Ready

Bought at a stamp show, a 2001 postcard shows U.S. Army personnel donning personal protective suits. The caption on the back of the card reads: "READY - The threat of nuclear and biological contamination of a battlefield requires that military personnel be highly proficient with a protective mask."

Unrelated, Capitol Police bomb squad blew up a pressure cooker from a ‘suspicious’ vehicle near Capitol yesterday before a Memorial Day concert. However, a follow-up search found nothing hazardous.

Vista of Capitol through Cherry Blossoms

Outgoing postcard US-3372297 to Japan was a reproduction of vintage linen postcard Vista of Capitol through Cherry Blossoms, Washington, D. C. by D.C. Reynolds Co in the 1930s. It shows the famed cherry blossoms around the Tidal Basin with the U.S. Capitol Building in the background. It has one of the USPS Gifts of Friendship stamps featuring the U.S. Capitol building surrounded by white and pink dogwood trees.

According to a USPS news release, "in a ceremony at the Tidal Basin in Washington, D.C., on March 27, 1912, First Lady Helen Herron Taft and Viscountess Chinda, wife of the Japanese ambassador, planted the first two of 3,020 flowering cherry trees gifted to the nation’s capital from the city of Tokyo. As a show of gratitude for this generous gift, former President William Howard Taft arranged for the United States to send 50 flowering dogwood trees to Japan in 1915. This reciprocal gift featured a species of tree native to the eastern United States and Canada."

Bicentennial Celebration of the Star-Spangled Banner

Two hundred years ago, Francis Scott Key, a Maryland-born lawyer and amateur poet, wrote a poem "Defence of Fort M'Henry" after witnessing the bombardment of Fort McHenry by British ships throughout the night of September 13-14, 1814 during the War of 1812. The Star-Spangled Banner, the then American flag with 15 stars and 15 stripes, was seen still flying the next morning. The poem made into the lyrics of "The Star-Spangled Banner" which became the national anthem of the United States.

On September 11, 2014, Fort McHenry hosted a ceremony where the National September 11 Flag, a patchwork stitched onto the flag that flew above the rubble at the site of the World Trade Center attacks, was raised. Threads from the original Star-Spangled Banner that soared above Fort McHenry in 1814 were sewn onto a patch and attached to the National September 11 Flag in June 2012.

The featured postcard shows the present flag of the United States, hoisted by two firetrucks at the annual Las Vegas Firefighters 9/11 Tribute and March in downtown Las Vegas on September 11, 2014.

Today on September 13, 2014, USPS issued a The War of 1812: Fort McHenry forever stamp, the third in the series, to commemorate of the bicentennial of the War of 1812 that ultimately helped forge our national identity and gave us our national anthem “The Star-Spangled Banner.”

President Obama Turns 53

Happy Birthday to President Obama, who just turned 53 today on Aug. 4, 2014. He was born in 1961, which was Year of the Ox in Chinese Zodiac. It is said that dependability, strength and determination are among the character traits for those people born in Year of the Ox. they are tolerant individuals who believe that the road to success involves hard work and scrupulous behavior; they do not believe in taking shortcuts.

Postcard US-1948589 to the Netherlands was made with a photo from President Obama's reelection campaign appearance at Canyon Springs High School in North Las Vegas on August 20, 2012, embedded in a template then available at photofunia.com.

Battle Born

In this Independence Day on the 4th of July, CNN Interactive is showcasing a natural wonder in each of the 50 states. CNN's choice of amazing natural wonder in Nevada is the Valley of Fire State Park, USPS also issued a Nevada Statehood Forever Commemorative stamp on May 29, 2014, featuring a view in the Valley of Fire State Park, to celebrates the 150th anniversary of Nevada Statehood.

When President Abraham Lincoln needed another Republican state to help support his anti-slavery policies in Congress, people in Nevada answered the call and voted to join the Union, even the population in Nevada back then was not big enough to form a state. Nevada was admitted to the Union in 1864, during the Civil War. Hence the words “Battle Born” have appeared on the Nevada state flag since.

The postcard was made by VistaPrint with one of my photos taken on November 27, 2011.

#CNN50spots

Giant Panda Cams Off During the US Government Shutdown

The Smithsonian National Zoological Park at Washington D.C. is home to 2,000 animals of nearly 400 different species. It is best known residents for the giant pandas, along with great apes, big cats, Asian elephants, and many others in residency.

Postcard US-2413118 to Czech Republic shows a pair of beloved pandas at the National Zoo. However, the visitors to the zoo today was greeted with a sign that read: "All Smithsonian museums and the National Zoo are closed today due to the government shutdown." In addition, its AnimalCams, including the Giant Panda Cam 1 and Cam 2, were also shutdown.

According to the Huffington Post, many people were surprised that the zoo was affected by the government shutdown. To find out how it affects you, visit NPR's blog "a Guide to What would and wouldn't Close".

A Postcard to Iran

President Barack Obama spoke with Iranian President Hassan Rouhani today, as the Iranian leader was heading to the airport to leave New York after attending the U.N. General Assembly meeting. During his time in the U.S., Mr. Rouhani made a number of public addresses indicating that Iran was open to restoring relationship with the U.S. and resolving conflict around the nuclear program in Iran. It is the first time leaders from the U.S. and Iran have direct communication since the Tehran hostage crisis more than three decades ago in 1979.

I was given an address in Tehran from PostCrossing on August 23, 2013. I hesitated to send out a card for a few days because I didn't want to give a reason to the NSA spying for communicating with people in Iran. However, since we PostCrossers had already been sending out mails oversea for sometime, we would have been targets already if they chose to do so. Traveling postcard US-2379246 shows a pair of table tennis paddles and a Ping-pong ball. Each paddle is decorated with a U.S. national flag and a Chinese national flag respectively. The postcard refers to the Ping-pong diplomacy that started with the exchange of table tennis players between the United States and People's Republic of China in the early 1970s. The event marked a thaw in U.S.- China relations that had been frozen since 1949 and paved the way to a visit to Beijing by President Richard Nixon. If history can be a guide, I am hopeful that an improved U.S - Iran relationship would contribute to the peace and prosperity in the Middle East and the world.

Update: The postcard was sent on September 2, 2013 and received on October 7, 2013.

The Four Freedoms - Freedom of Speech

Postcard US-2402743 arrived with many autographs from those who attended the Arkansas Meet Up in Little Rock, AR on September 7, 2013.

The postcard features a painting "Freedom of Speech", one of the four scenes of American daily life by illustrator Norman Rockwell, inspired by United States President Franklin D. Roosevelt's State of the Union address on January 6, 1941. President Roosevelt declared four fundamental freedoms that people "everywhere in the world" ought to enjoy: Freedom of speech; Freedom of worship; Freedom from want; Freedom from fear.

On the twelfth anniversary of the September 11 attacks and just after the nation stepped back from an imminent military conflict with Syria, we can appreciate more the meanings of the freedoms and understand how to protect them.

"In the future days, which we seek to make secure, we look forward to a world founded upon four essential human freedoms. The first is freedom of speech and expression - everywhere in the world. The second is freedom of every person to worship God in his own way - everywhere in the world. The third is freedom from want - which, translated into world terms, means economic understandings which will secure to every nation a healthy peacetime life for its inhabitants - everywhere in the world. The fourth is freedom from fear -which, translated into world terms, means a world-wide reduction of armaments to such a point and in such a thorough fashion that no nation will be in a position to commit an act of physical aggression against any neighbor - anywhere in the world. That is no vision of a distant millennium. It is a definite basis for a kind of world attainable in our own time and generation. That kind of world is the very antithesis of the so-called new order of tyranny which the dictators seek to create with the crash of a bomb."

Ronald Reagon and DCA

Ronald Reagon Washington National Airport (DCA)

Ronald Reagan, the 40th President of the United States, passed away 9 years ago on June 5, 2004,  after having suffered from Alzheimer's disease for nearly a decade. I received a card US-2060886 showing Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport (DCA) that was renamed from Washington National in 1998 to honor the former U.S. President. 

In the same year of 1998, Florida's Turnpike was designated as the Ronald Reagan Turnpike, originally known as the Sunshine State Parkway, by the Florida Legislature. There is a List of Things named after Ronald Reagan on Wikipedia.