With Memorial Day coming up tomorrow Balladeer’s Blog takes a look at some servicemembers who died in assorted neglected Cold War clashes.
APRIL 8th, 1950 – A U.S. Navy Privateer Electronic Intelligence aircraft was shot down by Soviet Union fighter planes over the Baltic Sea. All 10 crew members were either killed or captured by the Soviets with no further information ever becoming available.
NOVEMBER 6th, 1951 – A U.S. Navy Neptune patrol aircraft was fired upon by Soviet fighters off the coast of Siberia. The plane disappeared along with all 10 crew members.
JUNE 13th, 1952 – A U.S. Air Force Superfortress on a reconnaissance mission was reportedly attacked by Soviet fighters over the Sea of Japan and disappeared without a trace along with all 12 crew members.
OCTOBER 7th, 1952 – Another U.S. Air Force Superfortress encountered Soviet fighters off the coast of Japan and was presumed to have been shot down with 8 crewmen losing their lives.
NOVEMBER 29th, 1952 – A U.S. cargo plane was shot down over northeast China. Two crewmen died in the crash and were buried near the craft. The surviving pair – John Downey and Richard Fectau – were captured and imprisoned. Fectau was not returned to the U.S. until 1971 and Downey in 1973.
JANUARY 18th, 1953 – A U.S. Navy Neptune plane was shot down by Chinese anti-aircraft guns over the Formosa Strait off Swatow, China. It ditched, with 2 crew members presumed captured by the Chinese and 5 presumed dead. A U.S. Coast Guard “flying boat” crashed during the search for the downed crew, leaving 4 more men dead. Continue reading
Balladeer’s Blog always marks the holiday called Frontierado, which is observed every year on the first
Friday in August. This year that will be August 5th. Frontierado is about the myth of the old west, not the grinding reality. 
I will cover many of the other riders as we get closer to the actual date of Frontierado, but for today here is a brief look at the first Pony Express riders to depart from Saint Joseph, MO headed west and from Sacramento, CA headed east. There is still some dispute about which men officially count as the first riders, with two men put forth for both routes. 
JOHNNY FRY was born in Bourbon County, Kentucky in 1840 (exact date unknown) and in 1857 his family moved to Missouri. After the firing of the cannon, whoever the first rider was, Fry or Richardson, they galloped to the ferry Denver waiting at the landing on Jules Street. The Denver carried the rider across the Missouri River to Elwood, KS where that first ride resumed. 
Independent Voter site Balladeer’s Blog takes another look at the perennial question – Is career criminal, accused rapist, proven racist and illegitimate politician Joe Biden vermin or is he instead a large clump of bacteria sculpted into human form? 
As those Martin Luther King People of Courage the Hodge Twins have observed “We have lost so much faith in the Democrat Party. These people are a bunch of liars!” 
Independent Voter site Balladeer’s Blog takes another look at the damage being done by the career criminal Joe Biden. 
Independent Voter site Balladeer’s Blog takes another look at the ongoing war that 21st Century Democrats wage on the rest of us. We need Third Parties.
Call them what they are – Democrats. Twenty-First Century Democrats embody everything they used to pretend to oppose and basically oppress people while posing as the oppressed. You can’t fight oppressors if you aren’t willing to name those oppressors and too many people shy away from bluntly pointing out the common characteristic of today’s totalitarians: they are Democrats. NOT liberals. NOT progressives. 
America desperately needs Third Parties. The Democrats are the most divisive, destructive and selfish political party imaginable at the moment and elected Republicans are clueless, impotent frauds. For the umpteenth time in recent years I’ll point out that at present the Democrats need to be called out more because there are people – largely from overseas – who still have the ridiculous notion that the Democrats are somehow “the good guys” when in fact both our major political parties are “the bad guys.” 
