Saturday, April 29, 2006

Oh say can you see?

O say, can you see, by the dawn's early light,
What so proudly we hailed at the twilight's last gleaming?





































Whose broad stripes and bright stars, through the perilous fight,
O'er the ramparts we watched, were so gallantly streaming!
And the rockets' red glare, the bombs bursting in air,
Gave proof through the night that our flag was still there:
O say, does that star-spangled banner yet wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave?


On the shore, dimly seen through the mists of the deep,
Where the foe's haughty host in dread silence reposes,
What is that which the breeze, o'er the towering steep,
As it fitfully blows, half conceals, half discloses?
Now it catches the gleam of the morning's first beam,
In full glory reflected now shines in the stream:
Tis the star-spangled banner! O long may it wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave!


And where is that band who so vauntingly swore
That the havoc of war and the battle's confusion
A home and a country should leave us no more?
Their blood has washed out their foul footsteps' pollution.
No refuge could save the hireling and slave
From the terror of flight, or the gloom of the grave:
And the star-spangled banner in triumph doth wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave!


Oh! thus be it ever, when freemen shall stand
Between their loved homes and the war's desolation!
Blest with victory and peace, may the Heaven-rescued land
Praise the Power that hath made and preserved us a nation.
Then conquer we must, when our cause, it is just,
And this be our motto: “In God is our trust.”
And the star-spangled banner in triumph shall wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave!

Thursday, April 27, 2006

May 8, 1964

...assignment ... disposes of Rumors that LeMay's successor will be General Bernard Schriever (TIME cover, April 1, 1957), boss of the Air Force Systems Command and pioneer expert in ballistic missiles development. One possibility for Schriever: command of SAC, now in the hands of General Thomas Power, who plans to retire in November....

Tuesday, April 25, 2006

The Road Not Taken

From
Eisenhower the President Crucial Days 1951-1960

July 12, 1956...Dwight Eisenhower...fateful decision...put an Earth satellite into orbit ... 1956 ... no.
...
decisive turn... Sputnik October 4, 1957...
...
Ike knew Sputnik was approaching; he did not foresee its force...ho-hum mood...
...August 27... Soviet... multistage ICBM... U.S. attempt flopped...
...
America grown complacent, fat and unconcerned...
1948...Air Policy Comission... missile project... top priority... Truman rejected...
...Truman...spent less for missiles than for peanut price supports[Snopes-Carter welfare]...

"The United States had no ballistic missile progtam worth mentioning between 1945 and 1951." - Werner von Braun

"Any of you fellows want to go to the Moon? I don't. I'm happier right here." -Ike