Foreign Policy: Lies for every occasion and a Predator in every pot.

Can anyone make heads or tails out of our foreign policy? I can't and I know several people who feel the same way. These people range from intense Obama supporters to intense Obama haters. Even intense supporters are at a loss to explain his goals with foreign policy. The closest people can come is to state, "Well, at least he's not Bush." It seems like a feeble recommendation.

The average person probably shouldn't know much about what really happens behind foreign policy decisions. Often choices are made that seem illogical but given a larger perspective, may be quite good. Since we were attacked and recognized that there are a substantial number of people who eye the destruction of America as a good thing, we should be able to trust that even if mistakes are made, the president has the interests of America as priority number one. If we are secure, we can use America's largesse to help other countries. If we are not secure, any help we give can be used against us in ways we don't fathom.

Back in the Carter days, we underwent a crisis in both foreign policy and our ability to gather and process intelligence. But Carter wasn't the only culprit and Bush 41 made decisions that severely crippled our foreign services and other offices that deal with foreign intel. During those years, we developed a philosophy that we didn't need hard data gathered by our own sources but could use the intelligence agencies from our allies. We would then analyze that intel and use that as a basis for foreign policy decisions. There are several problems with that model. First and foremost is that information could not be verified. This glaring mistake rose to prominence when we were getting intelligence from foreign sources about Iraq and Iraqi ability to make a nuclear weapon. We didn't recognize just how disliked Saddam Hussein was by most of the Arab world. The information we were fed by our so-called partners was catered to what they wanted. So we were making decisions for America based on filtered intel from foreign sources that had little or nothing to do with America's foreign policy needs. Then the American public and possibly the congress was misled based on not just faulty but made up intelligence provided by people who had a specific goal. That goal was to destroy the only Arab country attempting to unify the disparate elements in the country into a cohesive body similar to a Western democracy but without the democracy. The monarchies and totalitarian states we regard as friends used the system we established to take out a neighbor and they did all they could do to provoke that neighbor. What do we end up with? The Iraq war of Bush 43. For all the disaster prediction and hand-wringing that went on over that decision by congress, it was approved and once congress got out of the picture and initial mistakes were resolved, it looks like the end result will be interesting indeed. Remember, we are dealing with a group of people who do not have a clear concept of something called Iraq in the same sense that an Englishman has a concept of England or an American has of America or a Frenchman has of France.

Recently, according to press reports, we have returned to a policy where we use intel gathered by our allies to gather information on which we base our foreign policy decisions. We expanded the Predator program based on intel that often is nothing more than tribal conflict rather than on solid evidence of actual threat to America. Predators are not a way to conduct foreign policy. They work great both strategically and tactically but there is still a lot of collateral damage regardless of how surgically we say the strikes may be. (Of course given something like carpet bombing in WWII or the mass civilian devastation of suicide bombers, Predator strikes are almost antiseptic in their accuracy.) Predators really are a weapon of terror because strikes often occur without people even knowing they are being targeted. That's a scary proposition but not one designed to win friends. In fact, it can be made to work against our interests. If a radical element wants to create terror, all they need to do is blow up some highly regarded structure and blame it on Predators. In isolated places, this is entirely possible. The only defense we have is denial and that is meaningless.

So, outside of something like Predators that give the appearance of carrying out a policy, do we have a foreign policy based on America's needs or do we have a foreign policy based on the idea that America's needs have to be secondary to a policy that integrates America into a world governance in contradiction with American values and historical preference?

Jumping back to Predators, are we really sure that the intel and processes we are using for Predator strikes is really among our goals or other's goals? It embraces the problem of making decisions for operations on foreign soil when little or no direct contact is undertaken. Because we are so used to top-down structures, we find it difficult to integrate American goals and operational systems into a structure that has a basic distrust of anything nonlocal.

So where is our foreign policy taking us? Are we emulating mistakes made by every empire and becoming so inclusive of other's problems that we have lost sight of the very things that make America exceptional? Are our leaders so enamored with anything not American that they are allowing our enemies to define what we are? I recently read an article where the Chinese are criticizing our record of human rights and actually stating that China has more human rights than America. Nowhere in the article did I see any mention of any American diplomat stating to the contrary. What I read was American officials devolving into an intellectual discussion of human rights problems in general. In other words, we don't have a policy strong enough for anyone to stand up and shout that America has freed more slaves from totalitarians than any country ever on the face of the planet. Nobody shouts that we even work to make our enemies active trading partners and have helped create a bounty never seen on the earth before. It's frustrating beyond belief but it seems obvious that American foreign policy has nothing to do with changing other nations but is more involved in changing the minds of Americans to accept ideas of governing that are in direct opposition of guarantees afforded us by the constitution.

Predators and Predator programs may be beneficial in that American casualties are kept at a minimum but foreign policy and the execution of such is one that can only be undertaken by feet on the ground and building sources of information that gather real data not just find sources that meet a predisposed set of ideas that may work against goals of the founders as to government involvement in an individual's affairs and how government should work in general. Does our foreign policy extend an ideology that is distinctly anti-American? One wonders and this is problematic in itself.

FB

More on the potential repeal of Don't Ask, Don't Tell: The Nazis

Not so interestingly, I was sent several links to articles referring to homosexuality and the Nazis. These covered the span from all the Nazis were homosexuals to only the ranking "elite" to the equating of the holocaust to the current prosecution of homosexuals. There even is a pink-triangle symbol that is supposedly used to commemorate homosexuals prosecuted during the holocaust. So I did some research. I started with William Shirer's "The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich" went to two biographies about Hitler (One by Bullock and one by Toland) then did a bunch of online research. Some of this was quoted in the emails I received.

The gist of the emails were that the example from history we have of homosexuals in the military was already here and this was the SA run by Ernst Roehm. So is this an accurate model? I don't think any reality of the Nazi experience translates to anything American other than the excesses that can be undertaken when a single purposed group gets control of anything.

Several online articles I read equate homosexuality with perversion and I don't think this is true. When it was discovered that the Roehm and others in the SA were not so closet homosexuals and that promotion in the ranks of the SA was dependent, in part, on sexual involvement, many people used this as a further condemnation of the SA and recently as an opposition to homosexuality in the American military. When I served, disclosure of homosexuality was grounds for being dishonorably discharged. Even with that, many homosexuals served and quietly went their own way. Everyone knew but nobody cared because there wasn't any established structure where sexual favors had to be granted to achieve assignment or promotion.

I am of the position that homosexuals are as much a part of the military and of society but that the military operates under a separate legal system so the freedoms afforded regular citizens do not necessarily apply in the military. So the freedoms that homosexuals enjoy in civilian life don't translate well into military life.

Let's go back to the SA example. In some of the readings, it was stated that Hitler was a homosexual as well as most of the Nazi leadership. Hitler ordered the purge of the SA because he was afraid of being "outed" by Roehm and others who supposedly had over forty-thousand confessions of people being involved in some kind of homosexual activity. Then Hitler specifically targeted homosexuals along with Jews in the holocaust. In other words, they were considered equally vile when "The Final Solution" was drafted. Both assumptions are wrong.

The reason the SA was destroyed during "The Night of the Long Knives" was not sexual at all but political. The leaders of the SA had waged a propaganda war to get the SA adopted as part of the military. The military leaders found the paramilitary tactics and the structure of the SA to be at odds with the long established military tradition. The SA hierarchy tried several tactics to achieve their goal but were thwarted at every turn. The SA were promoting a second revolution that would continue the radicalism that brought the Nazis to power while Hitler wanted to consolidate power and integrate the military into the Nazi party.

Just how much did homosexuality play in the structure of the SA? It seems that certain commanders were openly homosexual and demanded their immediate subordinates were of a similar ilk. In training camps, they had such rituals as mutual washing in showers to break down barriers to openly homosexual behavior. There were exercise regimens and specifically based social activities designed to promote homosexual behavior. But there were still people who didn't get involved and didn't adopt the behaviors. We have letters that highlight just how stressed the activities made some of the heterosexual people who were in the SA. This type of activity was completely in contradiction of military codes which was one of the reason that the generals did not want the SA attached to the military in any way. The SA leadership wanted the protections afforded soldiers in the German system. The Germans had no such law as America which states that the military cannot be deployed against American citizens. (There are, of course, famous exceptions to this. One of the most egregious is when Pershing marched on the veterans camped in Washington.) So the SA wanted protections for crimes they committed against Jews so they could never be prosecuted for their acts.

The Military Channel ran a documentary about the SA/SS and brought out the homosexual connection. In contrary to much current thought, the activity was supposed to enhance unit cohesion and camaraderie overall. In other words, if soldiers were sexually involved, they would be more inclined to operate as a unit than not. Because the SA was, in effect, destroyed by the Nazis themselves, we will never know if the assumption works or not. There are other countries where overt homosexuality is not governed by rule or tradition. But none of these are as extensive or oriented as much as an expeditionary army as the American.

Unit cohesion is important in any military endeavor and successful forces have high cohesion even in the face of overwhelming odds. If military tradition was carried forward in a way that doesn't include family, sons and such, open inclusion may be an interesting experiment. However when at war and when troops are deployed as ours are now, the time for experiments based on sexuality seems wrong. Of course, between WWI and WWII, we had a military based with no mission. Interestingly, homosexuality became more of a stigma.

I think that homosexuals serving openly is more of a political statement than a military statement and when your life and the survival of your unit depends on like-minded thinking, sexual preference is the last thing that soldiers should be thinking about. It shouldn't be a factor. However, if open sexuality is promoted and some do and some don't, I see nothing but problems. The problems may not be with homosexuality in general because most people just don't really care. People (Soldiers are, after all, people.) just want to be left alone. Because homosexuality is being made a political statement, it should be regarded the same as any other political movement. After all, we have socialists and communist in the military and we also have soldiers who think the military should control everything. We have gang members and neo-Nazis in the military but they don't exist as a political entity and don't have meetings, marches or are organized in any way. To afford homosexuals this ability within a military that doesn't allow communist or Nazis or gangs to organize openly would cause a whole set of problems. These kinds of problems destroy military effectiveness and cohesion.

We need a military that can operate effectively and already there are problems with changing ROEs and mission assignments. In many ways the military is being used as an experimental base and this doesn't help anyone especially the soldier looking to make a career in service to his country. Should we ban homosexuals? No, but we shouldn't make any special conditions for them either.

FB

Lies and more Lies: The Clintonistas Rule man. They really RULE!

So here's the story. Former president Bill Clinton, who's wife is Secy. of State, runs the Clinton Global Initiative, travels around the world in behalf of the current president, digs up congressman Sestak and offers him an inconsequential position on a board IN ADDITION to being a congressional candidate against Arlen Spector?

Sestak was running around saying that he was offended by the offer and that he was sticking to his guns. What a guy! He wasn't going to be bribed away from his civic duty and he was staying the course.

Look, if anyone believes that this wasn't an effort to influence an election by limiting candidates for a seat or office, that person lives in fantasy land. If it was so inconsequential, why did Sestak make such a big deal out of it several times? If it was really nothing, why mention it at all? Now we are being treated to a bunch of stories, retractions and out and out lies. Here's what we are being told: Nothing important happened. There's nothing to see here. I'm telling the truth and I was telling the truth and I will be telling the truth. The only problem I have is that Sestak's truth doesn't seem to be backed up by facts.

As my friend would say: "Oh the lies. The lies. How can these people not be burning in Hell from all the lies?"

FB

Health Care Misconceptions, Cancer, Kids and the VA

Four years ago, my son was diagnosed with T-Cell leukemia. All of this occurred before Obama was elected and somehow sold the American public on the idea that the American health system was broken and needed to completely overhauled. Sure, anytime one has a huge system, one os going to experience problems. People will be discriminated against, insurance companies will try to limit coverage and with anything as extended as four years of cancer treatments, there will be billing problems. But this is a far cry from a system broken beyond repair.

As my circle of international friends found out about it, I got a bunch of comments. I expected these comments to tout how much better my son would be treated in each friends country. I have friends in Sweden, Denmark, Belgium, Italy, the Czech Republic, Germany and France and some in China and Korea. So I got phone calls and a few emails. Here is the gist of the responses. The actual statement is from a President of a health care company in Denmark that make an artificial heart. She was previously an RN and has worked in the medical field for over thirty years. Here's the statement: "You should get down on your knees and thank God every day your son is an American citizen and you live in America. The care he will get is so much better than any place else in the world that a real comparison cannot be made."

I was shocked to a d egree because a friend who lived in France consistently touted how well the French system was dealing with his parents who were in their eighties at the time. He was comparing the "free" system there with the "paid" system here and it sure seemed that his father, at least, was getting care he would never have gotten here. I found out later that his father was quite wealthy and had purchased private policies. Yes the French state did pick up some costs for in-home nursing but his major medical procedure was paid for with cash in part and a supplemental policy he had purchased for himself and his wife. The person the state brought in was not a nurse but was a woman from a local village who did things like house keeping and cooking while his father was recovering. Yes, my friend misrepresented the whole of the French health care system and his motives are still unclear. Maybe it's like that condition where people who lose money gambling tell stories about how much them make from gambling. I really have no idea.

My son was making monthly visits to his oncologist by this time. When one it treated for cancer, remission starts immediately if one is responding to the course. Treatment is given and the cancer subsides and new cancers do no develop. If this condition does not happen, the course is changed to something more drastic. For leukemia, the courses have numbers. These numbers are not associated with years but are the number of the trial. My son was undergoing the course called 1976 B (It's called the Standard course.) and he was responding. Had he not been responding, the course would have changed and he may have had to move to a center that dealt with patients who do not respond to the standard course. Each case is reviewed by a panel which may be international. For childhood leukemia there is something called the COG (Children's Oncology Group) and it is a bunch of oncologists who meet online or over phone and discuss each case. When that happens, each patient can get the latest successes from a number of different sources. The COG is international in scope. (Subsequently, I met an oncologist from Italy who was a member of the COG and he also commented that success rates in America are higher than those in the rest of the world for a number of reasons.)

On one of the visits, the oncologist was moving offices. Materials kept in the back office, like case files, were now kept within sight of the waiting room. There were two different folders: one was blue and one was red. The blue folders took up about three feet by six feet of shelf space. There were approximately three times as many red folders than blue so I asked what the different colors meant. The office director told me that the blue folders were patients with insurance and the red folders were people being treated who did not have insurance and could not afford to pay for treatment. I asked if the government was paying for them and she said,"In part. We get some money from the government but nothing close to how much it really costs. We just absorb the costs."

I asked how they got reimbursed and she said they didn't in general but there were some private foundations they could appeal to which the did. So here we have people getting treated by a cancer center even though they couldn't pay. Regardless of what anyone thinks about health insurance, this doesn't seem like a broken system to me. Here was a doctor treating patients even though they couldn't pay and interestingly, he wasn't upping every other patients bills to compensate for what he was losing with the patients who couldn't pay.

It's hard for me to accept the facts we were given in regards to doctors and insurance companies, by the administration to "sell" health care reform. The facts didn't match what I was being told in the real world in this circumstance. It was the only I could really examine and the facts turned out different that the misconceptions being used to justify a huge government incursion into the healthcare system. We already have government involvement with senior citizens, Medicare and similar state run health care systems. We also have the Veteran's Administration.

Now, I do have some experience with the VA. I am a veteran with six years military service and am honorably discharged. I met a guy who was a beach buster in WWII. He served in the Pacific Campaign and was involved in five beach landings earning two Silver Stars. He entered the VA hospital and I went to visit him. I couldn't find a nurse or doctor or anyone on the ward where he was bedded. The care was appalling due to lack of resources. I went to visit my friend by he asked me to help the other guys who were in some pretty dire straights. I'm not going to detail what I did but suffice it to say I spent a day there and got some basic (non-medical) things accomplished. Now that is a system that is broken in many ways. After I finished what I was doing, I walked around and found a remarkable disparity in treatment: Some wards had adequate personnel and others did not. It didn't seem to matter what was being treated or age and just appeared to center around resource allocation.

It's government run healthcare and it's broken and needs and overhaul. I couldn't help but come away with the impression that the private system was adjusting to problems and was working but the government system was not adjusting to problems and was broken. Maybe someone else has experience in contradiction to mine and would be willing to state his experience. As far as I can tell, we were lied to to achieve a goal and that goal is the eventual socialization of healthcare following European models. By the way, the EU is falling apart and the social democracies are rapidly falling into disarray. The wonderful French system touted by my friend is failing on a massive level and the costs are rising way beyond the French private system to support it.

FB

Is there a Gay solution to Homosexuality in the Military Services?

Few know who Alfred Korzybski is or what he wrote about. Interestingly, among his students were state senator Hiakawa, science fiction writer Robert Heinlein and Scientology Founder and author L. Ron Hubbard. Korzybski founded the school of General Semantics and also founded the Institute for non-Aristotilian Thought. They have a cool logo that looks similar to Albrecht Durer's famous cartouche.

Korzybski basically stated that words make a difference and that most miscommunication was the result of people applying different meanings to the same words. He reportedly said: "The problem isn't that one plus one is two, The problem is what "is" means. Recently president Clinton took obfuscation to a whole new level when he questioned the meaning of a word in response to a question. His famous quote echoed Korzybski when he stated: "That depends on what your definition of "is" is. So words mean something. Nazi and other totalitarian propagandists understand the power and importance of words. Words and what one says is important.

This brings up the issue of "gays" serving in the military and the repeal of "Don't ask, Don't tell." The idea of the founders was that the majority rule but they have to take minority concerns into consideration. They thought that this would be optimal because it meant the majority group couldn't legislate against a minority simply because they were such. Sadly, the ideal of this concept hasn't always held. Due to demagogic or dogmatic political pressure, simple things like common respect get lost in interpersonal interactions. So when did "gay" become the identifier for homosexuality? We had the "Gay '90s" (1890s) and the word certainly did not mean people who practice same sex sex. Use of the word "gay" obfuscates what is really occurring.

Homosexuals do serve in the military. They have always served in the military in various capacities. Interestingly, covert services and so-called spy organizations seem to have a disproportionate number of homosexuals. Maybe it's the nature of secrecy. Until recently, homosexuals were socially stigmatized if they were open. So since people already lived a secret life, in a way, covert service might make a good fit. Since no studies have been done to determine the veracity of this, it will have to remain speculation. But hidden homosexuals have always served the the military as they have in the rest of society.

Serving in the military is not like working for IBM or GE or Alcoa. When a person enlists or takes a commission, he serves in an organization of which the CEO is the president of the United States. Soldiers also freely give up some protections afforded civilians. Soldiers are controlled by the UCMJ or Uniform Code of Military Justice. There are substantial differences with this system as opposed to the American system of jurisprudence. Soldiers give up a lot of rights taken for granted by civilians. A quick example is deployment. When a soldier is ordered to deploy on an action, the soldier has no say over whether he goes or not. If he doesn't show up or doesn't deploy, he can be tried via court martial for dereliction of duty. There is no analog in the private sector. Also, a soldier cannot openly criticize his direct command. To do so is considered insubordination and carries a stiff punishment. So the rights and privileges most people take for granted simply don't exist for soldiers. With the change to an all-volunteer (no draft) military, soldiers voluntarily agree to this system. Soldiers agree to abide by the limitations of the UCMJ.

Several people have asked: Since homosexuals are already serving, what's the big issue about them serving openly? If a person is a soldier, one would have to suspect that homo or hetero orientation aside, heroism and the ability to conduct combat operations would be the same. There doesn't seem to be any kind of quid quo pro that states that heteros equate with better soldiers.

However, outside of combat there could be potential problems. These have cropped up as women have entered the ranks to a greater extent. When there may be a problem is when sexual favors are demanded for promotion or job assignments. This may exist now but because of don't ask, don't tell, aspirants are protected from active recruiting by homosexuals the same as women and men of lower ranks are protected from superiors of the opposite sex. The difference is that hetero people can meet and date and unless lines of propriety are crossed, the existing Code of Military Conduct controls behavior. For example, officers and enlisted cannot fraternize. But what if we have open homosexuality? Would the same rules hold true or would the entire social structure in the military break down under the pressure of a minority?

Make no mistake about it, hetero culture far exceeds homo culture in all military branches and is not differentiated from sex. WACs, Women Marines or Soldiers are not predisposed to homosexuality. (This of course recognizes that sometimes people experiment sexually while retaining a primary orientation. It's a common male fantasy to have sex with two women at the same time. For the women to do this, they must be sexually liberated to the point were homosexuality isn't a soul-crushing stigma. For some reason both men and women find female homosexuality acceptable while they find male homosexuality unacceptable. Maybe is has to do with the whole beauty factor but there don't seem to be any clear reasons that can be stated with certainty.)

So would open homosexuality break down unit cohesion? I think this would depend on how hetero subordinates respond to homo leadership. In a country where homosexuality was open and long standing, this may be less of a problem. In America, however, hetero orientation in the military carries military culture. While there are members who engage in all kinds of alternative behavior, any sexually based system would influence military culture, unit cohesion and camaraderie. While individual homosexual behavior is tolerated by many, forced acceptance would be a disaster. If we apply the stupidity of affirmative action, it would mean that a certain number of homosexuals get promoted to fill unrealistic quotas. This would destroy aspiration in many individuals. It also might create a situation where people identify with homosexuality to access the special privileges that will come with acceptance simply to "Balance the Scales" after so many years of oppression. In a sense, we are creating a situation where not only homosexuals serve openly but they must be deferred to in all matters.

Our country was never founded on the idea that the rules a minority live under have to be accepted by the majority. In a sense, this would be like forcing the majority of Americans to defer to Sharia law instead of the constitution and the rule of law established in states and cities.

There is no reason to challenge or change "don't ask, don't tell" other than to politically satisfy a campaign promise.

FB

Obama's Record, World Leadership and the death of the Constitution

When now president Obama was a candidate in 2008, I did some internet based research on his record of accomplishments. This was not hard but finding any kind of linear progression was difficult. Often there would be conflicting statements about his involvement in various enterprises and organizations so it was somewhat problematic to really nail down a consistent record. One thing became clear as I kept examining: Outside of college graduation, Obama never finished anything he started. Since I don't have his transcripts, his actual involvement in University must be taken at face value. There were no list of projects he initiated and finished. No list of people he had helped get established in whatever enterprise they may have desired. No list of graduate projects or organizations he was involved with. As a community activist, there is no record of anything he really accomplished. There were lots of things and projects he was briefly associated with that went on to fruition but they completed after he had moved on to another brief encounter with a new project. It became quite apparent that he was a starter but not a finisher.

One wonders what his aspirations are leading him towards while he is president. He will get kudos for passing the health care bill regardless of how it ends up in actuality. It's such a foggy mess that it's difficult to understand the total ramifications of the crazy thing. But that's not Obama's fault. One could say that his glazing over details in his rush to get "something" done led to supporting a proposal that might end up causing far more damage than good. But America has a history of enacting bills and laws with good intentions only to have them backfire when the reality of the bill finally struck home. Prohibition comes to mind right away but there are many others. The Cooper-Church bill seemed positive but horribly crippled our ability to conduct foreign policy.

I think that for Obama, the presidency is nothing more than a stepping stone on his path to be the leader of a world government of which America is not the shining light drawing other, less fortunate, countries to emulate but a world government where the Constitution is a quaint document that has no meaning in the current world. It seems pretty clear that he is quite willing to put America in a secondary position so that a kind of social equality based on some European idea of social democracy becomes the law of the planet rather than extending the greatness of the constitution to other countries.

I think Obama is quite willing to support the idea that something like Sharia law stands along side the idea of American democracy established by the founders. I think he views Islamic law equal with the constitution. Obama may win a second term because so few people really examine or have the time to examine what is happening to the rule of law over the rule of man in America. The idea of majority rule and minority rights has been perverted to special interest rule and government suppression of any protests.

I have friends around the world and to a person, they comment that the greatest aspect of America is the Constitution (Bill of Rights) which states quite plainly what government CANNOT do. There is no document that comes close in any other country or any other land from any time present or past and everyone who has an interest in America but is a citizen of a different country understands just how incredible this document is. Even friends in such liberal social democracies as Denmark, Belgium, Sweden and France marvel at the document drafted by the founders.

But Obama is a world citizen not an American. His view is loftier and grander in the sense of hiw own perspective of his place in the world. As he tries to make America into a European modeled social democracy, he is using forces that are antiAmerican in many ways. These forces think they are doing something nobel and great by destroying the American machine to which they attribute many of the worlds problems. It isn't uncommon to hear the statements similar to: "If we were more like Europe, more people would like us." or "Who cares if we are the leader of the world?" or "Why not try some of the same things that China does. After all, they are growing and out competing us in many ways. After all, it's not so bad in China." (The one that kills me is the willingness of Americans to abandon the space program.)

People forget that under the Chinese system, the whole idea of American justice does not exist. There is no Constitution defining limits of government but there are plenty of documents that define how people will behave under severe penalty. It's the same with the modern social democracies in Europe and to a lesser extent parts of Asia.

We are being fooled into thinking that everywhere and every country is pretty much the same and that in many places, people are substantially more free than in America. This is true in a way, they are free from thinking about government because to do so is illegal.

So as Obama leads us towards a new world where everyone is controlled by governance defined by sources outside America, one laments the death of the Constitution.

FB

Racial Profiling

With the new Arizona immigration law, many politicians are concerned with the "potential" for racial profiling. Well I hate to be factual but we have been racially profiling for quite some time. Where does this heinous act take place? Are people of color secretly being kept out of certain houses? Are non-whites being kept out of jobs? Not really. While these things may happen occasionally, the real racial profiling is done by the government. It's called Affirmative Action.

Affirmative Action is racial profiling on a national level. It's illegal. We aren't supposed to pass laws or enact programs based on race alone for any reason. Why have we come to accept this kind of profiling which only benefits a specific segment of the population without question? On the same hand, any program that establishes quotas of any kind are supposed to be illegal yet they exist all over the place. Walk into any government office and check out the level of minority employees. It's estimated that blacks make up about twelve to fifteen percent of the population yet if one goes into most government offices, one is struck by the more than fifty to sixty percent of workers who are black. How is this possible? If the government is really balanced, shouldn't the level of employees roughly match the population? In areas with high hispanic populations, shouldn't the offices be filled with hispanics?

The only answer is racial profiling on a massive scale. We are worried to death about religion and state separation. (Actually the founders wanted government to be influenced by religion but they didn't want government influencing religion.) but don't blink at systematized racial profiling on a massive level.

Politicians will scream about a little state trying to find a way to control it's own southern border and limit the unending invasion. They will condemn the "potential" of profiling while promoting their own, self-serving brand of profiling which in the end damages America as much as the illegal invasion.

FB

Census Blues

There are some points about the census and the hiring practices that need to be examined. I will point out a few that seem obvious to me. Remember, the census was the idea of Benjamin Franklin to determine population ebb and flow so that people could be more accurately represented. Anyway, on with the criticism.

Hiring Practices and Training:

1. Many census offices would hire as many as three times the number of people needed for the work. There are reports that for jobs with as few as twelve places to visit, there were over thirty people trained. Questions to the local census office led to the statement that the numbers of people had to be high because so many dropped out. Little thought was given to the fact that people dropped out because with that many trainees, the amount of work available for each person was so insignificant that continuing with the process was a bigger waste of time and money than doing nothing. Many people did the training just to get the money for sitting for a week. Census workers were told that working for the census would qualify one for unemployment insurance. Then the supervisors were told to limit the hours each person worked to just under the amount that would qualify for the insurance.

Conclusion: The hiring practices were terrible across the board and it it quite apparent that the numbers were political rather than practical. After all, if the census can report that x number of people were hired and trained, it makes unemployment figures look much better. In addition, the same people were hired several times but the hours they were given were not enough to justify a full time job or even a good temporary job. Still, each time they were rehired, they were trained and treated as a new employee which allowed some to be hired as many as five times and count as five jobs created. Because the hiring practices were based on falsehoods and misrepresentations, getting a solid answer from anyone was/is impossible.

2. Training was often laborious, tedious and misdirected. There are many different tasks associated with the census. They go from examining the population of group homes, halfway houses and communal living to home interviews and follow-up investigations. Trainers, who were in general barely qualified to instruct were spending the majority of training time relating personal stories. Much of the training was so bogged down in minutiae that the goal of the training was lost. Once in a while a trainer would break though and reorganize the training materials but in general the "approved" training was completely misdirected. There were training sessions where people simply read from the book. They would go around the training class and each person would read a paragraph or two. Some of the trainees had language problems and while they could comprehend quite well, reading was laborious. However, the training slogged on.

Redundancy and Obfuscation:

1. For each home address plotted, at least three people were involved and in some cases four: They hired a bunch of people to go out and use GPS to plot houses by address and GPS coordinates. They they hired a separate group to go out and manually track the same houses. Then they put the two lists together and hired a third group to go out and resolve the discrepancies. Then they hired another group to verify that the group checking the first two groups were accurate. During this entire time, the census was mailed out and most people filled out the form and sent it in.

2. The carbon footprint of the census must have been incredible. In one part of the census, time cards had to be submitted daily. These then had to be taken to the regional center to be processed. In addition to the driving time required to plot the houses, the time card situation was incredible. Some of the supervisors were driving as much at 400 miles a day to get time cards processed alone. Meanwhile the people doing the house and address verification were driving to do that and also driving, in some cases, incredible distances just to submit a time card. All this had to be done within a specified 40 hour week because overtime was forbidden. So the way the problem was resolved was to give each person just a few real working hours. That way, the numbers could be inflated and the driving time which was paid for at $.50 (fifty cents) per mile piled up. With the ridiculous situation of the time cards, people were driving, taking hours and mileage for the task of turning in time cards. This had nothing to do with taking any kind of numbers for the census. Many of the early tasks were simply plotting houses to ensure a correct mailing. So people were driving all over to plot houses, then drive further to turn in time cards and all this had to be kept under a certain dollar limit so people would not qualify for unemployment. So. . . hire as many people as you can. The more you hire and the less they do, the better for the numbers and the better it fits into the overall census program.

The Census is supposed to be controlled by the Department of Commerce. However, the 2010 census is being controlled by the White House. This was one of the first things that Obama did after achieving office. This means that the 2010 census will be controlled by Rham Eemanuel a political appointee with no confirmation from congress and certainly not a person voted into office. So how does one spell corruption? Could it be C-E-N-S-U-S?

3. The amount of materials produced for each task was larger than all the works published by the GPO. Each job came with a set of maps of a specific area and surrounding maps. A case for one house had over 200 additional pages of information that had nothing to do with actual tasking. The cost in paper and laser tone alone must have been obscene. Many times the maps were completely useless. On some N was S and/or W/E. In other words some were useless. Each map set contained cover pages and legends and much information on separate pages that could have been condensed on one page.

Promotion of the incompetent:

1. Typical government. Promote those who accuse others and make other people look bad so you can look better. The game within the census is a joke from the top down. This kind of organization cannot develop unless the top people are looking for clones to promote below them thus ensuring their own safety. Because the top echelon is incompetent, the lower echelons echo the top. If anyone does too well, they simply are not hired back because this makes everyone else look bad. A low level person was assigned a task to map houses, most were horrible and not correct but the person was promoted. This person attacked anyone who questioned the bad work and because of the stupid organizational structure, nobody checked to see if the work was good or not. Instead, the people questioning the veracity were themselves accused of violating census guidelines.

Overall Assessment:

This was and still is a botched operation costing far more than it should and there is little assurance that the actual count will be correct. Several cases were homes were second or third vacation homes were treated the same as a primary residence. So a family may be counted more than once. Legal or illegal immigration status was never questioned and while it isn't in the scope of the census to determine residency, in an area like Texas, New Mexico, Arizona and Southern California, the whole census would be skewed by the inclusion of non-residents. Was this Franklin's goal? I strongly doubt it.

The census makes a big deal out of saying that if one works for the census one can then get unemployment. Well this is fine and dandy and if one was unemployed for a significant amount of time would seem like a good thing. The problem is that for most tasks, census work didn't provide enough hours to qualify for unemployment. Does bait and switch sound familiar?

America has achieved the ultimate when government can run an operation that costs way more than it should and is peopled by those educated in the same system. We have come full circle with incompetence and sloth. The Obama White House may be new and have been elected by a majority but the actions of this group shout corruption? How long will people assume that current census figures are a fiction designed to achieve some kind of political end at odds with the Constitution?

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Barack Obama is not Morgan Freeman

So did the American public really elect an untested candidate with few accomplishments or did they elect Morgan Freeman the actor? Freeman played the president in at least two films and in both he was measured and acted, well. . . presidential. His acting convinced the American public who get their main entertainment from movies, that a black president would be the same. So while Bush hatred and the democrat campaign to demonize him worked to a degree, the brilliant acting of Morgan Freeman cinched the election for now president Obama.

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"Avatar" :"Dances with Wolves" meets "The Empire Strikes Back"

"Avatar," directed by James Cameron, is certainly eye candy. All day-glo and varilight with seamless computer animation makes for a gorgeous sight. Probably nothing since "The Wizard of Oz" has made such a leap in the use of special effects. Yes, the wow factor is certainly there.

The movie looked great. The potential for Sci-Fi at the highest levels. The protagonist rolls out of the troop carrier to an alien sky with a giant planet and smaller moons. An alien environment with strange foliage and landscape. As our hero rolls on, (He has been previously wounded in combat serving as a Marine.) his way is partially blocked by a giant earth moving machine. It rolls by in all its technological majesty and then one notices arrows stuck in the tires. What?? Arrows in the tires? Somehow, the natives on this planet are so unsophisticated that they shoot arrows (The chances that a separate society on a far distant planet developing anything remotely similar to the culture of Amerinds is a pretty far stretch but this move takes that premise to the point of ridicule.) at the tires of earth moving machines equipped with rubber tires. (These things have been there for a while and they haven't figured out that arrows, even dipped with extreme toxins won't hurt the machinery?) From that point on, the credibility of the script went awry. The people who wrote this mess were grinding their own personal axes and the result was as sophomoric an exercise in biased intentions gone wrong as one could imagine. It is a textbook case in self-indulgence.

Here are some of the various themes in the movie. Some are obvious and others attempt disguise. I could extend this blog into a tome of criticism but we're only dealing with a movie and as extensive as the form is, it isn't a novel where events can be worked out more satisfactorily. In novels, such heavy-handedness would earn the label: "pot boiler." What we have here is a cinematic pot boiler so shot through with liberal and left-leaning sentiment that it more closely resembles a political parody than something serious. Movies aren't working when you are pounding your head from the sheer affront of such simplistic portrayals. So onward:

!. The US, with a high technology based military, doesn't understand the simple elegance of and steps on the rights and sovereignty of less technological cultures. The entire movie is anti-American in its intent and anglos are especially made to look insensitive and ruthless towards anything not them.

Comment: Sorry James, but the way of life on Pandora (The planet where the action takes place.) is so violent (Several times the comment is made that to venture outside of the safety of the compound is to risk death by any number of creatures who will kill you and eat your eyes like ju-ju-bees.) that it would seem impossible that any affront to the Na'vi would be beyond their capability to deal with it. A culture growing out of such violence would be tough. They would have developed a technology that would allow them to survive in that environment. As far as the American association, it's pretty obvious so I won't dwell. The Na'vi are a closed, insular society which is just how the Americans are presented but it's easy to overlook because Sully, the protagonist, has issues with loyalty, his military oath and his adoption of an alien system that didn't turn its back on him.

Not so subtly pointed out was the fact that he was wounded in combat (Bolivia or Venezuela or some such SA ongoing revolution.) but couldn't get treatment becuase he didn't have enough money (Based on the current economy -- what ever that is.) and the heartless VA left him to rot. What a crock! Yes, there are abuses in the VA system and it is grossly underfunded but the type of person in that system would not drop allegiance and join any kind of insurgency without a mental breakdown of an order that would render him useless as a person. But the whole premise is a not so subtle shot at the idea that enlisted ranks and the officer corps are treated disproportionately. This isn't the case. There is a point where his supposed commanding officer tells him he could rotate back and get some scars fixed but he "decides" to stay and keep them as a reminder of how harsh the environment could be. Gotta love those scars because they are worn like Prussian dueling scars at the turn of the 19th to 20th century. What a joke.

2. The indigenous population is known as the Na'vi. But the main interaction is with a specific tribe of Na'vi called the Omaticaya. They are such a loose metaphor for Amerinds that it's foolish. So the invading Americans treated the Indians with disdain bordering on hubris. The simile is foolish. Invaders always treat the conquered so.

Comment: Indians, Indians, Indians. Mohawk haircuts, loincloths, bows and arrows, horses, Indian shouts, Indian jewelry, (or something like it.) and barely-covered-breasted women. Ok, we get it, they're Indians. Here is the not so loose comparison. No need for a double entendre. This film is a single entendre and it's hack. There are many tribes in the Amazon that are being relocated and, in some cases, wiped out by encroaching mechanization. There are several movies that have used this plot device including "Medicine Man" starring Sean Connery. But this idea: that all mechanization is evil compared to the wonderfully simplistic appearing life style of the indigenous is too pat for words. By the way, many "tribes" in the Amazon practiced human sacrifice and ingestion until recently. Does the word hackneyed describe this "too easy" approach to establish tension?

3. Businesses and corporations are evil and only care about profits at the expense of human (or alien) life. Of course, in Avatar, the aliens are the members of the corporation and their mercenary killers.

Comment: How many plays, mini-operas and full operas ("Wozzeck" by Alban Berg comes to mind where the protagonist is actually the victim of medical experimentation.) and about a billion masters theses concepts have presented this concept as if it's something new and original. This is Freshman thinking at best. Even the contemporary composer Paul Drecher wrote a mini-opera based on the same idea: Corporations are bad and out to do evil. The hero escapes and destroys the corporation's evil plans. It's still surprising that Shakespeare didn't use this idea as one of the five main plot devices. Oh yeah, if the corporation would have been a girl, it may have worked: Find the company, lose the company, find the company, bail with a golden parachute.

4. In Avatar, mercenaries -- and by comparison all American soldiers -- are bloodthirsty killers with no conscience, care or soul. They are a motley crew of mostly anglos who hate any and all minorities including the Na'vi. They represent a rough comparison to American and British military contractors like Blackwater, (Now known as Xe.) Aegis and a host of other names. But the obvious comparison to American foreign policy is like a pie in the face.

Comment: Mercenaries are supposed to be bad. Even Bruce Willis was bad in "Tears of the Sun." He was supposed to be a cold-hearted SEAL who gets a conscious and defies his superiors orders. What a joke. Career ending decisions made at the drop of a buzz cut. But mercs are presented as bad because they supposedly operate outside the strict confines of government regulations. But, in reality, the most oppressive systems have not been mercenary based systems but governments. Of note are Nazis (National Socialists), Russian and Chinese Communists, the Khmer Rouge, the current regime in Mynamar (Used to be Burma.) and any of a number of small republics established under a totalitarian system. Corporate mercs would be constrained by any number of self-regulating controls centered around profit. The only entities that can work without regard to long-term profit and long-term consideration are governments.

5. The Na'vi are peaceful people (We only see one tribe of supposedly many.) who are in tune with their environment, don't pollute, wear elaborate clothes and are ordered in a typically tribal orientation with chief and shamans and the rest. These people live in this configuration without question: everyone fits. They are one with the environment. Nothing is wasted and no life taken without ritual of some kind.

Comment: Well if this is the case, of what need warriors? Who are these people, so integrated into their environment with more than enough food to eat and a rigidly established social structure, going to war against? Why do they need a class of men called warriors? Why aren't they all mediators or facilitators instead of warriors? This is a major plot problem and one that doesn't cut the mustard with close examination.

Here's another point: Our protagonist/hero is shown the ways of this warrior group by the chief's daughter. The writers have no concept of how these cultures really are organized. Out on the Discovery or Travel channel, there are two guys called Olly and Mark. They go into nontechnological cultures in the Amazon, New Guinea and other areas and film what life is like in these cultures. The women have specific jobs in these cultures but in each and every case, it is considered a dishonor to be taught by the women. This is because the women do gathering and farming chores while the men do hunting and ritual chores. So for Sully to be shown the "warrior's way" by a girl would have forever left him powerless in that culture. The real warriors wouldn't have anything to do with him. (They did shun him in the movie but no reason was given other than that he was a "Dreamwalker" or alien.) Yeah, I know it's supposed to be a movie but in reality, it's a thinly disguised set of political messages. Several critics and observers of aesthetics in culture have pointed out that art and politics rarely mix with good results for both. The same can be said about this movie too. (It is great to look at though.)

We should be aware that more advanced technological societies usually crush those without similar tools. It's the way of the world and one would suspect holds true throughout Universe. Several Sci-Fi writers have speculated that it would be a disaster if we ever were really visited by agents from an alien society. If they could get here given the vastness of space, they would be as advanced over us as we are over ants.

There are two big blockbusters made by Cameron. One is "Titanic" which was simply horrible and the other is "Avatar" which is visually stunning. In both of these, there is conflict between the haves and the have-nots, the upper and lower classes, privilege and those controlled. Both movies are similar in that respect: Both promote class warfare with the obvious dominant group portrayed in such a negative light it reminds one of attempting a fine oil painting with a roller designed for painting walls. In "Titanic" the rich and privileged locked the poor below decks so they could all escape. (It was reported that some of the gates to "steerage class" were locked preventing easy egress by those below. But this was done by the ship's crew, not by the passengers. As it turned out, there weren't enough life boats for even the rich passengers. Was there disparity in boat assignment? Probably but it wasn't a plot against anyone it was simply a matter of survival. People do strange things when survival is on the line. ) Only by the derring-do of a heroic figure were the gates to Hell opened and the oppressed given a chance at life. What a crock.

In "Avatar" there are so many left leaning political messages that it's like being beaten with copies of Mao's "Little Red Book," "The Communist Manifesto", "Das Kapital" and the combined writings of Lenin, Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot and a host of other socialist/communist driven tyrants who want to destroy imagination and enterprise in the name of social justice.

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Politically Incorrect? Is Maher a patriot or what?

What exactly is Political Correctness? Everyone seems to know what it is but nobody can really define it. It's a philosophy, law, ethic and trend without being anything concrete. Some years back, the comedian Bill Maher had a show called "Politically Incorrect Theater." One could actually never figure out what he meant by that title but supposedly he was going to be irreverent with everything adopted by the politically correct crowd. What a strange thing then when watching this so-called theater that the reality was that Maher was more PC than the most strident liberal democrat. What his brand of PC did was to lampoon patriotic people and groups groups and anyone else considered pro-American by some self-anointed group of liberal thinkers including himself. (His recent excursion into belief and faith is a film called "Religuous." One would have wished that he would have taken his cues from "Inherit the Wind" which also made a point to highlight the inconsistencies found in Christianity. It's an easy target. Notice that in all his anti-religious banter that he doesn't dare offend Islam. He shies away from discussions of Islam and instead focuses on Christianity as if he has discovered something new. Sorry Bill, you're late to the game and later still at finding obvious flaws in church doctrine. But hey, he's a big name and commands a pretty fair audience. The only problem is that he's boring. Every show is the same: Bash republicans, patriots and American policy yet stand for some kind of global government. He would like America to lose in a big way and be taken over by some benevolent conqueror like China. After all, China is the new poster child of radical chic leftists. Their parties must be tired affairs so devoid of original thought that somnambulism is the main course. It's no wonder these people want to freely use drugs. With such limited imagination, anything that sparks a glint of creativity is looked upon as God.

His and other's brand of PC was/is, in effect, nothing more than statism under the guise of protest: Everything the state did was fine and any anti-American sentiment was good and was supported. In fact, the more anti-American and divisive, the more it is presented as hip and cool. If you support the ridiculous sentiments often offered by Maher and friends, the cooler you were/are. (His program on HBO is now called Real Time with Bill Maher. I don't think trite and hackneyed quite covers what happens on that show. For a real alternative look at news stories delivered irreverently, check out "Red Eye." It's on Fox cable or satellite at midnight. You can get some of the shows on the web. Funny and irreverent and not politically correct in a way that Maher can only imagine.)

How could this have happened? Why is it considered cool and hip to be unAmerican? Why is love of country considered the domain of the barely educated and inbreeders? If anyone can offer a reasonable explanation, let him come forth and offer such. But it is my fear that any real criticism will be ad hominem at best. There have been some fine patriots who have not been Chauvinists but there are also people who drape the flag over their shoulders like a vampire cape and attempt to suck reason out of blind adherence. Wait a minute, that sounds like Bill Maher.

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Journatorials: Let the Obfuscation Continue

Well, here it is. A major news outlet is openly promoting a book written about our Dear Leader (President Obama) by one of their own. Could there be anything as telling? It's the indoctrinated sheep leading the rest of the flock to slaughter. News media is controlled in many way but it is consistently slanted left.

Look, if one drives across America and only listens to broadcast radio, one is struck by two major trends. The first is religious radio of any number of sorts. The second is conservative radio. The two aren't bound and are often at odds. But in most of America, these two formats dominate the AM and FM (To a lesser extent.) bands. But if one watches television in any of the major or smaller cities from network to local broadcasts, one is struck but the overwhelmingly liberal slant of all stories. Even in cities with largely conservative constituents, the local TV news is still incredibly liberal.

Per station, if one includes all radio and all television, a case could be made that the media is mostly conservative but this is an illusion. The illusion is that a radio station may have low wattage and only have an audience of a few hundred at any given time while even small television outlets have much larger audiences. So audience reach is skewed to the liberal side even if station numbers show a different story.

In print, it's the same proportion. Because so many small papers utilize wire services and larger papers for stories, the overwhelming bias is liberal and democratically slanted.

If one seriously reads articles and spends the time separating hard news facts from opinion, the impression is soon reached that the old axiom of "Who, What, When, Where, Why and How" have been replaced with "What" and the slant to a specific viewpoint. In simple words, most journalism has been replaced with editorials that use facts based on current events and real-world occurrences. In the fiction world, this is called expository fiction. In the news world, we should call these abortions Journatorials.

Watching the spate of opinion programs, the democratic side speaks from a set of talking points and are actively trying to apply simple slogans to difficult situations. Take the recent failed bombing in Times Square. If one were to only look at CNN and MSNBC the view would be completely different that if one watched FOX from the cable or satellite side. The broadcast stations don't even rate a view because they are so biased. But here we have democratic mouthpieces uttering such ridiculous statements in support of anything Obama that the only conclusion that can be derived is that these people are told to lie and lie they do. Lie after lie after lie to so distort and confuse the situation that a reasonable person cannot possibly fathom fact from fiction let alone find a truth. Why wasn't this as prevalent under Bush or was it? Did so-called conservative commentators forgive every Bush act and make inappropriate comparisons to Clinton? It may have been there but I just didn't see it. I don't recall such a concerted program to support a president since

Pravda would have loved to have such control. The democrats have taken the art of obfuscation to the level of Goebbels. Who would have figured that it would be the democrats who would become the largest proponents of totalitarian and fascistic thinking? Frank Benjamin thinks that Benjamin Franklin is rolling over in his grave. The goals of the founders, for all their flaws and missteps, have been completely perverted by democrats rushing towards power and they are using jounatorials to so pervert facts as to make them non-apprehendable.

G. B. Shaw wrote in the play "Don Juan in Hell" that people mistake opinion for intelligence. It is a tragic flaw that most just don't have the time or energy to really examine the absolute lies they are being fed day in and day out by the major news outlets and so-called opinion makers. One wonders if the American Republic and withstand 24/7 news when it is so distorted and untruthful. Harrison Bergeron would say "Turn it off. Turn the media off and shut out the noise that is nothing more than lies and obfuscation designed to sell soap."

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Government solutions solve the problems of the world

Years ago, a special aired on PBS about the proliferation of nuclear plants. Of interest, after Three Mile Island, was a plant in Tennessee and one in Georgia. Both took novel solutions to prevent something similar to TMI. The French model was examined where all the plants were of the same basic design and as upgrades were implemented as the technology matured, it would be applied to all existing plants. Since they were all based on the same model, upgrades would fit right in with existing infrastructure.

But as the special pointed out, America doesn't work that way. Plants are remarkably individual depending on area, demand and local ordinances. In a socialist society controlled by a central government, these are not even considered. So what works in France might not work here at all.

It turned out, that at the time, over 87% of the power in France was supplied by nuclear. This has since grown to well over 90%. However, France is a miniscule country compared to America and their power consumption isn't the same as ours. In addition, there is no real profit connected with power generation and any potential shortfalls can be made up through taxation. Interestingly, power isn't free in France even though it is totally supplied by the government.

Anyway, back to the plants in America. The producers of the special interviewed several of the executives of the proposed and developing plants with a varying of opinions. However, one statement rang through and it was a remarkable statement that made it through the PBS biased editing. The statement was: "Government doesn't look out for you. If you have concerns, you need to address them yourselves. If you allow government to make decisions for you, you can guarantee that government only makes decisions based on government needs."

Shocking? Wasn't the government supposed to look out for us? After all, wasn't this the country where the government represented the people and took care of the people? According to the local groups that approved the plants, such was not the case. For every safety measure they wanted, they had to fight government officials. The group in Georgia made one simple request. If the request was met, the construction of the plant could go forward and safety issues. Here was the request: All executives from the power company managing the site and all upper management had to live next to the plant. If the plant was so safe, the executives and management could prove it by moving their families there.

An interesting thing happened. The original plan was all of a sudden found inadequate and a new plant design was offered. A compromised was reached with the power company. While the Board and upper executives were exempt from the residency requirement, the managers were not. The reason this compromise was achieved was because the Board and upper execs didn't even live in the state. The power company had concerns all across America so they were freed from the residency requirement.

Now, had the local people left it up to government, who knows what they would have ended up with? Since many municipal projects are subject to minority set asides and lowest bid contracts along with a level of official corruption that makes Baksheesh in Turkey look like a simple tip, there was no guarantee that a plant overseen by the government would be any safer that a plant that was the outcome of free market enterprise. See, if a company makes bad stuff, people don't buy it. But if the government controls the process, shoddy construction, materials and processes can rise to the top for a number of reasons.

Now, the question was asked: Why didn't this happen in France? Well, it did. While the French did finally agree on a model, it came after a lot of failure. By the way, no more nuclear plants can be built in France and they are now taxing and allocating a lot of money for technology -- like wave and tidal systems -- to produce energy with the ultimate goal of reducing the number of nuclear plants over time.

It seems that while nuclear can be efficient, waste disposal is difficult and maintenance is difficult. Eventually, they will have to disassemble these plants and deal with the waste products and this is a major undertaking that makes the construction look simple. Over time and as technology improves, these difficulties will be overcome. Factor in human error and the actual safety record of the nuclear plants is quite impressive.

But back to the special. The bottom line was that people have to watch government and distrust government solutions. While the big lie is that government is watching out for you, it is more true and factual that government doesn't care about you at all unless you organize into a power bloc. As individuals, we are powerless against government.

You must be vigilant and watch government actions to ensure that something completely against your best interest isn't being sold as a solution to all your problems.

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Terrorist-Americans

We can't have a War on Terror or Terrorism. We can't call Islamic Terrorists, Islamic Terrorists because the illusion is being spread around that a group of terrorists have hijacked a religion for their own purposes. This, of course, is completely false. Islamic Terrorists are those followers of Islam who use terror to spread the Islamic way. It's that simple.

There are other practitioners of Islam who are not terrorists and who do not have the spread of Islam through violent means as their main purpose. These, or the ecstatic sects, love their music, songs, poetry, plays and find joy in festivals, communal sharing and such. Each year, there are many festivals, like the Fes Festival in Morocco, celebrating Islamic holidays and these are filled with music and performances and are attended by people from all around the world. The practitioners of militant Islam are at odds with these people and eventually the two sides within Islam will meet in conflict and the victor will determine whether Islam becomes a world partner or marginalizes into religious totalitarianism.

However, in America, we can't have such definitions. We can't call a terrorist such because the statement may be considered pejorative and God forbid we allow pejorative definitions. So along with all the other hyphenated Americans brought to us by political correctness that have done nothing more than break us up and cause dissent among people from different national and ethnic backgrounds, we need to add Terrorist-Americans.

There is good reason for this. As the ranks of terror organizations change, more will be from the core of America. They may be naturalized citizens or they may be born here and seek out terrorist activities out of boredom or some feeling of umbrage over some slight. But terror ranks will swell with American based terrorists.

So, in keeping with the politically correct notions about nomenclature, Terrorist-American should be added. After all, we don't want to offend the terrorists sensibilities.

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The selfish, unlawful invaders

Ok, let's have some compassion for poor and uneducated who illegally cross our borders to supposedly take jobs that no American will do. We must have feelings for these people who are just trying to better themselves. But look at it this way: These people want jobs at the expense of someone else. They are taking jobs away from people. Sure, a lot of the jobs are not so desired but they are jobs none-the-less.

We should call a spade a spade and admit that these people are selfish. They don't care about American laws or American citizens and only care about themselves. Once they are here, they demand services, representation and consideration above and beyond anything a third or fourth (Shorter or longer citizenship should not be forgotten.) generation American could expect.

For the most part, citizens who have been here a long time are taken for granted by politicians. Because they don't make noise and have rallies, they are considered powerless and useless for political purposes. The selfish get the most attention because like the spoiled brat, they make the most noise and scream the loudest until they get their way or someone pays attention to them.

We have elevated unlawful invaders to the status of immigrants and that name should be used with reverence not misused for law breakers. Soon, we will not have criminals of any sort. The reason being is that the word criminal demeans the self esteem of the class of people who resort to coercion or force to TAKE what they want from anyone else who has it.

So we can't call unlawful invaders just that, we must call them something soft and kind like undocumented workers or undocumented immigrants. This, my friends, is just wrong.

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Reverend Al et al: Once relevant icons who speak jibberish

Why do news stations still rely on a biased, outmoded thinker like Al Sharpton? Oh sure, he has roots in the civil rights movement but the good Reverend has offered little in the way of innovative thought or ideas to deal with the new realities of ethnic relations in America. In fact, it appears that his whole agenda is to keep alive racial thought that existed in the 1950s. Yes, we all suffer from intellectual ossification and it is often difficult to find thoughts that are relevant to youth who have benefited from the resolution of problems that were very real for the older generation. But at what point do reasonable people finally put people like the good Reverend and his ilk out to pasture?

I remember an old television show called "Amos and Andy." It was incredibly funny with an almost entirely black cast. However, many young black actors and actresses protested the continued airing of the show because they felt that it lacked relevancy and as long as it ran, they stood little chance of breaking into general broadcast. They were, of course, correct. The show was funny and supposedly presented different sides of the black experience from a comedic point of view. Whereas more modern black oriented television fiction deals with broad strokes (no pun intended) of family based interaction, "Amos and Andy" dealt with the individual traits of honesty, integrity, lying and forgiveness. The center of the television show was one George "Kingfish" Stevens and he was a con artist of sorts who prayed on his friend. The benefits of hard work and family values were stressed but they were values based on a white, nuclear family, not a black impoverished family. This did not denigrate the acting which for television of the late 1950s was quite good or the moral underpinnings of the show which could have come from Aesop. The show did not present blacks as inferior or less in any way but it certainly didn't jibe with black audiences who had grown from a completely different experience. (It must also be remembered, that the television version grew out of the radio show. The radio show contained not a single black actor or actress.)

The persistence of Reverend Al on telenews is kind of the same. In a sense, it's racial in a negative sense. Certainly there are better thinkers and younger, more energetic voices that would have a greater relevancy for the black community in general. It's easy to present the wild-voiced, conspiracy-around-every-corner old-line black activist but in a funny sense, it's almost like a political version of Stepin Fetchit. (For those of you who don't know this comedian, some research is in order.) In other words, because his views have so little relevancy and are so based in craziness, keeping him around is almost like keeping the uncle around who is descending into dementia but who every so often says something amusing at the family dinner.

The Congresswoman Maxine Waters throws verbal firebombs also but at least, her exposure in the news is minimized. Maybe people do understand when foolishness overwhelms even ratings but with all her lies, misrepresentations and outright foolishness, it's impossible to tell whether she is effective at anything other than getting reelected from a district that is 90%+ black.

So a good recommendation would be to shelve people like the good Reverend and Maxine and find others who speak with a rational mind and who are more interested in finding solutions to America's problems than stirring up racial problems so they can remain relevant.

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