I will stop subscribing the end of my year because I milked it for all I could. The WWII novel I am working on is too well primary sourced to need Questia. If I go back much farther for another book, I will rejoin.

Socrates?

I am curious - I know that there was some concern about a Japanese bombing run on the West Coast and that the U.S. had anti-aircraft guns in certain locations, but how real was the preparation?  As a child, did you have to do drills where you ran for cover?  Did you fear an imminent invasion from the sky?

Before the attack on Pearl Harbor, theonly preparations I was aware of were film and media propaganda. After Pearl Harbor, there were anti-aircraft preparations at the Presidio. I learned to "spot" enemy and our own aircraft.My parents and most others we knew were calm, so abject fear did not overwhelm us. We did have air raid drills at our neighborhood school, and the teachers walked us out in groups to let us disperse for home, but I do not remember any air raid shelters. For a short time there were blackouts at night. My future wife's German Jewish family in L.A., who had escaped Nazi German in 1938, had a 6PM curfew. In SF, some Italians had their radios confiscated. After a while we did not fear any Japanese bombing raids. My friends and I used to carry our toy guns to Golden Gate Park and look for defensive positions  we saw in films like Wake Island and pretend to hold off the "Japs."The schools kept us busy aside from learning with organized paper, tinfoil, and war bond drives.Of course we had gas, sugar, coffee, butter, and  other items rationed. I suspect my mother served horsemeat steaks during the war. I had giant theater of war maps in my bedroom with flags of all warring nations that I glued to pins. I followed the news each day and moved the pins accordingly. A great way to learn geography.Looking back, I would say that after the initial shock of the attack, our lives were fairly normal except for the minor inconveniences of  rationing.No civilian autos were produced during the war.One more thing, buttons replaced zippers to save the metal for the war effort, and in junior high, we played "Jack the Ripper" -- a quick swipe of the hand could flip away the buttons on a victim's fly.

I suggest you look up the term Manifest Destiny, which was the belief it was our God given right to expand our nation to the Pacific and as far north and south as possible. Also research President James Knox Polk, 1845-1849, and you will learn more about that concept.

Anyone watch Huckabee and the candidates on Fox this weekend? Great format. The attorneys-generals were tough and fair.

I do not remember that from my reading of The Prince and Discourses. Of interest, The Folio Society published The Prince with an introduction by Benito Mussolini.

Scout, you may be right about the approx. 50,000 — yet the number claimed by Canadian writer Bacque in his book Other Losses ignited a controversy when he claimed up to a million German POWs died in Allied camps under Eisenhower's orders — well refuted by American historian Steven Ambrose who, if I remember had some credibility problems of his own in another area. Unfortunately, no exact documentation exists on how to separate the severely wounded and diseased on their way to certain death in captivity from those supposedly deliberately starved or had their medications and treatments withheld. I should have added "I read but do not necessarily believe." It was a bitter winter, there were food shortages throughout Germany and the formerly occupied countries, and the Displaced Persons often received priority of supplies. As we know, the numbers will be manipulated by those with specific agendas.