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"There is a time to pray and a time to fight. This is the time to fight." - Pastor John Peter Gabriel Muhlenburg:Sermon at Woodstock, Virginia, 1775.
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I received a most thoughtful gift for my last birthday, a book entitled "A Time to Fight', published in 2008 by Doubleday.
Readers may recognize the author, an independent minded Democrat who is now a US Senator from Virginia.
Webb comes from a military family, has degrees from the US Naval Academy and Georgetown Law School, and has served in Vietnam as a Marine Corps infantry officer, where he earned a Navy Cross, the second highest decoration in the Navy and Marine Corps for heroism in Vietnam.
Webb also earned the Silver Star, two Bronze Stars, and two Purple Hearts.
He is an established journalist with a straightforward and distinctively direct [blunt] writing style.
In addition to 8 previous books, Webb has authored a number of articles in various journals and newspapers, including the Marine Corps Gazette, Proceedings of the United States Naval Institute, USA Today, The New York Times, The Washington Post, and the Wall Street Journal.
Webb also wrote the story and was the executive producer for the 2000 movie Rules of Engagement, which starred Tommy Lee Jones and Samuel L. Jackson.
Older folks and students of modern US government may recall that James H. Webb also served as the Secretary of Navy under Casper Weinberger in the Reagan administration.
That post, plus lingering memories from the Vietnam era caused Webb to distance himself from the Democratic Party for 30 years, returning only after witnessing the egregious harm being caused by our last President, his administration and its ruinous policies.
Suffice to say, he was motivated to run for the US Senate in 2006 as a result, and narrowly defeated the incumbent Republican, George Allen, son of the famous Washington Redskins football coach.
Readers may also recognize Webb from his Democratic Rebuttal of President' George W. Bush's State of the Union address in 2007.
Webb has much to say that will resonate with most readers, and his unique perspectives make this book not only informative but timely and interesting.
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