TRUST?

I need an answer to a political question.

What, exactly, in plain English, does the term:"Trust Fund" mean when is used in relation to the Social Security program under which we have been living for these many years? I have yet to be given a clear picture of exactly what it was originally intended to be or to accomplish in time. If not, it would seem we are justified in asking for some explanation as to why it has not done so, is not working out as planned, or if it is a downright fabrication which allows other ends to be achieved without condemnation.

By keeping the Trust Fund as a internal secret, the agency has done the entire nation a great disservice. By allowing other parts of the governmental machinery to "legally" drain off earnings of the two established trust funds as they wished can be seen only as an intended means of built-in wrongdoing. The technical facts which make it all seem to be a legal activity does not make it "honest", however. Common decency required that it be corrected. It would, in a practical sense, be unwise for us to try to punish those who did the original wrong, but we should be able to bring an immediate halt to the pilfering of designated trust funds for other uses in the governmental system.

The future of the entire Social Security System depends on our willingness to do so. The books are being "cooked" in street parlance. It must be stopped.

There are two such Trust Funds known as: "OASI" and "DI". All "Old Age and Survivor Benefits" are paid from "OASI.". All "Disability Insurance" are paid from "DI.".

The assets of the larger trust fund (OASI) was almost totally depleted as recently as the year 1982. No beneficiary was shortchanged because the Congress stepped, jerry-rigged, and quickly passed "temporary, emergency" legislation which enabled the federal to borrow. The funds borrowed which brought the Trust Fund so close to extinction were, it appears, paid back four years later.

We can all learn that much simply by looking at semi-public records, but I would like to know to what extent they compensated for the use of their accumulated funds. We should have available public records showing exactly how the funds are fairing at all times. Their management should not be a a political football to tossed about or kicked around at will.

Go back to l982. Check out who was "in charge" at various levels of our governmental structure if you wish to determine who has caused difficulties in the past - and judge with known facts in mind.

A.L.M. January 30, 2005 [c452wds]

 
FAT SICK

Now that being overweight is being listed as a disease, a person can call in fat-sick any day of the week - even on holidays , if you can think of some little twist to make such an action pay off in hard cash.

There's no doubt remaining about overweight being a common cause of time-off requests. Fat folks find it more difficult to keep up with with common office and plant routines without a great deal of huffing and puffing when moving about, even in ergonomic Edens designed and budget built with delicate wire, glass and soft metal or plastics. Modern work-place furnishings are designed by skinny workers for other small-seated persons. Only on rare occasions does one meet with the grandiose executive easy chairs once so common. One reason for the seeming disuse has been the rise of a secondary level of control in most industrial plants which determines how executives should be fed, exercised, properly supplemented with precisely the correct combination of vitamins and supplements in whatever combinations are in style with magazine editors or publishers at the given moment.

There was a time when the average citizen might turn with some logic involved, to his family doctor for an opinion concerning his body weight by today an editor, publisher or an Internet guru might be more easily accredited concerning such important matters.

A common sense crisis exists.

If millions of fat people should take to bed rest to cure their illness, we are at a impasse where deep trouble prevails: Who will wait on the rest of us? The waitress who brings your meal is fat. The attendant who supervises your purchase of fat priced gasoline for your fat-featured car, and so is the sales person who huffs and puff taking a pair of shoes from a shelf for you to try on while they watch to give instant approval. There seems to be no faster way to achieve weight gains than by standing or sitting behind a cash register all day or night. Notice how many car divers who pass you are fat. Go on, try again. Turn your head just a bit more. Now you can see them.

Never have we had such opportunity for home remedies to prove themselves.

A.L.M. January 29, 2005 [c388wds]

 
SPECIAL TV TREAT

I have profited today, I feel, from watching and listening to the ceremonies which made Dr. Condoleezza Rice our Sixth-sixth Secretary of State.

The amazing thing was the lack of pomp and yet it was very typical of the way the average American view on such events. So often frills and and meaningless flap doodle attachments only make such official recognition tiresome and devoid of individual associations which are vital to continued significance

Very often conscious attempts to keep[such ceremonies simple come across as having trivialized the subject. A facade is formed which seem to lack sincerity and the producers are accused of trivializing the subject.

The oaths taken during yesterday's ceremonies were not new. They were set, patterned and very serious. They were incantations. They were litanies, in a sense ideals and goals of perfection obtainable. President George W. Bush was also George Bush, Citizen at one and the same time. He and Dr. Rice thanked each other for shared associations and decisions. Each of them voiced special feelings for the outgoing Secretary of State Colin Powell and many of us at home thought prayerful words thanking him as well for work well done in times of war and strife.

I liked the conversational aspects of the exchange of sentiments was especially good and I think many viewers felt better than being faced with formal speeches. We feel a new sense of assurance that here were two people who would be heading up important actions in our government in the future. They knew each other well and would work as a team. Both had "matured" in many ways because they had shared many memorable experiences in the last four years. George Bush speaks and acts with courage and aplomb; Dr. Rice with new confidence and, now, with authority which has some real bite to it.

Fifteen member of the opposition party stood against Dr. Rice becoming Secretary of State. They allowed petty political considerations to warp the common rules of politeness which have made it possible for them to be where they are today. Shame.

A.L.M. January 28, 2005 [c360wds]

 
STUDENTS OF...

Both ancient and recent experiences would suggest that Mankind remains subservient to the violence of Nature. He has developed no real, complete defense.

Within the space of a fortnight we have experienced costly floods, avalanches of snow, rock and mud and creeping; leaping walls of flame have sent sacrificial billows of smoke and ash into the heavens over dense forests and grassy plains. As a centerpiece of the costly the menu of such horrors we also had a major earthquake deep below the surface of the Indian Ocean, generally west of Bangladesh and north of the Maldive Islands. That blast started the biggest Tsunami known to man with powerful waves measuring well over thirty-five feet high sweeping over eleven low-lying nations and doomed seas of doomed humanity. The total number of people injured is beyond counting and the soul-sapping loss of property and personal belongings by millions of people is beyond even general estimates.

A central concern with all of this - even though we hesitate to actually put it into words - is: why? What could possibly be the underlying cause of such a strange series of disasters? What might have engendered the force of it all? It is natural that we worry about others, possibly, which must,then, are out there just waiting to happen.

We are well-school by book-learning and my individual experience to feel that for every action there has been a cause. We can't just "forget about it." Nor, can we properly defend ourselves and those we love if we don't know what,who and where the opposition - the "enemy" might be. I meet with those who tell me:"Forget about it. Those things happen,and there's nothing you can do about stopping any of them - so ignore them. They have been happening for centuries. That's just the it is and the way it has always been!"

At the opposite extreme I find a great many people waiting to point out why and this seemingly haphazard series of events is my fault as part of a mankind which does not do that which is see to be good and proper in the sight of almighty God. How they came to such active analysis of the inner workings of God's mind, is never explained, but they extract all they can drain from their pet peeve - be it purification of the waters of the Chesapeake Bay, peace in Palestine, Justice in Judea, or ballots for illegals - and find ways to show how our neglect, our selfishness, our growing greed and activated avarice eat at the foundations of the Earth itself and at our civilization such as it may appear to be at that moment.

I have a feeling it is something deeper than all that. We are not all that we think ourselves to be. We have yet a long, long way to go. This Earth, this creation of endless wonders, universal in-gatherings of solar bodies and seminal substances we have not yet even heard about - much less known. We have yet to see and feel the total complex powers of Nature.

We keep our God small enough to comprehend.

As the weaknesses continue begin to show in our system, new revelations will come about and a even better life will emerge. We are still in the learning stage of our being and some lessons we learn do not come easily at all.

A.L.M. January 27,2005 [c570wds]

 
BY CHANCE?

Some wonderful changes appear to have come into being largely through
the mysterious element of chance

It may be that this continent on which we live was “discovered” by
wandering Norsemen long before Columbus set off to find a route to the riches
of India and, on the way, chanced upon the Caribbean Islands. There is also a
theory now being talked around that we were also discovered from the other
direction. It is widely held someone from China visited our Pacific shores,
probably at about the same time as the Norsemen hit the eastern edges of what
is now Canada. He, or they, may have drifted with Pacific currents which
still bring us occasional reminders of Asia, or they may have been a bit
later trying to find a new route to the markets of Europe.

No one knows because chance leaves no records on purpose. We find
some by accident, however, and our intense studies are based on, yes ...on a
chance of finding proofs some day ... somewhere.

Only when we get into the areas of religious concerns do we shy away
from the idea of chance.

What is providential and destined by a deity vies with the very idea
of chance happenings. I cannot agree with the Deist view that holds the
Universe came into being due to more or less accidental circumstances
prevailing at the time. It has been, it seems, set up as a giant clock-work
mechanism of some type which has been ticking away and running down ever
since. That would be chance, but it seems to me, to be a wider concept which
demands more than such a trite and trivial categorization.

When your child is in the process of being born at the hospital, you
don’t want the doctors and nurses to be doing things by chance, do you?

Think about it from time to time. To put your reliance on chance is
risky at best. If you lose a dollar of two on the lottery from time-to-time,
trusting to chance, the loss may not be too great, and that should be the
extent of such ventures for most of us.

To “bet you life” or any portion thereof, is foolishness.

Much in Mankind’s history which may seem to have happened by chance
really came about from the concerted mental and physical efforts of scores of
people in the past who contemplated and worked diligently trying to make
their world a better place in which to live. We are doing it now in our space
ventures and in countless other ways, and, in truth, we leave very little to
chance.

We don’t trust it...and wisely so.

A.L.M. January 26, 2005 [c455wds]

 
YEA OR NAY!

I am currently occupied in my annual phase of evaluating the wisdom of either continuing the use of the Electoral College system in our presidential elections,or junking the antiquated system completely.

The subject comes up every November when many people reflect on what they consider to have been the “iffy” points of recent or ancient elections. Very often great effort goes into such studies concerning that which may happened had voters not been subject to the oppressive elements of the Electoral College system.

The arguments set forth seems violently revolutionary to some, but others see the suggested changes as logical improvements to the system. It is easy to show that we do not vote for the candidate, but rather for the elector who will,then,in turn, vote for a candidate of chosen according to hard, set rules of based on studies of the make up of the area concerned with such things as population. trade, wealth and stature among other places of like interests and nature. Tradition plays a prominent role in determining where the votes will go. The whole thing appears to be very un-democratic and citizens hearing of it for the first time sometimes do not believe that such a an archaic system exists -much less prevails. At times criticism gets as far as our Congress but the last time that happened the house junked it and the Senate restored it. So, it stayed about the same it has been for many, many years years.
We hear little about it save in actual election times when millions of citizens either discover or re-discover how critical Electoral College systems are when we chose president or vice-president. In years past,I tended to side with those who wish to eliminate the Electoral College system; but it now seems we had best pause and, at least,question our observing the same old rituals as if they have not been questioned at all. It is time we re-examine this process.

Can the subject be brought forward for some responsible body to study and evaluate to decide if we should leave as is - undisturbed and festering, or opened up and examined to see if it is in keeping with with modern conditions or uncertain traditions? Isn't it time for us to see if we need to exorcise our old election litany? How can we allow it to go on-and-on year after year; decade after decade and never questioned as to genuine value?
. But, the question remains: who will cast the first stone? The Electoral College system is a clumsy, corroded, creaky leftover from a former era of our rather curious political life in this country – an era long-since departed with all its other frills. But, who among us is ready and willing to throw the first stone... to destroy it?

A.L.M. January 25, 2005 [c487wds]

 
ON THE HOUSE!

When too many business firms start to show concern about my financial well-being, I get a bit wary. When I feel besieged by offers to more or less assure me that my future well remain solvent and above bankrupt levels – at least, I begin to hide or stay out of the way while the “snow” falls. Beautiful! Maybe, but snow can turn to treacherous ice, ice to water and water, mixed with solid particles becomes gooey mud.

Some of the offers “make sense”....not exactly the best of good sense, but it is true, for instance, that many people today are in serious debt situations as a direct result of excessive buying using a selection of credit cards. It's the economic epidemic of our time, with scores of people becoming obligated to make repayments far in excess of their earning powers.

It can certainly not be accidental that, at this critical junction of plastic cards with with pay-up documentation, business firms pop up in print and on TV and radio offering - so often in a humorous, light-hearted camaraderie's - to bail out all those who have slipped into this shopping swamp. They stand read to lend such put-upon persons sufficient funds to pay off the mountain of credit card debt but to enable them to burn, mutilate, bury, flush or cut and deep-six the fragments thereof in whatever way suits their concept of finality.

Fine. You may say that, and feel tremendously relieved and even grateful. That which you don't know, can't hurt you – or, can it do so in time? You have borrowed money from a new firm with which to pay off the total of you credit card debts. The critical is this: the obligations which were yours where agreed upon in relation to your earning power to repay them,but the new debt you are now under is a totally different type of loan covered by other regulations and you now may find your home is in hock. If you fail, now, to meet your payments from your income your house can be the way the obligation is paid.

If you are contemplating such a escape from being a plastics prisoner, think it all over with special care. Determine the exact nature of he transaction and what collateral usually assigned. Get rid of the cards anyway. Avoid a common pitfall in which calls for plans to borrow from Peter to pay Paul. Be especially careful in seeking a quick rescue from those who seem to be too eager to help you solve your personal pecuniary problem.

A.L.M. January 24, 2005 [c446wds]

 
B-LIZZARD BUYING!

We've heard so much about global warming that people can't believe we are having a ”blizzard” in much of the nation.

It's cold in the northeast and central states – and it is also windy and the two together with plenty of white, fluffy snow piling up and making pagodas out of square roofs make what may, technically, be called a ”blizzard”. If it can hold out; last for several days and nights or a week, it can be spoken of years from now with even more authority as having been a true blizzard. You've got a great store of tall stories about tall snow falls in “The Great Blizzard of '83” and others of that era which have been told and with cracker barrel red-hot, wood-fired stoves as background.

In those ancient days the storyteller himself would usually start with complaints about existing weather conditions outside such as: “Hit don't snow no more likkit usta!”

As we have advanced in transportation capabilities our understanding of snow has gone the other way. One inch of the white stuff now causes consternation aplenty among such groups as school board members, plant managers, day care center workers, school principals, working mothers of every type and, well, just about every one, it seems, if you start to list those who might be affected.

The sudden appearance of actual snow also increases the urge to stock up on foodstuffs. A inch of snowfall can trigger a food shopping safari the like of which is seldom seen at any other time. Forest-like displays of bread, milk in any form, cereal in the usual eighty-five flavors and combinations there of are all swept from the shelves of the stores and super-stores causing more trucks to be dispatched from warehouses hundreds of miles away to help clog the already traffic-jammed roads leading to the area where the pre-snow. locust-like scavengers have done their early bird food shopping.

Buying as such a critical time is a real art.

I watched carts waiting in the long lines at the harried checkout person's point, and it was interesting to see that most of the foods purchased were those which involved baking, frying, broiling, basting, grilling or some other procedures which demands electric, gas and other utilities be in working condition during the extreme weather conditions ahead! Carts loaded with fully-prepared, ready-cooked, table-ready treats were few. Many shoppers seem to buy on the promise that since they'll be home anyway they will have extra time to cook things. After loading the bottle and cartons of milk, bread in every form possible, and super-large boxes of dry forms of wheat, oats, corn with attractive additives, they forget to get extra sugar for all of that combination, extra butter or jams and jellies.
Finger foods often in demand during bad weather – are ignored except potato chips which are a prime shelf-clearing item.

The household needs, too, there is some erratic shopping to be seen. It is during the continuing days and nights of the blizzard confinement that you wish you had bought more toilet tissue, some batteries, more soda drinks of any kind and color, razor blades, toothpaste and maybe some dill pickles.

There is a marked need for one of the super-stores to put together Emergency Kits containing food and creature comforts to see a family through such perilous times. Imagine everything you need, assembled by experts and boxed for quick pick-up. One inch of snow would trigger the Emergency Kit sale!

A.L.M. January 23, 2005 [c605wds]

 
NEXT!!

Who is next in “lion?” King of the human jungle! Tab-head creator! Entrepreneur of evil-seeming actions having borderline definitions and ingeniously mis-placements?

Next in line, since Donald Trump has placed himself off limits for the time being by becoming a newlywed once more.

I'm, sure we can confidently look forward to a profound shift in this sort of social comedy in the next few weeks as the name Sir Richard Branson comes to the fore to claim its place among names which associate easily and naturally with such companion terms as :”arrogant”,“quirky,”,”unusual”,“eccentric”,“dashing”,”sexy”,
”flamboyant" or just plain “nuts” at times.

The brown-bearded billionaire Bronson continually describes himself by his actions to be a prime candidate for such a place We are in a slump insofar as having figurehead for fancy, farce and fable. He is well-known to many of you through his financial holdings but he lives his own life style both in London where he is one of that city's forty-four billionaires. On his own private island of Necker, in the Virgin Islands he lives life by his own rules. So often the term “virgin” obsesses him. He started the cut rate airline 'Virgin Blue” with two planes just a few years ago.I brought him i$700-million last year and he has just ordered a dozen of the all new Air Bus 500+ passenger jet giant jumbo airliners - six for right away the rest as needed. His Virgin Atlantic airline is doing well. World wide he retails more records, CD's and electronic gear than anyone in countries all around the world - except the United States.

You may remember Sir Richard a few years ago when he was intent on being the first man to fly a balloon around the world. He spent millions on the project and tried several times, but when some one else did it, he quit. That's typical, if he can't be “first” he won't play.

The new Fox TV reality show “The Billionaire” stars Richard Bronson so he's very much in your home today. It you want to stay alert to times and events during the year, there is a Richard Bronson 2005 calender available on sale right now on behalf of a European charity for needy railroad workers. Richard and three of his feminine friends posed nude as the calender's photographic art feature. It is selling well and a fine place to check today's date on the Internet if you are tempted to doubt the date sheet's existence.

Richard Bronson is an ideal choice to be our zany of the day. That's “Sir”, too, by the way. Refreshing. It's been quite a while since we have had an English person as our comic relief buffer against all the serious news we have to face.

A.L.M. January 22, 2005 [c483wds]

 
STUDY IN STEADINESS

I liked the relaxed feelings which went along with much of the Bush Second Inaugural ceremonies. The whole thing was expertly planned and produced and it went well as far as most of us could tell. It had more of home-town air about it; less of the usual Hollywood flare and false fragrances larded heavily over thinly framed crepe paper. It was folksy, too without being Texas-ranch corny. There was a friendly,light-hearted feeling to much that took place. That's a quality we Americans have needed for a long,long time in our public life as a respite from dire times.

So often, much concern is expressed about what the first lady and the wife of the Vice-President choose to wear. Both Mrs. Bush and Mrs. Chaney set forth modest wardrobes which were sensible, appeared to be comfortable and not at glitzy with designers diversions from reality. The attention of the press and public at the dances was on the President and his wife dancing {not exactly his forte in most minds) rather than focused on some famous designer's daring departure from standards of proper attire.

The President's short inaugural speech, too, was a classic in steadiness and simplicity, as well, pointing out that our future era of success is to be found in our willingness and eagerness to spread the concept of truth and liberty to all needy nations. He words testified to sincere understandings of the costly disadvantages of military methods, while being fully aware of the fact that there are some who will wish to maintain even less admirable forms unstable rule.

In these simple ceremonies of accepting the task of running our government for another term of four years, George Bush has tacitly shown the way. We, as American schooled in history of dire and inspiring events, know it will not take place in that ideal way. The change will not be without difficulties and the steadiness needed to meet such challenges when they do arise is the underlying strength of this much-needed moment consolidation, re-girding and reforming of existing forces. George Bush has let it be known to all - friend and foe alike – that he intends to work at his set goals and cause Americans to take part in the restoration of human rights to be enjoyed by all.

Certainty the open candor of yesterdays events though they usually seem to be farm too expensive and even arguably unnecessary – enhanced the feeling of Americans en masse that the choice we made on election day was one well done. You noticed, no doubt,the presence of ex-presidents Bush, Carter, Clinton and of Senator John Kerry former-contender for the office just weeks ago. Where else in this world could that sort of thing take place so agreeably and without bickering, backbiting, rancor or worse?

We, too -each of us – remain always “at liberty” to live our own lives.

A.L.M. January 21, 2005 [c520wds]






































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































e and security we can come to know by being a leaders in spreading truth and freedom throughout the world.

 

DDT?

I read an editorial just the other day which praised the efficiency of using the well-known insecticide DDT. The view urged the material again with special care concerning its ill effects on our society, of course, to curb the increase in loss thousands of lives lost to malaria and other insect borne diseases.

It is time we take a mature attitude toward such matters.

We seem to have a streak within our makeup which allows us to be overly impressed with a dramatic factor at the expense of limited, sensible ways of a wider view based on facts. In 1938 a scientist by the name of Othmar Zeidler, synthesized a substance and a full year later Dr Paul Meuller. a Swiss entomologist, identified its application as an effective insecticide. In 1940 Meuller and the Geigy Corporation patented the product as DDT. It was initially used to get rid of moth infestations, but further studies showed it to have a far wider potential. It enabled health officials to eradicate malaria in Italy in 1945. It was noticed some species were already developing an immunity to the substance and it was made available in various forms and strengths and crewmen routinely “dusted” plane loads of troops and their gear being transported from one area to another. In 1955 the World Health Organization (WHO) granted its approval for world-wide use.

Yet, in 1972 it became the first insecticide ever to be banned in the United States.

In 1942 Rachel Carson's book “Silent Spring” was published, and it was followed by others of the same type but of inferior quality. A full decade passed before the literary affect was strong enough to bring about agitation calling in sufficient strength to cause a ban to be issued. The ban, politicized in some areas. It was total; allowed little or no discussion concerning partial, controlled or limited use of the insecticide. The contention was that DDT killed just about all natural life.

It took thirty years for the “opposition” to mount their attack. There was great deal of insincerity in the movement. It was used politically to bring about other change while an environmental diversion was being staged, I am still waiting for some explanation, in logical terms, as to how we can continue to buy our fresh fruits and vegetables and other foodstuffs from Mexico and other such places. The “rule”, I have been told, requires we ask them if they have used DDT in growing the produce. If they say “No.”... it's considered to be O.K. Buy it. It's cheaper, too. No bug damage. You might wish to ask if a crop was grown by rigid organic standards? And, do not inquire into their human waste disposal methods.

I agree with some aspects of the DDT ban “reasoning”. It is true that the substance is dangerous,and tricky, too. I think our scientific community was lax or lazy in mid-century decades. They were aware of dangerous changes and, seemingly, did very little to modify the product to suit man's needs. The half-life of DDT in water solution is from twenty-eight to fifty-six days and in and if anyone known that sort fact about it they can deal with its hazards for efficiently. It is time for us to move on this DDT front in the fight against needless deaths from malaria. Some variations may well, serve us in our farm and gardening needs, as well. How much is left of the original DDT of Meuller's time? This was classic example of throwing the baby out with the bath water.

A.L.M. January 22, 2005 [c609wds]

 
CHOICE

Feinstine at her finest.

I was not at all surprised to see and hear Condoleezza Rice at her top form this week at the hearings concerning her nomination to be our next Secretary of State. The big surprise for me was to find her being introduced to the Hearing Committee members by none other than California's Democratic voice Senator Dianne Feinstine. I was impressed.

This is a rather usual situation when you consider that we have here a dedicated and rather insistent and even noisy Democratic voice speaking in cheerfully, even eagerly in bright “gleaming” terms on behalf of a potential member of the George W. Bush cabinet. Condoleezza Rice is unflappable, I'd say and anyone else would have blanched a bit at the parade of terms allowed to flow forth from the Feinstine lips. Feinstine made it sound as if we have been remiss in not offering her the job long ago and that, certainly, no one better nominee could be found. I wondered if she had be same thoughts in the back of her mind,even as she was praising the lady beside her, that she was, in truth, speaking of someone who someone who might well go far beyond serving this nation of ours as head of our State Department. I found myself jumping a few years ahead and hoping I could one day hear Feinstine presenting the same young woman to a national convention nominating a future President of the United States. I don't think I was the only person watching who had such a thought, either.

Since we are all in a confessional mode at the moment, I must also let it be known that I have never been Fienstine fan. Far from it. More like a “foe” than a “fan”, I'd have to say, but judging by her spoken words the California legislator we all saw this week she made a fine, generous, speech “presenting” Doctor Rice to the Senate Foreign Relations Committe members there to take the young lady over the political hurdles.

If Feinstine had any doubts whatever concerning Rice, she must have given them her California compatriot and fellow Congressperson Senator Barbara Boxer, who unloaded pallets of ancient political pablum left over from the recent election on the nominee in a gruff and,at times, nasty maze of mean mannerisms. It remained for Condoleezza Rice , herself, to publically scold the Congresswoman - not once but twice - during the latter hours of the inquisitional trial Boxer seemed to think she was being called upon to run. Rice first “asked” her to refrain from maligning her honesty and veracity; the second time, she “told” her to stop. There was a gleam in her eye that sent forth a subtle warning that one had best remember that while Rice is nice, she can also - if need arises – become quite different. A riled Rice could prove to be something else.

It could well be, you see, even Barbara Boxer praised the nominee by pointing out she has a “limit”... a time and place when she can decree: “That's enough!”

We, as a nation, need a Secretary of State who has those qualities. She follows Secretary Colin Powell in the task, too, which gives her a good, firm base on which to build.

A.L.M. January 19, 2005 [c555wds]

 
BLACK BAG

Most doctors, years ago, hand-carried a small, black bag of leather with them whereever they went. It measured, perhaps, ten inches long, five or six inches wide. About four or five inches high - on the narrow side, sturdy and it had a good suitcase handle and a lock with a small, pressed metal key. Our doctor kept the key on the dangling , tassel-end of his pocket watch fob. It was there when he needed it; but he seldom locked his bag, as I recall. When he did lock it we knew he was carrying something special; something for limited use.

That small bag was his professional sanctum. .It was his local drug store. He was his own pharmacist.. It was his source of many of curative wonders brought to us in the mountain country to keep us well and active.

That era is gone, of course by I remember talking with a younger doctor who was “taking over”, you might say, as they died off one-by-one. He marveled at the number of cures the older doctors could bring about using just those six “ingredients” mixed with various types of “bedside" manners and TLC. I've been trying to remember what the six items were, and I've decided one had to be calimine loition, zinc oxide mixed with some ferric oxide; a bottleozf menthal- smelling linament and some iodine. More modern ones might have kept supplies of aspirin, they had to be a laxative powder of some sort and every last one of the old timers carried a bottle of liquid which had to be red in appearance. Patients, universally, seemed to be firm in their opinion that cough syrup had to be red in color to be effective. That came to mean that anything that was red was, automatically, became a cure for a cough or cold.

The basic six had to be there, and each doctor had a few specials that he was expected to carry. They may be a selected herb or two respected locally as a sure cure and, perhaps, a small bottle of peach or apple brandy for “nerve conditions” although that was more often a home preparation made in sufficient quantity to serve as an anesthetic if the illness or injury was sufficient to pose a need for surgery of any kind. I remember reading of one such doctor who was famous locally for his special ability to cure any form of rash or skin malady using what he called his secret “Indian Powders”. After his death, his son discovered a stock of homemade bread jammed like mortar between limestone foundation stones in his damp basement wall. He powdered the bread mold and tinted it various shades with dried leaves. He cured countless patients with skin ailments with a medication which would not be “discovered” for another hundred years or so when it would named “penicillin.”
Folklore entered into the practice of medicine in those days, too. The success of such a family doctor, then, resulted very much from the growth of the young doctor as he became a physician. So much of his success in curing human illness depended on his ability to assure the patient that the cure was in that little black bag or in his own brain. There was a close connection between doctor and patient – less obvious, perhaps, today but still very much present. Much of the “cure” was then, is now, I insist; was, and is, in the patient's head and in the the doctor's heart. Curative action prevails.

The mysterious little black bag contained all the physical help a doctor had in those days. The rest was up to what he knew about how to talk to, and reason with, the people he serve. The “black bag” is bigger now –-a pharmaceutical galaxy - but the element of concern remains critical to its best use.

A..L.M. January 18, 2005 [660wds]

 
TIMELY TALLEST TALLY

What is the tallest building in the world?

Are you sure about that? . There's a new title holder this week of January 19, 2005 – so if you said that honor belonged to Petronas Tower No. 1.in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia you get to join the rest of those people who don't keep up with important world happenings such as this.

The new champion is a glittering tower called ”Taipei 101” at new Financial area centerpiece structure in Taipei, Taiwan. It is 1,671 feet high (509 m) and it has one- hundred-and-one floors - which shows where that clever name came from. It is a multiple purpose building, as you might expect it to be, and it has a host of the latest construction advancements built-in which included, I was told, the “world largest tuned mass drum dissembler”. That one stopped me cold, so I had to Google-ize the mysterious set of words and I find it is a six hundred ton unit inserted in the 89th floor of the new building to help cut down on the natural tendencies of such tall, slender structures to sway in high winds. The gadget, now common to all such new structures, I find, will cut such swaying by about forty-percent. They're building an “Observation Platform” on the 91st floor. It is not yet completed but will be shortly if all goes well. There is some question as to including a telescope of any size, because it can't be focused if the base on which you place it is wiggling about. A great many of the tallest buildings already sway enough to pop window glass from frames but, thus far, steel and other materials are holding fast.

The United States is holding right in there with the “Sears Tower” ,In Chicago, as next in line. It was the top one from 1973-1990 when the “Petronas Towers” took over with their 37,000 windows. If you like to quibble, you will find others who do so pointing out that the “Sears Tower” actually has a top floor which is “occupied” that is 33- feet higher than any at PT No1.or No.2. Some critic take special joy in roiling stew of discussion by measuring TV towers on top of all of these buildings which are counted on our but not on”theirs”.

Number 5 on the latest list I have come across credits the “Jin Mao Building” in Shanghai, China as Number 5, and it is also spoken of as the tallest hotel in the world because it has a hotel atrium up at about the 47th floor. When that happens you hear rumbles from North Korea where the monster mansion called the “Ryugyong Hotel” claims that designation insisting that the Shanghai contender houses only a portion of a hotel among many other functions, whereas they are all hotel - full time. The owner's tags all read “Made in China” for the rest of the top ten, except for Number 9 - our grand old Empire State Building in New York. Two of the Chinese buildings are in Hong Kong ,one in Gaungzhou and the other in Shenzen, China.

Some lists go on to as many as twenty tall ones which pulls a few more up from the United States. As far as I know, I think “the tallest man made structure in the world” can still be claimed by Toronto, Canada with their “National Tower.”

Year-after-year, I watch for even just a mention of how many such structures which have been built have ever proved to be profitable and really worth building from a business standpoint. Look at the night time photographs of any of them to see for yourself how much of the interior has never been finished-off and is not occupied even by floors. So often, they appear to be giant floodlit, non-occupied and unprofitable shells.

A.L.M. January 17, 2005 [c656wds]

 


NEWS PRIME AND REHASH.

The first-ever “exploration” tour of Titan, the largest of Saturn's moons, was announced this past week by the European Space Agency and went all but unknown among the pulsing mass of other newsworthy events of the week.

The actual visit took place on Christmas Day, December 25, 2004.

Let's see, now... concerning our news coverage of the event went there was something more about one or more of the various troubles haunting Michael Jackson during the past year or two. Some of that was a suspected of some roiling of the back waters. Then, there was the compelling contrast of tense, active news reporting still more deaths and missing persons from the Indian Ocean tsunami; there was much re-telling about the the doctor waiting for his wife in a restaurant which she was outside in their car - very dead. The entertainment world was deciding who ought to and who ought not to win the upcoming “Golden Globe Awards” which will be handed out Sunday night.. We had a massive mud slide in California; tornadoes along the Arkansas-Oklahoma border and an avalanche of snow, ice, rock and timber in an outback area of Utah with five skiers on the “missing” list. There were floods in Ohio and L.A.; a major industrial fire in Indiana and an gas explosion in South Carolina. Washington D.C. showed more concern over the forty million dollars being spent on the 2nd Inaugural festivities for George W. Bush than on security for that event. But, that quieted down quickly when it was pointed out that the final bill of the Bill Clinton's 2nd celebrations added up to well over that amount.

This was also the week when Prince Harry happened to attend a private costume party and made the now obvious blunder of dressing up as a rather grubby looking chap wearing, on one arm, a tacky imitation of a Nazi arm band bearing Rudyard Kipling's favorite swastika emblem. The London tabloids hit hapless Harry heavily with pictorial punishment and it added to the stock of such semi-sick stuff the sleaze sorters love Stateside. Great hullabaloo about it being a thoughtless insult to the people of the Holocaust but it's drifting away slowly. Prince Harry plans to stay out of the public eye until he is de-palaced in the next few weeks to start his career as a officer in the Royal Army at Sandhurst.

Meanwhile, there was the moon Titan and the “Huygens Probe. The European built space craft managed to take over three hundred photographs on the way down and on the surface. Those shots published thus far have been few but of good quality, detail and interesting content. The entire visit lasted a little over two hours hours because limited by the short extent of battery life. The terrain of the Titan Moon was very much like that of Mars with some areas displayed a selection of good-sized rocks, widely scattered over a fruitless plain but plentiful enough to make a quarry and rock crushing business a possibility when we get the right machines up there – or, out there - with batteries strong enough to run it all a bit longer - days, at least, instead of hours. (C'mon, Battery Bunny, you can do better than that!)

Another photograph showed lands contoured which indicates the presence of fluids on the Titan. The audio portions of the report knock the knocked any watery idea aside by pointing out that the temperature on Titan is in 'way below zero - like 204 degrees below - and if any fluids did exist there they might well have been liquidized gases of various sorts. So, so you can put a “Hold”on those fancy marina plans you had drawn up. Keep them ready. We'll probably have to work out a deal with OPEC.

The exploration of Titan is in progress. It is underway. The initial step has been a small one, but it serves well as an early chapter in our development of our final frontier - space. For the time being, we had best pay attention, it appears, doesn't it, to merely staying alive to be ready, willing able to do it all some day when our other events don't override and obscure it?

A.L.M. January 16, 2005 [c722wds]

 
INITIAL IMPRESSIONS

We often forget that this “first impressions” thing we laud so much from time-to-time, has two sides to it. Perhaps it might be wise for us to give a bit more attention to the observe side to learn what might be like when people meet us for the very first time.

Our first impressions, while sound in many ways, but they can also ,from time-to-time, prove to have been deceptive. Wisdom dictates a second estimate might be best to consider before final decisions are made.

Homage is so often paid to “first impression” being correct on TV and radio quiz shows. That first answer which comes to mind is, quite often, said to have been correct whereas others were contrived. Unfortunately you hear the claim stated more often when a contestant has lost than when he or she has won a prize by giving a correct reply. I'd say the jury is still out on holding first impressions to be, even generally, most correct. Wisdom dictates at least a glance at a second estimate of true facts in most cases.

None of us is perfect. I think we must admit that we are not only marked by imperfections but also that we have been wrong more than we realize or admit. By that, I do not mean we are criminals in need of special care .Our infractions of set rules of good conduct are mostly minor in character. .So often we are on the defensive and not to well informed concerning who our real enemy might be or what they are doing against us. We can do better. The constant effort we can take to improve our capabilities is of the utmost importance.

Stop talking so much and listen more, is one thing I have had to learn and I feel I am much more of a “get along with” person because of that attention to real need of my own. You may be called upon to allow someone else to be the achiever. It is not going to be easy and there are other things you may well be called upon to do or to leave undone if you trust ourselection to the chance of a initial impression you have or think you have. “Love at first sight” is a good example of first impression strategy at work. It seems romantic and exciting; adventurous - but nature has put enough of those qualities in marriage as it is without adding extra qualities, I have a feeling that those who do rely on first impressions when choosing friends and associates are really doing a rather extensive survey touching on the points we have mentioned and many others – as unique at time as they themselves may really be.

What is really most important is what type of impression are you provide for them? This thing works both ways. What first impression are you setting forth? Is it truthful? Is it valid? Are you comfortable with it? Does it fit well?

If not, consider changing it here and there.

A.L.M. January 15, 2005 [c507wds]

 
CAUSE HUNT

If we are are really serious about hunting for the basic causes of crime and violence in our society, I think we had better start looking a bit closer to home.

It is only natural that we would seek to put the blame on someone else. There is always a ready supply of reasons why it is someone else who is suspect because many of us make a hobby of cataloging the faults which others seem to parade about while we minimize our own shortcomings.

And, I don't expect that to change one little bit, either.

Just attempting to “keep up with the news” in both fearsome and futile today. Since modern technology allows not only to hear news, read about it see in various forms and, and in some cases actually become immersed in the real happening - once removed, of course, by TV 's outreach but very much aware of the violence and inane actions of friends, allies, foes, enemies, neighbors or foreigners.

It may even be that our awareness of wrong throughout the world warps our sense of proportion somewhat and we tend to place emphasis on that which may harm, us in some way while overlooking the good being done, perhaps, at the same time. Providing food and water for a needy person in The Sudan, for instanced while chasing away oppressive Muslim rulers who have held them in slavery for years with genocidal intent is a combination of acts on our part.

It is difficult to impose rules on a person. So often we think we can bring about harmony by setting forth accumulations of items which seemed to have worked in other climes, only to find they do not transfer without modifications and changes. We seem to have such a view of Democracy at this moment, thinking that we can export it as an entity. It is not a pre-packaged product which can be shipped form point-to-point, assembled and used as it is. To achieve a firm respect the Law we need to go to the rudiments once more and attempt inculcate such ideas in the mind of our children, to modify existing rules and regulations to suit our own present needs and not expect one size to fit all. We need to reassure all segments of our people that we respect the Law. It extends - not just the suited individuals who represent it, but respect and admiration for the fundamental realities which form its base.. If the Law, and those who represent it, are constantly held up to ridicule - especially those based on political considerations – it becomes powerless. Law enforcement based on stricter religious tenets has proved to be un-workable at numerous times in man's history. This a common path for reformers and ,if it is not properly proportioned it can produce dictators and oppressors. Puritan excesses of Oliver Cromwell and those of strict Calvinists can serve as a base for study which will convince yourself that such is not a wise path to follow.
.
The home remains the prime area when lasting reformation can take definite form and endure. Parents must teach their children to respect the Law in all of its manifestations in order to build trustworthy character among future leaders and followers alike. We all need to stay active, alive and eager in good works for each other.


A.L.M. January 14, 2005 [c467wds]























































































































































































































































































































































































































































CAUSE HUNT

If we are are really serious about hunting for the basic causes of crime and violence in our society, I think we had better start looking a bit closer to home.

It is only natural that we would seek to put the blame on someone else. There is always a ready supply of reasons why it is someone else who is suspect because many of us make a hobby of cataloging the faults which others seem to parade about while we minimize our own shortcomings.

And, I don't expect that to change one little bit, either.

Just attempting to “keep up with the news” in both fearsome and futile today. Since modern technology allows not only to hear news, read about it see in various forms and, and in some cases actually become immersed in the real happening - once removed, of course, by TV 's outreach but very much aware of the violence and inane actions of friends, allies, foes, enemies, neighbors or foreigners.

It may even be that our awareness of wrong throughout the world warps our sense of proportion somewhat and we tend to place emphasis on that which may harm, us in some way while overlooking the good being done, perhaps, at the same time. Providing food and water for a needy person in The Sudan, for instanced while chasing away oppressive Muslim rulers who have held them in slavery for years with genocidal intent is a combination of acts on our part.

It is difficult to impose rules on a person. So often we think we can bring about harmony by setting forth accumulations of items which seemed to have worked in other climes, only to find they do not transfer without modifications and changes. We seem to have such a view of Democracy at this moment, thinking that we can export it as an entity. It is not a pre-packaged product which can be shipped form point-to-point, assembled and used as it is. To achieve a firm respect the Law we need to go to the rudiments once more and attempt inculcate such ideas in the mind of our children, to modify existing rules and regulations to suit our own present needs and not expect one size to fit all. We need to reassure all segments of our people that we respect the Law. It extends - not just the suited individuals who represent it, but respect and admiration for the fundamental realities which form its base.. If the Law, and those who represent it, are constantly held up to ridicule - especially those based on political considerations – it becomes powerless. Law enforcement based on stricter religious tenets has proved to be un-workable at numerous times in man's history. This a common path for reformers and ,if it is not properly proportioned it can produce dictators and oppressors. Puritan excesses of Oliver Cromwell and those of strict Calvinists can serve as a base for study which will convince yourself that such is not a wise path to follow.
.
The home remains the prime area when lasting reformation can take definite form and endure. Parents must teach their children to respect the Law in all of its manifestations in order to build trustworthy character among future leaders and followers alike. We all need to stay active, alive and eager in good works for each other.


A.L.M. January 14, 2005 [c467wds]

 

YESTERDAY

Now - today - seems important, doesn't it?

What about tomorrow? You have special plans for that, don't you? But, it is what you were yesterday that determines what your present and future are to be.

Don't knock history. Don't demean it in any way. Don't worship it as an icon of miracle potential, either. Above all, don't depend on it and it alone, either!

The present phase of our lives is a fleeing fantasy in some ways. It will be gone in moments. It can be so elusive, at times, as to seem meaningless – something happening “out-of-context - within frame work holding a the canvas on which our lives are being sketched; outlines, you might say, of our dreams, ambitions, aspirations and capabilities to be blended in strange way and uses as foundational material for our tomorrows. The excitement of it all is to be found in the fact that is be found along the way. How I started this page determines how it will end . ,

The study of history is vital.

In recent times we, as a nation , have tended to reject even the casual reading of the history of our country and with relationships of our nation with other world powers. We have come to a point where we actually welcome”now' thinking any other form. It is now all too common to find our children being instructed in history related to some narrow, partisan, social or religious view. Dwelling, for instance, on such topics as Black History to the exclusion of other elements is both costly and dangerous. serous. Such heavy emphasis can actually alienate potential friends of just about any movement - environmental topics, finance, or any other topic.

If you talk about actions taken you are talking about the past. These little niches of history we tend to glamorize may be entertaining; even stepping stones to better elements with a wider scope, but intense, detailed study is required, too. Without it, we deny ourselves and our children the key to our cultural treasures and insult those oldsters who lived those events we speak of so casually.

To live well in the future we have to be aware of how we have lived in the past. Reflection on how we did it the last time might help us to make redemptive choices.

Samuel Johnson in his book “Rassalas has his philosopher-poet Princess Nekayah observe: “the truth is that no mind is much employed upon the present; recollections and anticipations fill up almost all of our moments.”

Right on, Princess!.

A.L.M. January 13, 2005 [c424wds]

 
HABLA USTED EBONICS?

A year or two ago the Oakland (CA) School Board was trying make black English dialect fit into their schools as a second language. I understand they have reversed themselves now, and the subject is rarely even mentioned.

The contention of proponents of the idea at the time argued that black children - and not a few white ones - speak this mutilated form of English at home and elsewhere anyway, so why not make it legal. Such a step would prevent such slighted students being “left out”of educational advances; probably cut down on crime and violence; be of value to all of us by enabling us to to understand some of that which is being said, to, for or about us.

Actually,the entire scheme was more or less still born. The School Board found they had some political, social and legal problems at hand which had not been mentioned in the rosy-glow, dream-talk phase. Example: how does one go about applying for backing to teach a language which does not exist? The had to deny they would be teaching a narrow, “black” version of English; they had to deny that their term “Ebonics” was merely a semantic cover up to hide connotations of “black” anything.

One has to wonder what influenced the Board to consider the scheme at all. I sense an undercurrent of someone planning to be asked to do do research in development of such a course of study at a variety of grade levels; research in testing such materials , and control of editing, printing, publishing and altering such courses in all forms including printed,and other forms of of idea transfer -including some not yet in common use. Then there was also a need for allocated funds to train competent teachers.

The “real” damage had already been done, elsewhere.

Adapting the teaching of Black English would have opened the gates to demands from speakers of Spanish, German, Swahili, Russian, Japanese and any other language able to show that a minority existed in any area where public schools were ,a maintained ...including a comprehensive “Pidgin English” course for all Great Wall persons. You would be driven to tour the labyrinth of languages and never once would you come cross one named “Ebonics”.

I see no real need for us to designate English as our official language or to restrict the use of other languages within our borders. Certainly speaking and reading in other tongues nourishes understanding and mutual appreciation of each others cultural attainments and generates comprehensive understanding.

A.L.M. January 12, 2005 [c434wds]

 
LONELINESS

Being lonely is fearsome circumstance and we really don't experience it in is true harshness until we gather a bit of age about us. Oh, yes, we have all had moments, when we were youngsters, in which we were, for a time, without immediate friends with whom we might react and we, doubtless, spoke of such times as being a “lonesome “day. An old person, however, can be uniquely alone in that the friends are gone and will not return.

Some places are made for loneliness, I think. In my experience about the loneliest place I remember being, I'd say, was being seated not too comfortably on a metal strip in the Tail Gunner's bubble out on the rear end of a B-24 Bomber returning from the continent and flying low over the North Sea. You may not think of that as a particularly lonely spot. It wasn't quiet, for sure. The noise was steady and drumming constantly and, when held properly to your ear, you could hear scratchy human voices in the speaking tube. How could one be lonely with two humans just about fourteen feet behind you? The tiny, tinny voices yelled cryptic fragments. The system was not made for talking; more for listening to terse, crisp commands and comments. In talking to Waist Gunners I found they were different. They were lonely together.

Other military spots were just as lonely, I found.

“What do you do out there all night?” someone asked a guard who's duty it was to man a machine gun emplacement on the far edge of the airfield runway.” That's changed a lot, “ he replied. “There was a time when I could just sit there all night and ask myself questions, but that all had to change. I kept getting such stupid answers!”

For several months before our Bomb Group joined us in England during World War II we shared a particular type of guard duty with a British RAF company at the new base on a welcomed R&R stay following duty on Malta. There were, at that time, a number of crashed planes along the North Sea coast in Norfolk county and it became our job to guard them at night against pilfering of equipment, until they could be cleaned up properly. That ,too, was an all-night assignment as were so many guard-duty tasks. They were often made even more-so by the lack of “torches”” or of carbine shells. That meant you pulled guard duty without a flashlight and with either two or three carbine shells depending on what was available that night.

There are moments of “loneliness” in just about any occupational niche you choose, I suppose. I can recall feeling; lonely in a manufacturing plant where I worked on three tremendous, clattering. looms out of sight of the fifty or more other workers in the same. large area. Loneliness,so often, seems to stem from lack of association with other individuals.

That's why it is so important for each of us. as we get older, to make sure we are building younger friendships as we go. Never miss an opportunity to share your knowledge, skill and acquired abilities with a young person questing for guidance in a special field in which you have shown some success.

Teach a kid to build a kit. You will fly with him or her. You will fly together.

A.L.M. January 11, 2005 [c574wds]

 
AGAIN

It is not at all unusual,here in Virginia,to experience a bit of leftover summer in January and we are in such a re-run stage at this point. This week we are having days in the sixties in the bright afternoons, but I haven't seen any buds popping out or bulbs showing so it must not be as summery as usual. We haven't had any snow at all here, but east and west of us they have done very well. The far west is having real winter, even the Great Lakes area, so we will get our turn as the weeks roll on.

The countryside is still looking well with some calendar-shot greens evident instead of grays,browns and blahs. The trees still retain some color,too, here and there. To check that I pulled a volume of these essays down from the high shelf and I happened to get one dated January 1997. We were having the same sort of hold-over summer then and into the second week of January.

There were other “same” thing, too,I found. I had put a new black ink cartridge in the printer on the 4thof January and I seem to have been surprised that it had been been made in China. Someone told me “Taiwan had gotten too expensive.” I also discovered that my “Florsheim” shows were made in India. Those discoveries of l997 certainly ring true today when it is difficult to find any thing not made in some foreign factory. We re now a global market people,I suppose.

On this very day in 1997 I noted that some people were talking about, then just-becoming Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich as being potential presidential material for the Republican party. Here in January of 2005, we are hearing the same talk, as he eases back into public acceptance. He was up for a second term as the first Republican Speaker of the House in three-quarters of a century and was being compared to his predecessor Democrat Jim Wright,who had been set aside for ”ethical lapses”. The same sort of problem would confront Gingrich in due time.


You may have heard that there is some comment being bandied about concerning the extravagance of the Republicans in spending about thirty-five million dollars on the George W. Bush Second Inaugural festivities. I have, personally,fumed a bit about it being excessive but I find from things I wrote in January of 1997 that I was also upset when I found that a figure somewhere around 95 million dollars was to be spent on the Bill Clinton “2nd Ig Do.”
History, it seems,indeed, does “repeat itself” or, at least, our views of and comments upon our strange ways do so .

A.L.M. January 10, 2005 [c474wds]

 
WHAT GALAHAD HAD

It might seem a little odd that I would associate Sir Galahad with moments in my life, but anyone who has ever worked to a point of being really tired – I mean deep down “bone tired” as the old folks used to call fatigue ...utterly spent, washed up, pooped - has got to remember how done-in the gallant knight appears to be about the only painting I ever remember seeing of him as a subject.

It was done by George Frederick Watts who was born of Welsh parents in London in 1817.

We had a large sepia-toned print of Sir Galahad had an honored place in our family apartment, I remember. He wore full armor with a long sword from waist to ground level stood beside his horse who also appears to be resting. The picture was set in a two-inch frame of dark walnut frame under glass and the fame was about the same dark brown as the darkest portions of his metal armor.

Watts was an early bloomer as artists go. He had been discouraged by the president of the Royal Academy about seeking a career in art, but Watt’s father encouraged him to do so none-the-less, an by age nineteen George Watts was receiving commissions to do portraits and he also won a national prize in thee Westminster decorations competition in 1843. From Florence, Italy, Watts entered the same contest in 1845 and was, once again, a winner.

In 1864 he married young actress. They separated a year later and were divorced thirteen years later in 1877 when she married the artist Whistler. Watts married for the second time in l886 to Mary Fraser Tyler , a Scottish designer.

The painting of Galahad is typical of his many works as an allegory painting designed to bring about moral improvement in viewers. He himself was subject to prolonged discouragement. He went to visit a Princeps family in Kensington in 1840 and stayed, more or less until 1875. When they moved to the Isle of Wight, he moved with them. Their home was a Bohemian center for artists and seem to inspire him. He gained confidence and painted many portraits of visiting Victorian personalities. Married to his second wife Mary Tyler, an artist as well, he moved Melbury Road,.London and in 1881 changed that studio into a gallery and the couple moved to Surry where Mary Tyler setup a pottery, designed and decorated in Art Nouveau style the Mortuary Chapel dedicated to his works. In later years Watts refused a baronetcy two times - 1885 and in 1894. He did, however, accept the Order of Merit awarded in 1902.

It is good to have a reproduction of Watt's “Sir Galahad” handy when you feel tired. Dedicated as he was to finding the Holy Grail -the very cup used by Jesus at the Last Supper brought to England, it was said, by Joesph of Arimathea. He could not rest until .that prized cup had been found.

As a kid I remember looking at that picture and realizing how the subject was looking upward and into the twist of twigs, leaves and vines at sunlight peeking through. The drooped neck of his horse matched the armored man's obvious tired stance ,but the look on Galahad's face was was one of questing and searching, encouragement and hope. Mother must have though the old painting would help engender within us a spirit of steadfastness, stick-to-ity, gumption and stubbornness - depending on her mood for us at the moment.

A.L.M. January 9, 2005 [c597wds]

 
PRESS LORE

Old ideas will hang on!

The dream of so many newspaper editors - fine daily papers, still have a secret desire to, when they retire, buy and run a small town weekly.

Newspapering is a difficult occupation for one to leave. You don't just give it a quick thought, stand up and walk away from it as you might with other jobs. The news is still there; still happening and needs to be reported, written, printed and distributed to people eager for word of their world. It is the plan of many such old hands at newspaper work to get away from some of the hard work and yet keep some of it the more pleasurable moments close by.

. I have seen it tried with opposite results ; some and others not so good.
It is true, too, that a newspaper job is not the easiest job to leave. Newspaper is something that is more or less made from scratch every living day and they means you live what you do. It is seldom a matter of time clocks, style books, rules and rigid regulations and more of an inner urge a person learns to control as best he or she can in order to publish a worthwhile journalistic record of events and of the interactions their views cause among people.

As is the case with some many vocations today, there have been some radical changes in the nature of news gathering, news dissemination and news reading habits of subscribers in recent years. This has erased much of the real or imaginary glamor so often associated with the field.

Take a look at your own reading habits. Haven't they changed in recent years? You are doing less reading; seemingly not as much you once did in conventional newspapers. We now get most of our news from TV, radio, and from the various versions of both hometown and national - even international - papers and magazines on the Internet. We dwell on the particular type of news
we wish to follow - local, national or world-wide. We look for editorial comment either by editors of those sources we read or by that of independent person who may not be associated with the journalistic world at all. Readers today pick and choose their news from a variety of sources and are not confined to just one local just one “local” paper. Such terms as “Bloggers” and “I-Podders” - unknown a few years ago - are now becoming quite common.


People are said to object to having old newspapers pile up in their home. They see little reason why they should provide storage space for thousands of advertisement sheets for used cars, perishable foods, medicines they'll never use, exotic world of travel they could never afford and the birth of an Internet creation called “Craigslist” has all but put an end to “Classified Advertisements” in daily papers. Even without these features one of the nation's leading newspaper is getting larger and heavier as the months go by until it will soon take a forklift to throw it against our front door each morning.

There was time when a busy editor, retiring to run his weekly paper a a hobby, looked forward to having a full week in which to ponder what he intended to say in his editorials. No more. One week is too late in today's instant journalism.

A.L.M. January 8, 2005 [c571wds]

 
BUDGET TALK

If the founding father's of our nation had thought seriously about how much it was going to cost to maintain such a government, they may have had some second thoughts about certain portions of it.

The fantastic amounts of money now used in common conversation by our political leaders would have shocked the originators no end, I dare say.

I heard a voice on a talking head on C-Span the other day. The bottom line ident faded away before I got a good look at it, so I don't know who he was – a younger man – who observed,well beyond his years, I felt, that the main difficulty with our government costs today is not taxes ...cut or increased. It is less concerned with income at all but, rather with excessive, senseless and unnecessary spending.

The early leaders of our nation were not totally ignorant of that which today we called “pork” in the budget they set forth showing how much it would cost to run the government for a set fiscal period. Any such effort to pad the budget to take care of certain personal wants, desires and hopes of promising supporters would seem petty today.

I have notice it always seems to be the young politicians who speak of doing away with the back-scratching scheme but they lose interest in such plans after a few years go by. They vote, right along with timers and become aware of the values of such a non-conformist series of actions. It is not the politician who is to blame for the excessive abuse in this area; it is not the Congress-person,either. It is the voters at home who cause it to prosper. The politician is led to believe from real life experiences that the pork barrel route is the main road to take if one wants to get re-elected. Common sense tells you that you don't ignore or be too critical of that which has helped you get where you are. It must not be eliminated after it has proved to be so valuable, nor can it be curbed or led around on a leash, and it might even be wise enlarge it and to make it all a bit more by hiring some older writers in the for the Public Relation section. We,
you see, are the very ones who have profited most from the pols willingness to play the game.

Any chances of reform? I rather doubt it. Too many of us have a very real stake in the procedure remaining intact and active.

A.L.M. January 7, 2005 [c442wds]

 

WILD CHOICE

I have been disappointed in recent weeks since the newest lawyer named to defend Saddam Hussein has been named.

The name of a well-known American lawyer and former U.S. Attorney General under two of our Presidents has set forth before the Christmas holidays as a American voice named to speak to the world lauding the innocence of the fallen Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein.

I expected to see, hear and possibly even feel the heat from a large group of American citizens in a burst of anger and contempt for he man who would gloss over evil with his legal services to Saddam. There has been only a slight rustle in the Media which, is once again, getting ready, it appears to allow itself to be sucked into a frothy whirlwind of wrath and condemnation, over failure to set forth a worthy story because of what appears to be political bias.

Even now, with the New Year well underway, you can mention the name “Ramsey Clark” in public and find few people who recognize the name, much less know that he has signed- on as one of the lawyers to defend Saddam Hussein.

Ramsey Clark, to jog our mutual memories a bit, was Lyndon John­son's Attorney-General. The fact that he was the son of Tom C. Clark the Texan who had been appointed as Attorney-General and then as a member of the Supreme Court by President Harry S. Truman. Young Ramsey worked for a time at the county District Attorney's office in Dallas, then attended the University of Chicago. With a law degree, he returned to Dallas to set up a private practice specializing in antitrust matters. He had various partners, and one who lasted five years at it, left because he found it to be “financially unviable”. That ex-partner is quoted as having said that Ramsey Clark was “on the surface very congenial, but actually was quite unforthcoming.” A Kennedy Administration official said Ramsey Clark was “a pretty laconic fellow.”

I judge that official to have been a lawyer as well because I find most people I talk with seem to make use of a variety of all fifteen choices the thesaurus agrees exist – each with synonyms aplenty which can be used to make the
current term “laconic” either a praiseworthy trait or an insult. How the term was used by the quoted “Kennedy official” we cannot say, but judging by Clark's arena
actions in subsequent years the application may well have been a critical one.

Ziad Khasawna, spokesman for the ousted Iraqi president's stable of lawyers on December 29, 2004 when Ramsey Clark arrived in Jordan where the Saddam defense
team will be based, said that Ramsey Clark “had honored and inspired “ the legal team by agreeing to help defend Saddam.

The Iraq Special Tribunal was established by US-led officials to try former government members. Clark said that the United States must also be tried for the November assault on Falluja, destruction of houses, torture in prisons and its role in the deaths of thousands of Iraqis in the war. That gives us an idea of a few of the topics Ramsey Clark will be “laconic” about once the trials begin.

Right now is the proper time for the average American citizen and for the media to make an effort to become aware of information on this man before he begins
his wholesale harangue of accusations. To some his “uninhibited idealism and fervent defense of civil liberties” endeared him to some activists. He was known – both in praise and in censure, as ”The Preacher” when, at age 33,he was on Robert F. Kennedy's Justice Department staff. Robert Kennedy was thirty-five at the time.

He made unauthorized visits to Viet Nam 1972 and to Iran during hostage crisis of 1980. He defended the Harrisburg “Seven” led by Berrigan. He defended the Boston ”Five.” He served as counsel for former Nazi camp guards; for Milosevic, the ex-president of Serbia; worked with Gaddafi, in Libya on a failed attempt to sue Great Britain and the U.S. on behalf of school children allegedly killed in a bomb attack. He filed a motion against the U.S. in the Waco,Texas “Branch Davidians” Showdown. And such a list goes on-and-on seemingly without end

Ramsey Clark also insists the current tribunal is illegal.

Now is the time for our media groups to form public opinion to inform the citizens of this nation, and of the world, lest we be caught up in yet another “Strike Boat” situation which hit most people at election time in spite
of the fact that the films have been shown on C-Span as early as April of that election year and ignored by the media in line with wishful thinking in many areas of
the complex network.

Let's make an effort to stop that from happening again.

A.L.M. January 6, 2005 [c830 wds]

 

EXCESSIVE FEELINGS?

Off hand, I cannot recall a time in my memory when public sentiment seems to have been so deeply aroused by events of the day as with the current tsunami disaster.

Those times which do seem to equate with it are all of a nationalistic, restricted nature - such as Pearl Harbor Day, D-Day or the Moon Landing, when American's responded with exceptional shows of feelings of a patriotic nature.

The “Tsunami of 04-05”, as must eventually be called since it is a continuing thing - with strong aftershocks still being felt in some areas, plus new realizations of additional loss of life and property.

It is far from being ended.

Consider some of the strange things which have happened during the past week.

An earthquake takes place far from our shores in the Indian Ocean and our our advanced communications systems brought the actual visual horror of it, with special impact, into our homes and we came to realize rather bluntly that we were faced with a tremendous force and uncontrollable power in this strange explosion in our Earth's plates under the usually rather placid waters of the Indian Ocean just south of India and west of the coast of Malaysian. In all, before it will have ended, at least eleven nations of people will have suffered heavy property damage and each has steadily growing lists of dead, missing or injured. The economic base of most of those nations has been stripped away, shattered and dependent entirely on outside assistance. It was evident that such help must be prompt and plentiful – well beyond even exceptional bounds.

It has been heartening to be even just a small part of the emotional response to the need of this special ordeal. The response has come from individuals who have made exceptional contributions, commercial and industrial, even a show of some nations attempting to outdo others and finding it difficult to overcome past grievances real or imagined.

This can be seen as a special time of evaluation for many of Mankind's contrived arrangements called governments, unions, associations, denominations, types, kinds or divisions of all kinds.

Can we, indeed, work together, for the common good of all?

A.L.M. January 5, 2005 [c384wds]


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