American Excellence At It's Finest ---Forget What Obama Says

Colorado’s pride, America’s pride: Welcome home, drillers;

Update: Gag: Reid compares Obama to Chilean miner


By Michelle Malkin • October 18, 2010 09:48 AM


Last week, I pointed to the American story of excellence, strength, greatness, and generosity represented by Colorado driller Jeff Hart and his team in Chile.

They came home to Colorado on Saturday to a hero’s welcome:

It was a hero’s welcome at Denver International Airport Saturday as four Colorado drillers returned home from the Chilean mine rescue.

Dozens of family members and friends greeted drillers Jeff Hart, Matt Staffel, Jorge Herrera, and Doug Reeves with cheers, claps and warm embraces.

A humble Hart paid tribute to the miners:

“We went out there to do our job. We did our job and we got out of the way so someone else could do theirs. They did theirs properly, and in the end, 33 miners and 5 rescue people, who are braver than anybody because they had to go down and back up, all came out of the ground,” Hart said.

“It was amazing. It’s amazing to be a part of something so important. I’m really glad we could help out. I couldn’t be happier for the families down there. What they went through over those 70 days is just amazing,” Staffel added.

While the men are credited for making the rescue possible, they said they don’t consider themselves heroes.

“The real hero, as I’ve said before, was one gentleman in that mine that took control and for 14 days had 33 guys live on one can of tuna fish a day. That takes tremendous leadership and that guy is the hero. He kept those guys alive for 69 days,” said Hart.

Echoing a point I’ve been making here for months about the demonization of the drilling industry and the war on Western jobs, Hart emphasized the hits his occupation has taken:


When asked how life has changed, Hart said, “I really don’t think it’s changed. It’s just an honor to do what we do. The greatest piece of all this in my mind is that there’s a positive story about anything, but especially about drilling. The drilling industry gets hammered every day. To have a positive story about drilling is phenomenal for us, and we’re so glad to have that happen to us.”

After a short visit with their families, the Colorado drillers will head back to Afghanistan to finish their work there. Open-borders Democrats and liberal comedians constantly demagogue about the jobs Americans purportedly won’t do.

But when the world needs help, it’s unsung Americans doing the “dirty jobs” that need to get done.



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Emetic of the day award: JWF catches Harry Reid lionizing Obama with a most odious Chilean mine analogy. Sharron Angle’s victory over this crapweasel can’t come a day too soon.

Hurry:

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid has compared President Barack Obama to a trapped Chilean miner.

In a speech to supporters in Las Vegas on Sunday night, Reid said that when Obama replaced George W. Bush in the White House he found himself in a “hole so deep that he couldn’t see the outside world.

“It was like the Chilean miners, but he, being the man he is, rolled up his sleeves and said ‘I am going to get us out of this hole,’” Reid said at an “Early Vote GOTV” event.

At a Democratic rally in Boston on Saturday, Obama acknowledged Democrats in general were in a hole, heading up to the mid-term elections.

“There is no doubt that this is a difficult election,” he told the crowd of 10,000. “That’s because we’ve been through an incredibly difficult time as a nation.”

Quips JWF: The only things Obama has in common with the miners? “He’s in over his head, he’s leading a party that’s about to be buried by an avalanche in two weeks and he’s completely in the dark.”

I’d add: Sure, Obama is like a Chilean miner — stuck in a deep hole and dependent on competent, can-do Americans to get him out