I happily worked on my Christmas tree this year, anticipating the reaction when our family (especially my four grandchildren) arrived for Christmas Eve.

No matter how hard one works there are always a few last minute things to do. I almost forgot to hang the stockings.

Almost every room downstairs had some Christmas frippery hanging around. I take “Decking the Halls” literally.

The Santa tree went back up this year and our dog, Penny treated it with respect. (That means she didn’t use the tree as a chew toy.)

The tree on the piano was filled with special ornaments given to us by a dear sister-in-law, some in memory of her two lost children.

The dining room wasn’t left without Christmas touches. This year we hosted the annual Christmas Eve celebration at our house. We had a sit-down Dickens Feast with Turkey, Ham, Scalloped Corn, Baked Apples stuffed with dried fruit and pecans, Glazed Carrots with Pecans, Duchess Potatoes, Salad, Broccoli Cornbread, Rolls, Holiday Mincemeat Pie and Hard Sauce, Kentucky Derby Pie, Rum Cake, Banana Split Cake, Christmas Cookies and Eggnog with Brandy, Rum and Nutmeg. So what that the kitchen was filled with too many cooks? The result was glorious and delicious.

We have lovely bushes beside our house that have holly-like blooms on them that are at their best on Christmas. These berries added some love to the kitchen. I took time to drink in the moments and the wonder of this Holy time of year. We watched Jesus of Nazareth, which to me is the authoritive Christmas Story. We watched Elf and Love Actually.

All the attention and work was worth it watching our grandchildrens’ wonder at Christmas.

Farewell, Christmas, 2011. You were a joyous and hopeful occasion. I look forward to seeing you again next year.

More Christmas Frippery here. I love it!

This fall has been a busy one for me and I haven’t visited the Wide Awake Cafe for a while. Although I have no time at all today, I want to wish everyone who visits this tiny cafe a Very Merry Christmas. Christmas is my favorite time of year and every year I find myself wishing that the whole season lasted longer.

Wishing for snow like we had last year but it’s not in the forecast this year.

I recently wrote about the Aurora Borealis (The Northern Lights) making an appearance in the Civil War after the Battle of Fredericksburg in December, 1862. Some soldiers called the celestial occurrence God’s Windows.

It happened again last night in Northern Arkansas. I went outside when I heard about it but the lights didn’t appear in our sky. I wish I could have seen it but we are too far South.

I saw the Northern Lights for the first time when I was twenty six years old and on board an airliner somewhere above Iceland. My husband and our two year old son were on our way to Augsburg, Germany for our first overseas Army tour. When the pilot announced to all the passengers that we had a wonderful light show outside our windows I was awed but also very frightened. I had never seen nor heard of the Northern Lights. The sky was on fire with blue, yellow, green and red lights dancing all over it. I will never forget the sight.

The Aurora Borealis shone down upon both the armies of the North and South at the Battle of Fredericksburg during the Civil War, a very rare occurrence in the latitude of Virginia. On Sunday, Dec. 14, 1862, a bitterly cold night, the Union Army had just suffered one of its worst defeats.

Shelby Foote, in his Civil War Trilogy, wrote of the spectacle:

“A mysterious refulgence, shot with fanwise shafts of varicolored light, predominantly reds and blues—first a glimmer, then a spreading glow, as if all the countryside between Fredericksburg and Washington were afire—filled a wide arc of the horizon beyond the Federal right…to one Southerner it seemed ‘that the heavens were hanging out banners and streamers and setting off fireworks in honor of our great victory.’”

In 1905 Elizabeth Lyle Saxon wrote in A Southern Woman’s War Time Reminiscenses ” It was near this time that the wonderful spectacle of the Aurora Borealis was seen in the Gulf States. The whole sky was a ruddy glow as if from an enormous conflagration, but marked by the darting rays peculiar to the Northern light. It caused much surprise, and aroused the fears even of those far from superstitious. I remember an intelligent old Scotch lady said to me, “Oh, child, it is a terrible omen; such lights never burn, save for kings’ and heroes’ deaths.”

It was not to be a victory for the South but a great tragedy for our nation in the loss of life; nearly 620,000 lives and over a million casualties. But out of the death and destruction came freedom for the slaves, and a victory for human worth and dignity. There would be, in time, a great reunification of all of the states but, no longer, would people consider their own state, as General Robert E. Lee once did, “their country.”

God’s Windows had opened for a time on the night of December 14th, 1862 and human beings, being creatures of emotion, misinterpreted the meaning. The metaphysical meanderings of time have always intertwined great human events with cosmic and natural eruptions. Great men and women have emerged in dark times, when all of civilization seemed lost.

Abraham Lincoln would have seemed an unlikely choice as the leader of the strife filled United States of America had he emerged in the days of Hollywood casting. He was born poor, had very little education and was from what we now call flyover country and yet he was elected President of the United States in 1860. Abraham Lincoln guided our country through the most devastating experience in its history. He was never to see the flowering of the spring of the reunion of the states; the conciliatory plans he had in mind for reconciliation with the South were cast away just six days after the surrender by Confederate commanding general Robert E. Lee when he was assassinated by John Wilkes Boothe in Ford’s Theater in Washington, D.C.

Throughout Lincoln’s presidency there was little peace to be found inside or outside of the White House. There was the death of his son, Willie, the anguish of his wife, Mary, the constant attacks of friends and foes and the failures of his generals.

Throughout his life he also believed in dreams and other enigmatic signs and portents. As he grew older, and especially after he became president and faced the soul-troubling responsibilities of the Civil War, he developed a profound religious sense, and he increasingly personified necessity as God. He came to look upon himself quite humbly as an “instrument of Providence” and to view all history as God’s enterprise. “In the present civil war,” he wrote in 1862, “it is quite possible that God’s purpose is something different from the purpose of either party—and yet the human instrumentalities, working just as they do, are of the best adaptation to effect His purpose.”

Lincoln seemed to understand his place in the great stream of time. Just days before his death he spoke of foreboding dreams. Abraham Lincoln never graduated from high school, college, Harvard or Yale, (although those colleges did exist during his lifetime) but he is considered by most historians to be the greatest of all American Presidents.

This exceptional nation produced exceptional men - and women who walked through hard and bitter times, not stopping when events seemed to present no victory, no solution, no relief. Abraham Lincoln, and the Founders before him saw the glorious light through the darkness that John Adams described in a letter to his wife, Abigail:

“The day is passed. The Fourth of July, 1776, will be a memorable epoch n the history of America. I am apt to believe it will be celebrated by succeeding generations as the great anniversary festival. It ought to be commemorated as the day of deliverance by solemn acts of devotion to Almighty God. It ought to be solemnized with pomp, shows, games, sports, guns, bells, bonfires and illuminations from one end of the continent to the other, from this time forward forever. You will think me transported with enthusiasm, but I am not. I am well aware of the toil and blood and treasure that it will cost to maintain this declaration and support and defend these States; yet, through all the gloom, I can see the rays of light and glory. I can see that the end is worth more than all the means, and that posterity will triumph, although you and I may rue, which I hope we shall not.’’

In this present time of darkness and gloom in which the American people are steeping like a teabag too long in a cup of now tepid water, the economy and culture rests on the edge of a cliff and the 2012 Presidential Election approaches, like a distant candle seen through a fog. There are now nine Republican candidates competing for the GOP nomination, and some Eastern Elite nervous Nelly Establishment types are urging one more Republican politician to enter the race to unseat Barack Obama.

Since 2009 we have watched our Liberty rapidly decline due to the passage of Obamacare and Dodd-Frank. The EPA and the NLRB have declared war on business, spending is out of control and Obama has hinted that he is tempted to bypass Congress altogether.

Enemies, foreign and domestic, are working day and night to weaken our nation while Obama prances about the country blaming its very citizens for its problems. He claims that America has lost its greatness because America is soft.

Soft?

It will take a Republican with incredible courage and backbone to unite the party and the independents behind him (or her) and withstand the barrage of attacks Obama and the media will gleefully inflict upon him. (or her) There will never be another Ronald Reagan but there are candidates who may possibly possess the remarkable personality traits and conservative principles that Reagan will forever be known for. Our Republican nominee will also need to understand (and become an expert on) the times of Abraham Lincoln. We are at a great divide in our nation. Lincoln more than understood that fact in his time and he counted the cost and led the Union without the assistance of pollsters. The United States of America is now on the line. We may never know it again as it once existed if it continues to be led by Barack Obama.

Will God’s Windows open again? Will they be misinterpreted? Time is short. If we keep gazing up at the stars we could easily go to sleep. We are so close to the edge of the cliff if we begin to dream we might fall off. How far is the fall? Have we already fallen?

President Obama and former President George W. Bush one week ago at the September 11th, 2001, ten year memorial service in New York City.

Some have suggested that Obama was praying to himself in this photo while others have mused that Obama was simply bored at the tenth anniversary of the deaths of three thousand Americans.

I dunno. He could have just been feeling like the Maitre D’ in Ferris Bueller’s Day Off who couldn’t abide the fake Abe Froman, the Sausage King of Chicago, the type who gave old whats his name, Paul Shrugman, the heebie jeebies.

Perhaps Obama simply realized he was standing beside the Walrus and it really pissed him off.

“Oh! God! Oh” were the last recorded words of Kevin Cosgrove on September 11th, 2001 as the South Tower fell. Kevin Cosgrove,in his desperate and heart breaking 911 phone call mentioned that he, Doug Cherry and others were on the 105th floor of the South Tower when the plane hit.

I wrote about Kevin’s call back in 2006. The recording was played at the Moussaoui trial.

Ten years gone, and three very important elements are being left out of the September 11th Remembrance this morning in New York City. Mayor Bloomberg doesn’t want any representatives of religion at the remembrance of the tenth anniversary of the attacks of September 11th, 2001. There will be no firefighters, no police and no representatives of clergy present at the ceremony. In other words, no First Responders and no Last Responder.

No Comfort, no peace.

Kevin Cosgrove’s body was found in the rubble of the World Trade Center on September 22nd, 2001. He was buried at St. Patrick Catholic Cemetery in Huntington, New York. He left a widow and three children. He was 46 years old.

Imagine going to work on a Tuesday morning and everything suddenly turning to madness.

This could happen again in a world that forgets. When we forget to honor those who ran into the towers in an attempt to save the Kevin Cosgroves of the world something is terribly wrong. When we forget the shouts and prayers of grief that went up to heaven on that clear Tuesday morning we forget the monstrosity of the moment and how much in that moment we needed God.

When we forget the policemen, many of whom also laid down their lives to help their friends and neighbors on September 11th, we dishonor the civilization that emerged from the madness of the day.

When political correctness rules the mouths of men and women we become, again, the weak horse that enticed Osama bin Laden in the first place.

May we never forget all of those who perished on September 11th, 2001. May we never forget that we were attacked by those who are still scheming to kill us today. May we never forget that it is the very freedom that we cherish that they hate.

Let us not forget that we are Americans.

(The photo comes from a UM Facebook page via Bill Cooke at Random Pixels)

Donna Shalala, who served for eight years as Secretary of Health and Human Services under President Bill Clinton has been President of the University of Miami since 2001.

First, Shalala’s history with powerful men.

Soon after the sex allegations about Clinton’s involvement with White House intern Monica Lewinsky broke, Clinton had a meeting with his cabinet. Afterwards they met the press on the White House lawn.

Clinton did meet this morning with his Cabinet and afterward, his appointees voiced their support. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright said, “I believe the allegations are completely untrue.” Commerce Secretary William Daley added “I’ll second that. Definitely.” “Third it,” said Health and Human Services Secretary Donna Shalala.
Albright and the other Cabinet members said the president told them “to remain focused on our jobs.”

Shalala’s tenure as President of the University of Miami.

At Miami, Shalala claimed to always be on alert for violations against NCAA rules.

Again, others might not laugh. At Miami, president Donna Shalala personally hires each coach. She studies the NCAA rulebook and weekly compliance reports. During football games, she scours the sidelines for suspicious guests. “I’m on alert all the time,” she says.

Obviously not too alert. The photo below belies Shalala’s claims. She is gazing down at a $50,000 check from Hurricanes booster Nevin Shapiro who is now in jail and has been singing like a bird.

In 100 hours of jailhouse interviews during Yahoo! Sports’ 11-month investigation, Hurricanes booster Nevin Shapiro described a sustained, eight-year run of rampant NCAA rule-breaking, some of it with the knowledge or direct participation of at least seven coaches from the Miami football and basketball programs. At a cost that Shapiro estimates in the millions of dollars, he said his benefits to athletes included but were not limited to cash, prostitutes, entertainment in his multimillion-dollar homes and yacht, paid trips to high-end restaurants and nightclubs, jewelry, bounties for on-field play (including bounties for injuring opposing players), travel and, on one occasion, an abortion.

As school president, she is involved in the Nevin Shapiro sports recruiting scandal which broke in August 2011. Shapiro, who is convicted of a $930 million Ponzi scheme, allegedly provided cash, goods, prostitutes, and assorted favors to University of Miami football players and even purchased a yacht on which sex parties were held, again including prostitutes. 72 players have been implicated. Included in the case is a photograph of Shalala with Shapiro and Miami basketball coach Frank Haith receiving a $50,000 check from Shapiro in 2008. In an interview with time magazine earlier in August 2011, Shalala is quoted by Time as saying that such depravity “would not have lasted two minutes under me,” and that under her leadership there would be “no tolerance for breaking the rules.” [6] There is currently speculation that the scandal may prompt the NCAA to impose the death penalty on Miami’s famed football program.[7][8]

Guess Shalala’s been “thirding it” all along. She can’t tell those powerful football coaches how to run their teams.

Oh my, according to Wikipedia, Shalala was a friend of Angelo.

In June 2008, Conde Nast Portfolio reported that Shalala allegedly got multiple below-rate loans at Countrywide Financial because the corporation considered her a “FOA’s”–”Friends of Angelo” (Countrywide Chief Executive Angelo Mozilo).

Forbes is calling for Shalala to fall on her sword. It’s really doubtful that she has a sword, being a feminist. I love college football but it’s getting harder to watch, knowing there is so much cheating going on. Allowing and encouraging it via “boosters” and others is sickening. Shalala, in her quest for a big seat at the top either didn’t have a sense of discernment when dealing with Shapiro or any of the coaches or players when she claimed to be so alert. Since she failed at that she should resign.

Queen Elizabeth ll boards a First Capital Connect train at King’s Cross Station bound for King’s Lynn, Norfolk, en route to Sandringham for Christmas, 2009.

European royals make do with a less lavish lifestyle than the supposed citizen-executive of a so-called republic.

Thus speaketh the Steyn.

The man hits the funny bone of truth and it hurts.

He turns the knife in even deeper.

Symbols are important. In other circumstances, the Obamas’ vacation on Martha’s Vineyard might not be terribly relevant. But this is a president who blames his dead-parrot economy on “bad luck” — specifically, the Arab Spring and the Japanese tsunami: As Harry S. Truman would have said, the buck stops at that big hole in the ground that’s just opened up over in Japan. Let us take these whiny excuses at face value and accept for the sake of argument that Obama’s Recovery Summer would now be going gangbusters had not the Libyan rebels seized Benghazi and sent the economy into a tailspin. Did no one in the smartest administration in history think this might be the time for the president to share in some of the “bad luck” and forgo an ostentatious vacation in the exclusive playground of the rich? When you’re the presiding genius of the Brokest Nation in History, enjoying the lifestyle of the super-rich while allegedly in “public service” sends a strikingly Latin American message. Underlining the point, the president then decided to pass among his suffering people by touring small town Minnesota in an armored Canadian bus accompanied by a 40-car motorcade. In some of these one-stoplight burgs, the president’s escort had more vehicles than the municipality he was graciously blessing with his presence.

When I was a little girl my parents would take me to see my paternal great grandmother Emma Fletcher. She was an immaculate housekeeper so when we visited her we were allowed to snoop all over her house. My brothers and sister and I went into her dining room on our way to her fascinating kitchen and in passing would see Grandma’s hooked rugs. She never stopped working on her beautiful creations and had everything in her dining room set up as a display even though it was a work in progress.

We were intrigued with Grandma’s kitchen. Besides her pies tucked away safely in her old punched tin pie safe there always seemed to be something cooking in the oven. But it was the old ice box that fascinated us. My brother used to dare me to open the door to peak inside. There were always strange things that we never found inside the ice box at home. Things like pigs feet, ham hocks, and chitlins.

Our strolls through our great grandmother’s home were pretty good entertainment for us but one of my most striking memories is of the framed certificate that she had hanging in her bedroom above the framed photo of a young image of her husband, our great grandfather, who had died when I was five years old.

The certificate was from President Truman, an acknowledgment and thanks to my great grandfather for being the engineer who drove the train on one of the legs of President Truman’s whistle-stop campaign tour through the United States.

I was always in awe of my late great grandfather. I knew that he had been an engineer of the Frisco train and that he had told my father that he had put a million miles on the engine. Reading that certificate just put a little more burnish on the memory of the man who, in my last memory of him, had been cutting roses from his prized rose bushes and let me pick out my favorite rose.

President Truman (not an Ivy Leaguer but most certainly a buck stopper) engaged in a re-election campaign in 1948 that was “made in America”.

Truman’s 30,000 mile whistle stop train tour through the heartland of the United States was taken on the Ferdinand Magellan, the only car custom built for the President of the United States in the 20th century. Originally built in 1928 by the Pullman Company and officially the “U.S. No. 1 Presidential Railcar”, the Ferdinand Magellan is currently on display at the Gold Coast Railroad Museum in Miami, Florida.

But to undertake this feat, in each railroad region it took an engineer and an engine to power the railcar and it’s hard to imagine the U.S. Secret Service allowing that to happen in this day and time. It would take more than one massive train to carry the load of Obama advisers, aides, press handlers, political hacks, advance crew, mother-in-law, staff, cooks, hairdressers, dog-walkers, babysitters, golf-walkers, page-turners, and the like heading to Martha’s Vineyard.

And what a bummer for Obama! Now it appears that Libya’s Moammar Gaddafi has flown the coop for parts unknown. (perhaps Algeria) Chaos and euphoria are reigning in the streets of Tripoli and Obama must be terribly worried about his golf game plans for tomorrow. Should he make a statement right away or should he wait a few days to take credit?

How dare Gaddafi interrupt his ten day vacation only two days in?

The most transparent president ever traveled through the midwest this week on a tricked out rock star black bus. It reminded me of the Rolling Stones hit, Paint it Black, a source of nightmares for me when I was a kid. (I don’t know why the song gave me nightmares but it did)

I’ve written about it before here.

Obama’s trip around the three midwestern states he needs to shore up for votes may be a magical misery tour but that is all he has in common with my beloved Beatles.

Of course he stayed up north where things are a might bit friendlier for him.

So on to Martha’s Vineyard Obama goes for a ten day vacation. As far as I am concerned Obama does have a great plan to fix the economy as long as he stays there permanently and does nothing but golf and talk and golf and talk and golf and talk……………