Connectivity or the lack thereof

Campaign season and I haven't been able to post... but it looks like I might have put that issue to rest for the moment, and I hope to be able to run through the California ballot propositions. Of course, I'm primarily interested in seeing Obama elected, but California politics has this surreal quality that, after 38 years here, still makes absolutely no sense to me.

How did the global economy get into this condition? Well, in California we're running huge deficits, but there are still things we need (and even more things we want) so we've put up a bunch of pork barrel projects to be funded with bond issues because by the time the bonds mature we'll have the money to pay them, right? Right?

More Thoughts on the Bailout

I've been thinking about this bailout thing quite a bit and, although I'm probably no smarter than I was when I started, I'm pretty sure I'm against it.

For one thing, I admit it, I seriously don't like ultimatums. I've always felt that once the ultimatums started then sooner or later we were going to get to "or else" and so we might as well get on with it.

For another thing, I don't believe the doomsayers. Bankers bank. I don't believe for a second that the finance industry is suddenly going to start burying their billions in their back yards; they're going to invest it - perhaps more wisely but that's not a bad thing. Life will go on and the economy will rebuild on a sound fiscal footing instead of the Potemkin villages we've been putting our savings into.

The finance industry might very well wind up having to write off a trillion dollars in bad loans they never should have made in the first place, but that's what happens when you make bad loans. My 401 may turn into Monopoly money until stocks recover, but that's what I get for letting boneheads hold my retirement nest egg with no oversight. If we give these people, for instance the former CEO of Goldman Sachs who didn't see a trillion dollar loss coming while he was there up until a few months ago, $700 Billion to cover their current bad debt ceteris paribus why are they not going to just run up another $700 Billion in bad debt?

Threats irritate the crap out of me, and I don't want to embark on the rest of my life waiting for the other shoe to drop. Let's call in the markers and get this over with once and for all; and let's do what's necessary to prevent this from happening in the future.

Things I Guess I Don't Understand: Economics

Okay, is this whole bailout thing one last big grasp for the money before the elections? I ask this because otherwise I don't understand it.

I understand why people want to stay in their homes, including people who financed their homes with loans they had no realistic expectation of repaying. I get that.

I understand why the people who packaged and made those loans, and then bundled and sold and resold those loans don't want to get left holding the sack. I get that.

I don't get why (or how) those of us minding our own business trying to live responsible lives are supposed to give the people who created this cluster-fuck at least three quarters of a trillion dollars that we don't have to get them off the hook. I know that I'm not very smart, but I'm pretty sure that's stupid. We didn't have the money we used to buy an 80% interest in AIG, and now we're going to borrow $700 Billion (from our enemies) to try to cover the current crop of mistakes made by the very same institutions we want to prop up?

Listen, I wouldn't give anyone appointed to anything by George W. Bush change for a parking meter, much less co-sign for $700 Billion.

A Word for HM3 Eichmann A. Strickland

Hospital Corpsman Third Class Eichmann A. Strickland, 23, of Arlington, WA, died September 9 of injuries suffered when his vehicle hit an IED in Afghanya Valley, Afghanistan.
Doc Strickland was assigned to Combat Service Support Detachment 36, Iwakuni, Japan. He was deployed with an embedded Marine Training Team to Afghan Regional Security Integration Command Central. Part of his job was training Afghani soldiers how to treat wounds.
After his service, Doc Strickland wanted to become a physician assistant and become a medical missionary to Africa.
Semper Fi

It Can't be September Already

Things have been a little hectic lately. For awhile on Friday I didn't know if I was taking my younger sister to my baby sister's for Labor Day or driving a Red Cross Emergency Response Vehicle to Texas. (I wound up going to my baby sister's, but I got so flustered that I left her birthday card and present behind - her birthday was Friday.

This Wednesday I was supposed to drive a van with five other Red Cross people to San Jose for a Disaster Readiness Conference but we're down to four people in a car now. Happily for us and for the people along the Gulf Coast it doesn't look like the conference will be affected by Gustav. Anyway, this will likely be my post for the week.

The Thing About Oil

Here's the thing: we're running out of oil. For the near-term new drilling isn't going to help; it's going to take years to bring in the first new oil. For the long-term new drilling is just grasping at straws because we're running out of oil. My advice? Get over the oil and get busy on alternatives.

Up in Santa Barbara, which led the charge against off-shore drilling after a nasty spill years ago, the Supervisors want to allow drilling now. The Government (Minerals Management Service of the Dept. of the Interior) estimates there are perhaps 5.7 billion barrels of oil to be had between Point Conception and Mexico, and the folks in Santa Barbara are having Jed Clampett dreams.

The problem is that, according to World Watch, global demand for oil was almost 86 million barrels a day in 2007, over 20 million a day for the U.S. Assuming that it all comes in with no hitches whatever, we're talking about 66 days worth of oil... 275 days if we don't have to share it with anyone else. What are you willing to destroy for nine months of oil? How hard will you fight to keep from sharing it? What will you do next?

Sadly we've become such passive consumers that we're willing to believe that the oil companies know best about oil... like the insurance companies know about health care. They're in the oil business and they know about making money. Remember a few months ago when they found the leaks in the pipeline coming out of Prudhoe Bay? Pipelines need maintenance? Who knew? Supervisor Brooks Firestone thinks technology will prevent a replay of the 1969 spill because he has blinders on.

There are people running for office who are willing to stand watch while international oil sucks the last bit of blood out of every square inch they can get to and then two things are going to happen: that oil is going to get sold to the highest bidder on the world market, and then the biggest shareholders will sell their shares at the top of the market and move on to the next market leaving you on your bicycles with a scorched earth.

Deal with it.

"Armed Men Were No Threat to Obama"

I mean to write a few words about off-shore drilling, but first I have to ask what in the hell is going on in Colorado. Here's a suggestion if we're going to continue the trend away from "nominating conventions" toward coronations: have it in a safe place.

These three knot-heads... meth-heads actually... get busted with rifles, ammunition, body armor, disguise materials... oh, and they're white supremacists... and they confess to a "crude" plan to take advantage of Obama's planned Thursday night acceptance speech at Invesco Field to kill him. What do you think happens? Nope, not in Colorado!

The U.S. Attorney there, a guy named Troy Eid out of Jack Abramoff's old law firm appointed in 2005, says their plan wasn't good enough to succeed so he's just going to file weapons charges. "We're absolutely confident there was no credible threat..."

We live in an environment where if you sit in an airport discussing why "comb" is pronounced one way, "tomb" another way, and "bomb" yet another... yeah, your butt's in the slammer for awhile. Three skinheads blow into Denver with weapons and a dream, and that's just three crazy guys on meth in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Seriously people... no more neo-fascists for a while, okay?

People With Challenged Judgment Running for President

Suddenly there are at least a half dozen things I want to vent about here, but first I think I need to talk about Senator John S. McCain, III. I've given John McCain a pass for the last 35 years because of his experiences as a POW. I think we're past that. John McCain questions Barack Obama's judgment, and it occurs to me that peope in glass houses shouldn't throw stones.

I'm not sure what it is about the way McCain dismissed his first wife, Carol, that pisses me off. I'm not a particularly nice person at times, and I've done things I'm not proud of certainly. I can easily see how his life sucked from October, 1967, into March, 1973; but she held up her end keeping a house and raising three kids by herself not knowing if she'd ever see him again. If that's the way he treats a woman like that then how on earth can anyone trust him?

Five Senators were exposed in the Lincoln S&L scandal in 1989; one of them was my Senator, Alan Cranston. Two of them, John McCain and John Glenn, were bulletproof while the other three ended their Senate careers at the end of their terms. Senator McCain was criticized by the Senate Ethics Committee for poor judgment (as was Senator Glenn).

John McCain is supposed to have written "I would very much like to think that I have never been a man whose favor can be bought." Well, he can think anything he wants, but dumping a good woman for an heiress whose father is connected and enjoying the favors of lobbyists and fundraising from them while ostensibly campaigning to limit their access has the taint of corruption.

Senator McCain, I've come to terms with who and what you are. I don't even care anymore whether or not you've boinked Vicki Iseman because it doesn't matter; that's your wife's problem. I question your judgment. Moreover, I question your character.

Happy Birthday, Millie!

Sending my best wishes to Millie Garfield of My Mom's Blog for a fantastic birthday today, and for many more years of good health and great happiness!
Many thanks for sharing your life with us... and for teaching us a little Yiddish!

Millie, I have enjoyed your efforts.

A Word About the Trial at Gitmo

I've said before that the way we treat others, even our enemies, says more about us than about them; we do what we do because of who we are, not because of who they are. The issues of citizenship and territorial boundaries are not mentioned in the Bill of Rights; it's about people and how we, as Americans, treat them.

Yesterday Senator McCain reportedly said, "The fact that the jury did not find Hamdan guilty of all of the charges brought against him demonstrates that the jury weighed the evidence carefully," That's enough? I'm sorry, Senator, but isn't that a little like saying that, because they didn't kill you, the North Vietnamese didn't do so bad?

We're supposed to be the good guys in this picture. I'm not sure that lip service to the Constitution and violation of the Geneva Conventions is the way to go.

Time Flies When You're Having Fun

I haven't been having that much fun, but time has gotten away from me.
I did renew my lease here once again, and I've been trying to find a comfortable, productive niche for myself. I've been more active in the local community and training for CERT. I have more Red Cross training on the calendar in the coming weeks.
I've been tinkering with a piece on health care financing issues (I'm certain that the figures being tossed around for Universal Health Care are hugely inflated by corporate interests) but I haven't made the time to put it together.
The 2008 presidential election leaves me wishing for better choices, and California politics... why is it that in this blue state there are no standout Democrats? Is it simply that, with their gerrymandered districts, they don't need to do anything?
Welcome home, Sean at Doc in the Box!

Sentient Beings and Their Sacred Cows

I'm having a moment of frustration with the way corporate media and politics can totally bury the lead and change the conversation. General Clark didn't say that Senator McCain wasn't a military hero; he said that a fighter pilot, however great he was as a tactician or heroic in combat and in captivity, isn't necessarily any better or more knowledgeable in global strategic planning than someone who sat out the war entirely. (Witness the lack of military backgrounds in Department of Defense civilians.)

In a country in which W. gets elected to the presidency twice, and Arnold gets elected governor of California twice, one wonders when or if people will ever wake up and appreciate the mess we're in. What will finally be their inducement to recapture the patriotism of their forefathers, or will they finally just submit.

We're talking about the future of mankind and we're talking about it like we're in junior high school... a poorly performing junior high school.

Reflection on Mortality

My baby sister's mother-in-law's birth anniversary was June 19th. Gemma was a real spitfire, blind as a bat from her diabetes but she hardly ever missed a thing going on around her. Despite her diabetes and complications from it, she was totally aware and engaged and retained a keen mind. She was plain-spoken, totally without guile, and if she liked you she was fiercely loyal. This was the first birthday that her family had to observe without her.

On Wednesday I got a call from my step-brother telling me that his mother had passed away. I only met her in 2004, but everything about her was warm and genuine. She and my step-siblings opened their homes, shared family history with me freely, and I left the next morning with the strong sense that I had just spent the previous day with family. Bernice, in particular, just radiated compassion and, although I have no doubt she had a temper, it has been that loving compassion that I remember every time I think of her.

Today I finally had time to catch up on some blog reading and I learned that Joycelyn Ward, Maya's Granny, has passed as well. I never met her in person, but her writing was so clear and engaging that you have to imagine that she spoke just as she wrote. Of course, she was a Berkley liberal which was initially intimidating to an Iowa farm boy, but she was so articulate and clear in her thinking and writing that I always enjoyed what she had to say, even on the rare occasion when I couldn't agree with it.

Finally, I've been reflecting on mortality. Of course children must expect to lose their parents one day, but these three women were so full of life that it seems impossible that their lives have been lost to us.

I am reminded of a conversation I had with a friend a few years ago regarding her grandmother, and she told me that her grandmother had promised that she'd live forever. Her grandmother passed away, of course, as we must, but her legacy remains very much alive in the way my friend relates to her daughter and her daughter to her friends. Gemma's influence has been imprinted on her son and on my sister, and Bernice obviously gets a lot of the credit for how her children and grandchildren have turned out so far.

It occurs to me that what dies is the body. The love that emanated from each of them does live on, if not forever then at least indefinitely, in the lives of those they touched and in the lives we, in our turn, touch. I think people like Gemma and Bernice and MG don't die unless we let them die, unless we turn away from the gifts they left in us.

There are people I've forgotten, and perhaps I'll be forgotten (that's not for me to say), but there is a piece of Joycelyn Ward in me that I hope I never lose touch with.

Update: Winston Rand... He was a pretty good guy.

A Word for Hospitalman Dustin Kelby Burnett

Hospitalman Dustin Kelby Burnett, 19, of Fort Mohave, Arizona, was assigned to First Marine Division Detachment, Twentynine Palms, California.

Doc Burnett died June 20, 2008, when an IED exploded near his vehicle in Farah, Afghanistan. There's more about him in this article.

Semper Fi

A Word for Hospitalman Marc Retmier

Before I get too invested in talking about my "summer vacation," I have two other posts to do.


Hospitalman Marc A. Retier, 19, of Hemet, California, died June 19, 2008, of wounds suffered in a Taliban rocket attack on his unit while caring for Afghan civilians in northern Paktika, Afghanistan.

Doc Metmier was stationed at National Naval Medical Center, Bethesda, Maryland, and was assigned to Provincial Reconstruction Team Sharana in Afghanistan. There's more background on him in this article.

Semper Fi

Thoughts About Retirement

Ronni Bennett posed a series of questions about retirment at Time Goes By this morning, and it happens that retirement - whatever that means - has been almost constantly on my mind for the past few years.

Actually, I've been telling people for years that I'm a retired Navy Chief Hospital Corpsman because it's true and because it's preferable to admitting that I've spent the third quarter of this life shuffling papers for a medical management company. It's not like working for the IRS and it's paid the bills, but there is not much fulfillment from it. In the past four years I have made choices that have kept me from leaving this job and California, but almost certainly in 2009...

You'd have no reason to remember that back when Ronni was choosing between Portland, ME, and Portland, OR, I was trying to use logic to decide where I wanted to land when I retired (because I really have no roots anywhere). I drew a little circle around the area between Asheville, NC, and Great Smoky Mountain National Park, but it turns out that thousands of other retirees were drawing similar circles on their maps at about the same time, many of whom have already moved there. The idea of getting a Class C motorhome and living a more nomadic life has suffered a critical $4/gallon setback.

I've thought a lot about how I want to live the fourth quarter of this life. (It amuses me to refer to this time as the fourth quarter of my life although no male Babb has celebrated his 70th birthday since my great-great-grandfather.) When I leave here I'll have sufficient means to subsist which I recognize as a blessing; so my goal is to do work that is fulfilling... work that matters. I miss that from the second quarter. Toward that end, I've been volunteering with Red Cross Disaster Services for the past several months, and I have to say that is really working for me so far: I'm going out on local disaster calls (house and apartment fires so far), I can drive the ERV (Emergency Response Vehicle), and they're letting me train other volunteers in Disaster Services. That's like a fulfillment trifecta.

If I could find paying work that is at least as worthwhile as what I'm doing with the Red Cross, I'd sure consider it. My dream job would be to go back to school to become a Physician Assistant because I miss patient care a lot, but at this point I'd have to start from scratch. I'm up for that, but who gives student loans to guys in their 60s? Advocating for returning military wounded sings to me, but I'm not sure that working with the Veterans Administration bureaucracy does. We'll see.

Live each season as it passes; breathe the air, drink the drink, taste the fruit, and resign yourself to the influences of each. - Henry David Thoreau

Happy Birthday, Maya's Granny

It was good to read a post typed by Joycelyn Ward's hands this morning (Maya's Granny); and just in time for her birthday, too.
Best wishes for a great day, for your full and early recovery, and for many healthy and happy years to come.

Belated Birthday Wishes for Kay!

Belated best wishes to my friend and fellow elder blogger, Kay Dennison (Kay's Thinking Cap)! Her birthday was yesterday.
If you got here without having visited there a) what are you doing here; and b) swing over there when you get a chance. She's a good read.
Sorry, Kay!

Happy Birthday, Ronni!

I want to wish my blogger hero and role model, Ronni Bennett of Time Goes By, a very happy birthday today. Ronni is one of the hardest working bloggers I'm aware of, with a new blog offering almost every day and almost every one is informative and/or meaningful.
Thank you, Ronni; and Happy Birthday!

Getting Back to the Blog

I have to say that losing John Edwards has taken a lot of the wind out of my sails. I know I have historically been sporadic in posting, but it's 2008 and I have nothing left to write about in February. John McCain promises not to change anything, Hillary Clinton hasn't changed anything but says she wants to start, and I seriously doubt that Barack Obama has the political chops to change anything.
John McCain hurts my heart because (despite the Keating scandal) he's been someone I respected, and now it's painful for me to watch him. I'm reminded of how I felt when Admiral Stockdale stumbled so badly through the VP candidate debates several years ago.
I have a couple of posts working and I hope to get at least one of them out within a couple of days. It won't be anything like Kay's series over at the Thinking Cap... as I've said before, I am not comfortable sharing the fruits of my introspective efforts (and, yes, that has been a topic of discussion with more than one of my exes). I respect folks who are willing and able to do that, and it might be healthy if I did it, but... seriously... no. With me you get superficiality.
Keeping good thoughts, for Maya's Granny. Update here.
Namaste