The Best Strategy

Life teaches all of us a lot of lessons. We've heard it expressed in a million different ways. "With age comes wisdom" is only one. My big brother told me once that he disagreed with that statement. He said, instead: "With age comes experience".

He did a splendid job in supporting his position by mentioning several older people he knew, that were no where near any position that could be described as one that contained any degree of "wisdom".

Fifty five years ago, as I reported for my first day in boarding school as a 7th grader, I began to learn the ways of a little kid thrust into an environment that contained 109 students between the 5th and 9th grades. Some of them actually shaved. I didn't even own a razor at the time and one guy in the 9th grade, actually had hair on his chest. It was a fearsome sight to see him in the gym. He looked like a bear. His name was Falici and he was from Chicago.

I became a pro at it and it was a good thing because I eventually spent 4 years in two different boarding schools in Arkansas and Oklahoma. I learned and I excelled. I knew enough about the rules to insure that I never got caught.

One of the rules was: "Never throw the first punch". I learned very early on that it was far better to run to fight another day than to accept a fight on my enemies ground. That was an easy one to learn and it always served me well.

It appeared that I violated that rule when I was a senior in high school. Despite the fact that I was suspended from school for 3 days for fighting, despite the fact that I threw the first punch, the real aggression had taken place days before the fight and I simply waited for the perfect opportunity to beat the hell out of the trouble maker before I took my shot. It just happened to be in the parking lot at Byrd High School. Despite the embarrassment, the suspension took place one day before my 18th birthday, the legal age to drink in Louisiana. We partied hard and I went back to the "Never throw the first punch rule".

I walked away from a fight during my college years. It was due to the fact that my nose had been broken in a bar room brawl and I was still wearing the God awful nose brace and 16' of surgical packing that came after the surgery to fix all the damage. My room mate eventually beat the shit out of the guy that tried to hit me in the nose and in my eyes, all was well.

Later on, I found myself flying Nighthawk Gunships in Vietnam. We used the Huey helicopter back then and it was an excellent night time gun platform. It was always dark and very difficult to see the enemy in the dead of night, especially on moonless, cloud filled nights. They could hear us but had a tough time seeing us. When they took the first shot and we saw the muzzle flashes and the tracers searching the night sky for us, that's when we started shooting. The NVA should have live by the rule, "Never take the first shot".

When we invaded Cambodia, all of that was in broad daylight. There were only two occasions where I shot first but it was an unusual situation and I really didn't have much of a choice in the matter.

As time went on and I began my professional life, I learned another rule. Maybe we should call it Rule #2. "Don't start no shit and there won't be no shit".

A competitor of mine obtained a distribution agreement with a mounted bearing company named Koyo, that I was also representing. He cut the price and I lost a customer in Texas. Koyo also made un-mounted bearings so I bought those as well, cut the price and took one of his customers away. I didn't take the first shot during that lesson but he damn sure felt my shot when I took it. Another lesson learned.

The same lessons apply in one's personal life. Once some one offends you, as far as I am concerned, it's open season, fair game and no rules apply.

So, if anyone asks : "Did you hear what Butler did"? One might consider asking a very simply question. "Why did he do that, he never, ever, ever takes the first shot".

The Ride Seen Round The World

You guys remember the "Shot Heard Round The World"?  That was during the first American Revolution.

Yesterday, as I was watching the special report about the Office of Land Management where the government had snipers and an armed group of enforcers confronting the guy with 400 head of cattle that were grazing on State land, I couldn't help but notice all the people who were riding up on horses and supporting the family that was under siege. I couldn't help but view that as the Ride Seen Round The World. I wondered if this was Act 1, Scene 1 from the Second American Revolution.

There appears to be more and more complaining from Real Americans that they've had enough of this kind of thing. Despite the dismal situation existing in the media, they did report it. Despite the threats of armed intervention, the affected citizens didn't hold their comments. With Harry Reid's involvement, I wondered why there wasn't any mention at all of a possible "Election Recall". Don't they have the right to demand a new election? I always thought that was a hold card, so to speak, that gave the voters the right to change their vote when their elected representative failed to represent their wishes.

This morning, I read an email regarding the East Side of Detroit being 95% Arabic. I've become so accustomed to this kind of thing, I didn't even write down the number that was on some kind of welfare program or how many of those that drove their kids to school in their Escalades and Land Rovers.

I'm past the point of remembering how many illegal aliens are in prison or how many of them are there for murder, armed robbery, rape or other violent crimes. I did NOT however, fail to miss the fact that so many of the Land Management people were armed. I do remember an article that forbids citizens along the Southern border to carry arms even though there have already been several murders committed by those who are crossing the border illegally. As I considered all these things, I began to wonder why we haven't done more to rid our Country of these people.

Why do we see documentaries about Polygamy practiced in Utah by the Mormon Church members but nothing at all about the 3 or 4 wives claimed by the Arabs as "extended family members"?  I started smelling a rat years ago but haven't really been in any kind of physical shape to do anything about it except ventilate on this site or several military sites that I write on.

I had a vision several years ago that focused on Veterans finally standing up to all these things. I saw the 22.7 million Veterans finally giving up on the America we once had, and taking matters in to their own hands. I'm surprised that there weren't millions of them burning down buildings across America that housed these people and served as their training centers and propaganda platforms but at that time, W was in office and he didn't waste a second letting the world know that the enemy would "hear" our response.

I remember the day that we were told "We are no longer a Christian Nation". I have high hopes that we will hear the next guy say: "Welcome back to the Christian Nation known as the United States of America, One Nation, Under God".

Wouldn't it be great to have someone present a bill to Congress entitled "The Anti American Act" and that bill being focused on the people who do not aspire to our core beliefs and our history? I would love to see all members of every organization that violates our history, our laws and our way of life, deported.

I know I'm unelectable and not in any kind of shape to do anything other than deal with my post brain surgery, chemo and radiation stuff but I do enjoy the thoughts, sounds and sights of all these Anti Americans being deported and sent back to where ever they came.

I think I will leave you with that thought and ask you to visualize all Real Americans as a free people who have the capacity to either "recall their current elected officials" , demand their resignation or prosecution or do whatever needs to be done to enforce the American way of life.

GO, Uncle Sam!

Looking for answers? Try this!

A few months back, the www.11thacraviation.com site suggested a debate to determine who was really responsible for the political train wreck that came to us during the Vietnam War. It was a great idea and the site members provided a ton of information. For those of you who are hungry for the answers, you can check out "The Gulf of Tonkin Resolution" for starters. That was in 1964. You can move forward all the way to the 93rd Congress and the Paris Peace Accords and connect a whole lot of dots from the beginning to the end. The most shocking dot to connect has to do with the War of Attrition. Your Armed Forces won it big time and even the North Vietnamese admitted that was true. The other thing they admitted was: "We won the War of Political Opinion". From that, I concluded that even our enemies knew that the real battle was with the Congress not the President, the best tool they could use to defeat them was "The public" and the best weapon they had to win those battles was the news media.

As I began to study the details of all those organizations, I continued along a path that led backward from Nixon to Johnson and then, quite surprisingly, I found myself going all the way back to 1918 and studying Woodrow Wilson's Presidency. If you Google the "League of Nations", I'm not sure if you will see the League described in the same manner I would describe it. If you look at today's United Nations, you might see why they are as screwed up as they are and conclude that they came along because the League of Nations was such a good idea, not supported by Congress, that they thought they needed a different version of it.

From my studies, I have arrived at a conclusion that might have solved the problem in 1918. We should have named the League of Nations, "The League of Civilized Nations". If you don't agree with that, recall the day that the Japanese walked out of the League when they were asked to cease and desist with their invasions of South East Asia, China and everywhere else.

Had we simply built the League from Nations that had proven to be Civilized, we could have told them to "Make a Choice". That choice would have been a mandate to stop or to be subject to invasion by Russia, China, France, England and, last but not least, Colonel Paul Tibbets of the United States Army Air Corp. That would include the Enola Gay and Boxcar.

In any event, one thing that came from the debate about the Vietnam War was a new word to describe the end. The Cav is calling it a RESULT. I totally agree with that as we have already proven that a complete and total military victory was won by our Armed Forces. It may not be popular but I say that it is accurate and demonstrable. With that, we concluded that the Congress, manipulated by hippies, the SDS, the Kent State Shootings, Walter Cronkite and others, are to blame for the whole mess. Here is my HAND SALUTE to all you Veterans out there and a "Kiss My Ass" to all the commies and Anti American forces within our borders.  

The MRI machine at the VA is broken.

I went to the hospital and found out the reason I was given the appointment off site. Our MRI crashed and my Oncologist wanted a different view of my brain to measure the thickness of the scar tissue where part of my right temporal lobe used to be. As I understand it, this last test was the big one. Since I passed it and there's no evidence of any more cancer, I think he wants to see if the brain swelling medicine is as necessary as it once was. I'm not sure about that but that's what I understand is the reason for another look.

I guess I have to retract my statement regarding "Paranoia". I was claiming "Vigilance" and only did so as the normal method of arranging brain scans was not used this time. Aplogies to my first room mate in Vietnam, Ed Wolfe and to my big brother Leland for any concerns.

In any event, if it doesn't show up by July 9th, I fall into the category of "survivor" and shouldn't have to worry about any return of the Glioblastoma. I just wanted to clarify the last post. Thanks to all.

Back to the Battle of Glioblastoma

Last December, I was in the emergency room at the VA hospital. The Doc looked at my chart and said: "Nobody survives Glioblastoma". I was quite shocked by his comment especially since I had already made it past the 3 months to 12 months death sentence I was initially given when the biopsy came in.

Since 95% die within that time frame, I began to look at the ones that didn't. I saw death rates listed at 18 months, 2  years, 3 years, 4 years and then 5. There were a few that made it past the 99% death rate at 5 years but that was only a percentage point. When I made it past 3 years, they started calling me the "Miracle Man". When I made it past 4 years, that changed to "Mr. Impossible". The ER doctor made his statement 4 years 5 months and 13 days into my battle.

I knew he wasn't a brain surgeon and concluded, from his statement, that he must have been a proctologist because he surely didn't know his head from his ass as it related to Glioblastoma Multiform Grade 4 malignant brain cancer. In any event, it really pissed me off.

Maintaining a positive mental attitude is sometimes a difficult thing. When you consider the fact that I had been an Army helicopter pilot that obtained a fixed wing rating after I returned from Vietnam and that I eventually bought my own airplanes, one might think that losing the ability to remain a pilot, might be somewhat depressing. I got over it and continued to move forward. I lost the ability to ride my motorcycles and I got over that, too.

With the loss of my right eye, I also lost a bit of stability and had to start using a walking cane. I don't have to use it every day but, since a part of every day is not good, I treat it like that credit card advertisement. I never leave home without it.

In any event, I just received a "Cancer Free" report from Cat Scan. That was a few weeks ago. I decided to issue a complaint with my Oncologist about the Doctor's statement in the ER room and he had me report to the Patient Advocate Office and give a detailed account of the incident. I did that and it was forwarded to the Director of the hospital.

Now, out of the clear blue sky, right after the Cancer Free Cat Scan report, I get orders to report to an off site health provider for an MRI Brain Scan. It's important to note that I have been forbidden to have the MRI procedure as the last one put me in the ER as I am allergic to the new dye that they use for "Contrast".

When I was injected with the new dye, I had trouble breathing and broke out with a rash that covered my entire body. They shut down the MRI called for a crash cart to come to MRI and then hauled me off to the ER. Tim jr. was there and was really pissed as he had already told them NOT to inject me with the dye. In any event, that was when I met the ER doctor mentioned above. It was sometime in 2011 when that happened and I've not had an MRI since then. Thus, the confusion that came when the letter arrived for me to report for an MRI that was to be done "off site".

I'm certain that my Oncologist did not order this. My niece is his nurse and I called her when it came in the mail to ask if she knew anything about it. She said no. Mighty strange that I would start having difficulty swallowing and some head aches and then, all of a sudden, get a green light from Oncology and Neurology only to find the letter in the mail box yesterday.

I'm not sure if my report to the Patient Advocates Office resulted in the subject Doctor being called on the carpet or not. Nor am I sure if he ordered the MRI but one thing I am sure about is this: I don't appreciate being thrown under the bus after I have outlived 99% of the Glioblastoma patients. Where's the respect? Hmmm, must be a civilian.

More after I return from the hospital. Just want to let y'all know this in case I have a stroke or something. I was fine before Doctor Butthead started messing with me.

Away for a month

Tomorrow marks a full month that I've been away. I did 3 videos on VIMEO and you may go to Tim Butler there and check out the posts under my name over the past month. You'll have to go to the last page as the older posts are listed first. In any event, it's been fun filming even though it eventually ended up being a ton of work.

I thought I would make this post here to see if there are any of you that still check The Church of What's Happnin Now. I don't know enough about this thing to know if it contacts you when I post something or not. In any event, I'm going to post this as a test to see if I get any replies here or by email. If not, I'll probably shut it down as it sometimes requires a lot of work to post things here just like it's a lot of work to do the video. In any event, Thanks.

Tim