Saturday, December 18, 2004
DYING ROW
The leading cause of death, a federal prison authority is being quoted as saying recently when speaking of “Death Row” inmates, is old age.
I don't know that such a statement would strike anyone as much of a surprise today with the growing “Death Row” population growing ever larger as the kaleidoscopic system of appeal, potential pardons, unfair trials, confessions, mistakes on all sides and other such niceties such as DNA evidence we didn't know about that long ago – continue endlessly.
The good warden's comment answers two sides of a question equally well. Those y citizen who hold that capital punishment is a good thing ad should,be kept in place for capital crimes, as well as those who oppose it who usually fade away a bit before election times and pipe up loudly when they can't find anything else to advocate. I often wonder just how sincere either side might be. Too often ,the capital punishment idea is just the stone they used to put a sharp edge on any other weapons they have at hand and hope to use, perhaps often, for unrelated causes. Budget balancers used to point out some years ago that it costs at least $32,000 a year just to keep a DR cell current occupant alive and in fair health. That price has probably gone up a bit, just as the cost of expanding old prisons or building new ones to house newcomers has taken a billion dollar bound or two. The Chair or lethal injections are a better money-wise choice. And, of course both sides still talk about cruel and inhuman ways to kill people as if there was some other way.
Some would contend that the entire concept of Capital Punishment has become a political football. Let's see now, Canada does not have it; England does not have it. Who does ? Or, does it make any difference as long as a large number of government on Earth in recent, current and future times have not, do not, and will not offer any real choices.
Recent murder trials, far too numerous to mention here, have run far too long, been extended, dramatized, delayed, moved about, modified or started over again so much that a middle aged murder-”ers” or “eese” might be drawing security payments by the time a judgement is made as to his or her final place.
I remember when “Capital Punishment - Yea or Nay” used to be among the main topics for High School Debate Teams to mouth about.
We didn't decide a thing with all our talking, and continued talk today makes about the same amount of progress toward either goal. Our basic religious nature opposes Capital Punishment, but not always. I doubt if we will ever decide one way or the other. In the meantime, dying from Old Age will continue to be the way to go if the “Death Row” name says you've got to do so.
A.L.M. December 18, 2004 [c502wds]
Friday, December 17, 2004
UNITY
Around this Yuletide time of each year we tend to think a great deal about something we call “international”, “religious” or “racial” unity. We are emboldened with the Christmas-time fervor of Love-all-around and we think of how it might solve so many of our problems. It hides away in a corner of our Christmas wish box, or perhaps we make it a spoken part of our New Year hopes that something might come along which would bring about unity for all of Mankind- enabling us to live in peace.
Many years ago, I read a science-fiction piece which attempted to reach a solution for the problem. You may have read the same story. I think it was in the magazine called “Blue Book”- a rather long thing in the days when our magazines started setting forth “novellas”, as they were called. I don't remember the writer's name but he wrote a great deal of materials lot of the “pulp fiction”. If I had to guess it would be “H. Bedford-Jones”. It was in the mid 1930's and it had the somewhat unpleasant sounding title of “ The Gray Sickness”.
Scientists had found a strange silvery, metallic ball which had seemingly landed in our western desert regions. They took it under special care, thinking it to be something sent to us from outer space.
Wisely, they did not try to open it. Other such mysterious spheres were found and no one seems to know which might have in some way, shattered or opened one of them and released on Earth a fungus type dust, according to the news media of the time. Years went by and the sensational item fell out of the news awareness of Americans - like the Roswell, New Mexico, alien visitations did year's later to city a more recent on oncident, you may remember.
Gradually people came to be aware of the fact that newborn children were of a gray hue and that anyone who have suffered and had recovered turned gray. It soon became obvious that in the areas where the strange spheres had been opened – everyone was becoming gray. The theory of the story was that if we could eliminate the barrier of color we could live in absolute peace and unity. The scientists who had retained the first sphere by careful procedure, withdrew a portion of the contents of that ball and it was found that and advanced civilization far away in space, viewing our warlike self-deconstruction sent the continers of grey fungus to us with their best wishes for peace. Forget about color. Live as one and enjoy peace. It did not work.
The plan did not suceed as the space super nation though it would. In fact, we went to the extreme opposites quickly. New hatred, division; large segments of each color setting up protective enclaves, putting up walls to protect their culture - that sort of thing. I don't remember if scientists saved us all from destruction by created a anti-something substance, but the story was a thriller.
Isn't it odd how, even today, that when anyone brings forth an idea whereby we might find unity in the manner in which we live, that the very people who say they seek it readily are among the first to oppose it, by being unwilling to work together.
How sincerely do you really want and seek genuine, enduring Peace? There's a great deal more to it than simply going marching along waving a banner and screaming vocal tokens of your cupidity.
A.L.M. December 17, 2004 [c602wds]
Thursday, December 16, 2004
UPCOMING CRISIS
It isn't even New Year's time yet and time to start have special worries about the coming year.
Among such problems will be one which stays with us year-after-year and is usually just after a major election day or just before one. Citizens, who haven' t thought of it for months, feel a sudden concern for their political party and lament loudly over the number of qualified people who are non-voters. On an average we do well to get a bit over one half of eligible voters to actually do so in our elections.
If we were serious and completely honest with ourselves we would concede that this could be one of the flaws non-Democracy-minded peoples say make out system weak and worthless. The problm deserves study and re-evaluation. If not, we can expect it to become a crisis of out future.
It is an obvious flaw in our government structure. If we are to remain a republic, we had best remember the observation of Benjamin Franklin, who when asked what type of government we had just instituted said:..'we have republic, if we can hold on to "it", or words to that Colonial-times extent. We, the people of the new nation - must be more than casually concerned about the running of our government.
We are commongly told that many voters have been turned off". I think that sort of reasoning comes from the more liberal side of things who seem to accept the idea that voters can,indeed, be switched "on" or "off" by political, economic, or social pressures of one sort or another. Moderate and Conservatives allow more freedom in some ways, yet they do embody some qualities which could curb elements of creative innovation among voters. Much depends on the manner in which "statesmen" set forth their plans. Many politicians, fearful of not drawing enough votes, use the quality of fear to arouse interest.
What is the basis for this underlying strata of distrust?
We tend to seek learned and rather lumpy ingredients, in need of prcessing to help us mix up a potion which might help us counteract such a socio-politcal ailment. We look on the right area, but in the wrong direction when we turn to Acadamia. The reasons are plural, complicated and, oddly enough, recent as well.
We have, for the 2nd half of the past century, at least, failed to teach our children the basis of American history and its relationship to that of the world's other nations. In the l930's when we diminished the name "History" ; started calling it "Civics" and became guilty of feeding the eager minds of our youngsters fragment in what were called "Units of Study". Geography had all but disappeared at about the same time and that meant the end of regional and geographically- oriented literature and science attainment as well.
Think about those radical years of academic change! That's where we will find the causes of the current lack of interest in and concern for our national well-being.
A.L.M. December 16, 2004 [c449wds]
Wednesday, December 15, 2004
FORGOTTEN UNITS
It is un-intentional and nothing much can be done about it, but each time we celebrate days in memory of veterans of our various wars of various wars, we skip certain of our armed forces - ignoring their fine work.
In World War II, for example, today's youngsters might get the idea it consisted of two sites - the ETO and the South Pacific.
Thousands of men and a few women who can attest to the fact that there were other “theaters of operations” worthy of remembering and honoring.
Among such groups you seldom hear about you find some of the most unusual aspects of the war in relation to various peoples and cultures with which we seldom meet.
I know just a few veterans who were, for example, members of military units who served in the area known letter-ly as “the CBI”. Translated, that works out as having made reference to the thousands of our troops we had in the China, Burma and Indian sectors during World War II. Many young people today are taken by surprise when they find we had a viable presence in such places at all. Older people do not always remember the CBI, North Africa, Aleutian Islands, and a score of other such sites.
One GI I know who served in the China-Burma-India sphere does not fly to this day commercially. He feels that “catlike”, he used up the major portion of his “nine lives” during several years of service as a member of a crew who's assignment was to fly fifty-five gallon drums of gasoline across the “Hump” dividing Indian and Burma above other G.I. persons trucking such supplies below them on the the celebrated and dangerous “Burma Road.” His name was Owen and he remembers quite often - about every time he fills his car's fuel tank today, - how the metal barrels, worn and used to near-extinction, would crack and develop obvious leaks at high altitudes above the Himalayan range. Patch with pitch and pray was the only actions to be taken.
Take Bob's experiences, as an army cook in India. Bob died recently and his widow passes along to me copies of a fine, little monthly magazine edited by Dwight O. King of Newport Beach, CA. -just as Bob added copies to my reading over the last decade or two. His army years in India were less rigorous than Owen's in some ways but being so far from home and family in New Jersey among people who's culture was almost primitive despite its age and history was a disturbing Bob had to force himself to “get used to.” The magazine ”Ex-CBI Roundup” for December of is year has a letter in it from John Beaudoin II, of Wakefield, KS who has a memory a lot like Owen's gas cans. He flew out of Bangladesh as it is now called, placing river mines from the air. In preparation for an early morning mission, their B-24 had been loaded then night before. During the night they had a heavy rain. The B-24 was not designed to stay dry when rain falls. The ship was awash with water around the base of the mines and it was too late to unload and re-load so they took off any way. The interesting factor John remembers so well, was the fact that the particular type of mine they carried that morning was activated when block of salt melted in the water and a lever was released which armed the bomb to explode.
There was humor on the CBI front, as well. One trio of muleskinners in the land army gave their mules names. One rugged little stead was called “Loco” because he seemed to be just that. When three new skinners were assigned mules to care for and tend, they named them: “Wine”,“Women” and “Song”.
The CBI was a big part of The War and next Veteran's Day- - don't you forget that. Get a copy of “Ex-CBI Roundup” and learn much of their war.
A.L.M. December 15, 2004 [c687wds]
Tuesday, December 14, 2004
SEVEN POINTS
I certainly hope that none of you take this as an open invitation to rush to your kitchen and throw together a special Yuletide salad of poinsettias! I have just become aware of the fact that the Poinsettia is not a poisonous plant. It is non-toxic.
What a bum rap that beautiful plant has have to suffer for the past hundred years or so. It seem I’ve been hearing that scary charge at least that long – give or take a few years.
Every time Christmas came around and the poinsettia became the favorite flower around our home we were warned and double-warned not to place them down low where the children and pets could die a horrible death because of their being there. We have a cat named “Angel” who likes to nibble on pretty flowers anyway and we had a family [photograph taken a few days ago, and we received a live poinsettia plant for being the umpteenth customer's or something. We brought the potted plant home and put it “way up high on a china press to keep the cat cat from eating it”. Until last week, you see, we though she might be doing harp exercises by now living up to her heavenly name on cloud-something or other in cat paradise. ”We gotta keep the cat away from it! It’ll kill her! I'll kill her dead!” And. double-said like that, it sounded even worse.
That statement is not true. It is not worth the letters it is written with!
The American Society of Florists have looked into the matter and they found that the “poinsettias kills” thing got started started in 1929 when the two-year old daughter of and some busy-brain lolling nearby noticed she had been chewing on poinsettia portions. Research at Ohio State University indicates that a fifty-pound child would have to consume somewhere between five hundred and six hundred poinsettia leaves - about one and a quarter pounds - to equal the amount given in their tests. Because of the longevity of the rumor, the American Society of Florists points out that the poinsettia has been tested and re-tested more than any than any other flower. The toxicity rate is so low that the ASPCA – The Animal Poison Center, Urbana,Illinois does not even recommend decontamination of animals which have eaten of the happy holidays flower. The American Veterinary Association has charts of poisonous as well as toxic plants and the poinsettia does not appear on any of them.
During the holiday weeks of the year 2000 The Children's Hospital of Pittsburgh and Carnegie-Mellon University Hospital found that nearly 23,000 cases of “poinsettia exposure”, as they list it, were reported to our nation's Poison Control Centers.
This Christmas Season give your poinsettia the place of honor. They deserve being featured fragrantly in the festive surroundings. Don't shunt them off to a high corner because of their alleged toxic nature.
A.L.M. December 14, 2004 (c502wds]
Monday, December 13, 2004
PERSONAL ARMOR
A question remains in the back of our mental agenda right now which will be widely discussed many years from now.
Who is responsible, we seem to want to think we want to determine, for allowing our armed forces to have fallen into such a condition as that which inspires some of them to pass along seemingly legitimate complaints concerning the quality of the “standard” protective gear provided for their use in combat zones.
One strongly considered reason suggests that, perhaps, many years ago something went amiss which allowed a human misjudgment to be accepted as being valid. A some time or another personal well-being during combat conditions became a political “card” to be played for campaign advantage, with little or no concern for individual bodies in such combat situations as are common in today's war-making complexities.
It can be that we would be founding the base of yet another wrong if we center our attention on who might have been “to blame”. Who might have played careless card years is of minor importance now and does little so meet present needs. That one person or those persons who, for political advantage either allowed or purposely caused our protective military shell to decay from within , must know who they are, or were and that is punishment enough for the time being.
Two areas of consideration come, immediately, to mind.
As the outward form of military equipment changes suited to the technical knowledge available, certain things about their use hold steady. Trucks are supply and personnel carriers, by and large, whereas a tank and some other heavily armored vehicles are used in a more aggressive sense to attack the enemy or meet his thrusts. The use of “trucks” where “tanks” were needed seems to be at the bottom of so many of the recent equipment complaints. The cartoon-like misuse of equipment is an invitation to possible disaster. Being school to expect transport vehicles to fulfill the protective efficiency of heavier units might best be called a training and preparations error than a battlefield error. The solution lies more with logistics of supplying sufficient numbers of each type of vehicles required to accomplish the task at hand.
At the opposite extreme, we must also accept the reality of our time which has been in place for several decades at least which plainly indicates that the unit which is demonstrated at the munitions proving ground or other such testing for approval location, is not the identical unit which will then we find coming from the nation assembly lines. There is a great deal of leeway between the cup of creation and the lip of actual use. It is entirely possible that the unit created by “experts”and accepted for specific usage by other “experts” can become a variable dud under our strange sopho-moronic system of “controls ” so often associated with the word “quality. Too often it becomes “cost” control. In military hardware: cutting corners kills.
It has long been true and will continue to be so, that some individual are born complainers ... often at odds with authority of any kind. The current spate of critical comments seems to coming from from a broader base than habitual faultfinders. It deserve serious attention by Congressional Oversight persons.
Now! Not “next year.”
A.L.M. December 13, 2004 [c560wds]
Sunday, December 12, 2004
IN A STORM
I cannot explain it. But, there is a lesson in it for each of us.
From my place as a “crew member”, I do not question why my Captain has, apparently, decided to support Secretary-General Anan in his present difficulties of being involved in United Nations in-fighting.
To my rather limited scope of awareness, it seems that the Secretary General has knowingly, or thorough neglect, allowed the occurrences of a highly improper exchange of funds designated to be spent in oil-for-food relief work in Iraq. Payments have gone to individuals rather than to the Iraqi people as planned. Lists of such who gained in personal wealth from the UN project include the name of the Secretary General's son as a recently- hired employee of the French-associated banking firm which handled the actual exchanges. I, along with many others who kept seeing and hearing such allegations came to believe there had a measure of hanky-panky along the way. Poppa was amazed, shocked at first, but the more it was said he knew when his son had been selected to fill the rather obscure post, the less convincing his words became. Nothing has been done about it so far.
Our Ship of State has only recently departed on another four year voyage into the unknown and this is no time for any of us to be rocking the boat. We have had subjects aplenty with which we can be occupied such as the re-alignment of efficiency for all those cabinet positions now under new departmental heads. In fact, the emergence of this Anan business serves as somewhat of a relief from the resignation of cabinet secretaries with some, I'm sure.
For the common citizens among us, all these changes are expected and should be accepted in the sense that something is being done. Anything, I suppose, can be said to be better than nothing.
It will be interesting in the future to see how this acceptance of works out in the long run. It maybe that President Bush has chosen well in supporting the Secretary-General at time when the UN is not the most popular American idol by any rating. The UN needs our continued support if it is to endure; be modified along lines of common fairness and equity for all rather than being destroyed because of dishonest activity by some.
It may yet be that the United Nation will develop some worthwhile teeth, talons and stamina of its own but it can't if it is killed. Right now, within out own country we have political factions waiting for some signal for them to dismantled the entire UN. That would be a sad occasion, but those of us who saw the ideals of the old League of Nations vilified know it can happen. Dropping Anan right now could be seen as such a sign.
A.L.M. December 12, 2004 [c492wds]
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