Club, killing 87.
Folks, a semi-auto gun is not required for mass murder. It is not the gun. It is the person.
Overheard today in a WAL-MART near you, George : “l just cannot believe that American flags are flying at half-mast for GAY people” !!….good ol’ boy philosophy at its finest. Ecuador looks better and better.
At the same time thousands show up to honor Boxer and Moslem Mohammed Ali, while some hours
Later more thousands scream anti
Moslem immigration rhetoric.
How crazy is that? The Oklahoma City Bomber was home
Grown…wasn’t that a massacre?
Until we teach how to wage peace
in public schools , this madness
Will continue.
If you think the OKC bomber was “home grown” you better do more research. Esp into the “evidence” gone missing and the role of a third person, believed by many to be a gov’t plant.
More details about the terror databases Mateen was placed on
Omar Mateen is shown in an undated photograph. (AFP/Getty Images)
Omar Mateen is shown in an undated photograph. (AFP/Getty Images)
Omar Mateen was once placed on the Selectee List of the FBI’s Terrorist Screening Database, which the bureau describes on its website as “a single database of identifying information about those known or reasonably suspected of being involved in terrorist activity.”
He was placed on the list while being investigated for 10 months starting in May 2013 for potential ties to terrorism. His co-workers reported to the FBI that he had scared them with talk of having family connections to Al Qaeda and being a member of another terror group. The FBI later concluded — after interviewing Mateen — that he was mostly full of bluster and had no such ties. Even so, during the investigation, he was added to the terror watch list and FBI agents would have received an alert if he had tried to buy firearms during that period. Being on the list would not have prevented those purchases, and he was removed shortly after the FBI closed its investigation in 2014.
About 42,000 people are in the overall Terrorist Screening Database, also known as the Terrorist Watchlist. About 98% of them are foreigners. About 16,000 of those in the database are on the Selectee List, a subset of potential terrorists deemed to be serious threats. Those on the Selectee List generally get a closer look from law enforcement during investigations and are subjected to additional screenings from airport security officials before getting on planes.
The Terrorist Watchlist also contains the more well-known and selective “No Fly List,” a database of about 16,000 people deemed so dangerous that they are barred from boarding commercial airliners. About 500 on the “No Fly List” are U.S. citizens or lawful permanent residents.
—Del Quentin Wilber
l t f
10:25 A.M.