March 7, 2017 Ridley's Believe It Or Not National Be Heard Day

Ridley’s Believe It Or Not For March 7, 2017 Finally in this dreary political drama some good news to report as on March 7 after the ceremonial start on the streets of Anchorage, the Iditarod, the Last Great Race on Earth commenced for real out of Fairbanks and Aliy Zirkle is in the lead out of the Manley Hot Springs Checkpoint by 5 minutes; go to www.alaskanpoet.blogspot.com for daily race summaries and updates (being in Nome when the dog teams start coming in should be on everyone’s bucket list but you have to plan far in advance as the supply of hotel rooms sells out months in advance); the Reds revealed their Obamacare replacement plan to a lot of scorn on both sides of the aisle (Trump may have made a fatal error in pushing Obamacare replacement as number one as opposed to tax cut and regulatory reform); while the controversy rages on in the Swamp as to whether the Obama Administration wiretapped Trump and Sessions,  Wikileak just released a trove of documents on the CIA’s domestic hacking capabilities and programs that will terrify most Americans (if you thought you had any privacy left think again); hypocrisy is alive and well in the Blues sadly even with Senator Feinstein who ranted during Rosenstein’s confirmation hearings as Deputy AG that she was concerned that the DOJ become politicized yet was silent during the Holder and Lynch tenure of what has to rank as the most politicized DOJ in the history of our republic; in another example of why we need to deport aliens, an illegal who had been deported 5 times and had an extensive rap sheet in an intoxicated stupor collided with a woman’s parked car, killing her (build a wall and build a wall around the welfare offices to prevent any welfare payments going to illegals); almost like a stuck record, the carnage in Chicago continues unabated with total shootings in 2017 through March 6 at 564, 104 of whom have died (God help those poor minorities being shot mostly by minorities when the weather gets warmer and the shooters’ aim gets really better and there is more daylight) and yet nothing, absolutely nothing, appears to be occurring to address this blight on blacks and minorities which is what racism from a black mayor really looks like.   

    As always, I hope you enjoy today’s holidays and observances, music links to Jo Stafford and USA Africa, factoids of interest for this day in history, a relevant quote from William Shirer, while always ready to grab a merrythought and break off the larger part secure in the knowledge that if you want to find a gift for any memorable events like birthdays, weddings, or anniversaries, you know that the Alaskanpoet can provide you with a unique customized poem at a great price tailored to the event and the recipient. You need only contact me for details.

1. National Be Heard Day—celebrating in a day devoid of holidays not another protest against the Trump presidency but rather to promote small business, the backbone in terms of job creation of our economy; best way to celebrate the day would be to shop at a local small business as opposed to a corporate giant’s outlet.   

2.  Unique Names Day—celebrating as part of International Celebrate Your Name Week today is Unique Name Day—if you have a common name like Smith or Johnson today would be a great day to look up someone whose name is more unusual and congratulate him or her for having a unique name.    

3. 1954 Number One Song—celebrating the number one song in 1954 on a run of 3 weeks in that position “Make Love To Me” by Jo Stafford.  Here is a recording of her performing the song: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JG5Brc9KrS8 Check out the cost of the record.  

4. Word of the Day—today’s word of the day is “merrythought” which means the wishbone of a bird, probably so named for the merry wishes one makes at Thanksgiving when pulling it apart when making a wish.                         

 5. Giving Women Drivers A Great Name—celebrating the birth on this day in 1938 of Janet Guthrie, the first woman to break the glass ceiling in the male dominated sport of auto racing to  compete in the Indianapolis 500, the Daytona 500 and the NASCAR Winston Cup.

On this day in:                                                                                   

a. 321 Emperor Constantine declared that dies-Solis Invicti (Sunday) was to be a day of rest in the Roman Empire.      

b. 1850 Senator Daniel Webster gave his Seventh of March in support of the Missouri Compromise of 1850 to avoid a civil war which sadly would come ten years later.

c. 1936 in a blatant violation of the Versailles Treaty German troops reoccupied the Rhineland while Great Britain and France stood idly by. Had France crossed into the Rhineland Hitler would have withdrawn his puny number of battalions and his regime would have collapsed, sparing the world the agony of World War II. 

d. 1965 a group of some 600 peaceful protesting marchers at Selma, Alabama was viciously and brutally attacked by police and dogs giving the event the nickname “Bloody Sunday.”

e. 1985 “We Are the World” written by Lionel Ritchie and Michael Jackson and performed by  45 of America’s top recording artists was released to raise money for famine relief in Africa. .

Here is a link to the ad hoc group performing the song: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M9BNoNFKCBI   

Reflections on a true lost opportunity to halt Hitler which Obama repeated in dealing with Putin in Crimea and Ukraine and hopefully in dealing with Putin Trump will not repeat: “that almost certainly would have been the end of Hitler, after which history might have taken quite a different and brighter turn than it did, for the dictator could never have survived such a fiasco...France's failure to repel the Wehrmacht battalions and Britain's failure to back her in what would have been nothing more than a police action was a disaster for the West from which sprang all the later ones of even greater magnitude. In March 1936 the two Western democracies, were given their last chance to halt, without the risk of a serious war, the rise of a militarized, aggressive, totalitarian Germany and, in, fact-as we have seen Hitler admitting-bring the Nazi dictator and his regime tumbling down. They let the chance slip.” William Shirer noted journalist and author of The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich 
Please enjoy the poems on events of interest on my twitter account below (if you like them, retweet and follow me) and follow my blogs. Always good, incisive and entertaining poems on my blogs—click on the links below. Go to www.alaskanpoet.blogspot.com for Ridley’s Believe It Or Not—This Day in History, poems to inspire, touch, emote, elate and enjoy and poems on breaking news items of importance or go to Ridley's Believe It Or Not for just This Day in History.

© March 7, 2017, Michael P. Ridley aka the Alaskanpoet 

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