Striking Constrast in These Brief Bulletins from LBN News Alerts---

First, a PROFILE IN JELLO

LBN-PRESIDENTIAL BACK ROOM:   ***Senator Barack Obama said he might "refine" his Iraq policies after meeting with military commanders there later this summer. But hours later he held a second news conference to emphasize his commitment to the withdrawing of all combat troops from Iraq within 16 months of taking office. 

And then, a PROFILE IN COURAGE

CONDOLEEZZA RICE SAYS SHE'S 'PROUD' OF DECISION TO INVADE IRAQ": Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said she's "proud" of the U.S. decision to wage the Iraq war and insisted that the world is not more dangerous than it was when George W. Bush took office. "We're now beginning to see that perhaps it's not so popular to be a suicide bomber. We're beginning to see that perhaps people are questioning whether Osama Bin Laden ought to really be the face of Islam," Rice, 53, said in an interview to be broadcast this weekend on Bloomberg Television's "Conversations with Judy Woodruff."

Ronald Reagan, "What the Fourth of July Means to Me"

July Fourth is the birthday of our nation. I believed as a boy, and believe even more today, that it is the birthday of the greatest nation on earth.

The day of our nation's birth in that little hall in Philadelphia, [was] a day on which debate had raged for hours. The men gathered there were honorable men hard-pressed by a king who had flouted the very laws they were willing to obey. Even so, to sign the Declaration of Independence was such an irretrievable act that the walls resounded with the words "treason, the gallows, the headsman's axe," and the issue remained in doubt.
. . . 

In recent years . . . I've come to think of [Independence Day] as more than just the birthday of a nation.

It also commemorates the only true philosophical revolution in all history.

Oh, there have been revolutions before and since ours. But those revolutions simply exchanged one set of rules for another. Ours was a revolution that changed the very concept of government.

Let the Fourth of July always be a reminder that here in this land, for the first time, it was decided that man is born with certain God-given rights; that government is only a convenience created and managed by the people, with no powers of its own except those voluntarily granted to it by the people.

Thank you, troops, for preserving our freedom; thank you, heroes and heroines of all stripes who have led this country wisely and well -- and most of all, thanks to the Creator who has blessed us with a country so generous, and free, and fair.  Happy Fourth of July!

First off, Happy Independence Day to all of the Townhall readers out there. I know many of you, like me, spend the holiday with friends and family enjoying apple pie and fireworks.  This is also a time for us to celebrate the bravery of our men and women in the Armed Forces, and their courage to keep us free.  My wife introduced me to this new campaign to show our support for the troops.  It’s very easy, but meaningful at the same time.

http://www.gratitudecampaign.org/fullmovie.php

It’s shocking how many times I have approached a soldier to thank him, and to see that he is embarrassed by it.  I’m sure most of it is due to their humble nature, but I can’t stop thinking that in this day and age, when cynicism and indifference seem to be laudable character traits, that maybe they’re just not used to the positive attention.  Either way, it’s best to shake their hand and give them a sincere “thank you” but this is a terrific gesture just the same. 

Have a happy, and safe Independence Day.

If I had been a Clinton supporter -- or just a leftist committed to defeat in Iraq -- I'd be pretty bitter about this one.  Remember Barack's promises of immediate withdrawal from Iraq -- the ones that distinguished him from Hillary's more "nuanced" position?  Apparently, as Politico's Mike Allen reports, those Obama pledges are no longer operative:

This is the text of a speech I have delivered on many occasions to many groups, usually around Independence Day.  I know this is a bit long for a blog post, but I hope you will enjoy it and pass the message along.
----------------------------

“For we must consider that we shall be as a city upon a hill, the eyes of all people are upon us, so that if we shall deal falsely with our God in this work we have undertaken and so cause him to withdraw his present help from us, we shall be made a story and a byword through the world…

We shall shame the faces of many… and cause their prayers to be turned into curses upon us till we be consumed out of the good land whither we are going.”

The words of the Pilgrim John Winthrop.

The image of the “city on a hill,” of course, comes from the Gospel of Matthew — the words of Jesus Christ in the Sermon on the Mount.

The “work [the Pilgrims] had undertaken” was a new life in a new world, free from persecution.

And the “present help” he referred to was the chance to reach the destination toward which his people were sailing when he delivered that sermon aboard the ship Arbella in the Spring of 1630, somewhere in the Atlantic Ocean en route to the New World.

This is not Christian revisionism — this is American history. 

From the earliest days of American civilization, the inhabitants of this continent have understood that the abundant wealth of resources and opportunity found in the New World is not man-made nor an accident of nature — but the generosity of our Heavenly Father.

In other words, not only was America a shining city on a hill, but Americans knew from the first that they were not the ones who screwed in the light bulb.

America is not an accident.


Read More...

Part Two

Part Three

Picture this: Brian Wilson, Fox News vice president and Washington, D.C. bureau chief, versus Bill Sammon, White House correspondent for The Washington Examiner, in a one-on-one basketball game. Who would you put your money on? According to Sammon, you should be on the side-lines rooting for him!

In the July issue of Townhall Magazine, Sammon talks to Mary Katharine Ham about everything from blocking shots on the court to the craziest thing he’s ever heard in a White House press conference to his nickname from President Bush. Read more about Sammon’s experiences in D.C. in the July issue of Townhall.

Click here to receive a free copy of Townhall. If you're already convinced, subscribe today and look for more fun facts about your favorite journalists and personalities in our “5 Questions” department every month. You'll receive a free copy of Willful Blindness: Memoir of the Jihad by Andrew McCarthy with your one-year subscription.