Some Heroes:

real life heroes ...

 "You always felt, in his presence, that life was more worth living, was greater fun.
Of course, he liked doing whatever he was doing, hard. If he wanted to go for a sail, he'd go for a sail even though no other boat was out in the harbor. I remember one day at Hyannis Port -- not a sign of anybody else trying to sail -- he insisted on going sailing,
with the result that, at the end, we lost the top of the mast. This was when he was President. I think the Secret Service got quite upset about it."

"My most vivid memory of him is on the top bridge of the aircraft carrier, the U.S.S. Kitty Hawk, late in the evening Of June 6, 1963. We had survived a two-hour display of missiles and rockets in the afternoon, and at ten o'clock there was to be a night exercise, the fastest small jets being launched like firecrackers and retrieved the lightning jolt of the catapults across the deck. "By happenstance, the commanding officer of the battle fleet turned out to be a friend from the early war days. I came on him along one of the endless decks, and he invited me up in his elevator. We came out directly on the bridge, and I stumbled in and saw nobody but the supervising officers who were tiptoeing around with red flashlights in the necessary dark on the huge bridge. There were a couple of captains and rear admirals watching a whole console of dials and lights. There was no talk.
Up against a curving window pane on the port side, however, was the black silhouette of a man. He could barely be seen not to be in uniform. What I noticed at once was the quite beautiful contour of the head. It could be nobody else's, and the leather-padded rocker the man sat in confirmed it. It was the President. We'd been with him all day, but it was eerie to see him alone in this night aquarium, with not an aide or a Secret Service man in sight.

"We moved over to him, and he said little. He just stared at the ejecting planes. He asked no details, which was untypical, because he was a very inquisitive observer of everything. The Admiral was leaning over, briefing him on the routines he was watching. The President said very quietly, and with infinite fatigue, 'Admiral, I'm afraid I can take no more.' He grabbed the arms of the rocker and began to force himself in a twisted, writhing motion, to his feet. It took about a minute, and then two officers led him to his quarters. It was his back again. It was always hard to know whether the wry eyes were an expression of humor or agony. Anyway, it was with him all the time, and he never talked about it, and you had to remind yourself of the extra demands of courage it made on him."

http://conspiracies.about.com/newsissues/conspiracies/index.htm
 
 

John Glenn; Neil Armstrong;

Jesus Christ; Sigmund Freud; MahatmaGandhi; Dag Hammarskjold;
Robert Kennedy; Martin Luther King, Jr.; Jimmy Carter; Bill Clinton
Father Edward Joseph Flanagan
Bruce Jenner   (hmmm ...  one of the greatest and most charismatic athletes ever)
Bobby Orr  (ditto ...)   Mark Spitz   (ditto ...)

ficticious heroes ...

James T. Kirk; Spock  (Captain and First Officer in "Star Trek" - the original series)
Jonathan Harker  (narrator/ lead male character in "Dracula")
Han Solo; Luke Skywalker  (lead characters in "Star Wars" trilogy)
Atticus Finch  (defense attorney/ father in "To Kill A Mockingbird")
Sherlock Holmes   (sharp as a tack - need more be said ...?)

Gordy LaChance (Wil Wheaton) and Chris Chambers (River Phoenix) - two of the lead characters in the movie "Stand By Me" (and the Stephen King novella "The Body").
I can't watch this movie - or even similar "coming of age" movies -
without thinking of my own youth and growing up with the kids next door.

Some Villains, Scumbags, Phonies, Wolves-In-Sheep's-Clothing,
and Other Assorted Useless Trash:

Richard Nixon  (liar, conspirator, opportunist, etc. When a reporter asked Nixon where he had been and what he was doing when he'd heard that JFK had been killed, Nixon said that he "couldn't recall." He was in a cab in Washington, DC on the way back from the airport. Where had he just flown back from? DALLAS, TEXAS, that's where ...)
J. Edgar Hoover  (nosey bastard, closet homo calling everyone ELSE one, conspirator ...)
The "Warren Commission" (sham artists, paid liars, conspirators)
Gerald Ford  (high-ranking criminal pardoner, conspirator, etc.)
Lyndon Johnson  (for once - an arsewipe Democrat, escalated/started Vietnam for personal profit, conspirator, phoney, liar, trashbin, "Texas trip" - need I say more ... )
Ronald Reagan  (stooge, wastrel, arsewipe typical Republican puppet of the highest order, proposed having KETCHUP legally declared a vegetable in order to initiate cutbacks in kids' school lunches in order to finance "Star Wars" - nuclear missiles orbiting in space stations around the earth - now THERE'S a real idiot for ya ...)
George Bush  ("former" CIA scumbucket, profiteering from "Cuban operations")
Monica Lewinski  (man, guess she never knows when to keep her mouth shut ...)

And currently? Let's just say that I voted for Gore and Kerry.
Otherwise, from what I understand, I just might have the Gestapo at my door.

PATHETIC.

BUT ... Do you know what ...? They're all just PEOPLE - just like anyone else, capable of error - it's just that they're so in the limelight that everyone watches - and ultimately judges - their every move ...

So, don't make any assumptions about me, either. Just because I don't care for this current president and I detest this war, doesn't mean that I don't support our troops.

Hey - I told everyone during his father's presidency that there is no such thing as a month-long war, referencing the "Gulf War." Nobody wanted to believe me.

It didn't exactly take an Einstein to see this war coming.
Now they want answers to everything...

.

"Love It ..."
Technology; Old-Fashioned Implements; Gardening; Gourmet Cooking;
Intellectual Conversation; Science Fiction; Medieval period; Gothic period;
Old West (American) period; Space Exploration; Christmas/ Spirit of "the Holidays;"
All-nighter heart-to-heart conversations with intelligent, deep-thinking, tight friends;
HALLOWEEN...You've Just Gotta Check This link Out

"Hate It ..."
Demise of the Drive-In Theaters - well, in my home area, anyway...
That America (or the WORLD, for that matter) has ANY Homeless People ...
The Selfishness of Extreme Conservatism and its Disregard
for the Feelings and Conditions of Fellow Human Beings ...
People who deliberately cause suffering to any degree to others ...
Ageism, Racism, Sexism, Homophobia - and any such stereotyping and bigotry
(such as the common practice of blaming almost everything which is perceived as having "gone wrong" on "the kids...")
People who constantly complain about almost everything in life ...

"Enter Sandman"
by