MAY TWENTY-EIGHTH NEWS ROUNDUP

Independent Voter Site Balladeer’s Blog is here with yet another current events roundup.

ICE AGENTS ARREST ILLEGAL IMMIGRANT KILLERS, CHILD SEX CRIMINALS, DRUG TRAFFICKERS AND MORE IN NEW JERSEY. Meanwhile, Democrats attempt to impede their efforts and want an ICE facility shut down. 

DEMOCRAT GUBERNATORIAL CANDIDATE TOM STEYER VOWS TO ARREST ICE AGENTS IF HE WINS. He forgot to add “No matter how many illegal immigrant killers, rapists, child sexual assailants and other violent criminals are left at large to endanger the public”, but Democrat voters heard that dog whistle anyway. It’s pretty much their Party platform these days.

ILLEGAL IMMIGRANT SENTENCED TO TWENTY-FIVE YEARS IN PRISON FOR RAPING AND IMPREGNATING A TWELVE-YEAR-OLD. Never forget that if Democrats had their way this rapist would still be at large.

PRESIDENT TRUMP PRAISED FOR BRINGING HOME RECORD NUMBER OF AMERICAN HOSTAGES – ONE HUNDRED SIX – IN JUST THE PAST FIFTEEN MONTHS

CORRUPT JOE BIDEN, KNOWN FOR BEING UNFIT AND ILLEGIT, SUES TO TRY PREVENTING THE RELEASE OF EVEN FURTHER TAPES PROVING HOW MENTALLY UNFIT HE WAS YEARS AGO. More HERE. And all the while the Democrats and their media outlets were insisting Biden was “sharp as a tack”, etc.

MAINE’S DEMOCRAT NOMINEE FOR SENATE JAKE AUCHINCLOSS COURAGEOUSLY CALLS MAINE’S DEMOCRAT CANDIDATE GRAHAM PLATNER’S NAZI TATTOO “DISQUALIFYING.” Too bad The Party’s bigwigs still back Platner.

MINNEAPOLIS’S DEMOCRAT POLICE CHIEF RESIGNS IN DISGRACE AMID SCANDAL. He was pretty useless a few months ago during the city’s attempts to obstruct ICE, too.

TRUMP-ENDORSED KEN PAXTON CRUSHED OBSTRUCTIONIST JOHN CORNYN BY MORE THAN TWENTY-SEVEN PERCENT. More HERE. The clueless and out of date Republican Party anti-Trumpers lost again HERE!

DONOHEW ON PRESIDENT TRUMP’S SELFLESS SERVICE Continue reading

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AMERICA 250: 1926 MONTH BY MONTH

America’s 250th birthday is coming up in July, so over the next few months Balladeer’s Blog will take a look at various anniversary years. Previously I did 1826, and 1876, so this time it’s 1926. Next will be 1976. 

1926

U.S. President: Calvin Coolidge    Vice President: Charles G. Dawes    Speaker of the House: Nicholas Longworth    Chief Justice: Former President William Howard Taft

Number of Senators: 96    Number of House Representatives: 435    Number of Supreme Court Justices: 9 

JANUARY

1st – The ROSE BOWL GAME was broadcast on radio for the first time. This game pitted the undefeated UNIVERSITY OF ALABAMA CRIMSON TIDE, then from the Southern Conference, against the undefeated UNIVERSITY OF WASHINGTON HUSKIES, then from the Pacific Coast Conference. The Huskies led 12-0 at Halftime, but the Crimson Tide came from behind to win the game 20-19 in what has been called “the football game that changed the South.”

6th – Mickey Hargitay, bodybuilder, movie star, husband of Jayne Mansfield and father of their daughter Mariska Hargitay, was born.

11th – The Whittemore Gang, led by Richard Reese Whittemore and his wife Margaret, robbed a Manhattan jewelry store of $175,000 worth of gems, equal to $3,205,000 here in 2026.

12th – The radio comedy program Sam ‘n’ Henry debuted on WGN in Chicago. Two years later the title would be changed to Amos ‘n’ Andy but it’s inane under any name.

13th – 91 coal miners were killed in a mine explosion in Wilburton, OK.

15th – The silent film The Sea Beast starring John Barrymore opened. Continue reading

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FORGOTTEN TELEVISION: THE FANTASTIC JOURNEY (1977)

THE FANTASTIC JOURNEY – This was a very promising hour-long science fiction tv series that somehow just never gelled well enough to last even for a full 13-episode tryout. The premise involved a 1976 nautical expedition into the Bermuda Triangle by a group of scientists and a few of their family members.

Their ship encounters green mists connected to the many sea and air disappearances in the Triangle and they wind up stranded on a continent-sized island called Evoland. Beings from many time periods and planets are trapped there as well and at times try to help or hinder our main cast in their efforts to escape the Bermuda Triangle.

VARIAN, played by Jared Martin. Varian was an Earthling from the 23rd Century. He is cultured, refined and highly intelligent. Like many scholars from his time period, Varian is capable of focusing his mental energies through his crystal rod/ tuning fork called a Sonic Energizer. The device responds only to his mind and lets him diagnose and heal others, as well as manipulate matter in various destructive and constructive ways depending on the needs of each episode’s story.

Yes, the Sonic Energizer was every bit as much of a Deus ex Machina as the Sonic Screwdriver on Doctor Who. In fact, I’ve always felt that if American television had decided to do an Americanized version of that BBC series rather than import the episodes starring the terrific Tom Baker, that Jared Martin would have made a perfect U.S. incarnation of the Doctor. (Or maybe even a rebooted Gary Seven.)  

FRED WALTERS, MD, played by Carl Franklin. Fred is fresh out of medical school and is co-leader of the group along with Varian.

Dr. Walters is a brilliant physician in his own right and his 20th Century cynicism lets him read many potentially dangerous situations more accurately than Varian, whose largely innocent and pacifistic 23rd Century nature leaves him a bit naive. Fred was like an 80s badass in a 70s tv show. Continue reading

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THE AENEID: FOURTH AND FINAL PART

FOR THE FIRST PART CLICK HERE. FOR THE SECOND PART CLICK HERE. FOR THE THIRD PART CLICK HERE.

FOUR – A council of the gods is held on Mount Olympus as the goddesses Venus and Juno make their cases for and against Aeneas and his fellow survivors of fallen Troy. Venus argues for them since Aeneas is her son, while Juno retains her position against Aeneas because she wants to prevent the founding of Rome.

Events move back to the battlefield as Aeneas finally arrives back at the Trojan camp with an army of his Tuscan and Arcadian allies. In the following battle casualties are again high. King Turnus – Aeneas’s rival for the hand of King Latinus’s daughter Lavinia – kills the Arcadian Prince Pallas, whose father King Evander had sent him forth to fight on the Trojan side.

Elsewhere on the battlefield, Aeneas wounds Mezentius, but the man’s son Lausus leaps between his father and Aeneas. While the two younger warriors fight each other, Mezentius flees back to his camp and Aeneas kills Lausus. Continue reading

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NEWS ROUNDUP: MAY TWENTY-SIXTH

Time for another currrent events roundup from Independent Voter Site Balladeer’s Blog.

OIL PRICES TUMBLE UPON WORD THAT END TO IRAN CONFLICT IS CLOSE.

DEMOCRATS CALLING FOR DNC CHAIRMAN TO RESIGN FOLLOWING RELEASE DETAILING WHAT A DEBACLE KAMALA HARRIS’ CAMPAIGN WAS.

BOLT CEO SLASHES ENTIRE H.R. TEAM, POINTING OUT THAT “THEY WERE CREATING PROBLEMS THAT DIDN’T EXIST“. Like so many other H.R. staffs in other companies working as Commissars for Democrat political opinions rather than doing their jobs resulted in “a culture of not getting things done and complaining a lot.”

      Among his other remarks: “there is “a sense of entitlement that had festered across the company, and people who felt empowered, felt entitled — but weren’t actually working hard.”And this is the number one thing that I had to battle. Ultimately, most of those people just had to be let go,” Breslow stated.

      Also, in place of a full HR department, Bolt has since set up a smaller “people operations team” to handle new employee onboarding and training. “We have a team a quarter of the size, who are much more junior, who work a lot harder, who have better energy,” Breslow said at the event. “And our customers are telling us, ‘We haven’t had this type of attention in four years.

SENATOR MARSHA BLACKBURN REMINDS THE PUBLIC THAT PRESIDENT TRUMP IS ENDING A WAR THAT IRAN HAS BEEN WAGING AGAINST THE U.S. FOR FORTY-SEVEN YEARS.

EVEN DEMOCRAT SENATOR TAMMY DUCKWORTH COURAGEOUSLY ADDED HER VOICE TO SHAMING THE DEMOCRAT NATIONAL COMMITTEE INTO DELETING THEIR GROTESQUE POST USING MEMORIAL DAY AS A PARTISAN ANTI-TRUMP ANKLE BITE. Trump Derangement Syndrome continues. Continue reading

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HAPPY MEMORIAL DAY – 2026

Balladeer’s Blog hopes all of you are having a respectful Memorial Day. I always feel it’s an appropriate time to look at neglected conflicts or battles. The military members who died in those actions are sometimes overlooked in the big picture.

THE TOP FOUR FORGOTTEN MILITARY UNITS FROM AMERICAN WARS – Looking at the Oneida Indians First Allies Unit from the Revolutionary War, Doniphan’s Thousand from the Mexican War, the “Yankee Samurai” (Nissei Battalion of 2,000 Japanese-Americans) from World War 2, and the racially integrated 1st Rhode Island Regiment from the Revolutionary War. 

THE TOP FOUR FORGOTTEN CONFLICTS IN U.S. HISTORY – A look at the forgotten Revolutionary War battles after Yorktown (1781-1782), the Mexican War (1846-1848), the Nicaraguan Conflict (1926-1928), and the Philippine War (1899-1902).

FORGOTTEN U.S. NAVAL BATTLES OF WORLD WAR ONE – There were clashes between German U-Boats and the U.S. Navy ships transporting the American Expeditionary Force to Europe, the years-long underwater mining campaign, the German attack on Orleans, MA, the attack on Austria-Hungary’s naval base at Durazzo, Albania and much more.

Continue reading

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BALLADEER’S BLOG MAY BE BACK TO NORMAL

BALLADEER’S BLOG

Trying to see if everything is working properly at last. Basically just a test post.

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MEMORIAL DAY WEEKEND: MEDAL OF HONOR WINNERS FROM THE BOXER “REBELLION”

TECHNICAL PROBLEMS CONTINUE BUT AT LEAST I CAN DO RERUNS FROM YEARS AGO.

Balladeer’s Blog once again takes a look at a currently neglected conflict and some of the military personnel who served in it. Here’s a look at some of the Congressional Medal of Honor recipients from the Relief Expedition during the Boxer Massacres in China (1900).

corporal titus


CALVIN P. TITUS

Branch of Service: Army

Rank: Standard Bearer/ Musician

Citation: “For gallant and daring conduct in the presence of his colonel and other officers and enlisted men of his regiment on 14 August 1900, while serving with Company E, 14th Infantry, at Peking, China. Musician Titus was first to scale the wall of the city.” He raised the American Flag from the top of that wall. (Pictured above.) NOTE: Titus previously served in the Philippine War (1899-1902) and subsequently in the Mexican Expedition (1916-1917) and Occupied Germany after World War One. 

CONTINUE READING:

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STILL FIGHTING TECHNICAL PROBLEMS – IT’S STILL NOT LETTING ME VISIT OR LIKE OR COMMENT AT MANY OF YOUR SITES.

HOPEFULLY I CAN RETURN TO NORMAL POSTING AND VISITING VERY SOON.

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X-MEN: THE NEW TEAM IN 1975

This weekend’s light-hearted, escapist superhero post from Balladeer’s Blog looks at the first twenty stories of the “All New, All Different” X-Men beginning in 1975. I have a soft spot for superhero stories because reading them as a kid served as a gateway to two of my adult passions – mythology and opera.

new x-men 1

GIANT-SIZE X-MEN Vol 1 #1 (May 1975)

Title: Deadly Genesis

Villain: Krakoa

NOTE: This was the very FIRST appearance of the new team of X-Men who replaced the original, blander team launched in 1963. That team’s original series had been canceled and reduced to reprints (reruns).

Synopsis: The story opened with a series of vignettes featuring Professor X traveling the world rounding up a new batch of mutants detected by his invention Cerebro. Three of them had prior history in the Marvel Universe:

*** WOLVERINE (real name unknown at the time), who had fought the Hulk and the Wendigo in Canada. Wolverine willingly joined the X-Men and angrily resigned from Canada’s Department H, which had been sending him on missions up to that point. This would have repercussions down the road.

*** BANSHEE (Sean Cassidy), a sometime foe and sometime ally of the original team of X-Men. This Irishman had also fought Captain America and the Falcon.

*** SUNFIRE (Shiro Yoshida), a Japanese mutant who had fought the original X-Men as well as Sub-Mariner, Iron Man and Captain America.

The rest of the mutants Xavier rounded up were new:

*** STORM (Ororo Munroe), from Africa, where her weather-controlling powers had made her revered as a goddess by an isolated tribe.

*** NIGHTCRAWLER (Kurt Wagner), a German circus performer whose monstrous appearance made him the target of a mutant-hating mob from which Professor X saved him.

*** COLOSSUS (Piotr Rasputin), a Russian teenager working on a Collective Farm in the Soviet Union.

*** THUNDERBIRD (John Proudstar), a Native American mutant from a reservation in the American Southwest.

Once they were all assembled at Xavier’s School for Gifted Youngsters, the professor introduced them to Cyclops (Scott Summers), the leader of the original X-Men, who briefed them. He had led the original team – Iceman, Angel, Marvel Girl, Polaris and Havok (Beast was joining the Avengers at this point) to investigate a new mutant detected by Cerebro on a Pacific Ocean island called Krakoa. The original team vanished and only Cyclops escaped in their aircraft, but with no memory of what happened there.

Continue reading

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