Philip V. Brennan

The Battle Lines are Forming

It’s an issue that has long been simmering just below the area of public debate, and has now emerged full fledged in Wisconsin, and how it concludes will determine the limits of the rights of public employees.

The Japanese Quake: Another Ice Age Precursor?

Back in the summer of 1997, I wrote a nine-part investigative report on climate change: Global Warming or Globaloney. It attracted a lot of attention at the time, but given the fact that the nation was being barraged by advocates of the socialist global warming propaganda campaign and their media allies, what I had to say fell mostly on deaf ears.

Coming Apart at the Seams

In case you haven’t noticed, the world is in turmoil, with Nature shaking her fist at puny mankind in places such as New Zealand, and with people in the Middle East rising up in blind rage against their rulers.

In Memoriam

Sixty Six years ago, on February 19th, 1945, three Marine Divisions landed on a barren, rock strewn, volcanic island, barely two and a half miles at its widest point and about five miles from one end to another. The island was well named - Iwo Jima, Japanese for Sulphur Island. In a matter of minutes the Marines huddled in the open on the volcanic sand under intense enemy fire had another name for this evil strip of a black sand - Hell! Over 25 thousand tough, hardened, fanatical Japanese soldiers held the island, concealed in the hundreds of caves that honeycombed the landscape. Among the Marines facing them were the men of D Company, 2nd. Battalion, 26th Marines, 5th Marine Division. In the weeks of bitter fighting to come, this unit would suffer so many casualties the Division history would single it out to illustrate how deadly the battle for Iwo Jima had been.

When Push Comes to Shove

Uncle Sam is broke. So are a lot of the states. Unlike those of us locked in a state of penury thanks to a drunken sailor policy of spending money we don’t have, a lot of politicians and labor unions insist on continuing to spend the public’s money as if there was an endless supply of it.

A Nation of Wimps

What a bunch of wimps we are. We sit idly by, emptying our wallets to pay for costly foreign oil – a commodity always subject to potential disruption thanks to the ongoing and never ending political instability of the Middle East.

The blame game

It starts with an attempted murder by an unbalanced Arizonan but quickly escalates into a cause célèbre where, depending on your political orientation, it was either a senseless, unprovoked assault on a partisan politician or the act of a politically motivated activist.

Where Were Your People, Sheriff?

By the way Sheriff Dupnik while you are busy trashing some of the people of your state of Arizona as right wing extremists, you might just take the time to explain just where your people were when a left wing nut shot Rep. Gabrielle Giffords.

There’s Always Hope

In the early fall of 1944 when I was in Pearl Harbor, en route back to the States to attend the Naval Academy Prep School, a front page story in a Honolulu newspaper caught my eye.

Climbing the Hill

A whole slew of brand new members of Congress are swarming into Washington, eager to begin what many hope will be a long career in the United States Congress. I have a few words for them.

Bye 2010 and a Tentative Welcome to 2011

The year that ends at midnight was, like all years, a mixed blessing. On the good side, it was a year that saw the Republican party win control of the House in the incoming Congress, while on the bad side it saw aberrations such as Obamacare squeeze through Congress, saddling the nation with a massive and expensive health care program we can’t afford.

You Can’t Say I Didn’t Warn You

Piers Corbyn is one smart cookie. The British meteorologist, astrophysicist and owner of Weather Action makes forecasts most weather experts deride but also invariably turn out to be uncomfortably accurate.

Christmas, 1777

I understand that times are tough with unemployment rising and the economy shaky at best, but things were a lot worse for our ancestors this time of the year at a place in Pennsylvania called VI understand that times are tough with unemployment rising and the economy shaky at best, but things were a lot worse for our ancestors this time of the year at a place in Pennsylvania called Valley Forge..

It’s Christmas Time – Celebrate!

We are about to celebrate a very special national holiday that evokes joyful memories of past Christmases and anticipation of the joys we will experience this December 25th.

Remembering the Enquirer and Generoso Pope

Tomorrow I am having lunch with a group of fellow former inmates of a journalistic insane asylum known as the National Enquirer. It will be an event similar in some ways to the reunions of survivors of wartime prison camps.

Who runs America?

(Note: I wrote this some time ago but it remains pertinent, especially now when the Federal Reserve is inflating the dollar on a massive scale.) "The real truth of the matter is, and you and I know, that a financial element in the large centers has owned the government of the U.S. Since the days of Andrew Jackson." Franklin Roosevelt in a letter to Edward M. House (President Wilson's closest aide), dated November 23, 1933.

Lame Duck Session

As December arrives the 111th Congress, still in the hands of the Democrat majority, prepares to pass into history and the Democrat’s future as a decided minority in the House of Representatives.

The Constitutional Right to Travel

When a would-be dictator wants to rein in the rights of the citizenry one of the first steps he needs to take is restricting the public's right to travel. The ability to move around freely within your nation's borders is the ability to congregate with like-minded individuals all across your country who share your views, one of which may be opposition to the ruling powers.

Looking back

When I was a youngster, Veteran's Day was known as "Armistice Day" -- a day originally called that because is marked the end of the First World War. Now it is celebrated to honor all who served in past wars.

Opportunity to rein in the federal government and Barack Obama’s thirst for power

Speaker in Waiting John Boehner faces quite a few daunting challenges as he goes about the job of organizing the new Republican majority in the House of Representatives, not the least of which will be forging an overall consensus on the direction his GOP membership wants to take over the next two years.