Our Government At Work

    

Tucson Weather Today

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After hearing about all the scandals and wrong-doings in high places, I did a quick search on the subject of political corruption -- and was amazed at how many exist and are readily available to anyone who is interested in the workings of government.

A Few Examples Of U.S. Government Corruption:

Martha N. Johnson head of the General Services Administration fired two top GSA officials and then resigned herself after it was revealed that $822,000 had been spent in Las Vegas on a four-day training conference for 300 GSA employees. (2010)

Terence Flynn an appointee of Barack Obama to the National Labor Relations Board resigned in May 2012 after being accused of serious ethical violations by leaking information to the National Association of Manufacturers.

Jesse L. Jackson Jr. (D-IL) pled guilty to one felony count of fraud for using $750,000 of campaign money to buy personal items such as stuffed animals, elk heads and fur capes. His wife, Sandi Jackson, who is a Chicago City Alderman, pled guilty to filing false income tax statements at the same time.

Tom DeLay (R-TX) On November 24, 2010, a Texas jury convicted DeLay of money laundering connected to the Jack Abramoff scandal. On January 10, 2011, he was sentenced to three years in prison in Texas.

Samuel B. Kent, Federal District Judge of Galveston, Texas, was sentenced to 33 months in prison for lying about sexually harassing two female employees.

Lewis Libby, Chief of Staff to Vice President Dick Cheney (R). 'Scooter' Libby was convicted of perjury and obstruction of justice in the Plame Affair on March 6, 2007. He was sentenced to 30 months in prison and fined $250,000. The sentence was commuted by George W. Bush (R) on July 1, 2007. The felony remains on Libby's record though the jail time and fine were commuted.

Darleen A. Druyun, Principal Deputy Undersecretary of the Air Force, pled guilty to inflating the price of contracts to favor her future employer, Boeing. In October 2004, she was sentenced to nine months in jail for corruption, fined $5,000, given three years of supervised release and 150 hours of community service. She began her prison term on January 5, 2005. CBS News called it "the biggest Pentagon scandal in 20 years" and said that she pleaded guilty to a felony.

These are only a 'few' examples. There are many, many more. So many that reading them all would make one of Satan's demons sick (If Satan or demons actually existed).

LINK

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TRIVIA

On November 13, 2009, William Jennings "Bill"Jefferson was sentenced to thirteen years in federal prison for bribery after a corruption investigation, the longest sentence ever handed down to a congressman for bribery or any other crime.

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HISTORICAL EVENT

Ruby Ridge

On this day, August 22 in 1992, on the second day of a standoff at Randy Weaver's remote northern Idaho cabin, FBI sharpshooter Lon Horiuchi wounded Randy Weaver, Kevin Harrison, and killed Weaver's wife, Vicki.

The day before, after a period of surveillance, U.S. marshals came upon Harrison; Weaver; Weaver's 14-year-old son, Sammy; and the family dog, Striker, on a road near the Weaver property. A marshal shot and killed the dog, prompting Sammy to fire at the marshal. In the ensuing gun battle, Sammy and U.S. Marshal Michael Degan were shot and killed. A tense standoff ensued, and on August 22 the FBI joined the marshals besieging Ruby Ridge.

The controversial standoff spawned a nationwide debate on the use of force by federal law enforcement agencies, and a U.S. Senate panel accused the federal agencies involved of "substantial failures" in their handling of the Ruby Ridge operation. Of particular controversy was an FBI "rule of engagement" implemented at the beginning of the Ruby Ridge siege that stated "any armed adult male observed in the vicinity of the Weaver cabin could and should be killed." Many condemned this policy as unconstitutional.

Rumors that the FBI had engaged in a cover-up regarding the Ruby Ridge operation were verified when E. Michael Kahoe, former chief of the FBI's violent crimes section, pleaded guilty to obstruction of justice in 1996. Kahoe, who had destroyed an official bureau critique of the standoff, was sentenced to 18 months in prison.

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WORD FOR TODAY

corruption
noun
-  The act or process of corrupting.
-  The state of being corrupt.
-  Decay; rot.

Corruption is spiritual or moral impurity or deviation from an ideal. Corruption may include many activities including bribery and embezzlement.

Government, or 'political', corruption occurs when an office-holder or other governmental employee acts in an official capacity for his or her own personal gain.

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CELEBRITY BIRTHDAYS

Valerie Harper
(born August 22, 1939)

Valerie Harper is an American actress known for her roles as Rhoda Morgenstern in the 1970s television series The Mary Tyler Moore Show and its spin-off, Rhoda, and later as Valerie Hogan in Valerie.

Herbert Norman Schwarzkopf, Jr.
(Aug 1934 - 27 Dec 2012)

Norman Schwarzkopf was a United States Army general. While serving as Commander-in-Chief, United States Central Command, he led all coalition forces in the Persian Gulf War.

Cynthia Jane "Cindy" Williams
(born August 22, 1947)

Cindy Williams is an American actress best known for starring in the television situation-comedy series Laverne & Shirley, in the role of Shirley Feeney, and for her role as Laurie Henderson in the classic film American Graffiti.

Steve Kroft
(born August 22, 1945)

Steve Kroft is an American journalist and a longtime correspondent for 60 Minutes. His investigative reporting has garnered him much acclaim, including three Peabody Awards and nine Emmy awards, one of which was an Emmy for Lifetime Achievement.

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The two most notorious examples of federal abuse of police powers were seen at Ruby Ridge and Waco, where non-aggressive citizens were needlessly provoked and killed by government agents.
--Ron Paul

NASA TV

 

This Is Who I Am

    

Right Of The People To Keep And Bear Arms

    

Tucson Weather Today

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HISTORICAL CLIP

On 'January 31, 1950' U.S. President Harry S. Truman publicly announced his decision to support the development of the hydrogen bomb, a weapon theorized to be hundreds of times more powerful than the atomic bombs dropped on Japan during World War II..

Then, on November 1, 1952, the United States successfully detonated "Mike," the world's first hydrogen bomb, on the Elugelab Atoll in the Pacific Marshall Islands. The 10.4-megaton thermonuclear device  instantly vaporized an entire island and left behind a crater more than a mile wide.

Three years later, on November 22, 1955, the Soviet Union detonated its first hydrogen bomb on the same principle of radiation implosion.

I saw this image on Facebook --
Liked it. Copied it. Pasted it here.

 

Sometimes I grow so confused by the rhetoric of the American Ruling Class, the Industrialists and Politicians with their subservient lackeys, they who in the background manipulate the pretty-faced script reading puppets of the Mass Media, that I feel like throwing in the towel and just accepting things as they are. After all, I am only one man, and an old man at that... and I will soon be out of the picture. A vanished voice plucked from the roar of an ever-growing population.

But at other times I feel a feeble spark of defiance and begin to tap, tap, tap the patiently waiting letters, numbers, and symbols of my keyboard.


There is an old tried and true principle known to the once ubiquitous door to door salesmen that pestered harried housewives during the mid-twentieth century know as the foot-in-the-door ploy. And I wonder if the newest generation of supposedly informed citizens (voters) of the United States are familiar with that principle: getting a foot in the door is the first step to making a sale. Canny salesmen knew that. So the most successful sales persons did just that; they slipped their foot in the doorway as soon as the customer heard them knock and innocently opened the door.

Politicians and elected officials know and use that principle. You can bet on that -- take it to the bank, as it were.

Dedicated liberals such as President Obama and the leaders of the Democratic Party know that in a dispute with conservative congress-persons (the Republican Party) they, the liberals, must ask for the moon and seemingly settle for a crumb of cheese. Why? Because with the passage of time that crumb (foot in the door) will (by accretion) grow until it is as massive as the moon which was originally sought.


WORD FOR TODAY

accretion [un-KREE-shun]
Noun
1.
a. Growth or increase in size by gradual external addition, fusion, or inclusion.
b. Something contributing to such growth or increase.
2. Biology The growing together or adherence of parts that are normally separate.
3. Geology
a. Slow addition to land by deposition of water-borne sediment.
b. An increase of land along the shores of a body of water.
4. Astronomy An increase in the mass of a celestial object by the collection of surrounding interstellar gases and objects by gravity.

Simply put, accretion is the growth of a massive object by attracting more bits of smaller matter.

Passing a law that restricts gun ownership by banning certain types of guns is, on the surface, apparently a common sense act. But wait! Perhaps this is not common sense at all. Perhaps it is one of those crumbs of cheese.

History shows that additional laws will follow. It is inevitable. Eventually private citizens, the people of the United States, will no longer be allowed to own a gun of any kind. Only the enforcers, the members of the police and the military will be allowed to carry and use a firearm. And by then, the president may no longer be as meek and mild as Barach Obama. The future president will be (by accretion of power) more on the order of Orwell's Big Brother. Or worse.

Once, a rag-tag army of freedom-loving militia men rebelled and followed committed leaders in a war against King George of England. Those leaders knew what it would take to win such a war. And that is the reason that the following phrase appears in the U.S. Constitution:

The Right Of The People To Keep And Bear Arms Shall Not Be Infringed,

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BORN ON THIS DAY IN HISTORY


Jackie Robinson

 

Born Jan 31, 1919
Died Oct 24, 1972

Jack Roosevelt "Jackie" Robinson was an American baseball player who became the first black Major League Baseball player of the modern era. Robinson broke the baseball color line when he debuted with the Brooklyn Dodgers in 1947. As the first black man to play in the major leagues since the 1880s, he was instrumental in bringing an end to racial segregation in professional baseball,

In addition to his cultural impact, Robinson had an exceptional baseball career. Over ten seasons, he played in six World Series and contributed to the Dodgers' 1955 World Championship. He was selected for six consecutive All-Star Games from 1949 to 1954, was the recipient of the inaugural MLB Rookie of the Year Award in 1947, and won the National League Most Valuable Player Award in 1949—the first black player so honored. Robinson was inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1962.

Carol Channing

 

Born Jan 31, 1921
Age:  91 years old

Carol Elaine Channing is an American singer, actress, and comedienne. She is the recipient of three Tony Awards (including one for lifetime achievement), a Golden Globe and an Oscar nomination. Channing is best remembered for originating, on Broadway, the musical-comedy roles of bombshell Lorelei Lee in Gentlemen Prefer Blondes, and matchmaking widow Dolly Gallagher Levi in Hello, Dolly!

Channing also appeared in a number of movies, The First Traveling Sales Lady (1956) with Ginger Rogers, the cult film Skidoo and Thoroughly Modern Millie, opposite Julie Andrews and Mary Tyler Moore. For Millie she received a nomination for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress, and was awarded a Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actress – Motion Picture.

Suzanne Pleshette

 

Born Jan. 31, 1937
Died Jan. 19, 2008

Suzanne Pleshette was an American actress and voice actress. After beginning her career in the theater, she began appearing in films in the early 1960s, such as Rome Adventure (1962) and Alfred Hitchcock's The Birds (1963). She later appeared in various television productions, often in guest roles, and played Emily Hartley on The Bob Newhart Show from 1972 until 1978, receiving several Emmy Award nominations for her work. She continued acting until 2004, four years before her death.

Minnie Driver

 

Born Jan 31, 1970
Age:  42 years old

Amelia Fiona J. "Minnie" Driver is a British actress and singer-songwriter. She was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress for her performance in the film Good Will Hunting, and an Emmy Award and a Golden Globe for her work in the television series The Riches.

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Patriotism is supporting your country all the time, and your government when it deserves it.
--Unknown
(Not M. Twain)
    

Politics And We The People

Tucson Weather Today

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Although I continue to comment from time to time regarding presidential candidates, I hereby admit that I know little about politics and about government machinations. When writing about politicians I am usually expressing either the opinions I agree with that I have read about or overheard from others, or else I am clumsily trying to put my crude gut-feelings into words.

And let's not get into the high-level top-secret stuff the public doesn't know about, and never will know about.

I am saying that civics is a mystery to me and one I have no real interest in learning about. In fact, I think the country would be better off if I (and all who are as politically ignorant as am I) would simply abstain from voting in national elections.

To Vote Or Not To Vote

Two Potential Republican Candidates

To Vote Or Not To Vote

The Democratic Candidate

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There is a seemingly small item from history that is threatening to burst forth into the news again. It is the objection to and a re-examination of the following:

The words, under God were added to the Pledge of Allegiance by Act of Congress and signed by President Eisenhower, on Flag Day, June 14, 1954.

President Dwight David Eisenhower

Added "Under God" to the Pledge of Allegiance

Read about it here.

On that date I had just turned 15 a month before, and when we went back to school in the fall, I remember how hard it was for the teacher to get all of us in the Freshman class to voice the under God phrase. If I recall correctly, I never did say those two words aloud while reciting in a school group, all of us mush-brains standing there at attention every morning facing the flag with our grubby little hands over our grubby little hearts.

American education?

American indoctrination.

Ah yes, those were the days.

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A fool and his money are soon elected.
--Will Rogers

Whatever . . .

Whenever my attention to the task at hand--whether severely or ever so slightly--wavers and wanders then wanes, I turn for diversion to my Kindle PC and read a chapter or two from the novel 'Lord Jim.' Not to learn from its pages how to write literature. No, not to discern from the author's words the process of composing text for a modern novel that will be both understood and appreciated by today's readers. No. Joseph Conrad employed far too many adjectives and adverbs, and too many over-used figures of speech, too many abstruse similes and metaphors. (Or so I've been told)

As, (italics mine) for example, in:

She held on straight for the Red Sea under a serene sky, under a sky scorching and unclouded, enveloped in a fulgor of sunshine that killed all thought, oppressed the heart, withered all impulses of strength and energy. And under the sinister splendour of that sky the sea, blue and profound, remained still, without a stir, without a ripple, without a wrinkle--viscous, stagnant, dead. The Patna, with a slight hiss, passed over the plain, luminous and smooth, unrolled a ribbon of smoke across the sky, left behind her on the water a white ribbon of foam that vanished at once, like the phantom of a track drawn upon a lifeless sea by the phantom of a steamer.

It seems that the temper of the times determines the perceived quality of a published work.

Is a writer, aiming for publication, ever free to write whatever and however he or she wants to write? I think not.

Lord Jim, by Joseph Conrad

A used hardcover copy for a penny.

. . .

Uh oh! -- I forgot; I was going to heed a famous author's advice to improve the quality of my blog by making each day's entry a miniature story, with beginning, middle, and end. Oh well, as with a weight loss diet, I can always start doing so tomorrow.

. . .

I read over at The Writer's Almanac that Andrew Bell illustrated 160 plates for the first edition of the Britannica, including illustrations of female pelvises and fetuses for the "Midwifery" entry, which shocked King George III so much that he demanded they be ripped out of every copy of the encyclopedia.

Now, I'd say that's a pretty good illustration of why an actively ruling Monarchy is not the most desirable as a form of government. In fact, life's experience shows the folly of allowing any form of government to grow unchecked. They all grow larger and larger, and grow more and more powerful, feeding mercilessly off the people, until the finally just get too big for their britches. And have to be taken down a notch or two.

And on and on groans and grumbles the crusty old curmudgeon.

. . .

The more I speak and hear spoken aloud the guttural word 'blog' the more I dislike it. Perhaps I should stop using the word and refer to it instead as my web journal... or something like that.

. . .

I finally got around to officially effecting the change of address for my Amateur Radio license from Jacksonville to Tucson. I'm not sure how soon the change will be made in the FCC database though. I'll keep checking until I see the correct address.

. . .

Even Mark Twain put to good use the practice of salting his writing with multiple grains of adjectives and adverbs, even the -ly ones. For instance, in his autobiography he wrote: "John Robards was eternally and indestructibly amiable. I may even say devilishly amiable; fiendishly amiable; exasperatingly amiable."

That's what can be accomplished by incorporating -ly adverbs into a statement the author sees as being enhanced by using those particular parts of speech.

So there . . .

. . .

New Word

pleonasm
redundancy;
The use of more words than necessary to express an idea

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Words Of The Wise

I recently read the following:

"If all mankind minus one, were of one opinion, and only one person were of the contrary opinion, mankind would be no more justified in silencing that one person, than he, if he had the power, would be justified in silencing mankind."
--John Stuart Mill

After thinking about this for a time, I found myself in mild disagreement, wondering if perhaps all mankind might have once been justified in silencing Adolph Hitler.

But, what do I know?

Wikipedia states: "Totalitarianism (or totalitarian rule) is a political system where the state, usually under the control of a single political person, faction, or class, recognizes no limits to its authority and strives to regulate every aspect of public and private life wherever feasible."

Therefore, I propose that a perfected form of cyber-totalitarianism ("Gort... Klatu borada nikto!) could be not only an effective law-enforcement tool but might also be the ideal ruling government.

Or is that merely foolish blather from the failing mind of an old man?

After all . . .

Which of the following two pictures best represents a hope for the future?


or



As I said . . .

I'm 71 years old; what do I know?

Censorship and the Banning of Books

The mother of a student in Menifee, California complained that the 10th edition of Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary contained inappropriate material regarding Oral Sex, to which district officials over-reacted a bit, proposing to ban the dictionary from the school's library shelves.

Here is the supposedly offensive definition:

A district official that stoops to removing books from a school library has merely done his job in a manner he believes right and proper, even if only to further enhance his own eminence in the eyes of a deplorably ignorant electorate.

But a community that condones such actions has injured only itself. Students will mature and self-educate and move on. The village, if ignored by a wiser external society, will stagnate and eventually choke to death on its own vitriolic vomit.

Here are some books that have been banned in the United States.

Anne Frank: The Diary of a Young Girl was outlawed in Alabama schools due to "sexually offensive" passages. Adding to this, four members of the Alabama State Textbook Committee called for the rejection of this book because it is a 'real downer.'

Alice Walker's The Color Purple, where parents and school leaders in Jackson County West Virginia banned the Pulitzer Prize-winning novel due to its sexually and socially explicit nature, in addition to the book's "Troubling ideas about race relations, man's relationship to God, African history, and human sexuality."

The Grapes of Wrath, a novel by John Steinbeck. Banned in many places in the US. In the region of California in which it was partially set, it was banned because it made the residents of this region look bad.

Howl a poem by Allen Ginsberg. Copies of the first edition were seized by San Francisco Customs for obscenity in March 1957; after trial, obscenity charges were dismissed.

Lady Chatterley's Lover a novel by D.H. Lawrence. Temporarily banned for obscenity in the U.S. but the ban was lifted in 1959.

Tropic of Cancer a novel by Henry Miller. Banned in the US in the 1930s until the early 1960s, seized by US customs for sexually explicit content and vulgarity. The rest of Miller's work was also banned by the United States

Ulysses by James Joyce. Challenged and temporarily banned in the US for its sexual content. In 1933 the ban was overturned.

Uncle Tom's Cabin by Harriet Beecher Stowe. Banned in the Southern States due to its anti-slavery content.

United States-Vietnam Relations: 1945-1967. A government study by Robert McNamara and the United States Department of Defense. Also known as the Pentagon Papers. US President Nixon attempted to suspend publication of classified information. The restraint was lifted by the Supreme Court in a 6-3 decision.

Fanny Hill or Memoirs of a Woman of Pleasure by John Cleland. Banned in the USA in 1821 for obscenity, then again in 1963. This was the last book ever banned in the USA.

That's just a few. A list of the most often challenged books can be found on a page of The American Library Association.

Banned Books Week: Celebrating the Freedom to Read

September 25-October 2, 2010 is hailed by the ALA. as Banned Books Week

(BBW) is an annual event celebrating the freedom to read and the importance of the First Amendment. Held during the last week of September, Banned Books Week highlights the benefits of free and open access to information while drawing attention to the harms of censorship by spotlighting actual or attempted bannings of books across the United States.

Banning books, indeed censorship in all its multi-cloaked disguises is inherently damaging (often lethal) to the citizens of any supposedly Free State. Any government eventually will, and must, demand the power to regulate the distribution of information to its subjects.

Thinking individuals should always keep that principle in mind. When a government acts (or seeks to make laws) to suppress the free flow of information on grounds of religion, morality, or simply that it knows "what is best for you" or that it

"NEEDS YOU" -- Watch out!

. . . 'nuff said?

Laughter is God's most soothing balm.

--Gene Chambers