Usa Thread

[Flashermac]

70 years later, D-Day vet Jim 'Pee Wee' Martin jumps again

 

 

Normandy, France (CNN) -- Jim "Pee Wee" Martin acted like he'd been here before, like jumping from a plane is as easy as falling off a log.

 

Maybe that's because he had -- 70 years ago.

 

"I'm feeling fine," Martin told reporters moments after landing in a French field. "... It was wonderful, absolutely wonderful."

 

Martin was part of the U.S. 101st Airborne Division that parachuted down over Utah Beach in their bid to retake France and, eventually, the rest of Europe from Nazi Germany. They actually touched down in enemy-controlled territory a night before what's referred to as D-Day.

 

His jump Thursday in the same area was different and -- despite his being 93 years old now -- a whole lot easier.

 

"It didn't (compare)," Martin said, "because there wasn't anybody shooting at me today."

 

Every year, every day it seems, the number of surviving World War II veterans like Martin dwindles. He estimates there are only a few dozen members of his unit who took part in the now historic D-Day invasion who are still around.

 

It's ironic, in a sense, because Martin was among the oldest of his bunch in June 1944 -- at 23 years old -- surrounded by others who were mere teenagers.

 

Together, they parachuted onto France's northern coast in the dark of night not knowing what awaited them. Whatever it was, it would not be friendly or easy, they expected.

 

"Everybody (was) scared all the time, and if they tell you anything differently they are full of crap," the former paratrooper recalled. "But you just do what you had to do regardless of it. That's the difference."

 

And they didn't stop. According to a Facebook page he regularly updates, Martin fought for 43 days as part of the Normandy campaign before moving onto invade Holland, fending off Nazi fighters during the Battle of the Bulge and finishing off by taking Berchtesgaden, site of Hitler's "Eagle's Nest" redoubt in the German Alps.

 

None of it was easy, but Martin insists, "I don't ever have flashbacks. Never. Nothing ever bothered me."

 

All these years later, he has become a celebrity of sorts -- as evidenced by a mob of reporters who greeted him after his parachute landing Thursday. Martin says he feels "kind of humbled and embarrassed at the adulation because I don't feel we did anything that we weren't supposed to do or anything exceptional."

 

He adds: "We just did what we trained to do."

 

Seven decades later, Martin did it again -- not fighting a bloody war but at least reliving his role in a military campaign that changed the course of history. Others joined him in this now daytime jump, though he was the only one from his generation.

 

This time, he said that he wasn't scared because, "once you get in the plane, you forget everything." Bored would be more like it.

 

As he told reporters afterward, "To tell you the truth, riding around in the plane is boring. It's when you get off the plane, that's when it gets exciting ... But there's no fear to it. It's just something you do."

 

Martin admitted that he was motivated by "a little bit of ego, (to show that) I'm 93 and I can still do it."

 

"And also I just want to show all the people that you don't have to sit and die just because you get old," he added. "Keep doing things."

 

Among those things he'd like to do is another jump in the same plane, one year from now.

 

"If I come back next year, I'll make a jump next year. You can bet on it."

 

 

http://edition.cnn.com/2014/06/05/world/europe/d-day-paratrooper-jumps-again/index.html?hpt=hp_t2

[BelgianBoy]

I saw that on TV yesterday, hats off !

[Flashermac]

Obama Chomps On Gum During D-Day Anniversary Event…

 

France Not Happy

 

 

Obama was caught on camera chewing gum while clapping during the welcome for Her Majesty the Queen. He kept chewing throughout the ceremonies, also managing to anger France. French twitter blew up (not to mention British and American reaction):

 

...

 

http://weaselzippers.us/188765-obama-chomps-on-gum-during-d-dad-anniversary-event/

[unit731]

Apparently, other presidents have chewed gum !

 

 

 

"After the meeting, NTV, the once-independent Russian television station now controlled by a state-dominated firm, kept replaying footage of Bush entering his meeting with Putin while chewing gum and then spitting it into his hand.... "

 

 

"Yeah, but ... but ... that's when a president should chew gum! When he's talking to some red Russki commie! And so what if they were discussing nuclear proliferation in a post-9/11 era! Screw diplomatic niceties! Putin is a pinko and George W. Bush is a great American! U-S-A! U-S-A!"

 

LINK

[Coss]

I thought chewing gum was a right enshrined in the constitution, like talking very loudly and giving raucous high fives to everyone in the vicinity, for the most trivial of events, like, successfully opening a soft drink can.

[Flashermac]

Except in Singapore ...

[unit731]

Gotta love those Rednecks.

No matter what part of the country they reside.

 

WOLFEBORO, N.H. —A police commissioner in a predominantly white New Hampshire town says he won't apologize for calling President Barack Obama the N-word, and he sat with his arms crossed while angry residents at a meeting called for his resignation on Thursday.

 

 

Wolfeboro Police Commissioner Robert Copeland, who's 82 and white, has acknowledged in an email to his fellow police commissioners he used the racial slur in describing Obama.

 

Town resident Jane O'Toole, who moved to Wolfeboro four months ago, said she overheard Copeland say the slur at a restaurant in March and wrote to the town manager about it. Copeland, in an email to her, acknowledged using the slur in referring to the president and said he will not apologize.

 

 

LINK

[unit731]

The TEA PARTY uses the same flag !

 

 

The killers stripped the officers’ of their weapons and ammunition, before covering the officers with something that featured the Gadsden flag, a yellow banner with a coiled snake above the words, “Don’t tread on Me," according to the Review-Journal.

 

LINK

[jitagawn]

Hmmm not good They are linking them some how to BUndy it seems. Now we kow why Hoemeland Security bought all of that ammo..

 

Murder plain and simple with apolitical undertone behind it -Very ominous-

 

I am a suporterof the 2nd Ammendement but this is bad..

My German friends think we are ALL gun nuts :dunno:

 

I grew up with firearms and well Ij ust lke the smell of Hoppes 9 and would be

pissed off i they tried to take my Les Baer

 

it reminds me of my dearly departed Mom when we used to go up to the High Sieras as a boy

She always carried her little 32 auto to scare off the bears (it would not have helped)

 

Born on the 4th of JUly

[dean]

The Tea Party took out their biggest prize yet; House Majority Whip, Eric Cantor. I wonder if that makes a Tea Party Congressman/woman in line to take Cantor's job? I also wonder if the Speaker is worried about staying Speaker in the next Congress?