June 6th, 1944.
The English Channel is angry and half the men in the landing craft are seasick. Diesel fumes mix with saltwater and vomit while rifles are checked for the fifth or sixth time by hands that need something to do. Nobody talks much anymore because the jokes have all been told and the bravado has finally burned away somewhere behind the English coast.
You are nineteen years old and carrying more weight than you’ve ever carried in your life. You don’t know it yet, but it’s the most weight you will EVER carry in this life. However long or short it may be.
Your rifle rests across your knees. Your life hangs from a few pounds of steel, wood, and training. Somewhere beyond the gray horizon sits a continent that has spent five years tearing itself apart, and in a few minutes you are going to step into the middle of it.
Across from you sits another kid. He can’t be much older than you. His jaw is clenched. His knuckles are white around his weapon. Neither of you says a word because there is nothing left to say.
Then your eyes drift toward his shoulder.
That red numeral catches your eye: “1”.
You’ve seen it a thousand times before. In barracks hallways, on training fields, in motor pools, and on long marches. It never meant much beyond belonging to the same outfit.
Now it means everything.
Because in a few minutes the world is going to ask something terrible of both of you, and there is comfort in knowing that whatever waits on that beach, neither of you will face it alone.
The historians will eventually reduce this day to arrows on maps and casualty figures. Politicians will give speeches. Journalists will write books. None of that exists inside the landing craft.
What exists is fear, and duty.
What exists is the understanding that courage was never the absence of fear. Courage was always charging into the maelstrom anyway.
The shoreline emerges through the smoke. You can see flashes now. You can hear the distant percussion of artillery. Men stop checking their equipment because there is no point anymore. Whatever mistakes were made are already made. Whatever prayers were going to be said have already been said.
The coxswain throttles down.
The boat grinds forward.
The ramp is about to drop.
Into the abyss.
Overlord.
How Disney can save the Star Wars franchise in two simple steps:
1) Declare that Kathleen Kennedy's sequel trilogy is non-cannon.
2) Replace it with Timothy Zahn's trilogy.
He is risen! And because Christ rose again, we will too. Thanks to Him, no pain, fear, failure, or unfairness is permanent. This is greater love. This is Easter.
@SenJohnCurtis Senator, please have the good sense to back a measure that 85% of all Americans want. Nothing will have changed w/ the filibuster other than the democrats actually have to utilize as the founding fathers intended.
There’s been a major attack on Mormonism. This is the latest. An attempt to mock. I hope all see this for what it is. Also, this lady looks like a meth head.
@SJack801 @tvheidihatch For an office w/ between 30-40 officers and zero long-term detention available, while also trying to train new-hires, and defending themselves against an adversarial local news media?…I’d say ICE in Utah is doing a pretty damn good job 👍🏼
@AgedTabasco@livkellehernews Because commission of a felony should have punishment as a consequence. Despite media’s portrayal, being returned to your country of citizenship is not a punitive action.
DHS has launched https://t.co/2YzVImX37Y so Americans can see the criminal illegal aliens we are arresting, their crimes, and the communities we removed them from.
Yesterday, @ICEgov arrested more murderers, sex offenders, and drug traffickers from American communities.
NEW: Since yesterday's deadly shooting in MN, I've talked to more than half a dozen federal sources involved immigration enforcement, including several in senior positions, who all tell me they have grown increasingly uneasy & frustrated w/ some of the claims & narratives DHS pushed in the aftermath of the shooting.
Specifically, I'm told there is extreme frustration with DHS officials going on TV and putting out statements claiming that Alex Pretti was intending to conduct a "massacre" of federal agents or wanted to carry out "maximum damage", even after numerous videos appeared to show those claims were inaccurate. While they say it was a terrible decision to show up with a gun and inject himself into a federal law enforcement operation, there is no indication Pretti was there to murder law enforcement, as videos appear to show he never drew his holstered firearm.
These sources say this messaging from DHS officials has been catastrophic from a PR and morale perspective, as it is eroding trust and credibility - comparing it to when Democrats falsely claimed the border was closed or that Haitians were being whipped at the border.
Some of these sources have described DHS’ response to the shooting as “a case study on how not to do crisis PR”, one said they are so “fed up” that they wish they could retire, another said “DHS is making the situation worse”, and another added that “DHS is wrong” and “we are losing this war, we are losing the base and the narrative."
These sources all believe this is going to end up being what they call a “bad shoot”, a “shitty” situation that happened in seconds where agents likely heard “gun!”, then the disarmed firearm may have had an accidental discharge that spooked the agents, and they shot. The agents do not have the luxury of multiple slow motion angles - and had to make split second decisions.
All of the sources support the mass deportation agenda, but have serious hesitations about the way it is being carried out and the messaging that comes with it. Many of the sources have expressed frustration that ICE is routinely blamed for the actions of Border Patrol, a completely separate agency.
I reached out to DHS for comment on concerns that their rhetoric and comments have damaged their credibility.
DHS provided the following statement to @FoxNews:
“We have seen a highly coordinated campaign of violence against our law enforcement. This individual committed a federal crime while armed as he obstructed an active law enforcement operation. As with any situation that is evolving, we work to give swift, accurate information to the American people as more information becomes available."
@UteNationAlum Alex Jensen is great. I remember genuinely rooting for him and that 1998 team to win it all. Utah played great tonight, hope you guys keep it up. I’m going to try a crazy thing as a BYU fan…I’m going to root for Utah in 🏈 and 🏀 in all their games except one. Good luck Utes.
If you're going to penalize a 1-loss Power Conference team for a weak strength of schedule... BYU's SOS is better than Ole Miss and Notre Dame.
If you're going to penalize a team for not having the strongest power ratings (which incorporate prior year's history and recruiting rankings)... BYU's FPI is higher than Oklahoma's.
If you're going to penalize a team for a non-competitive / bad loss... Alabama lost by 14 to a team with a losing record and Miami lost to two unranked teams.
If you're going to use strength-of-record like you indicated you would, BYU's SOR is the second highest of teams 6-12.
BYU also (1) made its conference championship game and (2) if you sum up the wins of the teams it has beaten, it is THIRD in the country. It is hard to win games and BYU has beaten a lot of teams with a lot of wins.
This. Makes. No. Sense.
The @CFBPlayoff should be ashamed of itself. It has literally contorted itself into a pretzel to avoid putting BYU where it should be ranked (somewhere between 6th - 9th).
RT to get the info out there. They need to feel pressure.