Escape Artist

A Glimpse Into The Election in California

2008-11-05T10:23:00.000-08:00

Well I for one am glad this election is over, and not just from the standpoint of being an inspector for a precinct. Now I don't have to worry about what will happen if the McCain / Palin ticket wins which would not only put a Bush in McCain clothing into office, but also put a book banning, right wing, unqualified, wolf killing maniac second in line for the presidency. (see my hubpage on this issue at "Risky Business- Republican Candidates")

Ok, so here is what it was like for me as an inspector at a polling place this election. I started out with dread of the voters being semi-educated on the "Steal Back Your Vote" issue that has been online for sometime that failed (in my opinion) to point out that if you happen to live in a state where the legislature was NOT predominantly Republican then it was not likely that this would be an issue. Why dread? Well, one of the things the videos I saw stressed was to "refuse a provisional ballot and demand a "real" ballot. This was of concern because provisional ballots ARE real ballots IF you really are a registered voter. They are provisional because at the polls there is no way to verify that you in fact are a registered voter. There is no access to all the registration information when you are out there collecting the votes.

My fears were not to be realized (and being a believer in Murphy's law I believe this is because I was ready to handle it if it came up and I also did a little extra training of my pollworkers on WHY this was not an issue in California so they too were prepared.)

On arrival at my polling place, there was already a line of ten to twenty voters.. some had brought their folding chairs which made me wonder if they had been there all night. The line continued to be twenty to forty deep throughout the morning hours but tapered off slightly between about 12:30 and 1.30pm and while there was a steady turn out the rest of the day, it was the morning that was the rush.

Thankfully I had a really great team, most of whom were students (one who was not yet old enough to vote) who worked hard without complaint. They usually declined breaks of any length when offered and really put in a very full day. I could see them starting to tire as the day wore on, but they remained curteous and helpful and on the look out for the most common problems of a polling place. At one point I started giving them assignments to go take a walk around outside to stretch and get some air just so they would get a second wind. I also opened up my ice chest and shared raw almonds, string cheese and kebasa with some of the crew I knew had worked steadily and refused to take breaks. Another thing I did towards the end of the voting day was to assign them each some time to review the materials on closing so we would all be on the same page. Only one of my crew failed to do that, and it was not one of the students.. and sure enough, he was the one who everyone else had to stop from putting the wrong thing in the wrong place when we were packing it all up. (sadly this retired person thinks he is never wrong, it is never his fault and it was my third time having him as a poll worker under me. I finally felt I had no choice but to talk to the district co-ordinator and request he not be assigned to me again should I continue to serve as an inspector.)

Over all the voters responded well to my working the line and asking them to remove their political buttons that constituted electionering and reminding them that everyone who was processing them was a volunteer who had a very long day going, so please to be patient and kind to my crew.

We probably had less errors and problems than the average precinct since the district co-ordinator (mine had 8 precincts to deal with) only managed to visit me once during the day and that was very late in the day.

There were a couple of highlights to our day at the polls. The first was during the morning when no one got a break. I had taken a walk to reassure the line we were processing them as fast as possible. On my attempt to re-enter the polling place, my way was barred by a 4'10" viet namese woman (she barely came up to my midriff) and said "you have to wait in the line". I was getting tired by this time and all I could manage was to look down at her and say softly, "I'm the inspector here dear, I need to get by." She gave me a look that appeared to doubt my veracity but she let me pass. The next was very late in the day when a woman came in wearing a very short trench coat ... to be honest I don't know that there was any clothing under this as none showed.. who was all excited about this election and chatted with my whole crew as she filled out her provisional information. She invited my whole crew to her house to party when we closed the polls. I would be hard pressed to explain the entertainment value of this, but the crew chatted back and seemed somewhat enthusiastic over the prospect of a party. It gave them an extra lift to their day so all in all I deemed it to be a good thing.(the woman's boyfriend seemed somewhat less enthusiastic over the prospect of a house full of stangers for a party.)

At the very end of our day we did get one complaint, but considering we processed over 670 voters I would say this was all in all a very good day for our precinct. This was no doubt a record turn out for this precinct, and we all survived in relatively good spirits. I got home just before 11pm, fed my Mother and went to bed.
When I got up in the morning the only down side to the election was the passage of Prop 8 which is in direct violation to certain sections of the California Constitution (specifically the Human Rights Amendments)so now I wait with the rest of California to see the outcome of the court challenges that will happen that we all as taxpayers will be paying for.

The Upcoming Election

2008-08-21T17:58:00.000-07:00

Political discussions are cropping up at cocktail and dinner parties more often as election day nears. Hillary did not make it into the top spot, so those who wanted to elect the "first woman President" are feeling somewhat let down. Companies are capitalizing on the candidates with everything from bumper stickers (the norm) to playing cards (Politically Wild)

I admit that the idea of the first woman president did occur to me as a good thing... just not Hillary as she is so very much like the male candidates that are well known and in the running. As a Libertarian, I have watched the mainstream parties grow closer and closer together in their ways of thinking. It is unlikely that much will change for the better following the end of the Bush regime since it is unlikely that any of the "mainstream" candidates will want to tackle undoing the wrongs done to this country by things like the patriot act.

There is a candidate you won't find in the political playing card decks being sold and that is Christine Smith.

You probably have not heard of her, and she might not even appear on the ballot come election day. She is a candidate for president none the less. Her basic premise is one of returning the country to a pre-war, pre-Bush, pre-patriot act status, giving back the freedoms stolen from the American people under the guise of homeland security.

In any case, you won't find her in the decks offered by politically wild, but you might find some solace in seeing McCain as a dinosaur or a skunk , or Mike Huckabee as a Dodo bird.

Perhaps the perfect gift for an apathetic nation are these decks of playing cards.

Myths Lies Medi-cal and Medicare

2007-06-06T16:24:00.000-07:00

I have neglected pretty much all of my blogs as I have been caught up in a morays of mis-information, lies, myths and working to uncover the truths I needed in order to continue caring for my aging and ailing parents.

It was a necessary if unpleasant reality that I would need to put Dad in a nursing home as he requires 24/7 care and no matter how I try, I need some sleep sometimes. I was given a list of nursing homes by the hospital and doing what I considered to be due diligence set about visiting a good share of those on my list.

Quite frankly this is not a pleasant chore as the majority of homes I visited I would not leave my dog in overnight let alone a parent for an extended stay during rehabilitation. Many had clients falling out of wheelchairs screaming for help in the hallways. Often the smells were so vile that I had to stifle a gag response.

After the first two or so, I made a mental list of my criteria for determining where would be acceptable to place Dad. This list included noise levels within tolerance as no one gets much better if the noise level is a constant deafening experience. The second of course was smell and cleanliness of the facility. From there I also included accessible parking as I knew I would be taking my wheelchair bound mother on a frequent basis to visit her husband. There were a few more criteria that I added, but what I have mentioned was the most important issues.

Having found one that matched my criteria in good part, I spoke with them about getting my Dad into their facility. Here is where the lies and mis-information began. Now, I need to stress that I do not know if the lies are deliberate, and I would prefer to think that it is just that the folks at the homes really don't know any better. What they tell you is that Medicare will pay for the first 100 days, and that after that we will work out what costs need to be covered.

If you believe that as I did you will be in for a very rude awakening when your 100 days is up or coming close to being up. After between 5 and 20 days something kicks in that is called "share of cost" but no one tells you about this until your 100 days are up or coming close to being up.. then they will present you with a bill. I suspect it is often much higher than the one I was presented with, which was for about 9 grand.

They wanted their money of course, and of course I was totally unprepared for this. Now, we have some of those long term care insurance policies, but they are pretty much a waste of your hard earned money and here are the reasons.

First of all, they only pay between 5o and 100 dollars a day.. this won't even cover the bed let alone any medications, physical therapy, occupational therapy etc etc etc. The other problem is that they do not pay the nursing home directly, you have to pay that out of your pocket and then prove you have paid it, at which time you settle back to wait for them to process your claim which they are really in no hurry to do.

Ok, lets leave that subject for a moment and discuss affording to keep someone who needs care in a nursing facility. Unless you are independently wealthy, you can't afford it. The average cost might be higher, depending on the care needed, but what I was quoted was 5 grand a month being average when things went to private pay. I am in possession of a bill for one month in excess of 17,700.00 and there were not trachs or any machines attached, that was with physical and occupational therapy and some intravenous treatments so you can imagine if your loved one needs something like dialysis or a breathing machine etc.

Now, the truth is, that you can get the care needed without draining your entire life's savings but you have to have some help. You need experts who know the law and specifically the law about medi-cal and medicare. We have a fine family attorney, but he is not a specialist in medical and the way I knew he was good was when he flat out told me I needed an expert in the field which he was not.

I found some experts, and while they are far from cheap, in the long run they will be very worth the price since instead of having to fork over 5 grand a month, I will be forking over zero to the nursing home, and our added expense will be paying the attorney fees off. They even made arrangements for a payment plan with a sizable down payment.

The first item of business was to empty the trust. Trusts are wonderful things if you drop dead suddenly, but are a hindrance if you linger. You don't need to revoke the trust, but you do need to empty it out so that there are no attachable assets and no cash value insurance policies.

If there is a house involved, those who don't know jack about the real truths when it comes to medi-cal, will tell you the house is exempt. Guess what? this is actually another lie as it can be a real trap...here's how it works.

You put Dad in a home, and get him qualified for medi-cal. Lets say Mom then falls and breaks a hip or something and needs to be in a facility for a short time while she heals. That house that was so exempt, is no longer exempt and Medi-cal can attach the house forcing it's sale to pay for the expenses incurred by Dad to date. This leaves Mom and Dad no home to come back to.

Hopefully if you have parents or loved ones who might need or currently need the help of a nursing home, you are beginning to get the picture that you really need legal advice on how to hold onto your assets and still be able to provide the care needed.

Lets go back to the nursing home for a minute. The very well meaning book keeper (and again here I am assuming this is a well meaning person who does not mean to mis-lead you) will tell you that your "share of cost" is that person's social security check minus 35 bucks. Well, that is typical for single people, and does not take into account that a spouse at home is permitted to keep up to 2500 dollars of their joint incomes to live on. It also does not take into account that you can have your attorney go into court and show that the monthly costs of maintaining the home are in excess of that amount and request they up the amount allowed to be kept by the at home spouse.

Whatever your situation, I must stress that you cannot safely traverse the pitfalls of the medi-cal system without expert guidance. I am paying good money to my experts, and in no way are they compensating me for this recommendation. The people I have hired and would recommend to you with my highest grade for taking care of business are NHS also known as Nursing Home Solutions in Glendale Cal. They have a website where you can get more information
http://www.nhscare.com/index.html

Of course should my opinions change you can be sure to read about that here, but I suspect from what I have seen so far, that I will be able to recommend NHS for a very long time to come.

My Dog's Tougher Than Your Cat

2007-03-24T21:12:00.000-07:00

What was she thinking???? I was taking my dog out for a walk tonight, and as usual, half a dozen of our cats came along. Now, among these cats were the second and third meanest cats I have ever known. One has sent several people to the emergency room for stitches, and that is the 3rd meanest.

This woman, who I have it on pretty reliable authority called the only Jew on our block a Nazi (at best in extremely poor taste) walks her dog daily around the block passing our house and has upon occasion made rude comments about my not keeping our ivy trimmed completely off the side walk. (so rude in fact that for some time now I have not been trimming much ivy off the sidewalks at all.) There is a narrow pathway through the ivy which apparently is sufficient for the rest of the neighbors as no one else as deemed it necessary to comment.

Well tonight, her dobie, whom she keeps on a retractable leash that is wound around it's muzzle in some fashion was headed our way. The second meanest cat saw them coming and deliberately walked close to the side walk and hunkered down mid driveway as if she intended to attack should the dog set one paw on her turf. This woman said to the cat, "what's the matter with you, your not hiding." I said, "actually, she does not hide, she tends to attack." I considered this fair warning to curb her dog, but she sort of snorted at me and said her dog was a dobie, and they don't feel pain.

Now, for those of you who don't know dobies, they do have a reputation for being great guard dogs, but having had two different dobies in my life, I can guarantee you they DO feel pain when it is inflicted. Rather than get into a verbal pissing contest with this bizarre woman, I said, " I wouldn't be putting my money on the dog" to which she replied her dog had killed at least two cats that she knew of.

I found this really weird. The "my dog is tougher than your cat" attitude coming from a senior citizen was sort of a surprise. I did not mention that should she opt to turn her hound loose upon a cat already bent on causing some pain and damage, that directly behind me was my chow mix dog who thinks of all the cats here as her cats, and the ONLY thing I have ever seen cause her to become aggressive in any manner is if she thinks someone is going to hurt one of her cats. There was also the 3rd meanest cat, who if she saw her mom in trouble, would no doubt join the fray.

After all, I certainly would not want to have this relatively unhinged woman think I was issuing any kind of a challenge. While my money would be on the two cats and the chow, I personally prefer not to add to the vet bills of anyone who actually cares about their animals.

Since her dog was in effect muzzled, I don't see that it would have stood a chance against two crazy mean cats and one very protective dog.

I sort of think this woman must also be a war supporter in general. As I recall, the reason she called the very nice Jewish lady down the street (who is in her late 80 to early 90's and is not of German decent) a Nazi was over her feeling she was not up to taking in more stray cats and had been asking around to find anyone either willing to take on the newest arrivals to her property, or help finding someone to catch them and take them home.

I started to wonder if this woman had produced offspring, and if she had, has she instilled in them this same attitude of confrontation? We really do need higher learning institutions that teach peace and arbitration and not conflict and war.

My dog would never think of being aggressive unless it was in defense of a cat. I prefer negotiation and arbitration to fighting although I will admit to having been in a fair share of fights of one kind or another when there seemed to be no alternative.

The neighborhood where I grew up certainly has changed. There are far more important issues that require my attention now, but should she ever turn her dog loose on any of our cats, then I will feel I have duly warned her of the possible consequences and will not hesitate to stand up to any claims against the cats. The dog would be trespassing after all.

Economics 101

2007-02-25T09:28:00.000-08:00

In the left column you will find a counter that is doing an estimated cost of the war on Iraq. This is based on an algorithm that is creating an estimate in real time. Here are some facts about what this illegal, immoral war is costing.

Federal spending on the war and reconstruction

2001 & 2002: $2.5 billion
2003 $ 51 billion
2004 $ 77.3 billion
2005 $ 87.3 billion
2006 $100.4 billion
total of $318.5 billion

US funding of the Iraq National Congress

$ 38.6 billion

State departments "Future of Iraq Project" (which the white house pretty much ignored.)

$5 million

The survey group that failed to find weapons of mass destruction

$900 million

Cost of the Iraq study group

$1 million

Amount the Pentagon has requested to construct military bases in Iraq

$806 million

Amount Congress has budgeted for a "commemoration of success" for American Troops
$20 million (what would they budget if there was any chance of success???)

reconstruction to date has cost the US $34.1 billion. Rebuilding post war Germany cost $30.3 billion in 2006 dollars.

As macabre as this sounds, economists have estimated each life lost in the war to be worth $6 million the reality is

for each US Army private killed in action the US government compensates the family with $500,000 plus $40,000 annually.

for each American defense contractor killed on the job $102,000 annually

for each Iraqi family member killed by American missile up to $2500 per person.

The cost in life:

Remember now that there is potential for the US to be paying 2500 bucks per Iraqi civilian

70,100 to 601,000 Iraqi civilians are estimated dead as of January 2007.
US soldiers dead 3,021
Iraqi soldiers and police 5965
defense contractors 665
journalists 146
British soldiers 129
Other coalition soldiers 123

It is time to stop this war and close the coffers.

While we seem perfectly content to spend billions on an illegal and immoral war, we as a nation, seem unwilling to save an estimated $3.1 billion annually. How is that? Based upon the Congressional budget office, Williams Institute, $3.1 billion could be saved by legalizing gay marriage.

This is based upon the following stats

Same-sex couples marry and move into higher tax bracket, boosting federal taxes by $400 to $700 million

New gay households move up in income and are cut from programs such as medicaid resulting in savings of $50 to $200 million,.

Uninsured gays and lesbians whose health care is now paid for by the government join their spouses insurance plans .. If only 1/3 do this federal costs drop by $190 million

If half the same sex couples now living together get married (this is the rate seen in Vermont and Massachusetts) and spend a quarter of what straight couples do, it results in a wedding industry boon of $2 billion

Back to Iraq, corruption costs Iraq $4 billion annually. $8.8 billion the US gave to the Iraq government cannot be accounted for. More than 20% of the governments ministry are ghost employees.. that is they don't exist but they collect paychecks.

The true cost of this illegal and immoral war will not be known until it is halted and there is time to tally up the stats. I have not even mentioned the costs expected to treat the wounded .. just brain injuries which more than 4600 soldiers have suffered will be an estimated $19 billion to care for and treat them. Evacuating a single wounded soldier to the US can cost more than $1 million.

The amputation rate is twice that of any other war. More than 1300 soldiers have lost a limb. The rehabilitation costs could easily be over $200 million.

1 in 5 Iraqi vets suffer some form of post traumatic stress syndrome. A prosthetic limb can easily cost $100,000

The suicide rate of our soldiers in 2005 was double what it was in 2004, I have been unable to find how dramatic the rise has been since then.

44% of Gulf war vets have filed for disability benefits, a similar percentage is expected of the 1.4 million current soldiers. Long term medical care and benefits could cost $127 billion.

On the home front, the Pentagon has ordered the National Guard to transfer $1.76 billion worth of equipment to the Army. Transferring gear overseas has left domestic Guard units with 1/3 of their essential combat equipment. 7040 National Guardsmen were deployed to Vietnam, 126 died. More than 100,000 have served in Iraq so far, 392 have died. Deploying reservists in Iraq costs the US $4 billion in lost productivity annually.

Expecting Bush to ever do the right thing? Think again. Here is part of his stated stands on laws in force in this country.

Sabanes-Oxley act of 2002

The law said: Corporate whistle blowers giving information to government agencies or Congress will be protected from retaliation.

Bush said: Only whistle blowers who squeal directly to the congressman or a committee that is investigating the relevant issue will be protected. (Senator Grassley R-Iowa says this means the statue only applies to people who are lucky enough to find the one member of congress out of 535 who happens to be the chairman of the appropriate committee and who also happens to already be conducting an investigation even though the problem has not yet come to light.)

Post Katrina Emergency Management Reform Act 2006

The law said: Future FEMA administrators must have some background in disaster management and not less than 5 years of executive leadership and management experience.

Bush said: The statute rules out a large portion of those persons best qualified .. to fill the office and will be ignored.

US Patriot Improvement and Re authorization act 2005

The law said: The Justice Department's inspector general must investigate "any improper or illegal use" of expanded powers provided by the act, including the FBI's use of National Security Letters that force businesses to turn over sensitive customer information,

Bush said: He'll withhold any information whose release he deems harmful to "foreign relations, national security, the deliberative process of the Executive, or the performance of the Executive's constitutional duties" In other words, any information that might be worth knowing.

Department of Defense Appropriations Act of 2006

The law said: Detainees in US custody will not be subjected to "cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment"

Bush said: The administration will use whatever interrogation tactics it sees fit.

Department of Defense Appropriation Act of 2002

The law said: Congress will be briefed before launching a "special access" (read "black") program along the lines of the National Security Agency's surveillance efforts

Bush said: Special-access programs are non of Congress' business; he'll inform lawmakers when he chooses, "as a matter of comity."

Postal Accountability and Enhancement Act 2004

the law said: First-class mail will be protected from warrant less searches.

Bush said: We don't need no stinking warrant to open your mail.

Hitler.. er... Bush is a clear and present danger to freedom and the American way. He continues to violate the laws of the land and pursue an unwinable war. Only with the impeachment and public trial for his war crimes can the United States hope to regain face with the rest of the world, and reclaim the freedoms that are the basis for our countries way of life.

Almost the final episode with WaMu

2007-02-09T07:47:00.000-08:00

After having an attorney come out to the house and draw up durable power of attorney that included specifically a clause allowing me access to any safe deposit boxes held privately or by the trust, I returned to the offending branch to close out the boxes.

From past experience, I determined it might be best to go to the branch manager first to avoid any unnecessary delays. Seeing the branch manager was indeed in, I went up to him, verified he was indeed the branch manager, a Mr Breslau, and explained I was there to conduct some business on behalf of my parents and took a seat. I was informed he could not help me since he was on his way out to a customer... making me wonder what he thought I was.. which apparently was not an important enough customer to even find out why I would bother to come to and ask specifically for, the branch manager.

Thus I was dismissed and sent to "sign in" and wait for someone to help me. Mind you, there was no one else at any of the desks needing attention, and yet I still was left to wait for attention.

A young man who I recognized as having been present during much of the altercation between myself, my Mother and Flora finally came to help me. I produced the power of attorneys for both my parents, explained that I believed it to be ineptness and in efficiency rather than theft or fraud, that had caused my Mother to be denied access to their safety deposit box, I was there to empty and close that box, surrender the keys and close their Money Market account.

A counter check was produced almost immediately, but access to the box seemed to be in question. I cited page 3, item h which was quite specific, but that did not seem to help much in expediting the matter. Mark, the young man waiting on me, had to go to Katherine (or Kathleen, I know her by sight having had difficulty with her before, but have managed to dismiss her name the way she usually dismisses me)

Due to this conference, which took place within 8 feet of where I was sitting, Mark was instructed to delay me because "they had not been advised of the power of attorney" I pointed out I was informing them now of the power of attorney, and that it would have been impossible to advise them prior to that day since I had just come from the meeting with the attorney and the signing of the documents that gave me power of attorney.

I was then treated to sitting there for over half an hour while Mark looking more uncomfortable by the minute, spent that time on the phone with their legal department asking if I had the right to close the box out. It seems they could not stop me from getting into the box as it was clearly stated in the document, so they were grasping at straws to keep me waiting.

I put up with this delay, and finally, when they had nothing left to question, I was admitted to the vault where we together searched for the missing box...which it turned out was another of the duplicate numbered boxes in the back room... and I mentioned knowing he was present during the problem with myself and my Mother and Flora. His only comment was that he had to work with her everyday but I got the impression he was sympathetic and understood why I might be somewhat impatient with the delays I was experiencing.

I emptied the box, we replaced it, I surrendered the keys and signed off on the box. That only leaves on more trip necessary to close the last remaining account once we are sure all the direct deposits are going to the new account and all the checks have cleared the old account.

In summary, if you are just a regular person, and do not dress in $100 + suits, you cannot expect the slightest courtesy from employees or management at Washington Mutual banks. I have been urging my friends to move their accounts to another bank and to let WaMu corporate know exactly why they are closing their accounts. Just about every other bank I went into to ask for information, treated me with far more courtesy than I have ever gotten from WaMu, there were no head to toe evaluations or dismissals based on what I was wearing or how I looked.

You can be a part of this very grass roots protest by telling Washington Mutual Corporate that you will be moving your bank accounts to another bank and why, or why you would never open an account with WaMu if this is an example of how they treat their customers.

If you bank with WAMU you need to read this.

2007-02-01T22:53:00.001-08:00

The following occurred at Washington Mutual, Corbin/Nordoff branch.

Following Father being admitted to the ICU at Valley Presbyterian Hospital on Friday January 26, 2007, we (the family) were advised that it did not look good and that it was very likely he would not survive due to renal failure and his blood pressure bottoming out. With this in mind, my Mother believed she needed to get a handle on where things were, what was in the safety deposit box etc. Knowing that she would be unable to handle getting in the vault and getting the box out on her own, we decided we should see about putting me as a signer on the safe deposit box. I had other bank business to transact for Mother so while I was there on Jan 28, 2007, I asked if this would be difficult to have me put on as a signer for the box explaining that Dad was in ICU and not expected to make it. The teller asked me to wait as she wanted to make sure that the secondary on a box could have me put on as a signer or if it would need to be the primary (which I was pretty sure was Dad). I was told that Mother would be able to do this.

On Jan 31, 2007 I took Mother to the bank. There was a long line, which we started to wait in, then Mother, not having been to the bank in over a year suggested I take her down by the desk for the safe deposit boxes so I did this. After waiting for some time, she had me approach a desk across the room to see if we were in the right place. I was told no, that we would have to wait in the line, which was now even longer. We got back in line and waited. There were two tellers waiting on customers, and when our turn finally came, Mother made a small deposit that she also had brought to take care of and explained she wanted to put me on the safe deposit box. The teller looked it up and determined there were in fact two safe deposit boxes which explained why I had two keys in my possession for this errand.

The teller informed us that the adding me to the box had to take place at one of the desks across the room, and told us to go see Kathleen. I knew who Kathleen was having had previous dealings with her, where I had noticed her being very short with me, just shy of rudeness. I wheeled Mother towards her desk. When we were within three feet of her desk, she abruptly rose and headed for the exit door. I asked her if she was leaving as we had just been told to come to her.. she said yes she was going to lunch and someone else would have to help us and walked out the exit with out any further conversation.

I then wheeled Mother over to the desks that were occupied, and a small woman who I believe had a name tag that said her name was Flora asked what we wanted. Mother said she wanted to add me to the signers for the safe deposit boxes that they had at the bank. The woman said she did not know how to do that, and there was no one who could help us except Kathleen who had just walked out the door. Mother asked to see a manager and was told no one from management was there right now. Mother was beginning to become irritated and having worked in a bank herself suggested there must be someone who could help us now. The woman said she would see if she could find someone to help us. She disappeared for a rather long time, returning with two clear plastic sleeves waving them about explaining to Mother that I could not be added to the box as it was in the trust. I started to ask if both boxes were in the trust whereupon this woman said “you don’t talk. You have no right to say anything here. It was apparent English was not her first language, and her tone and demeanor led me to believe she had just told me to shut up in an extremely rude manor. I said “ Excuse me?” Mother had been unable to read the paperwork in the sleeve and asked to see it and since this woman was not holding it still she took it and held it where she could read it. Flora then told me I had no right to say anything again, and snatched the paperwork out of Mothers hand turning to her and saying “and you don’t be taking anything out of my hand” I said to her, “ and you don’t need to be grabbing anything out of my Mother’s hand either.”

Mother was becoming more upset and said “how about if I just empty out both the boxes then.” Flora said she was welcome to close the boxes, I said I did not think she should close the boxes and again was told I could not speak, and said to me “ I am not talking to you I am talking only to her” and shoved her stubby little finger in my Mothers face. I admit I was having trouble maintaining my temper at this point, and again spoke despite the warnings I had no right to say anything. I told Mother not to close the boxes, if she wanted to empty them fine, I had a fire proof safe at home that would do for temporary storage, but did not want her to close the boxes in case Dad got well and wanted to put things back into them.

Flora stated I would not be permitted to help my Mother in the vault, so I said then she would have to push her in and help her as she was not able to do this on her own. She said she could not push Mother would have to do it on her own. I said in effect you are denying my Mother access to her safe deposit boxes as you will not let me help her and you won’t help her. This line of dialog repeated at least twice before looks were exchanged between this rude woman and a male who was seated not far away. At which point they decided I could help Mother and her wheelchair in the vault as long as it was alright with Mother.

The teller had written down two box numbers for us, and I wheeled Mother back to the gate by the safe deposit box vault to wait.. which we did for another 5 minutes or
more and then Flora came and filled out a list and had Mother produce ID and sign on two lines of the log.

During this transaction, Mother asked Flora if she always told her customers to shut up. Flora responded with “don’t tell lies, who said this” Mother and I both said, “you did” and she again said “no, you lie, don’t tell lies” calling both of us liars. I said never mind Mom, lets just do what you want to do here, I am not going to argue this.

On entering the vault I saw one of the two numbers the teller had written down on an open door that was obviously empty. I pointed out that was one of the numbers and it was apparent the box was missing. Flora looked for the other box for about 15 minutes before finding one with the correct number, but when she climbed the ladder and tried the key marked 401, it did not work. She then said there had to be another box with that number, which seemed very wrong to me, but she kept looking and eventually found a box with the same number on the bottom back end of the vault. The key worked in that one and we took the box to the tiny cubicle, Flora came back to the cubical and stated “ You only have one box, the other was closed out a long time ago.” She also indicated that the second key must also be to the same box. I had already compared the keys and knew them to be for different locks but did not bother to try to discuss this with her as I could not expect civility let alone any help from her.

I held out my hand for the box keys, and Flora kept pulling them away as if she was not going to relinquish them to me even though I was the one who had handed them to her. Finally I just took them out of her hand. At the cubicle Mother’s wheelchair was a tight squeeze and the door could not be shut. I squeezed in to help her. At this point I asked if she wanted to just inventory the box and put it back, she said no she wanted to empty it out. We took the contents of the one box and put them in Mother’s purse. I was handed the box and Mother told me to just put in on the counter, which I did. I stood there looking for someone to let us out. Two people who had no customers at desks saw me and made no move to come over. Mother asked me to get her out of the cubical, which I did. More time passed and she said turn her around. She also looked for assistance and none was forthcoming even though it was apparent we were waiting for it. Mother then said, “ Just wheel me out of here.” I told her I could not, that they had to buzz us through the gate. When no one came Mother said loudly, “I’m about to start hollering” and getting no response, picked up the metal safe deposit box and started pounding it on the counter. This did cause someone who had already seen us to finally come. Mother did not want to go back into the vault so I accompanied this male and we replaced the now empty box. I said to him I was not impressed with being told to shut up or with being called a liar, and told him what Flora had said to us.

After being buzzed out, Mother had me wheel her up to the only person who had made any attempt to help us as his name plate said he was a vice president. Since Mother was an assistant vice president when she worked in a bank she knew this might mean he was not the manger she wanted but she asked him if there was anyone in management since he had identified himself as a stocks and bond investment person. He pointed out the male who had just been with me in the vault who had heard Flora tell us there was no one from management, and certainly had not identified himself as management when we had a complaint.

On Feb 1,2007 Dad seemed to be rallying and was well enough for me to ask him how many safe deposit boxes he had. He replied two. I said you’re sure, you did not close one out a long time ago, he said he was sure. I asked him if either of the boxes might be empty and he said no, there were things in both boxes. I said I had hoped to wait until he was feeling better but was worried about the box being open so I related to him the events of Jan 31. We then discussed where the boxes were. He said the small one was on the very bottom, and the larger one was way up high. This description did not jive with the open door, and since it was also a small box I was somewhat relieved as this meant it was more than likely inefficiency and not fraud or theft. I reassured him that the box number they had written down that apparently was wrong with the open door and no box inside did not match the description he had just given me. It did match the box that Flora could not get into that was up very high.

Dad then told me that in the morning I was to contact his attorney and tell him the whole story, document the events and to have Mother document the events. Further instructions were to determine if there was a way I could act for them in this matter, and what action needed to be taken. I was then to advise council if Dad was needed to act, that he would need at least a week to gain his strength. He then stated we would need to change banks which is also what Mother had said she wanted to do as soon as we could work out the logistics.

I fear Flora's accent sounded German to me, which made me tend to think of Flora as a neo-nazi bitch. I can find no redeeming character traits, and no excuse for her rude and vulgar treatment and do not believe she should be working in any place she must deal with people as she seems to have no people skills. While this is not over for us, I cannot help but recommend if you have accounts with Washington Mutual, you should consider changing banks. It is most likely that the corporation is just so cheap they fail to adequately screen or train their employees. Passing the buck appears to be the only department they excel in.

Exciting New Products

2006-12-31T16:10:00.000-08:00

For those of you who have been following my tirade about the government's disregard for privacy, you will be heartened to learn there are companies out there working on helping you keep your privacy in tact. One such outfit is selling wallets and passport cases that block RFID signals, so even if they put those nasty little chips inside your driver's license and your passport, you can foil them following you around from place to place. You also limit the possibilities of someone stealing your identity by having a receiver set up near where you must pass and grabbing your data. There is a link to this at Silvaspoon.net

This is most likely a better solution than running around with your passport and drivers license wrapped up in tin foil, and hopefully more effective at blocking those trackers of your every move. I sort of equate it to the difference between being found carrying a credit card and a full set of lock picks.... the former is not considered something to be suspicious of, while the latter does cause some eyebrow raising even if you happen to be fully entitled to these tools because you are a locksmith. A regular looking wallet is not going to garner much attention, while unwrapping your id from tin foil is bound to cause some interest.

I am equally excited to see on the market an affordable way to plug into the sun to recharge your cell phone etc.. the solar backpack, also linked to Silvaspoon

While these backpacks are not cheap, they are decidedly liberating in that you won't ever be tied to a power outlet. Having a battery pack, they are not just useful when the sun is out as the battery pack will store the energy until you need it.

Both of the above items just went on my wish list for anyone interested in buying me anything, or the manufacturers if they want some field testing done. (after all, there is a gear review page I am affiliated with at Silvaspoon Bicycle Touring

You will also find gps systems, and if you wander around the site a bit, you can also find travel tips, cameras for sale and more.

Not For, Nor By The People

2006-12-29T11:05:00.000-08:00

When a former president dies, there is lots of hoopla and ceremony. In the case of Gerald Ford there is also the release of his thoughts and feelings that for some mysterious reason, he did not want released until after his death. While it is not my intention to cast aspersions upon this man who was never elected to office, yet served as both vice president and president, I am disappointed that he felt more loyalty to .. what? party lines? status quo?

Perhaps I should explain. It seems that ex-president Ford had much to say about Bush, Rumsfeld and the illegal war Bush is conducting at alarming cost to US taxpayers: an up to the second cost counter is available here
cost of the war

Ford was against the Bush war, which might have been a good thing to know.. perhaps more people would have stepped forward against the war sooner. If everyone who harbored thoughts and feelings against going to war or supporting an illegal war had stood up against Bush when he was still saying anyone who stands against his war is the enemy, then maybe we would have already stopped the illegal war of fascist dictator Bush. Perhaps not, now we will of course never know.

Why did Ford keep his anti war/anti Rumsfeld/anti Bush sentiments quiet? Was there some secret code we don't know about that says one cannot critic anyone who takes over a political office?

Whatever possessed him, I for one think it was wrong not to come forward against and illegal and immoral war. Perhaps he would not have made a difference. Chances are we would still be at war, but perhaps there would have been more outcry against the war if those who respected Ford had had the moral support of knowing that he did not approve of the war.

Of course it is not fair to single out one person in the public eye and say "he should have said something", which is what I have just done. The world is not fair. What I will do is say that if you are in the public eye right now, and you know the war is one of lies and deceit, brought about illegally, then you need to take the moral high ground and stand up against the war.

As a people the United States need to stand up and speak out against the war. Condemn the illegal waging of invasions, and take on the task of putting Bush, Rumsfeld and the rest of those responsible for this illegal financial drain upon us on trial for their violations not just of US law, but of the Geneva convention and all the other agreements they have broken and/or violated.

Impeachment is actually not just to get justice served, it also is a preventative measure. Thus far, the actions of Bush and cronies has followed pretty much what Hitler did in Germany in the 1930's. (I have mentioned this before in this blog and you probably are tired of hearing it.)

Looking ahead, the next big step taken by Hitler to rise to power, was to stop elections... yes yes, we have laws, but so did the German people. Bush ignores laws he finds inconvenient or that do not match his agenda, so there is no reason to suppose he would not pass some kind of executive directive (most likely to postpone at first) the next election as when we are in a "state of war" (even an illegally started one) it is not wise to change the power structure. (sort of like, you don't want to change horses in the middle of the steeple chase)

Now I know you are thinking, the people would never stand for such an action.. well I am not convinced.. after all.. the people stood by and did nothing when the current administration tortured people at Guantanamo. They did nothing when the Geneva convention was violated. Nothing when Bush announced his war without ever getting the approval of the congress (a requirement for going to war)...

I realize some of you thought we might be out of the woods on this war thing when the democrats took over the congress this last election. Guess again. Bush is pushing for an increase in troops, (more canon fodder.) and more money. The first woman speaker of the house(Nancy Pelosi) is busy saying she will not defund the war.. and here we thought she was against the war. We thought she was a liberal.. we thought she would make a difference.

As long as Bush has funds to kill people, he will keep killing people. This in turn will keep creating more terrorists, which I have explained before, you can create, but you cannot un-create.

All the newly elected have been pledging to work with everyone when they should have been screaming at the top of their lungs "hell NO"... no to the war, to the funding of the war, to increasing the national debt. No to allowing the present administration to continue to violate the laws of our country. No to the military abuses against civilians, no to the military abuses to women who are in the ranks with the abusers, No to the double standards used in dealing with foreign powers, (we are only for democracy if the folks in power are pro US, despite them being legally elected. Previous posts have discussed this at length.)

In other words, nothing has changed significantly, the American people are still not roused to the warning signals, buffaloed into thinking that all is going to be well in the world. The national debt continues to increase, the cost of the war continues to increase, the body count rises, and the government is neither for nor by the people.

Bush & the Constitution

2006-12-21T11:59:00.000-08:00

There was one and only one thing new and unique in the Constitution of the United States. It consists of 16 words: "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof."

These 16 words provide for, nay demand, the separation of church and state. Lincoln, while he may have been a white supremacist who was doing some political maneuvering knew enough to keep religion and God out of his speeches for the most part.

Bush on the other hand has told people God wanted him to be president, wanted him in the White House and wanted him to invade Iraq. Bush opened an office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives in the White House and handed out hundreds of millions of dollars in grants--known in Washington as "pork for preachers." Almost all of it has gone directly to conservative Christian churches.

He signed an executive order allowing churches that receive federal funds for so-called faith-based programs to practice religious discrimination: hiring as staff members only those who belong to the same church.

Then there is the voucher program that gives parents FEDERAL FUNDS (yes your tax dollars) to spend on tuition at private religious schools. Also the Bush administration approved a federally funded health plan for Catholics only; excluding insurance coverage for contraceptives, abortion, sterilization, or artificial insemination. Bus instituted a religious test for judges with a promise to only appoint those who understood our rights were derived from God. ( I sorta thought they were derived from the Constitution, whose authorship has never to my knowledge been attributed to God.)

Employees of federal agencies, the White House and the Justice department are under pressure to start their day by attending "voluntary" Bible study and prayer meetings.

House Republicans introduced the Houses of Worship Political Speech Protection Act, which would allow churches to endorse political candidates, broadcast issue ads, and engage in political fund-raising--without losing their tax-exempt status.

It may begin to appear that the religious right owns the Republican Party. This is not an illusion, and is most evident in the Terri Schiavo case where special legislation that applied only to one person was enacted when the majority of the people felt there should not be government intervention.

Democrats have done their share to blur the lines of separation of church and state,
religion and politics. Franklin Roosevelt shocked and angered many Protestant leaders by giving Myron C. Taylor ambassadorial status as his personal representative to the Vatican and by naming New York's Cardinal Francis J. Spellman military vicar of the U.S. Armed Forces. It was Clinton who first raised the idea of vouchers to religious schools from federal funds. The first governor to take advantage of those funds was George W Bush.

In fact, the move today is towards destruction of the first amendment's guarantee of separation of church and state. Politicians urge the backing of "faith based initiatives" to "rebuke" the idea of separation of church and state that has been "imposed upon us" for years.

See, here is the thing. Not all Americans are Christians. Not all share the beliefs of Christians, and the country basically started so that religious freedom could be a reality. If you merge politics and religion, you no longer have freedom of religion. You are no longer free to worship in your own way to your own set of beliefs.

Religious right leaders have bandied about quotes for many of our forefathers, later to admit they could find no original sources for them, and that in fact these "quotes" had been made up by someone somewhere. Because these leaders are known, and generally respected, their words are taken as absolute truths by the masses.

More and more of Bush's speeches include references to God and pretty much NO references to laws, of which Bush continues to violate when they do not fit his personal agenda to make war on the world.

He is in a war that cannot be won but insists we must win. He ignores all the suggestions that include bringing home our soldiers within a given time line, and continues to alienate other nations. He is seen as the bully on the block, which in fact he is. So numerous are his double standards (one for him and another for any other country that does not follow his lead), so flagrant are his violations of our own laws, and so poor are his reasons that it baffles me that the American people have not risen up in revolt already.

Bush is fast becoming the NEO-HITLER, who next will introduce legislation stopping elections using as his reason that we are involved in such a world conflict that we cannot be bothered with them or worse, that it would be impossible to "change horses" mid stream.

Beware, this same scenario played out in Germany in the 1930's.

Drugs the American Way

2006-12-20T13:41:00.000-08:00

I just got back from a fairly routine trip to the pharmacy to pick up prescriptions and stock up on items we use on a regular basis. One of those things is an item called leg cramps, which should be fairly evident what it is for just from the name. The shelf was bare of this product, which has happened once in awhile in the past so I was not excited or agitated. When I got to the check out counter, I requested they have someone check the back room to see if they had any, as we were running a bit lot and my Mother as a general rule needs this nightly to avoid waking up with leg cramps, staying up most of the rest of the night. (actually it is a bit more than that as usually she groans, Dad then wakes up and yells for me to come help her, which of course there is nothing I can really do but either bring her the medication or commiserate.. thus every one's sleep is disturbed.)

I was informed by my friendly pharmacy staff, that this product had been pulled from the shelves per the FDA and they showed me an article from a newspaper that said the FDA has ordered pulling all products that contain quinine from the market unless you have malaria, in which case there is only one product that is approved. Well, we don't happen to have malaria, (under normal circumstances this would be a good thing) so we are just sol (sorry out of luck)

This is reminiscent of another product from many years ago. Once upon a time in America, you could purchase a jar of cream that smelled like rotten eggs. Not something you would over use if you had any sense of smell. This product was called hydrosulfasol (I am actually not certain of the spelling but that is how it sounded.)

The miracle of hydrosulfasol was that when applied to just about any wound, would heal it almost over night and with NO Scaring. When they pulled that one, they did so on the basis of testing that showed if you used this product every day of your life for 20 years you MIGHT end up with some sort of blood disorder. I cannot imagine anyone using this product any more than was necessary considering one went about smelling like rotten eggs, but none the less, it worked so they pulled it off the market. You actually can still get hydrosulfasol if you are dying of skin cancer, but only in a liquid form.

Back to the Leg Cramps pills. The current population of the United States, according to the Census Bureau, is 300,436,624. The article stated they had 600+ reports of severe side effects that included 93 deaths which were attributed to drug interaction. (Many drugs have interaction difficulties but are not pulled off the market, they have warning labels and conditions under which you should not take them)

If I round the number of reports up to 700, it means that 2.32994 per cent of the population has had severe side effects. Even if it was 10 per cent, it strikes me that a warning label rather than pulling something that works for so many off the market would be a saner action to take.

I could see where the one company that has the FDA's approval to market the product with quinine in it might be making out like gang busters if we had epidemic proportion malaria in this country, but I have not heard of such an epidemic so find myself mystified at the actions of the FDA.

It can only be chalked up to the American Way.. if something works, take it off the market or make it so expensive that the masses cannot afford it.

It is not just the government that pulls this kind of shenanigans, private corporations do as well. I cite my own experience with Hershey's. For a short time they made a 1 gram of sugar candy bar. It was not very large, it was relatively expensive, but it satisfied my diabetic Mother's craving for chocolate and we could keep her sugar intake down enough that it was not problematic. They apparently were not making enough money off this product as they discontinued it leaving me fewer options, none of which are as pleasing to Mother as that one was.

In that particular case, I blame their advertising as I am convinced that more people would have bought enough of the product to keep it in a good profit margin since it tasted good and was not so over priced that you could never afford it.

Is it really any wonder that so many Americans violate laws to get things (particularly medications) from Canada or Mexico where they can get what they want/ need and usually at far better prices than are available in the US? Or that so many Americans will be turning to ordering their tobacco products from overseas as the taxes continue to go up and up on these products, and the majority of those taxes don't even go to the medical projects related to the dangers of smoking. Americans dumped some tea into Boston Harbor a very long time ago over taxation. The modern day Boston Tea Party consists of going elsewhere for the products denied us or taxed beyond reason. Eventually I suppose the government will find ways to make criminals of us all.. as they take more and more of our freedoms and deny us more and more of the products we want and need in our lives.

Slice it This Way

2006-12-14T10:30:00.000-08:00

I have been calling for impeachment and criminal trials for Bush and his regime for some time now, and it has occurred to me that perhaps there is another route that might placate the growing masses that are ready to kill all Americans because of the unabated actions of our infamous leader. There has been some speculation that Bush has relapse into this drinking problems from the past, which would make him a prime candidate for rehab... it would need to be a very long rehab I think.

Speaking of drinking, I tend to look at a lot of political websites and have noticed that many of them are so busy doing the "get the word out" that they have not given much if any thought to the page design. There is a young man who does coding of designs and has recently started his own company for "code slicing" (I figure if you need that you know what it is.. to me it sounds like something you do in photo shop or css) Jaymeblackmon

He is also seeking folks who want to go to a conference in Vancouver BC on the direction the web is taking. It seems that if he finds 4 people to go, he gets to go free.. which I suppose means also that if you sign up under him, and then get 4 people.. but you would have to ask him Jayme Blackmon

Surprising to me at http://www.jaymeblackmon.com/ was the distinct laid back personal website. I suppose the biggest surprise was that I came to this personal page and not to the much better put together commercial site for his design slicing (coding) which explains things far better and has the benefit of being a single price for any size project. I suppose if you want to rummage around in Jayme's mind his personal site is the place to go, but if what you want is to have your design worked up into css and html, then I would suggest his commercial site http://slicemydesign.com/

I think political websites (and for that matter any website where the data changes with any frequency) Needs this css coding in order to maintain a flavor/ theme or at least some consistency that can be relied upon. Granted the most important thing is the message, but people tend to stay longer at sites where there is a consistency and a cohesiveness, so you might want to check out Jayme.

Irresponsibility of the People

2006-12-12T03:24:00.000-08:00

The news is filled with more and more dead soldiers in a "war" that cannot be won. Now Bush is "considering" his options and getting advise from "experts" who disagree with the report that took months of study that found a way to get American troops out of Iraq.
Bush keeps saying he still wants to "win" his war. Here is a problem. Lets forget for a moment that Bush is a war criminal. Lets forget all the past lies about weapons of mass destruction. Lets even put aside that the main difference between Bush and Hitler is that Hitler wasn't an idiot.

How do you make a terrorist? You kill family and friends. The front page of the New York Times this week showed an old woman carrying an automatic weapon. It was taken shortly before she did a suicide deal where she took out American troops. When I say an old woman, she was I think in her 80's although I could be wrong, she might have only been in her 60's. Still, when you think about terrorists, you usually do not think of old people. Why was she a terrorist? Americans killed her grandson. Probably killed others in her family as well, but she gave as her reason revenge for the taking of her grandson's life.

So the longer we keep killing people over there, the more terrorists we will be creating as pretty much everyone has relatives who love them. I do not think that impeaching Bush is enough anymore. I think the only way that these people will believe the United States wants peace is to charge Bush and his regime with the war crimes they are guilty of, and to put them on a very public trial.

The US media seems to censor or ignore entirely many of the stories that point towards the violations of US law by the current administration.

The United States has stopped being for democracy when they challenge the decisions of the people of another country when the people democratically elect their own government. This has been going on a very long time actually, the US was 100% behind the evil dictator in Chile.

Pinochet, the brute, proceeded to have his forces kill at least 3,000 Chileans and torture many thousands more. (Shamefully, The New York Times headlined its editorial on Pinochet’s death “The Dextrous Dictator.” That was in keeping with the Times’s headline on its obituary for Alfredo Stroessner of Paraguay, who died earlier this year. The Times called him “Colorful Dictator.”)

When Allende came to power, Henry Kissinger infamously said: “I don’t see why we need to stand by and watch a country go communist because of the irresponsibility of its own people.”
Now that the United States citizens are being ignored in their desire to see an end to the illegal Iraq war (Last time I looked the US congress had to declare war, not the president.) Now that the committee that was put together to give Bush a way out of that war, he is going to turn his back on their recommendations and get more and more young men killed in the process.

What will it take to get Bush and his cohorts out of office and into court? How long will the American people buy into more and more lies? How many more young soldiers must die before we rise up as a people and take down the current American dictator and try him for his war crimes? How long will the American people continue to be irresponsible? ( Bush was elected for a second term, that was pretty irresponsible)

Nightmares and escape

2006-11-15T17:50:00.000-08:00

Recently I had to pick my Dad up off the floor after he had a nightmare about the government coming for him because he subscribes to The Nation and a couple of other publications that might be construed as left wing or an enemy of the current regime.
He also said with the new laws, all it would take to wave the magic wand of terrorism over him and make him vanish was his contributions to an anti-defamation Iranian group.

I did not mention to him my blog, and decided it was probably best if I did not mention it, since I figure if he is already scared of being invaded over the magazines he reads, how much worse could it get to find out someone under his roof is writing the same kind of stuff.

These thoughts led to flights of fancy about how one might have to make a hasty departure, and how one could disappear if the need arose.

The first order of business seems to me to alter your looks enough that existing photographs would make you tough to spot at the airport.

Now you would not want to have this done locally, so I did some looking around and found Facial Plastic Surgery in Austin located at 630 West 34th Street suite 201 Austin, TX who are just commercial enough that you would not arouse suspicion if you were to go in for a change of nose or something. Last time I talked to a Texan, they informed me they still had the right to secede from the union, so it also might be a good bet they would not be asking the government's permission to give you a face makeover.

Now, that is not the only thing you could do at Plastic Surgery Experts.com since they also do liposuction, you could lose some weight which would make you look even less like yourself.

This Personique outfit is pretty much a one shop stop for this purpose when you consider they also deal with hair loss, weight loss, cosmetic surgery and more.

Normally I am not a big advocate for changing your appearance through surgery, but that's mostly because it is usually for vanity's sake. In the event I need to look less like me, in order to survive, I very well might look into doing some changing in appearance. Better that than being a prisoner in one's own backyard.

Medical Politics

2006-11-13T10:18:00.000-08:00

Owing to a doctor's order that my father needed daily whirlpool treatments on his leg, it was arranged to rent a unit that was supposed to fit on the bathtub. For this we were being charged $35 a month. The company that delivered the unit was Duramed Homecare Services out of Duarte Cailfornia. I mention them by name because I think it is important to let you know there are companies who make their money by cheating people.

After the unit arrived and it was determined owing to space limitations that using this unit would be very difficult as no one could get their feet into the tub once it was in place, nor could someone with a walker (which both of my parents use unless they are in their wheelchairs) get past the unit to use the toilet. All around a pretty unsatisfactory situation. Yes we could take it off and put it on when it was needed, however, having all tile floors this would sometimes mean taking something dripping wet across normal pathways. The water dripping (if I were to miss even one spot) would become for a short time a slipping hazard.

There are enough slipping hazards with tile floors and in the world in general, it seems unnecessary to create more. Because of this, I started doing some research and to my shock and dismay I learned this pollenex unit only cost $35 to buy outright. So, per month we were paying the same amount as a new unit would cost to buy for a used unit. My anger mounted when I started reading the customer reviews for the unit they had sent out. They were all bad. Not one review liked this unit enough to say they were going to keep it. The kindest one said it was way too loud, not powerful enough and they were taking it back in the morning.

I found a Conair model that was pretty much a better unit even on the face of the description. Instead of just stirring the water around, you could aerate the water by adding bubbles, it had two jets instead of one outlet, heck, it even had a mood light... the price? $45. After a brief consultation with Dad, I ordered one. When it arrived, I was very pleased to discover that the entire unit hung on the inside of the bathtub solving the constant moving of the unit, it had removable filters for cleaning, (the pollenex one required taking the whole unit, turning it over, scrubbing a mesh screen that never quite looked like you were getting it all). All in all this new unit out performed the old one 100 times better and easier.

When I called Duramed to have them come pick up their rental unit, I asked them about how they justified charging the same price as the whole unit could be purchased for as a monthly rental. At first they wanted to know if I had found somewhere renting them for less.. I did not answer that, I pointed out that you could buy the unit outright for the same price they were charging per month and was asked who had ordered the unit to begin with. I said the doctor and was told, the doctor should have told you you can look around to see what you can find...

I at this point realized there was not much point in talking to them about extortioners charges and said something to the effect of, I guess you don't care that you are cheating people, just have someone pick this up at the earliest possible time.

I am not quite done with Duramed. I will be investigating who called them to use them in the first place, as I want to make sure it is widely known they overcharge for rentals. If a device has an expected life of 3 months before it needs replacing, then perhaps I could see them charging $15 a month to insure profit. I think the expected life on this kind of a device is more like a year or more, which certainly does not justify the extortionist pricing.

It is probably just as well that this equipment rental was not covered by medicare, as that would have meant the extortion was well over the price of the unit if our part was the price of the unit. It would not have been the first time I called medicare about them being over billed. If more people took the time to do this, medicare might not be in the shape it is in, and there might not be more and more cuts to benefits before some of us paying for it get old enough to use them.

War Criminals Loophole, the Military Commissions Act

2006-11-07T17:53:00.000-08:00

The current issue of The Nation has in the comments section a very enlightening article. On Nov 14, a group of lawyers and experts, will ask the German Federal Prosecutor to open a criminal investigation targeting Donald Rumsfeld, Alberto Gonzales, and other key Bush administration figures for war crimes.

Two years ago a similar action was asked for in Germany naming Rumsfeld, brought by the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR) and the International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH) a network of 141 national human rights organizations founded in 1922. When Rumsfeld refused to go to a security conference in Munich unless these charges were dropped (since he could have been served, or even arrested) the prosecutor dismissed the case saying that there was "no reason to believe that the accused would not be prosecuted in the United States."

It is apparent that Bush promoting and signing into law the Military Commission Act that it is the intent of the Bush administration to immunize itself from prosecution in the United States.

There was a conference in October in New York about universal jurisdiction, the doctrine of which allows the prosecution for international crimes by domestic courts, regardless of where the crime was committed, the nationality of the perpetrator or the victim.

This new case will draw on the argument that the Military Commission Act of 2006, which the President promoted and signed into law, provides retroactive immunity for civilians who violated the War Crimes Act, including officials of the Bush Administration. According to Scott Horton, chair of the International Law Committee of NY City Bar Association,an effort to block prosecution is in itself evidence of crime.(When Yugoslavia sought to immunize senior government officials, the US declared the act itself to be evidence of such a conspiracy.)

The new complaint will present new evidence showing responsibility for torture and prisoner abuse at the highest levels of the chain of command. There have been few convictions based on universal jurisdiction, but it is believed that such cases might serve as a deterrent to government officials contemplation of torture.

It is apparent to the world that the U.S. is led by terrorists and war criminals.

Educate Yourself

2006-11-04T22:30:00.000-08:00

There are apparently folks who read my blog as I get an occasional e-mail, some who say "That could never happen in America" , some saying "where do you get this stuff" and sometimes, "What can I do?|

Since there are so very many issues today, and the local newspapers are so frequently fascist run publications, you have to start educating yourself about new developments. One, but certainly not the only one source is magazines. A site I know of www.magsdirect.com/magazines.htmlgives you the lowest subscription rates on many magazines that the publishers will allow so is a good place to start.

I am not saying just get news magazines, as much of what you need to keep up with won't make the news as it is being developed. Science magazines frequently will explain what is happening in the realm of RFID (radio frequency identification) which is so vital to keep up on in a world where incrementalism is sneaking up on taking your rights away.

Of course there are some good news magazines available at www.magsdirect.com and since you can get the lowest rates on your subscriptions, it makes sense to use a source like this to round out your reading material.

Another source for news is from the travel magazines (also available at www.magsdirect.com with a pretty good selection) as one of the most threatened freedoms is that of movement across borders. Travel magazines keep up on that stuff since their livelihood is dependant upon folks being able to travel without having to jump through hoops.

When you do your reading, do so with a critical eye. Many of the publications (like the science magazines) will talk in glowing terms about the ability to track packages, speed up crossing of borders by using the RFID systems.. which might make you thing what good ideas these are.

I have noticed in publications like the populist, that other writers from around the world have started (or perhaps are just continuing to) comparing the current US administration to Germany in the 1930's and to Hitler taking power.

Incrementalism is something Hitler used. There is a writer by the name of Ted Rall who starts out one such recent comparison with "Students of historical hysteria immediately saw 9/11 as America's version of the Reichstag Fire.Both incidents were organic acts of terrorism ..." He goes on about it being a popular misconception that the Nazis started the fire, but that their power hungry government seized upon it to justify their actions intended (and successful) crushing of dissidents and taking away the civil liberties of German citizens.

There were violations, blatant ones, of human rights violations, and many times the police stood and watched. (the death camps were not built until 1941. ) I am talking about the incremental taking away of civil liberties. People were detained, tortured and murdered breaking existing laws against racism, constitutional protections and anti religious discrimination laws. All this was happening before 1935 when Germany passed the Nuremberg laws which striped Jews of citizenship and banned them from marrying or dating non-Jews.

His article continues to point out that between 2001 and 2006 George W. Bush has worked tirelessly to eliminate American liberties and freedoms most of which have been common to all other civilized legal systems since the Magna Carta.

The world knows about Bush, the CIA, mercenary and military state terrorists kidnapping thousands of innocent people. They know about the secret prisons where these folks were held without any recourse, without any rights. Most of these folks were NEVER CHARGED with any crime. The government has admitted that fewer than ten of these people had actually done anything wrong.

There was a time this was illegal in the United States. (What? You thought that was illegal still?) Pre Bush the Republican controlled Supreme Court handed down many decisions ordering the White House to give those being held trials or let them go. That was back when there was still hope for the US to be a civilized nation.

In this country today, thanks to the "unhinged leader" and a "gullible passel of Republican senators" the Military Commissions Act 2006 makes imprisonment without due recourse, torture and yes even murder LEGAL IN THE UNITED STATES.

Our intentions matter little. Our next president may be far more diplomatic (may even be able to form whole sentences) when it comes right down to it, our laws now allow kidnapping, torture , murder and deny access to trials to detainees.

There was not defining moment or act that turned the Weiner Republic into the Third Reich. It was done with small incremental steps of taking away the freedoms and liberties of the people. There is not defining moment from a civilized democratic American government to The United Fascist States Of America... but it is happening every day in small ways.

Incrementalism is "the tendency of radical change to manifest itself in bits and pieces" If you want to make sure you don't wake up asking yourself, "How did we get here?" Then educating yourself on what is happening, keeping track of each and every move that is taking away your freedoms and rights is an American Imperative. It will not help that the rest of the world already sees it, if we do not see and try to change it now.

The Things Science Fiction Are Made Of

2006-11-04T12:38:00.000-08:00

This RFID (radio frequency identification) thing has got me a little spooked now. When I first started reading about it, I thought it was an invasion of privacy and more actions designed to take away more of our civil rights.

Among the things I read were indications that these chips could eventually be implanted into human bodies. Well when I read that my thought was this is the stuff science fiction is made of.. and started putting together a novel plot. I figured there were more people more paranoid than I am and was feeling pretty much superior.

Then I was sort of channel surfing and stopped on one of those late night talk shows (that I normally don't watch). What caught my attention was the guest this guy had on who had one of these RFID chips implanted into himself. He was all for these implants, said how being hooked up to the computers at his office opened doors for him, unlocked things, greeted him by name as he entered etc. He had taken things a bit farther as well, he has some kind of electrons injected into his system that hooked him up to computers as well. His premise was that eventually people would be able to access computers by just thinking, and that people would be able to communicate brain to brain with this technology.

You need to understand that it takes the same mentality to be a good cop as it does to be a good criminal. If it did not take the same mentality, the cops would never catch the good crooks. I say this in defense of where my mind went with this new input.

If I was say, a bank robber, in this future of tracking people via their implanted chips, I would kidnap someone who had access to all the target banks doors and vaults, force him through all the doors I needed, and have a much easier time getting into the goodies I was intent on making off with.

Even if they had systems to grab all the information on MY chip (assuming I was so unlucky as to have one) I am relatively sure I would be able to find a way to jam my signals to foil anyone being able to identify me.. or worse yet, I could jam mine, steal someone eles' chip (the scenario for that obviously would include harming the poor sap who I wanted to pin things on.. digging around in his/her flesh for their chip) and carry it in my pocket so that when two people went past the sensors, they picked up two chips. Now if some of the more sensitive areas needed both to be cleared for passage, then my victim would have to be another high mucky muck of the same financial institution.

Then I had an even worse thought about RFID. Lets say that upon induction (voluntary or in-voluntary) into the military, they planted these chips in all the soldiers, and broadcast instructions to jam whatever brain waves give us our flight instincts in danger.. so that they could send them off to war and know they would never retreat? Or if at birth one was mandated to have a chip installed (I am quite sure it would be under the guise of protecting the children from abduction or some other "for the greater good" scenario) and they had the technology to short circuit any free radical ideas about servitude, civil disobedience or other things, like free speech?

I visualize such a world as a bunch of walking zombies with no free thought, no free speech, no freedom of movement and certainly no free will. If you got out of line, zap you with a little bit of nationalist rhetoric, or just plain fry the part of the brain that is having such thoughts with an electrical charge.

The hero or heroine of a science fiction book with this outline would have to be someone who had learned how to block all the signals, or with great pain and sacrifice dug their chip out of their own body.. (I am not sure how one would get rid of the thousands of little electrons injected into the system without causing instant death.)

I figure another way the administration would work on the conscious of Americans would be to start with these kinds of tracking devices on people like convicted sex offenders, murderers and then spread to political dissidents (labeled or wrongly accused of crimes) under the auspice and even the sanction of groups who already want to make sure no sex offenders are near their schools and parks.

Don't get me wrong, I believe repeat sexual offenders should not be living close to temptation. I just don't think it wise to put into motion laws that will begin the tracking and electronic surveillance of the masses.

I can hear someone thinking as they read this, "this would never happen in America" but then, there were German's who did not believe Hitler would ever rule. When I was young and idealistic, I never thought I would see the day when our civil rights were taken from us as they are today. The government can tap your phone, gain access to your finances, your e-mail and much more.

To date I do not believe I am of any interest to the powers that be. I am not important enough to justify any extreme measures to track me, or invade my privacy to any great degree. That does not mean that I do not think that eventually, even the least important of us will be spared this violation of our rights. With this in mind, even though in my last post I mentioned this, you might want to check out www.poundprivacy.org as one small step towards maintaining your right to privacy.

Another thought has just struck me, if brain to brain transmissions became the norm... what would stop them tracking your very thoughts? Spooky stuff.

Privacy Issues

2006-11-03T12:15:00.000-08:00

Privacy is something guaranteed to citizens of the US. If you have read past posts you know that right to privacy is being bombarded by the government in many ways. Some folks are striking back and making attempts to keep some private things private. One such place iswww.poundprivacy.org.

They are not fighting RFID or anything like that, they are on the level of Internet privacy. Since the Internet is one of the tools used to collect all kinds of personal information I view this as imperative to educate yourself about, and take action to protect your privacy.

This is not a new idea, there are all kinds of software programs designed to find and stop and rid your home computer of information gathering "cookies".
http://www.poundprivacy.org./ is an ongoing privacy campaign. They have a letter for you to send to the big 4 search engines (Google, Yahoo, Microsoft,and Ask ) requesting the use of "# privacy" as an operator to stop the collection of information about what you are searching. This, by the way can be qualified to NOT include searches for child pornography or other criminal related activities. (In other words it is not designed nor intended to aid criminals, it is designed to protect the right to privacy we are supposed to have as Americans.)

If you happen to be an AOL user, you might have been among the hundreds of thousands who's personal data, linked to their IP address, was made public. AOL is sort of the tragic comedian of Internet providers, and this faux pas has got to be one of the best contenders for idiot actions of the year.

The way "# privacy" would work, is you would enter it after your search term in the search engine, which would key the engine not to associate your IP address with the search, (unless the search was somehow linked to criminal activity.. it is important to remember this is not to aid and abet criminal activity, it is for personal privacy we are supposed to have in this country.)

When you think about it, medical and other organizations have strict rules about how and when they can share personal information.. search engines don't have any such constraints. This information can be gathered, and used freely by sales people (in its least invasive and least alarming aspect)

OK, here is an example. I did a search about diabetes. I have a mother who is non-insulin dependant, and a cat who is insulin dependant. Since that search, address to me in my name I get mail trying to sell me diabetic care supplies, cures, books etc.. all targeting diabetics. I am not diabetic, so where would they have gotten my name and address? From the search engines that collected data about me during my searches.

Not bad enough to warrant action? How about this, we now get phone calls asking to speak to "the diabetic person" of the household.

Now, the first few calls I just said "No, you cannot talk to the diabetic in the household" or "No". They kept calling. I think I even started to recognize voices. Mom is pretty much hard of hearing and can't deal with the telephone, and the cat can't talk.. well... cept to say meow... but he's gone deaf now anyway.. so here is what I did that finally stopped the calls.

I would say you want the insulin dependant or the non-insulin dependant?
they would say one or the other.

If they said dependant, I would ask them why they wanted to talk to a deaf cat? If they then changed to the non dependant, I would say she's pretty much deaf too.

Eventually, the calls stopped. Don't want to have the fun I have had with this? Then I would suggest you get over to www.poundprivacy.org and send that letter to the big 4, they make it really easy. And you don't need to worry, they don't collect your information, they don't even store your email addy for more than 24 hours to get your voice heard by the search engines.

Prisoners of America

2006-11-02T21:08:00.000-08:00

I recently read somewhere about the new laws going into effect regarding "homeland security". Probably the most alarming is the radio-frequency identification (RFID) cards that will now be in all passports issued, may be soon required to be in your drivers license, and are required by all non-citizens to be carried while visiting this country.

The biggest objection I have (if you don't count the invasion of privacy that is obvious) is that critical personal data is broadcast up to 15 meters from these chips making them an incredible source for anyone with very cheap equipment to steal your identity.

Then if they do something off color, go some place suspicious in the governments eyes, or do something down right criminal, you get tagged for it. Tourism in this country is already being effected by issuing these cards to visitors. Read some of the travel blogs from the UK, France, the Netherlands and you will see that folks are downright against having their personal identification information broadcast in this manner.

The Netherlands and a couple of other countries have lodged complaints about the invasion of privacy issues to their citizens. Does anyone remember when they wanted to use these chips to track cattle in this country? The ranchers objected on the basis of not feeling good about how and where all this information would be stored.. so now we treat visitors worse than we treat cows???

I can envision a scenario here, I am in line at the local market carrying my passport (if I had one that was not pre-chip that is) and some sleazy character is sitting by the door with is seemingly innocent ipod.. he grabs my data, which can even include credit card information.. he walks out the door without my even knowing my identity has been stolen.

OK, lets now imagine a bit farther down the line. He gives this ill gotten information to one of his female compatriots (I am vainly hoping that a male could not easily cross a border with a females identity.) Goes over the border to Canada (on my credit card) books a flight to say.. Turkey and gets out of the country.

Then I get a vacation. I go over to one of my favorite cities.. Paris. Meantime this guy is living it up on my credit card, being tracked across many borders, into places that are at war even.. smuggles guns.. whatever.. and someone in some bureaucratic office sees a pattern emerging that indicates I have been everywhere a bomb has gone off, everywhere there have been illegal happenings.. and they tag me for having "ties" with terrorism or any crime.

I think you see where I am going with this so I will leave the rest of the scenario to your imaginations. I just read this 60 page piece of garbage that talked incessantly about beefing up border security, stopping the travel of terrorists, and how we will win against terrorism.. (hard to fathom when you realize the American executive branch are the terrorist leaders today.)

Then I read this entry in some forum by a Canadian business woman who had just found out the sticker on her car window (she traveled across the border frequently) was transmitting her every move.. a sophisticated tracking device.. she was pretty angry. This RFID is also affecting free trade with our "allies".

Am I paranoid? Perhaps I am.. but then you have to understand that even as a grown woman, my mommy won't let me visit Northern Ireland because she is sure that quite innocently I will stumble into some illicit endeavor by the IRA.

Now, before you go "oh yeah, like that is gonna happen" let me tell you about a trip many years ago I made to Paris. The French government (unbeknown to me) was holding someone that the US wanted to extradite for some crime.. this guy had friends, he was not a French national, and these friends started setting off bombs, and committing (dare I say it?) acts of terrorism. I was pretty much oblivious to all of this, until I saw the newspapers the next day. The timing was truly bizarre. I had been to just about every place at very close time proximity to where these events were going down.

I have a photograph I took during that trip, as I was astonished to see a French policeman armed with an automatic machine gun on the streets of Paris. (a reaction to all the stuff that I was so blissfully unaware.)

Now think about it, if I was being tracked with some stupid chip, do you think I would have made it out of the country? Since they stopped the bus I was on to get to the ferry, and removed several people "of interest" I very likely would have been one of the detainees. Not a pleasant thought.

Now lets move to another thought that has crept into my paranoid little mind. You know that wall they are putting up on our southern border? What if it is to keep us in as much as to keep anyone out?

I think it is fair to say that my political views are not popular with the current regime. Does my exercising my freedom of speech link me to terrorists? If the government decided to label me with "anti-American" or any of the labels they are illegally imprisoning people without due process and no recourse, what would stop them from denying me leaving the country even though all I am guilty of is disagreeing with them?

Here is one more thing, and then I will put this one to bed. I have a passport that does not have the chip. It is good for a few more years. I go out of the country, to somewhere requiring a visa, which I get.. and they haven't done the chip thing to visas (which is also in the works) my visa is about to run out, and the powers that be don't answer the issue of my being allowed to come back into the US. Guess what? They aren't going to let me on the plane. (Now I am not so sure I really would want to come back, but if I did, I would be SOL. ) These decisions are done in secret behind closed doors. Maybe the secretary knocked the re-entry request into the trash and it never even got looked at. There I am, no visa, no way to cross any more borders, and suddenly suspect.

Sorry folks, this is reminding me way too much of movies about Hitler's Germany where the Gestapo officer says " Where are your papers?" in a threatening manner.

The Issues

2006-11-02T12:34:00.000-08:00

For the most part I have been addressing Bush and his administration in this blog. With the election days away, I thought I should mention a couple of issues here in California.

First lets talk about the tax on smokers. I admit I am somewhat bias on this issue as I am a smoker. As a matter of fact I feel almost obligated to continue being a smoker as an act of rebellion against more laws being enacted upon our bodies. (I chalk this up to a knee jerk reaction on my part so will not dwell upon it.)

This is Proposition 86, which gives me a great slogan.. eighty six 86. (I don't know if it is still slang for throw it out to 86 someone, but it used to be.) Here's the deal, they want smokers to fund through extortionist taxation, emergency services, hospitals, childcare, cancer and a very very small amount to smoking cessation.. after all, if we all quit smoking, you won't have those funds to count on. Not only is that unfair to smokers, but will probably create a black market for cigarettes. I already know of, but have avoided the temptation of places overseas that will ship me cartons of cigarettes without the current taxes being taken for the state of California. If the prices go up by $2.60 a pack, (which is what they intend with this legislation) I might have to consider becoming a smuggler.

Moving on, Proposition 87. OK, we all are not happy with gas prices. Here is the deal. Gasoline is made from fossil fuels, that is, non-renewable stuff. Once it is gone, it is gone. So there is an absolute need to come up with other ways to run our gadgets and gizmo's. We must find other energy sources, no ifs ands or buts. While it might hurt for awhile at the gas pump, it will hurt a lot less when we find clean renewable sources to switch to.

It should come as no surprise that the biggest opponents of this bill are the big oil companies. The good news is that next year an outfit called Magenn Power Inc has plans to start production of a power air rotor system (MARS) which is a lighter than air tethered thing that sort of looks like a blimp. This is really exciting stuff! There are other outfits out there that are selling packages to reduce carbon and pretty much get your home more earth friendly while saving you money with alternatives.

One of the outfits is Krystal Planet, who have a package that includes a system to produce your own Hydrogen to power hydrogen power cells.. which are also in the package for two vehicles. More exciting stuff.

It isn't like there are no other power sources to be had /found by a group set up to get us off of the petroleum pablum we have been sucking on for years so those who say they don't have to produce results, well how can they help but come up with something better when there is so much out there to find? (I didn't even mention the recycled cooking oil powered cars.. that any diesel engine can be converted to with a pre-heater device.) So I am for 87, bottom line? We need it.

OK, there are more measures on this ballot than Carter has pills. That is why I will stop with the ones I have addressed thus far. There are some places that have one more issue that I want to address.

The legalization of Gay Marriage. There is in this country supposed to be separation of church and state... despite Bush saying that God wants him to be president.. (I cringe at the very thought of a God that hateful.)

It is not the church that issues your marriage license. It is the state. Why? Because a marriage is a legal contract between two people that they wish to be treated as one family, protected by the same laws that protect opposite sex partners. No one is asking for special rights or privileges. No one is asking all churches to be willing to perform gay weddings. The Netherlands was the first country to strike all references to gender in their marriage laws. They were followed by Belgium. There are many places that have "civil union" laws which are pretty much gay marriages.

Why should some of the people have to go to extremely costly legal recourse to get the same rights as other citizens who choose as their life mate someone of a different gender than themselves? You will notice I said SAME RIGHTS. When my significant other passed away, because we did not have the money to have done all the extra legal work to obtain those same rights, I had to fight the state of Nevada to even release her body to me for burial. They would have given her an indigents grave in some nameless place, when I had already paid for her plot next to my son.

Every day homophobic parents and siblings are taking away the homes, the belongings, the memorabilia and sometimes even the ability to live from the surviving partner in an unrecognized union between same sex couples.

If your state has any propositions dealing with the legalization of gay marriage, I urge you to put your religious rhetoric aside, and vote to give all citizens the same rights to legal partnerships .. call it marriage, call it civil union.. it does not matter. It comes down to this... you don't have to approve or sanction their choices, it is only right that you give them the same protection under the law that is enjoyed by heterosexuals.

2006-10-28T15:58:00.000-07:00

Back in June the US Supreme court decided it is ok to seize private property and give it to anyone who will pay more taxes than you do. Eminent domain has been around a long time, but it used to be there at least had to be a tag on it saying it was for public use. Now the government can take your property away and give it to a corporation or someone willing to build a store which will be subject to more taxes than you currently are paying on that property.

Bush just signed the Military Commissions Act 2006, which :

1. Takes away the right of detainees to habeas corpus (the traditional right of detainees to challenge their detention)

2. Gives the US President the power to detain indefinitely anyone—US or foreign nationals, from within the US, and from abroad—it deems to have provided material support to anti-US hostilities, and even use secret and coerced evidence (do any of you remember his speech where he said if you are not supporting me and my agenda then you are the enemy????)

3. Gives US officials immunity from prosecution for torturing detainees that were captured before the end of 2005 by US military and CIA.

Amnesty International says the legislation will lead to violations of international law and standards and accuses the US Congress of “failing human rights” by voting for this Act and says it “deeply regrets that Congress failed to resist this executive pressure and instead has given a green light for violations of the USA’s international obligations.”

Striping habeas corpus and other fundamental rights:

Strip the US courts of jurisdiction to hear or consider habeas corpus appeals challenging the lawfulness or conditions of detention of anyone held in US custody as an “enemy combatant.”

Prohibit any person from invoking the Geneva Conventions or their protocols as a source of rights in any action in any US court.

Permit civilians captured far from any battlefield to be tried by military commission rather than civilian courts, contradicting international standards and case law.

Limit the right of charged detainees to be represented by counsel of their choosing.

* Fail to provide any guarantee that trials will be conducted within a reasonable time.

* Permit the executive to convene military commissions to try “alien unlawful enemy combatants”, as determined by the executive under a dangerously broad definition, in trials that would provide foreign nationals so labeled with a lower standard of justice than US citizens accused of the same crimes. This would violate the prohibition on the discriminatory application of fair trial rights

* Establish military commissions whose impartiality, independence and competence would be in doubt, due to the overarching role that the executive, primarily the Secretary of Defense, would play in procedures and in appointments of military judges and military officers.

* Permit, in violation of international law, the use of evidence extracted under cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment, or as a result of “outrages upon personal dignity, particularly humiliating or degrading treatment”, as defined under international law.

* Permit the use of classified evidence against a defendant, without the defendant necessarily being able effectively to challenge the “sources, methods or activities” by which the government acquired the evidence.

* Give the military commissions the power to hand down death sentences, in contravention of international standards…. The clemency authority would be … President Bush [who] has led a pattern of official public commentary on the presumed guilt of the detainees, and has overseen a system that has systematically denied the rights of detainees.

* Permit the executive to determine who is an “enemy combatant” under any “competent tribunal” established by the executive.

* Narrow the scope of the War Crimes Act by not expressly criminalizing acts that constitute “outrages upon personal dignity, particularly humiliating and degrading treatment” banned under Article 3 common to the four Geneva Conventions.

* Prohibit the US courts from using “foreign or international law” to inform their decisions in relation to the War Crimes Act. The President has the authority to “interpret the meaning and application of the Geneva Conventions.”

* Endorse the administration’s “war paradigm”—under which the USA has selectively applied the laws of war and rejected international human rights law.

In the last five years the administration has systematically engaged in violations of international law that have included:

* Secret detention

* Enforced disappearance

* Torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment

* Outrages upon personal dignity, including humiliating treatment

* Denial and restriction of habeas corpus

* Indefinite detention without charge or trial

* Prolonged incommunicado detention

* Arbitrary detention

* Unfair trial procedures

Yet you keep hearing Bush and friends (there was a moose and a squirrel that had more credibility than the current administration.. ) keep portraying the USA as a nation of laws and one that in the “war on terror” is committed to what it calls the “non-negotiable demands of human dignity,” including the “rule of law.”

The newly signed Military Commissions Act of 2006 in fact violates international law. Thousands of detainees remain in indefinite detention without charge or trial in US custody in Iraq, Afghanistan and Guantánamo. In passing the Military Commissions Act, Congress has failed these detainees and their families. Congress has passed into law, the same way Germany did for Hitler, the means to the demise of the land of the free.

Overdue Impeachment .. Vote against Facism.

2006-10-25T20:15:00.000-07:00

This is going to be a long entry. With the election right around the corner, there are some things you need to consider before you go cast your vote. If you have been reading my blog, you know I am pretty much anti-Bush, but I think you need to know some of the reasons. And since I know this is going to be a long haul, stop now, go get your cuppa (of whatever you usually drink) and get comfy.

There are 14 criteria for determining if you are dealing with a fascist regime. These 14 points came from a professor who studies fascist governments.

1. Powerful & continuing nationalism
flags fly everywhere,

2. Distain for the recognition of human rights
looking the other way or even supporting torture, imprisonment for long periods with no recourse,

3. identifying enemies or scapegoats as unifying cause
rallying people to stop or get rid of perceived foes (illegal aliens/undocumented workers?)

4. Supremacy of the military
disproportionate funding to the military even when there are homeland issues of major concern.

5. Rampant sexism

6. Controlled mass media

7. Obsession with national security
Even your toothpaste cannot be taken onboard a plane now.

8. Religion & government intertwined
(God wants George W. to be president???? Yes he actually said that.) Christian sentiments are continually espoused by the current administration.

9. Corporate power protected
Can you say Enron?

10. Labor power suppressed

11. Disdain for intellectuals and the arts
Free expression openly attacked

12. Obsession with crime and punishment

13. Rampant crony and corruption

14. Fraudulent elections
Sometimes elections are complete shams. Other times the judiciary is used to control elections.

Ok, I could not help it, I had to make a few comments along the way. The current administration fits neatly into every single one of those criteria. Lets have a little look at some of the things Bush and friends have done.

1. In exchange for large U.S. oil companies gaining access to occupied territories, Bush reportedly gave $43 million of your tax dollars to the Taliban in May of 2001 - only 4 months before their September 11th attacks on the United States!

2. Bush had no concern about terrorist attacks on the U.S. before 9/11/01 After Bush's "election" was officially announced, President Clinton requested numerous meetings with Bush - specifically to discuss terrorists threats and making them a priority of Bush's Regime. Bush refused to meet with Pres. Clinton, but allowed one of his staff "underlings" to talk to Clinton instead. Not surprisingly, Bush never bothered to find out what Clinton had to say.

3. Bush wholeheartedly supported the infamous "Patriot Act," which infringes on most of your constitutional rights. In addition, he is an outspoken supporter of the "Patriot Act II."

4. Bush pulled the United States out of the Kyoto Treaty, a global warming agreement between major world powers, signed in 1997. Like global warming is not a pressing issue???

5. Bush banned federal aid to any international group offering abortions or abortion counseling, even if their funding from those projects came from other sources. THE HYPOCRISY HAS SPOKEN

6. Bush used his presidential powers to repeal the Alternative Minimum Tax for corporations. All taxes paid under the AMT since its 1987 inception were refunded to the corporations. Do we have any guesses how Bush is financing his campaign?

7. CRIMINAL ALERT!!! Bush appointed Elliott Abrams to the National Security Council. Abrams was convicted during the Reagan administration for Iran-Contra ties. He also signed into law stronger penalties for drug use, even though it is “irrelevant” that he did cocaine.

8. Bush proposed to nominate the attorney responsible for the court case that weakened the Americans with Disabilities Act, Jeffrey Sutton, to judgeship in a federal appeals court.

9. Bush turned the 9/11/01 terrorist attacks on the U.S. into a scheme to justify severely limiting civil rights and attacking the Constitution and to avert public attention from the extreme economic threats the Bush Regime has invoked upon the millions of middle-class, working-class, and poor Americans, while giving break after break to large corporations and rich individuals. (as well as using it as a rallying point for going to war.)

10. Of Bush's proposed $2 trillion tax cut 43% goes to the wealthiest 1% of Americans.

11. Bush cut $35 million in funding for doctors to receive advanced pediatric training. ( "No child left behind, unless they're ill"??)

12. Bush has already packed the federal courts with radical conservative judges - Charles Pickering, Priscilla Owens, and Miguel Estrada -etc.

13. Bush finally realized the giant tax cuts for the rich had an effect on the economy. What does he want to do about it? He wants to take away benefits from children and the elderly to compensate.

14. Bush used his infinite "wisdom" to completely halt international negotiations designed to monitor and prevent the production of biological and chemical weapons. (The weapons of mass destruction are right here?)

15. Bush refused to federally fund the continued clean up of a uranium-slag heap in Utah. The large Mormon population there doesn't care if their kids come out with birth defects and die at a young age - do they??

16. The Bush Regime took an anti-human rights stance in the U.S. and abroad, by treating basic human rights as an obstacle of setting up civic security. Who needs freedom anyway? (secret prisons, countries throwing us out for them... violations of the Geneva Convention are rampant.)

17 Bush leaves abused and neglected children behind by cutting $15.7 million that was supposed to aid states in investigating their cases. As long as they're educated, who cares how they're treated.

18. Pay very close attention to this one: Bush used the 9/11/01 terrorist attacks on the U.S. to create the Department of Homeland Security. Ironically, Hitler also created such an office, the Reichshauptsicherheitamt, or "Main Office of Homeland Security," and look where he took Germany. True Americans, BEWARE!!!

19. Bush lied to the American public and Congress about the Taliban's motives in the 9/11/01 attacks in order to gain approval of extremist foreign policies and shield their eyes from the true dangers of the "Patriot Act."

20. Bush repealed the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty, while spending billions of tax dollars building a large national missile defense. (and you wonder why North Korea won’t cooperate?)

21. Bush shows his true opinion on affirmative action, by appointing outspoken affirmative action opponent Kay Cole James to direct the Office of Personnel Management.

22. # Bush nominated a lawyer for a teen sex video distribution company, Harvey Pitts, to head the Securities and Exchange Commission. (Then he publicly decries Foley’s actions, while perhaps reprehensible, all the “boys” who got those e-mails were of legal age of consent.. something that keeps being left out of the press.)

23. Bush and Cheney both refused to testify under oath - or by themselves - to the 9/11 Commission. What are they trying to hide from the public?

24. After screwing up that nation's economy to the point of a record high number of jobless Americans, Bush cut $200 million in funding to help retrain dislocated workers. Oh well, if they're jobless, they can't pay their inflated working-class taxes, now can they?

25. Bush proposed a measure to use eminent domain to the government to seize private property for power lines.

26. # Bush took steps to abolish the White House Council on Environmental Quality.

27. After the U.N. questioned Bush's "war on terrorism," the Bush Regime decided the nation should act with a small group of other nations stupid enough to believe the "weapons of mass destruction" fables. (France among others knew these were fables.)

28. Bush nominated the leading critic of the separation of church and state, Michael McConnell, to a federal judgeship. (When Christian rules become our laws, we are no longer a nation of religious freedom.)

29. Bush's oil buddies celebrated when he nominated J. Steven Giles as Deputy Secretary of the Interior. Giles was an oil and coal lobbyist!

30. After brother Jeb "guaranteed Florida" in the 2000 elections, thousands of eligible voters in the state were mysteriously turned away from the polls. Bush and co. denies this ever happened, takes the election, and screws the world... (does this sound like election tampering to anyone?)

31. Bush cut $60 million from a Boy's and Girl's Clubs of America program for public housing.

32. Undermining a Clinton-era agreement, Bush gave $95 million to North Korea for their nuclear programs and waived the part of the agreement that required inspections to ensure no weapons-grade plutonium was being hidden. (and now leads the UN in sanctions against North Korea, with underlying threats of war on yet another front.)

33. Bush adds another passionate opponent of civil rights to his list by nominating Terrence Boyle to a federal judgeship.

34. Looking for a little more waste in America? Try Bush proposing to ease environmental considerations for permits for refineries, nuclear plants, and hydroelectric dam construction.

35. Bush nominated Linda Fisher - an executive for Monsanto - to the Environmental Protection Agency. Monsanto is one of the largest farming and pesticide biotechnology companies in the world.

36. "There is no gap in gender pay," implies Bush Council of Economic Advisers appointee Diana Roth. (Last time I looked women still made 37 cents to a dollar in the same job.)

37. Bush cut $700 million in capital funds for public housing repairs.

38. Promises, promises... Or outright lies! Bush promised $15 billion in AIDS funding for Africa in his 2003 State of the Union Address, then "accidentally" left it out of the budget.

39. Bush eased field-testing controls of genetically engineered crops.

40. In a Supreme Court Case, Bush opposed affirmative action at Michigan State.

41. Just because he can't read more than 5 words at a time, Bush is working to ensure you won't be able to - by cutting federal spending on public libraries by $39 million.

42. Bush created $4 million in federal grant money for HIV and drug abuse prevention programs - but only for religious groups and non-secular equivalents. (what happened to separation of church and state?)

43. Eliminating workers' rights and environmental safety, Bush renegotiated a free trade agreement with Jordan.

44. Bush proposed to reverse a federal regulation to protect 60 million acres of national forest from logging and road building.

45. # More Iran-Contra ties... Bush appointed unindicted high-level Iran-Contra figure, John Negroponte, as the United Nations Ambassador.

46. Even more Iran-Contra ties... Bush appointed unindicted high-level Iran-Contra figure, Otto Reich, as the Assistant Secretary of State for Inter-American Affairs.

47. In these scandalous times of war crimes committed by Americans with possible ties to the executive staff, it's not hard to figure out why Bush renounced U.S. support for an International Criminal Court and aggressively campaigned to exempt all American personnel from its jurisdiction. He threatened to pull American support from all U.N. peacekeeping operations unless he got his way...

48. More reductions for the good of the corporations... Bush cut 28% of government funding for researching cleaner, more efficient automobiles.

49. # Too bad Bush isn't an endangered species - he might not have nominated an advocate for repealing the Endangered Species Act, Bennett Raley, as the Assistant Secretary for Water and Science. (or maybe your vote will help make him an endangered species?)

50. Bush ran from his duties, so he's not a veteran. That's probably why he cut the Veterans' Administration budget by $25 billion. (so.. its like, support our troops ONLY while they allow themselves to be weapons.. then screw them.)

51. Many of Bush's buddies own oil companies, so it's not at all shocking that he cut government funding to research renewable energy sources by 50%!

52. Nuclear Bush undermined the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and the Comprehensive Test Ben Treaty by supporting testing of new nuclear weapons and refusing to rule out a nuclear first strike on non-nuclear nations.

53. Bush doesn't like women, or so one can assume following his closure of the White House Office for Women's Health Initiative and Outreach.

54. Who cares about the environment? Not Bush, he cut $500 million from the Environmental Protection Agency's budget.

55. Bush suspended U.S. support for the U.N.'s family planning programs and stopped short of supporting the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW).

56. How about all-out opposing the U.N.? Maybe Bush is just like his Under-Secretary of State for Arms Control and International Security, John Bolton, who opposes nonproliferation treaties and the United Nations.

57 Bush has refused to release federal funding designed to provide for stem cell research projects.

58. # Thanks to Bush, federal employees can have Viagra but no contraceptives, due to his cut of a program that provided prescription contraceptive coverage.

59. # Create an international offensive against the spread of AIDS? Nah, Bush refused to participate and helped his buddies in the pharmaceutical business capitalize by increasing costs of life-saving medications

60. Bush suspended rules requiring rock miners to clean up sites on Western public lands. Think your tax dollars will end up paying for the clean ups?

61. Bush cut a federal program to provide child care to low-income families transitions from welfare to work. So, they can work but cannot get child care, without using pretty much all their earnings.. leaving them what to live on?

62. Bush's America will stay uniformed about potential consequences from chemical plant accidents, thanks to his cancellation of a proposal to increase the public's access to the information.

63. Undermining world peace, Bush condoned the Israeli reoccupation of Palestinian territory and rejected the U.N. Security Council's resolutions that provide a framework for conflict resolution between the two. The resolutions have been supported by previous U.S. administrations.

64. Bush abolished rules mandating energy-saving regulations for central air conditioners and heat pumps. What was that about an energy crisis?

65. Bush proposed a bill to prevent groups from suing to have an animal placed on the Endangered Species List. Again, too bad Bush isn't an endangered species.

66. Convicted of murder? That's okay, you can get financial aid for college. However, if you've ever been convicted of a misdemeanor drug charge, Bush has made sure you will never get financial aid for college.

67. Once upon a time there was a 2004 deadline for auto makers to develop PROTOTYPE high mileage cars. Nevertheless, just like the June 30, 2004, Iraq deadline, Bush has pushed the prototype deadline up indefinitely. Maybe this one's because his oil buddies fear losing revenue if people actually get more than 30 or 40 MPG...

68. Bush censored the environmental concerns found by scientists his administration hired - to make it look like global warming is not a major threat.

69. "The terrorists are coming, the terrorists are coming!" That's all that our Chicken-Little-In-Chief cares about. Therefore, Bush proposed eliminating a federal program to help communities prepare for natural disasters. The program had been developed and successfully used in Seattle. Never mind that! "The terrorists are coming, the terrorists are coming!" Besides, he made most of these terrorists with his little war.

70. Bush 2000 campaign pledge: To invest $100 million in rain forest conservation. This was a promise the "compassionate conservative" didn't keep

71. Another broken promise... Bush failed to increase public education funding and failed to fund the so-called "No Child Left Behind Act." It seems every child gets left behind, except those whose rich mommies and daddies send them to private or boarding schools.

72. Bush 2000 campaign pledge: To regulate carbon dioxide emissions. He didn't, decided it would be "too costly." This from the guy who has created the largest deficit in history!

This is just the tip of the iceberg here. There is nothing new or profound here, all these things are public record. There are longer lists all over the internet.

How about if we apply the 3 strikes laws to the oval office? Lets see, just with my short list 72 divided by 3 is 24 strikes.. then there the over 800 laws he has broken.. that's just the US laws.. not counting the long standing treaties and the Geneva Convention violations.. I would say we are a bit overdue for the impeachment. So if you won’t start the impeachment, best make sure you vote this guy out of office.. while you still have a vote. Lets try not to forget that corporal who became Hitler... its looking more and more fascist here every day.

University Of Peace

2006-09-20T13:06:00.000-07:00

In the current issue of the Beijing Review, there was a rather good article that pointed out we have many schools in the world to teach war, but none to teach peace. It suggested that the path to peace might start with the creation of such universities and that in a time when the world is crying out for peace and peacemakers, we are sorely lacking in anyone trained to the task.
War is big business. There is always money to be made in war, but where is the profit in peace? If we could make peace as viable a profit maker as war is today, then we might be able to actually sustain lasting peace in the world. The trick of course is to find a way to make peace pay.
Perhaps also if there was a way that did not violate free trade to make it impossible to realize any profit from war it would also help. (like imposing such dramatic taxes on any gain realized as a result of war to make it an unpopular way to make money)
Back to that article. This author made the article an invitation, or a challenge to all nations to individually or jointly create schools for peace. One thing I do not recall being mentioned in the article was religion which would actually have to be left at the door to the class rooms as we all know the history of using religious beliefs to embark upon "holy wars" which in fact were sometimes not so thinly veiled wars of aggression over property and wealth.
Arbitrators and negotiators could take the place of troops and guns. They would need to have more of a global consciousness than a national one in order to be unbiased and really look at all the issues and find common ground for all parties.
From the perspective of a follower of the Tao, it appears that Christianity and Islam are not all that far apart in theology, yet some would have you believe there is a holy war in progress. Somehow making a war one of a holy cause is supposed to validate it. People still die, there is still ground taken, there are still the same prizes and costs.
Bush is taking the stand that his war is righteous because it is against terrorism. Think about that for a moment. It is first and foremost, an un-winnable war because with each terrorist you kill or maim, you create two or more (sometimes even hundreds) more terrorists. He claims to be there to spread democracy.. which like the previous argument makes you wonder if he is really this stupid or just a liar since he fails to recognize that Hezbollah was democratically elected as part of the Palestine government .
Ok, cease fire for a minute on Bush. What about Condi Rice? Sent supposedly to negotiate a peace or help to do so. As far as I can see she has no qualifications as a peace maker or peace keeper. She delayed her trip for what, a month? to give Israel time to bomb the crap out of the Hezbollah before she could step in and have the appearance of being a peace maker with all the best intentions. The only agenda for the United States is to put folks in power who agree with us and destroy those who don't. (or better yet, let someone else destroy them and we wont step in to look like the good guys until the "bad" guys are pretty much wiped out.)
We need to have institutions of higher education that teach peace, negotiation, and ethics. We need to have the graduates of such institutions be the negotiators and peacemakers of the world without valuing nationalism above globalism.
Maybe we can even make this a race. Which Nation shall rise above all others and be the first to create a higher education institution of Peace? Which Nations will band together in an attempt to end wars forever ? Who will be the first to hand out diplomas in Peacekeeping? My money is not on the US as long as Bush still holds the reins.

Fundies & The War On Terrorism

2006-09-07T13:28:00.000-07:00

We all have multiple identities. Race, religion, nationality, ethnicity, class, and probably some others that do not spring readily to mind.

Every identity has it’s fundamentalists, the gatekeepers of what is permissible for those who share that specific identity. They usually have their work cut out for them to keep everyone within their identity toeing the line. Their one commonality is that they are all reactionary, guardians of authenticity, there job is to deny complexity and impose uniformity.

They exploit identity as an end rather than a beginning from which to connect with humanity and exclude the rest of humanity from their specific niche. They are devoted to eternal and exclusive truths and brook no dissent or debate.

A Christian fundamentalist will only recognize you as a fellow human being up to a certain point unless you also are a Christian, beyond that point you are just one more lost sinner.

In the real world identities do not exist in a vacuum and are rooted in material conditions that confer power and privilege in relationship to one another.

Lets examine 9/11 for a moment with regard to national identity. Immediately nationalist fundamentalism took grip after the terrorist attack on the World Trade Center and has been thriving ever since. We are told REAL Americans will rally round and support the administration in the war on terrorism, and that if you do not agree you are not a real American, you are the enemy.

Fundamentalists thrive only at times of crisis. The rest of the time we can pretty much ignore them and be true to all our combined identities.

So here is the problem. Finding alternative and more attractive routes out of the current crisis, breaking the cycle of violence that is snowballing out of control.

The Taoist ideal of sitting quietly is something poets, artists and mystics usually know how to do. When our minds are stuffed full of current ideas there is no room for new thoughts and we are unable to be truly creative.

In our current situation we are faced with a great need for creative solutions to the unprecedented dangers of the day. It was unthinkable after 9/11 to declare a 40 or 60 day period of mourning and take no further action until the horrific reality was fully accepted and understood.

Instead, without all the facts, politicians reached after short-sighted policies. Afghanistan, Iraq, threats to Iran, all of which have made a bad situation much worse. I have said before that you can make a terrorist, but you cannot unmake one.

Listening is a rare commodity, as is forgiveness, and in fact forgetfulness. ( at this point I can feel the knee-jerk reaction of those fundies who still cry remember the Alamo and throw the Mexican over the newly built wall to the South.) I do not mean we should forget the past entirely, I do mean we need to sit quietly and listen. We need to start from scratch and be ready to forget who did what to whom so that we can actually negotiate peace for our people. It is clear that the current administration has no intention of anything but continued violation of the laws of our nation. The headlines even on a local small time paper this morning told of more prisoners that have been being held in secret without legal recourse, who have just been shipped to Guantanamo.

Sit quiet for a moment, and reflect, let your mind empty. Then look at the reality of what the administration is doing and ask yourself if you believe in the rule of law. If you answer yes you believe in the rule of law, then it is your duty as an American to rid the country of an administration that has become a dictatorship eroding away all the human and civil rights this country was founded on based on the premise they are at war on terrorism. The only way to stop the terrorism is to stop feeding it by creating more terrorists.

Typical Politic

2006-08-30T12:33:00.000-07:00

The norm for politics in the United States is, thanks to Bush, becoming violation of the law of the land.

Bush has personally violated over 800 of our own laws and it is apparent he intends to continue to do so until the people call him to task by impeachment and trial for his crimes.

This disregard for the law seems to be spreading with unprecedented vigor. An otherwise relatively good candidate, Mayor of Los Angeles Antonio Villaraigosa will no doubt be challenged in court for getting a bill passed that gives him control of the Los Angeles Unified Public Schools, which is in direct violation of the state constitution.

While it is true that if you don't like a law, then you should work to change it but the current way of doing things if you are a politician is to ignore or by-pass the existing law and then try to show how you were not really violating the law.

Villaraigosa is small fry compared to Bush, but I bring it up as an example of the insidious trend that Bush and his cronies have started.

The central claim of the Bush administration is that to spread democracy in the middle east will bring an end to terrorism. This seems to ignore the possibility of a democratically elected terrorist organization.

Hezbollah is an important part of a democratically elected government, yet Britain and the US continue to label it a terrorist organization and insist we are only trying to strengthen the legal government of Lebanon. Well hey fellas, if they were democratically elected, what makes them illegal? The fact that we don't particularly like their methods?

The Palestinians spoke in their election, then we say, you must have gotten it wrong, you have been misinformed and you must now re-think it all and vote the way we want you to. This is democracy according to Bush and his administration.

Is it any wonder at all, that it is becoming more and more thinking around the world, "if Bush is for it, it must be bad and we are against it"?

Lets talk about democracy for a minute. In it's full liberal sense, it contributes to peace, or so they tell us. In a half-baked partial or manipulated from it can increase the danger of war.

While it is possible for democracy to grow from military occupation like Germany and Japan following war, it is not always going to work that way. Building democracy as a purpose does not justify military intervention. Iranian dissident Akbar Ganji had a point when he wrote to the NY Times that it is better for people to find their own paths to freedom, and our job is to support them.

It is time to stop meddling in the rightfully elected governments of other countries and to start addressing ourselves to the losses of our own democracy that are occurring through the continued violations of law being committed by the Bush administration.

I have a favor to ask

2006-08-28T16:52:00.000-07:00

I have three photos/ digital images that are entered into a contest that is vote based. It is for skin designs for laptops. I entered relatively late so have some catching up to do if there is any hope of my having a good showing so I am asking my subscribers to vote for one or all of my images. (the deal says vote early vote often.) Here are the images, and if you click on the one you like it should take you to a page where you can then click on vote for this design. Then it gives you a box with some letters in it so you can copy them and prove you are a real human being.

So have a look, and if you are so moved, please place a vote for me ok?

Thanks so much

image 1

image 2

image 3

ok, on this last one they did not get it that I would place the picture the other direction on the laptop, but hey, it still is sort of interesting ?

Anyway, your vote and help in this competition is much appreciated.

The Fall of a dictator

2006-07-22T16:02:00.000-07:00

In June the Supreme Court of the United States, the majority opinion mind you, agreed with what I have believed and been saying for some time now. President Bush has and is violating the Geneva convention, Common Article 3, and the military code of justice. The violations of the law are clear and constitute war crimes by our country's own definition. Bush and his conspirators (which includes Cheney, Rumsfield and Addington for the suppression of the opposition to the violation of our own laws by the joint cheifs of staff.)

In case this is all a sea of mud to you, it really boils down to we have a dictator in control of our country who is violating the law, illegally detaining and torturing folks without them having any recourse to a defense or protest their treatment, and violating the Geneva convention of which the United States is a participating signer with the intent to have the world behave in a more civilized manner.

Bush is a war criminal. He should be prosecuted for his crimes. If we as the people of the United States do not police our own, how can we expect any country on the planet to ever feell any obligation to honor any treaty with us? How can we expect any of them to honor our borders? It would be perfectly plausible for some country to decide to "liberate the Americans" from the dictator in charge.

Cleaning house in the executive branch of our government is an absolute imperitive if we are ever to be proud to be Americans.

Bush has created more terrorists in his time in office than anyone I ever remember reading about in history. It is very easy to create a terrorist, it is impossible to un-create one. Only time without acts like those of Bush will cause the hatred and hostility to stop. The time has come to impeach the current monarchy, and try those responsible for their war crimes.

Laws make the society and when we continue to allow the dictator Bush free reign to ignore those laws, America is truly in it's last days as a free nation. I can see the book title now, although it may not be in English... The Decline and Fall of the American Empire.

Silvatungfox

2006-04-29T21:53:00.000-07:00

Birds Of A Feather

Being a recent enrollee of the New York Institute of Photography has gotten me out with camera in hand to experiment with a new camera, ideas, and a new eye on the world surrounding me. It is perhaps a coping mechanism for the day to day vigil of watching my parents decline in health slowly. A larger version of the above picture can be found at my webshots site http://community.webshots.com/user/silvatungdfox/2 which is actually the third page of my photo albums now, in the Birds album.

Previously I was sitting at my computer combing through the real estate ads for France, The Netherlands, Italy and Switzerland. (yes I found the one I want, but suspect it won't still be on the market when I actually am free to proceed to that stage of my life plan.)

It also may be a knee jerk reaction to the recent bout I had with breast cancer. I want to encourage all women to do self examinations every month, and have anything abnormal checked out right away. Mine was stage 3 only because of the size of the tumor, and happily I am now well again. It is just as well as I turned out to be allergic to the chemotheraphy they wanted to do because of my age.

2006-02-02T10:13:00.000-08:00

Elephants on the Roof and the Cancer Merry- go- round

I thought I was pretty much out of the woods when coming out of surgery they told me there had not been cancer in the lymph nodes. As it turns out an addendum to the original pathology report says there is malignant cancer cells in the lymph nodes they took.
They do something now days called centinel nodes where they inject dye and radioactive material into the breast and then follow it to the first lymph nodes and do a biopsy on them, then leave the rest of the nodes if they do not find any cancer there. You can imagine that the term disappointment hardly covers my feelings about the news that this addendum contradicted the good news originally given me about my cancer.
The oncologist was rather scary but not for the reasons one might expect. In addition to a coffee mug with dopey of the 7 dwarfs he had in excess of 20 sponge bob square pants toys strew about his office and desk. When I asked him about this, his response was that he was a fan I could only reply that I had rather hoped that his reason had been that he treated a lot of children patients. He has no children patients.
This vist sounded rather like a bad joke, "the tumor tested estrogen receptor positive"
"so that's bad... " "no that's good as they recur far less often. It also tested progesterone negative."
"so that's bad..." "no that's good as those that test positive tend to be faster growing and larger"
You get the picture here. Meanwhile back at the ranch.... there were elephants on the roof. Or at least that is what my dog thought. In actuality the roofers where ripping off the old roof in preparation for the new roof. She also decided the elephants on the roof had abducted me and was hell bent on finding me. So much so that 8 adult males and my father could not stop her forcing her way through gates to conduct her own search for me.
All this was yesterday. Today the elephants are on the roof again.. with saws and hammers and debris raining down on my head as I type this. Indeed, they do rather sound like elephants on the roof.. but once they are done I will no longer have to pitch a tent on top of my bed every time it rains.

Twinkie January 19, 2006

2006-01-19T18:47:00.000-08:00

One of our neighbors who is an 85 year old jewish,still politically active left wing radical came over with some banana nut bread today. She met her now deceased husband at an anti nuke demonstration and his death just before his 101st birthday has left her somewhat lost. I have occassionally been asked to come over and show her again how to send something by e-mail, or to fix something that she has managed to screw up on her computer, but I think mostly she just wants company. (I also think she is one of the less blessed when it comes to understanding current technology, but she does have a good heart.)
Today she was telling us about the new feral cats she has aquired and wanting an option other than animal control, so I tried to find her some alternatives to try. Then things went to the past and other neighbors. She confuses two of the daughters of some folks who lived on the corner. In her attempt to idenitify the one she was speaking of she said "she was twinkie for years" There was a short silence where my Dad said, I think she said twinkie to which she replied I did. She then said but that was at Disneyland.
After a moment when no one quite knew how to respond I asked if she perhaps meant tinker bell? Sure enough that was who she meant. She said something later about being close enough as I figured it out to which I replied.. It was a reach actually.
It now occurs to me that this neighbor is a twinkie, and that I probably know a few folks I would give this newly adopted designation to.

Aspersion cast

2005-12-16T23:41:00.000-08:00

Today the USPS cast aspersions upon my character. The implication was that I would lie and thereby cheat a government agency.
To wit, I took two packages to be mailed that were filled with books, the main thing my family gives as gifts on all occasions.
This rather disagreeable fellow at the counter had been a nuisance previously when I sent a box of books some months ago as I asked if it would get to its destination by the birthday it was intended for.
Rather than say it should based on the time frame from his computer, he kept saying he could not guarantee as he did not deliver. Ok, fine, what does the computer say? It says 3 days.. well that was certainly in time, and I did not see the point in paying for a guarantee when thee guarantee was for 3 days anyway, and the event was some 10 days hence.
Today it was different. I did not ask about a delivery date, I was instead met with the absurd statement that I should not have sealed the box. Incredulous I said I never have been told not to seal a package I was shipping, and I frequently sent books via media mail from this post office.
He persisted so I suggested he open the boxes. I pointed out the books were wrapped for Christmas, and that he could still feel them and tell they were books. He stamped a paper to show me a stamp that said "opened to verify contents" and said it was a postal rule that the box not be sealed so he could stamp it. I again suggested he open the damn boxes and verify the contents and then he could reseal them.
He instead started to put postage on them. I said, "I thought you were going to open them" He said next time. Just don’t seal them.
In hindsight I realize I should have insisted he open them and verify the contents, and let the wrath of the long line behind me that I had also waited through get crankier by the time he got to wait on them.
If I had not had to get to a lab for some blood work by a specific time I most likely would have done this.
The packages got mailed, I got to my appointment on time, I just feel rather unsatisfied that I did not have the satisfaction of making this insulting jerk eat his words and be forced to apologize.

God is a deaf cat

2005-11-27T11:02:00.000-08:00

A cramp forms in the arch of my foot forcing me to stir. I have not really been asleep again, but wish it to avoid thinking. Better to dream and believe it reality than face what appears to be reality.
My body shudders with the silent uncontrollable racking sobs that want to escape. It is hard to breathe.
I avoid the mirror but am drawn to it with a weird curiosity. I need to look. I need to see if the image that was there the last time I looked stares back at me.
I am transfixed. It is not my image I see but something akin to what I am used to, yet not.
A grotesque gargoyle with slits for eyes and all the pain stares back.
I bury my face in my hands thinking I can wipe away this image and look again...it is still there.
Not able to look anymore I put on my glasses. This masks some of it, but the image is still looking back at me.
I cannot watch in morbid fascination any longer and rise hoping no one else will be up in the house, knowing someone will be.
I walk the dog. My breathing is shallow, and comes hard. I light a cigarette and suck in the familiar smoke.
It is not the deep pull, I am incapable of that this morning. tears come unbidden and there is a pain in my chest, in my stomach, my back is aflame with muscle spasms.
The dog is ready to go back in. I wipe away the tears and go to my computer which has mysteriously put itself into some kind of sleep or off state which it does not want to come out of, much like me I think.
I look at my watch even though I know the time. I know they have turned off the machines. I spoke with Charlie last night.
It was the longest conversation we have ever had. I heard in her voice what I saw in my mirror at the beginning.
I heard her relax by the end of it. She needed reassurance that she was not a heartless bitch from someone who she knew loved her sister.
I cannot breathe. There is a pain in my stomach, and empty ache, my lungs struggle to pull in oxygen and I wonder if I can’t breathe because she cannot breathe.
I wonder if I will ever breathe again. The pain increases and I struggle to appear semi-normal as I do not wish to worry my parents.
They know someone I care for is dying. They heard my end of the conversation with Charlie, it could not be avoided.
I put my cell phone on the desk next to me so I can see it has not been turned off, in case Charlie calls to tell me it is over.
Will I be able to breathe again then? Or will I continue to suffer?
I tell myself she will be out of pain. I know she had the gift of being able to talk to folks who had passed. I wonder if she will come to me if only in my dreams to give me the chance to tell her I love her, that I want to hold her.
I imagine myself telling her I see she is going to be late for our date to take her children to Europe, by a lifetime.
It was a joke between us. We only ever had one "date" it was the set up meeting we had. One of the children was sick and she had to postpone the date for a week. I told her she was a week late for our date.
I find myself talking to the deaf diabetic cat. I think, God is a deaf cat. I think of all the times I have asked for God’s intercession. All the times I have offered myself in the place of someone I love dying. Let them live, take me instead.
I remember someone, maybe many someone's telling me that God answers our prayers, it is just that sometimes the answer is no.
I think, the answer for me is always no. It is like talking to a deaf cat. Independent of me or my feelings, the deaf cat will do what he wants.
The knot in my stomach tightens. I try to relax and find my muscles also acting like deaf cats. Uncooperative, stubborn painful.
I think of her children, picture them in my mind weeping for their mother, and weep silently with them. I think how winter is always when losses seem to happen for me.
I think how the holidays will not be very cheery for her children now. It is 10:55am. My breathing is somewhat less labored. I wonder if that means she is dead and out of pain. Another wave of silent racking sobbing shudders through me. I am not gifted with visits from those who have passed.
The distractions of daily needs come, and I end this here.. knowing it is not over for me.. the grieving has just begun.

2005-11-22T17:53:00.000-08:00

Creating Income Out Of Nothing At All

2005-11-22T16:18:00.000-08:00

When it became apparent I would be needed on a 24/7 basis to care for my parents, I determined I needed to find a way to make a living online. In the pursuit of this end I have joined an affiliate program, created a website and been putting together content which search engines prize when ranking pages.

I found a way to open a shop for free that sells my designs on shirts, mugs, coasters, handbags and mousepads. (they also do ball caps but since they do not yet recognize xara files as vector graphics I have not been able to include these in my line of products. ) The upside is they do the order taking and fulfillment, they do the shipping and pay me a commission which I dictate when setting up each article in the shop. The down side is I do not have a lot of say in the price of each item other than my commission. This allowed me to add a gift shop to my website for zero cost.

I added a Graphics page to my site that has a 3-D sampler where you can create your own 3-D header, read about the Xara software programs that make creating vector graphics easy for anyone. There are also links to try the software for free or purchase it, as well as some of the graphics I produced in under an hour playing with the Xara program for the first time.

I added an Adventure and Travel page where you can search for the best deals on air fare, hotels, tours and more. There are links to my own photography, online published stories, and a link to free screensavers or wallpaper photographs.

The calendar page I added is for purchasing 2006 calendars that I have created using my own photography, the favorite seems to be "Grandpa's Cats". This is all automated to use paypal.

One of the affiliates with the same program happened upon my pages and suggested to me that on my links page I should not include other hosting programs for websites... I wrote back and suggested having a look at what they offered since they did not beat the deal we had, and by including them I was not only giving my visitors other choices, but showing by comparison that we indeed had the best package deal for domain name and hosting. (there are cheaper hosting options but when you add in the domain names they are no longer cheaper.)

I guess it is not out of Nothing at all, it is out of my creativity, and determination to make it all work... not just for my current need to be here for my parents, but also so that when I am not needed here anymore, I will be free to travel and probably relocate to Europe.

Agony of helplessness

2005-11-16T17:58:00.000-08:00

Tonight finds me filled with anguish, trying to think of anything I can do... I learned this morning upon rising that my best friend... no we are actually more than that.. is on a respirator in a hospital in Tucson. It took me about an hour of phone calls to find out she had been unconscious and sedated for about three days now.

Having had a bone marrow replacement her trips to Tucson battling with various problems that often arise from such procedures. The steroids have done some damage to her kidneys, but she opted for the respirator early enough that mostly the other organs are not damaged. Now it is a wait and see situation.

My chest hurts. Tears well up but do not fall, as I try to maintain.. I will cry later when it will not be grist for the mill of upset to my parents who I now care for. Sherryl's oldest child has left the hospital and gone back to protect his job where he is relatively new, while her two other children are in Tucson on the life watch. Her sister is there, and has said she will keep me posted. She may not approve of me, but she knows I care.

I was tempted to have her tell Sherryl, even if it was in an unconscious state, that I did not mind if she was late for our date.. a date tentatively set for about 3 years in the future as that is how long they said it would take to know if she was going to live or die following the bone marrow transplant. We are going to Europe, where she knows I will try to convince her to live with me.

I actually was surprised when she agreed to go to begin with. She is very big on family and has a very big one of those here in the states.

We have had one date, many moons ago... and she was a week late for that one, something I have teased her about now and then just to remind her. It was a sort of blind date arranged by mutual friends (one of who still misspells her name) and attended by a large consortium of co-workers to insure no one felt they needed rescuing. Back then she had decided she needed to focus on her children and was not ready to pursue any relationships with anyone. I finally went off to live somewhere else for a bit, lost touch, tried to regain communication.. and was finally successful with the help of mutual friends who worked at helping me search when she was nowhere to be found. It was on finding her again that I learned about the bone marrow transplant and all that had been happening.

I want to go there. I know she is sedated, not awake. I have no one to leave here to care for my parents. I have an obligation. Mother has become more and more dependent upon me on a 24/7 basis. Dad has become less and less able to care for her and more dependent on me as well.

Because the trips to Tucson were pretty much weekly for treatments, I gave her my laptop computer so she would have a way to communicate with her kids during these trips as only speaking to them at bedtime on the phone was pretty unsatisfactory for both her and the kids.

grief is a strange thing. I have buried more than one loved one so clinging to hope when they say things are this bad is hard to do. Yet I am clinging. I find myself offering a swap to God. Me for her. Holding back tears that would only cause concern from my parents who do not need to be stressing out.

I have almost forgotten that I am due for a mamogram, and I expect certain results there that will require some attention. I ache in places I am usually unaware of. I know that I am stressing out here, but do not know how I can stop that process. I left word that any of her kids can call me if they want to collect. I do not really expect to hear from them. They want their Mom.. I do not blame them. So do I.

2005-11-16T01:10:00.000-08:00

A little bit about me. As you can see I was ready to go way back in 1954 (the date on the license plate in the picture to the left.) Impatient, impetuous, inspired, are all terms that probably fit me like a well worn glove for most of my life.

I have returned to the scene of the crime, or crimes as the case may be and now am putting my globe trotting and adventuring on hold while I tend to the business of caring for my aging parents who after 3 years of my saying, "Do you need me to come?" finally said, yes we need you to come.

In the two years I have been back here I have discovered a vast number of lies I grew up with.. Some blatant, some suggested, some of omission... Like, eat your bread crusts it will curl your hair.. Little did they know I did not want curly hair.. But this made me think Mother liked the crusts of bread.. Which she now removes from her sandwiches before eating.

More shocking was that she used to tell me the best part of the baked potato was the skin, which she no longer eats.. and she denies memory that she ever said such a thing to me..

I digress. I have started this blog to tell the stories of my life and the stories of those in my life, or at least those stories that are printable. (and maybe a few that are not time will tell.)