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Sometimes, one has to find humor where ever they can.

My sister, Deirdre says our youngest sister Marcy is sick a lot. Part of the back story is that she was struck by a car in 1981, leaving her paralysed and causing the loss of one of her legs and has been in a wheelchair ever since.

Deirdre tells me, “Doctors up here are idiots and I don’t mind saying so.”

She says Marcy wishes she didn’t ramble on when visiting with her doctors, but they talk over her like she doesn’t know a thing about her condition. The last doctor told her she needs to get out of her wheelchair and get some exercise.

“Guess what?” Deirdre adds, “He almost succeeded in getting her out of her chair – in order to choke him!”

 

It’s taken 46 days, but finally something seems to be happening with regard to the terror attacks on our U.S. compound in Benghazi.

Three senators are demanding the Obama administration make public the surveillance video taken during last month’s deadly attack in Libya. Senators John McCain, Lindsey Graham and Kelly Ayotte wrote to President Obama’s defense secretary, CIA director and attorney general demanding the video be declassified.

In the run-up to the presidential election, a number of news reports show the Obama administration is distorting the account of the attack on September 11th that killed Ambassador Chris Stevens and three other Americans. Officials continue to blame it on a mob set into motion by an anti-Islamic film.

Meanwhile, the Senate Intelligence Committee has scheduled a series of hearings to investigate the intelligence and security surrounding the Benghazi attack. The panel, chaired by Democrat Senator Dianne Feinstein of California, will hold closed hearings beginning November 15th.

The  hearing will look at four main areas: Information surrounding intelligence and reporting of threats before the attack; what is now known about what happened in the attack, including who is responsible; the capability of the intelligence community to collect information in the Middle East and North Africa; and security at State Department and other U.S. facilities in the region.

Unfortunately, they won’t look into the connecting between the Muslim Brotherhood and the Obama Administration.

This is like untangling a spider-web, without breaking the strands, so I’ll do my best to keep it simple. In July, the U.S. State Department approved a license for the newly formed U.S.-based organization “The Syrian Support Group” to raise money for Syrian rebels — overriding President Obama’s administration sanctions and his Executive Order against such activity.

Near the end of May, the group sent a letter to the State Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) which issued the group a license on July 23rd, allowing them to “export, re-export, sell, or supply to the Free Syrian Army (‘FSA’) financial, communications, logistical, and other services otherwise prohibited by Executive Order 13582 in order to support the FSA.”

The FSA is affiliated with the Syrian National Council, whose political director, Louay Safi, used to be one of the top Islāmic advisers to the Pentagon and was only one of two officials authorized to certify Muslim chaplains for the U.S. military services. Safi’s relationship with the Pentagon ended in 2010 after it was discovered he was teaching Islāmic theology classes to troops headed for Afghanistan.

Then there’s the man who incorporated the Syrian Support Group in April 2012, and applied for the State Department OFAC license, Chicago-lawyer Mazen Asbahi. When running for president in 2008, Barack Obama appointed Asbahi to head Muslim outreach for his campaign.

After his appointment, it was learned Asbahi served as a board member of the Allied Assets Advisors Fund, a division of the North American Islāmic Trust (NAIT), which is yet another front for the Muslim Brotherhood. And as an aside, also on the board of Allied Assets Advisors was Jamal Said, a Chicago imam who raised $50,000 for Sami al-Arian, the head of Palestinian Islāmic Jihad in North America.

Both NAIT and Said are named unindicted co-conspiritors in the Holy Land Foundation trials of 2007 and 2008.

Finally, Asbahi and Safi were at the same White House meeting on June 29, 2011. Furthermore, Asbahi visited the White House again in April, jus’ days after the Syrian Support Group was incorporated.

And let us not forget that four Americans, including a U.S. Ambassador, two Navy SEALS and a civil service employee, were murdered in Benghazi because of this vast web.

As I was leaving work last night, ABC News had jus’ announced a Tunisian man was arrested October 11th, in Turkey with reported links to the attack on a U.S. consulate in Libya a month earlier. I’ve been on fire, burning angrily, ever since.

This comes on the heels of the Obama administration’s appointment of an investigator for the terror attacks in Benghazi with known Islamist-sympathizing. Former Ambassador Thomas R. Pickering, who has documented ties with the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), is the co-chairman of the board of George Soros’ International Crisis Group who funds the pro-Iranian front group, the National Iranian American Council (NIAC).

Pickering’s Islamic-connections came to light after by the Investigative Project on Terrorism was published, exposing what it called the “scores of established, radical Islamists” who met with senior administration officials over the course of hundreds of White House visits.

These “established, radical Islamist,” include members of the Muslim Brotherhood. But lets step back and take a walk through the Rose Garden the days following the attacks in Benghazi.

Here’s what President Barack Obama said on September 12th:

“Since our founding, the United States has been a nation that respects all faiths. We reject all efforts to denigrate the religious beliefs of others. But there is absolutely no justification to this type of senseless violence. None. The world must stand together to unequivocally reject these brutal acts… No acts of terror will ever shake the resolve of this great nation, alter that character, or eclipse the light of the values that we stand for.”

Here’s Jay Carney, White House Press Secretary, the following day:

“I think it’s important to note with regards to that protest that there are protests taking place in different countries across the world that are responding to the movie that has circulated on the Internet.”

Here’s Hillary Clinton on September 14th:

“We’ve seen the heavy assault on our post in Benghazi that took the lives of those brave men. We’ve seen rage and violence directed at American embassies over an awful Internet video that we had nothing to do with. It is hard for the American people to make sense of that because it is senseless, and it is totally unacceptable.”

And Carney the same day:

“We were not aware of any actionable intelligence indicating that an attack on the U.S. mission in Benghazi was planned or imminent. That report is false.”

Finally, Obama’s U.N. Ambassador Susan Rice hit every Sunday show with this message on September 16th:

“Based on the best information we have to date … it began spontaneously in Benghazi as a reaction to what had transpired some hours earlier in Cairo, where, of course, as you know, there was a violent protest outside of our embassy sparked by this hateful video.”

Earlier this month, Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said the U.S. has been looking into the arrests of two Tunisian men being detained in Turkey reportedly in connection with attacks on the consulate in Libya last month.  The charges are punishable by six to 12 years in prison, according to the provisions of the anti-terrorist law in force in Tunisia since 2003.

Now we’re learning that between 300 and 400 national security officials received emails detailing the Benghazi terrorist attack as it was happening on 9/11, raising fresh questions about the truth behind the Benghazi attack. The emails show that the Libyan radical Islamic group Ansar al-Sharia claimed responsibility for the attack just two hours after it began via social media.

White House officials told CBS News that an unmanned Predator drone was sent over the U.S. mission in Libya, providing Washington with a live feed to the chaos that unfolded. However, we still don’t know why and, Americans deserve answers.

U.S. diplomat Sean Smith, who was killed in the attack, left distress messages on a gaming website, “Assuming we don’t die tonight, we saw one of our ‘police’ that guard the compound taking pictures.”

Thirty minutes later, U.S. Ambassador Stevens met with the Turkish ambassador. By this time special operators in the CIA safe house already knew something was wrong.

The Turkish ambassador left with no incident, unharmed. Hours later, the attack began.

The fight lasted seven hours, with a live feed streaming into the White House Situation Room. Cameras positioned in the compound, as well an aerial drone taking pictures of the U.S. outpost in Benghazi were also fed live into the State Department and the Pentagon.

So how did this really start? And it wasn’t because of a You-Tube video as they administration would like us to believe.

The Obama administration appears to have been arming Libyan “rebels” with rocket-propelled grenades (RPGs), surface to air missiles and other weapons in order to overthrow Muammar Gadhafi. In 2011, these rebels were successful in their goal, ultimately torturing and killing the dictator.

The Muslim Brotherhood, which had been coordinating with the U.S., offered its assistance in dealing with rebels in the region in exchange for help in crushing the Gadhafi regime.

Those same rebels turned out to be members of al-Qaeda. They allegedly sought to oust Gadhafi because he had been cooperating with the U.S. to end their presence in Libya.

Recall the U.S. had partnered with Gadhafi ever since he complied with U.S. demands that he abandon his nuclear and biological weapons program. Nonetheless, the Obama administration abandoned it’s agreement to continue joint cooperation with Gadhafi.

Since Gadhafi’s death, al-Qaeda’s only counterbalance in Libya removed, the terror group responsible for the September 11th attacks has now been left uncontested to spread through the region. But it doesn’t end there.

Benghazi is a well known weapons location point, which might explain what Ambassador Christopher Stevens was doing there to begin with. It’s also a place where no U.S. diplomatic outpost should have ever been situated in the first place.

It’s believed that Stevens knew trouble was coming, which is why he requested additional security. This is because Stevens was “pointman,” in this weapons-running scheme, working directly with Abdulhakim Belhadj, who is commander of the Muslin-Brotherhoods proxy organization, Libyan Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG).

Through Belhadj, Stevens supplied weapons for rebel forces in Libya and later to Syria via Turkey. It’s widely known that President Obama has maintained warm relations with Turkish PM Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, having spoken no less than 13 times by phone last year alone.

The New York Times reported in June, CIA operatives were on the ground in Turkey helping opposition forces and it is known that Stevens had met with a Turkish official the night of his demise. Also no secret is the blood-feud between President Bashar al Assad and Erdogan.

From what I’ve pieced together, the Muslim Brotherhood and its proxy, LIFG, through it’s leader Belhadj, were advising the U.S. on which rebel-factions in Libya and later, in Syria, should receive our arms. Those rebel receiving arms turned out to be members of al Qaeda, whose now dead leader bin Laden was once counted among the membership of the Muslim Brotherhood.

Aiding Islamists to retake the Maghreb while expunging the region of all Western-influence makes sense, if you understand Obama ideology, however despite the unofficial U.S. policy of aiding “non-violent” Islamists, the Obama administration has forgotten jihadists will do what jihadists do, manipulate Americans to get what they want, then kill in the name of God as they work to implement a global caliphate based on sharia law.

Ambassador Stevens learned this the hard way after he outlived his usefulness and, like any other infidel, was beaten, raped and eventually murdered by “true Believers.” By calling Benghazi what it is Obama could no longer say he cut off the head of al Qaeda when he killed bin Laden, nor would he be able to say the war on terror is over.

However as this unfolds, the U.S. media continues to focus largely on the election cycle we are in, so it seems doubtful this scandal will blow up on the Obama Administration before November 6th.  The facts as they now stand reveal that not only did Obama know from day one the Benghazi breach was an act of terror waged by pro-al Qaeda militants, but he watched it unfold.

It’s October — and so far the media has missed the surprise.

It slammed into the bridge and immediately disappeared over the cement wall and beyond the line of cars and trucks. That’s when I realized it had also smashed into what had once been a mini-van, demolishing its front end and drivers side.

Heading north bound on 395, I already knew the crop duster was in trouble as plumes of white and black smoke streamed from the craft. To me it appeared as if the pilot was trying to turn it around and make it back to Reno-Cannon International Airport in the southeast part of town, when he crashed.

Since traffic was at a stand still, I pulled my vehicle off the road and onto to the gravel shoulder. I grabbed the fire extinguisher and dashed as quickly as I could towards the downed aircraft.

To my amazement the plane had landed right side up, yet leaning against a part of the overpass. However the engine was on fire, and though partly torn from the fuselage, it was growing rapidly.

I could see pieces of the craft scattered across both lanes of the freeway.

Quickly, I aimed the red canister towards the blazing cowling housing the engine. I squeezed the handle and swept the icy, white dust onto the flames inside.

At first it seemed to have worked, but the fire came back to life with a roar. It was orange-red and sizzling.

It was a magnesium fire and I knew there was no way I could put the engine fire out, it would take foam. Instead I aimed the rest of the canister at the fuselage hoping to halt the spread of flames into the cockpit which was filling up with smoke.

It did not take long for the fire extinguisher to run dry. Yet the flames continued to gobble at the plane as I stood there helplessly.

I could only envision the trapped pilot inside.

Racing around, I stood on what remained of the left-wing and slammed the now empty extinguisher against the canopy in hopes of breaking it or jarring it open. I could feel the flames licking at my forearms as I hammered away and my lungs fill with the acrid odor of smoke with each labored breath.

Without warning I felt a pair of arms wrap themselves tightly around my waist.  I was suddenly jerked off the wing and dragged to the dirt and away from the burning plane.

The arms belonged to that of a Nevada State Troop. He decided that it was useless for me to continue trying to rescue the pilot.

He was sure that if he let me continue pounding on the canopy another half-minute I would be dead as well.

While I attempted to wrestle myself from the trooper, several fire engines arrived and started pouring water and foam on the downed aircraft. They had the fire out in minutes and were using the Jaws of Life to open the uncooperative canopy only to remove the lifeless body of the downed flier.

Later that night while I nursed second degree burns to my hands, arms and left side of my face, I watched the news. They said the pilot did his best to miss a bus full of school children, dribbling oil on top of the vehicle and only struck the mini-van, killing the woman driver because he didn’t see the power lines across McCarran Boulevard.

Republican Mitt Romney told a cheering crowd of about 4,500 in Reno they will play a big role in deciding who’s the next president. Romney said during a lunch-hour speech Wednesday he’s confident Nevada will help send him to the White House in November.

The former Massachusetts governor appealed to everyone in the crowd to go out and find one person who voted for President Obama last time and persuade them to “come out and vote for us this time.”

Obama carried Nevada last time partly because he became the first Democrat since Lyndon Johnson in 1964 to win the Republican-leaning Washoe County.

Meanwhile, Obama is in Las Vegas for a campaign rally featuring a free concert by pop singer Katy Perry at a park near downtown. The rally drew more than 5,000 people, with a fire official estimating several thousand more in long lines waiting to get in.

Prior to Obama’s arrival, Democratic Congresswoman and U.S. Senate candidate Shelley Berkley told the crowd Nevada is the key to re-electing him.

Then there’s a top advisor for Governor Brian Sandoval whose predicting Romney will lose the state November 6th. Lobbyist and former Republican lawmaker Pete Ernaut says Obama will carry Nevada by one to three percentage points.

Rasmussen Reports conducted a statewide presidential poll that shows Obama has a 2-percent over Romney at 50-48. Third party candidates and undecided voters were both at 1-percent statewide.

The former chief of staff to Sandoval is now the special assistant to the president for external affairs at University of Nevada, Reno. Heidi Gansert will help involved in university outreach and building partnerships with business and industry, organizations and other agencies.

Gansert served as Sandoval’s chief of staff from January 2011 until her resignation in September. Before that she served six years in the Nevada Assembly, representing District 25 in Reno.

After four days of early voting, 17 percent of active Nevada voters have already cast ballots in the upcoming election. The secretary of state’s office shows 214,609 people have voted, either in person or by mail, since early voting began Saturday.

Of those, ballots received from Democrats total 99,415, compared with 79,697 cast by Republicans. The remaining ballots are nonpartisan or voters registered with minor political parties.

Finally, a state judge in Carson City has struck down a Nevada tax initiative pushed by the state teachers union to raise money for education.  In a ruling issued Tuesday, District Judge James Wilson said the initiative’s description  was misleading and deceptive on several grounds and  is invalid.

The Nevada State Education Association backed the measure to impose a 2 percent margins tax on businesses making $1 million or more annually. The teachers union said it would raise $800 million a year for education.

Fresh from her speaking engagement at the Democratic National Convention in Charlotte, North Carolina, Sandra Fluke, a Georgetown Law Student, spoke to 10 people in the parking lot of the Reno, Nevada Sak ‘N Save on Silverada Blvd. The event, held Saturday, was part of an effort to get Nevadans to the polls on the first day of early voting.

She has been campaign in support of President Obama’s re-election campaign, which described the rally as an “intimate gathering. A campaign photo showed Fluke talking to a few people within the confines of a parking space.

“I’m trying to do everything I can for an election that I feel is very important,” she told the Reno Gazette-Journal.

Fluke became known earlier this year when she spoke before a House Democratic Steering and Policy Committee in support of mandated contraception coverage.  Rush Limbaugh referred to her as a “slut” on his radio program following her comments.

President Barack Obama and Republican challenger Mitt Romney are making campaign stops in Las Vegas on back-to-back days. Romney and his running mate Paul Ryan will make their first joint appearance Tuesday in Nevada when they appear at a rally at the Henderson Pavilion.

Obama is scheduled to attend a grassroots rally late Wednesday night in Las Vegas as part of a two-day campaign blitz in six battleground states. First lady Michelle Obama is scheduled to return to Las Vegas on Friday.

The latest Rasmussen Reports telephone survey of Likely Nevada Voters shows Obama with 50% support to Romney’s 47%. Obama has now hit the 50% mark again in Nevada for the first time since July.

Romney will be in Reno Wednesday. The campaign confirms that the GOP nominee will make a campaign stop in the area, but no other details have been released.

Northern Nevada’s largest newspaper has endorsed Romney for president. The Reno Gazette-Journal says the state and nation can’t afford four more years of President Obama’s leadership, noting Nevada’s economy continues to lag behind the rest of the nation.

In 2008, the paper endorsed Obama over Senator John McCain and Governor Sarah Palin.

Democrats in Nevada have a strong advantage over Republicans in voter registration totals heading into Election Day. Figures released Friday by the secretary of state’s office show Democrats outnumber Republicans by 90,187.

By percentages, Democrats account for 42 percent of active voters statewide, compared with 35 percent registered as Republicans. The tallies are similar to 2008, when Democrats outnumbered Republicans by 100,000 statewide and helped propel Obama to a 12 point victory margin in Nevada.

Hired this summer as a public relations specialist in the Sandoval administration, Julie Ardito has left the Nevada governor’s office after 15 weeks on the job. She was hired by Governor Brian Sandoval in July as director of community affairs and constituent services.

Ardito returned as principal of her firm, Julie Ardito Public Relations, in Reno. Her last day was October 12th.

Governor Sandoval and members of his Cabinet will be reading to elementary school students, Thursday. Sandoval says the program is designed to encourage children to read and help bring focus to the reading challenges many children face.

Dubbed “Cabinet Reading Day,” members of the Sandoval administration will either read “Tomas and the Ghost Town” by Mike Miller or “Pogonip Magic” by Karen Collett Wilson.  Both are Nevada authors.

Reading sessions are planned at elementary schools in the Reno-Sparks area and in Las Vegas.

It was always one home improvement project after another with my parents. Mom and Dad planned to turn the garage into a family room; there was the sidewalk widening project; followed by building a flower bed bordered by black and white speckled river rock.

Working with Dad for nearly a month, I helped dig post holes and hammer redwood planks in place as we built a fence along the side of our yard. Shortly, there after we began hanging wood paneling and gold etched mirrors in the front room and down the hallway.

But the first project I remember after we moved into the new house on Redwood Drive was a rose garden my folks planned. It involved the use of a backhoe and creating a four-foot deep six-foot wide trench the full-length of our backyard.

Pa Sanders brought his backhoe over and dug at the hard earth for hours at a time for nearly two weeks. I had to stay on the cement slab attached to the house while watched Pa work the big machine.

Only eight-years-old, I thought it was fun to watch. Little did I know how much that trench would play in my life as I would learn to dread weekends for the next two-years.

As soon as Pa took the backhoe away, that’s when the hard work began. I helped move the green serpentine stones from the pile Dad and I had gathered at the river.

Each Saturday and Sunday, I found myself outside dropping rock after rock into the trench. The rocks were then stacked atop each other and cemented into place, creating a wall, taller than myself.

Eventually, the wall formed a barrier from the fence line we shared with the owners of Camp Marigold. The campground’s fence was a small, simple wooden affair, painted barn-red.

Before I knew it, the rock wall we were building was taller than Dad. It now took both of my parents to cement the rocks in place.

The height concerned the owner of Camp Marigold and he complained to my folks about it. He said several of the stones from the wall were leaning against his fence and threatened to knock it over, though none of the rocks touched it at any point along the boundary line.

With the complaining, came word from Mom and Dad that all our hard work was for nothing. My parents received paperwork instructing them to pull down the wall to prevent it from tumbling down on Camp Marigold’s fence.

It took some time to resolve the fence-wall issue. The outcome was that the wall was only half-torn down.

Now I found myself helping lift those same green stones out of the trench and carrying them to Dad’s pick-up. Once filled, the old Studebaker, Mom and Dad and I returned to the river’s edge where we first picked them up.

It would be another few months and the passing of my tenth birthday before the project would come to an end. One early Saturday morning Pa reappeared with his backhoe and within a few hours, he had filled the trench in.

From that point on, Mom and Dad never mentioned the stone wall again. Stranger still, not one rose-bush was ever planted in the area that had once been designated a rose garden.

For a couple of years, anyone who went into our backyard could see the top layer of green stone as it protruded between the dirt Pa had moved back into place and Camp Marigold’s fence. It would go away as well, as I helped Dad build a six-foot fence along the entire length of our backyard about two-years later.

The number of Nevadans filing initial claims for jobless benefits fell in September to the lowest level in five years. The state Department of Employment, Training and Rehabilitation says the 13,932 claims filed last month are the least since 2007.

September’s filings compare with 16,693 claims filed in the same month last year, with claims peaking in December 2008 at 34,414.

Nevada has had the nation’s highest jobless rate since May 2010.

Vice President Joe Biden is continuing his visit to Nevada with an appearance at a Democratic campaign rally at a union work training center in North Las Vegas. Campaign officials say about 600 people gathered for Biden’s appearance at the Culinary Academy of Las Vegas.

Senator Harry Reid introduced Biden before the speech which focused on the choice between President Barack Obama and Republican challenger Mitt Romney. The appearance is Biden’s third in Las Vegas in four months.

At the same time, the founder of Jimmy John’s sandwich shops hosted an event supporting Mitt Romney in Las Vegas. Romney has mentioned Jimmy John Liautaud on the campaign trail as an example of a successful entrepreneur.

The Champaign, Ill.-based Jimmy John’s Gourmet Sandwiches, founded in 1983, now has more than 1,200 locations. Food-industry consulting firm Technomic has listed the company as one of the fastest growing food chains in the country for the past several years.

Nevada is drawing yet another visit from a top Democratic campaign star.

Campaign officials say First Lady Michelle Obama will make an October 26th visit to Las Vegas. Last week Former President Bill Clinton visited Las Vegas campaigning for President Obama.

The President has made nine campaign appearances between Reno and Las Vegas. The First Lady also spoke earlier this month at the University of Nevada, Reno.

Finally, the Nevada Democratic Party has filed a complaint with the Federal Elections Commission against Republican congressional hopeful Danny Tarkanian. The complaint questions Tarkanian’s legal standing to forgive a $250,000 loan he made to his failed 2010 U.S. Senate campaign after a judge signed a $17 million judgment against him as well as a later $40,000 loan made to his U.S. House campaign.

Democrats allege the GOP nominee for Nevada’s 4th Congressional District lacked legal control over his personal funds after a federal judge in May signed the judgment against Tarkanian and other members of his family stemming from a failed real estate deal. Tarkanian is fighting that judgment.