From time to time I come across a tribute or website that gives thanks to our soldiers, servicemen and women, for their sacrifices and commitment to keeping us free that really grabs my attention.
The Iraq war for all the political hype that the press constantly puts out, is a war. Men and women are putting their lives on the line day by day for me, for you and for all Iraqis. Words cannot possibly express my thanks and heart felt gratitude for their valiant efforts.
I came across this link today which comes close. You can find the original article at backyardconservative.blogspot.com.
Saturday, August 19, 2006
Post Katrina - Whose to blame?
It has almost been a year since Katrina brought her fury ashore in New Orleans and the Mississippi Gulf Coast, and left a disaster of epic proportions in her wake. New Orleans received the most in both aid and publicity of their plight and probably because it was the largest city in the disaster zone.
Parts of the city remain uninhabitable, with clouds of mosquitoes, festering sludge and stagnant water, dilapidated houses and buildings, and a rescue and rebuilding effort in tatters. Who is to blame? The Mayor? FEMA? The President? The Governor? The French for being foolish enough to build a city on top of a swamp?
All of them, including the homeowners for not leaving the city. I understand the plight of many and how they were caught in the seemingly endless and empty-filled promises of assistance and fervently believe that once help is offered the agencies have a responsibility to provide that help and not take a year to do it. However, in looking back it’s important to realize the many mistakes that were made which will hopefully prevent us from making them again.
The French were / or should I say ARE the biggest idiots of all. Nobody with even the slightest amount of common sense would in their right mind build a city on top of what is basically a swamp. Of all the dumb things they could have done, this is the biggest. Swamps are by their very nature unstable, and with New Orleans sitting approximately 8 feet below sea level, you would think that someone would have stood up and said "This is crazy! We are asking for trouble here." Nobody did, and now we can see the result - billions upon billions of dollars in reconstruction costs which at the end will simply put us back at the same point we started at.
The Army Corps of Engineers for the most part is a solid organization that does their job and does it right; HOWEVER!, after spending this past year dealing with engineers, I have come to the conclusion that most of them have spent little time reviewing disasters and preparing for them. One aspect of software design and engineering that is beat into the heads of mush at every college and university is that you TEST, TEST, TEST, and TEST the TESTS. You look for problems; you consider every possible point of failure and make adjustments for each one of them. If a programmer can get it right, I fail to see why an Army Corps Engineer cannot. Their planning of the levee system and shipping channel was a complete disaster and had they considered and double checked their own work and that of their contractors they could not have possibly missed the problems that were inherently built in.
Hours before Katrina came ashore, Mayor Ray Nagin had at his disposal, hundreds upon hundreds of city and school buses which he could have used to ferry the residents out of harms way. Did he do it? Nope, he sat on his ass and played the blame game. Now, what I cannot for the life of me figure out is why after this debacle, the residents of New Orleans in their infinite wisdom reelected this fool. Nagin may be a nice guy, I have no issue with that; however, his inept handling of this tragedy borders on the criminal. He ** LEFT ** people to die whereas if he would have simply used the brains that G-d gave a horse he would have saved hundreds if not thousands of people.
FEMA - What can one say about this organization besides that it should be dismantled, everyone fired, and reorganized. Federal Emergency Management Agency should be renamed "Federal Emergency MISMANAGEMENT Agency. They screwed everything up from not preparing for the oncoming storm, to wasting hundred of millions of dollars, to making unfilled promises in a political attempt to cover up their own ineptness. I understand that the FEMA director is a political appointment, but come on Mr. President, this idiot had trouble managing horses let alone a Federal Agency.
The Governor of Louisiana completely and utterly failed in her job. I am not sure if Katrina was more than she could handle or if she simply froze? Either way, she failed and because of that failure people died. There is nothing else that can be or should be said.
I lay far less blame at the feet of the President, he has staff to handle these agencies and problems and he cannot personally respond to each and every single one; however, he committed hundreds of millions of dollars in reconstruction money (which I believe was a huge mistake), and then failed to deliver it. One tenet of Judaism is to not make promises and commitments unless you are willing and able to deliver on them. PERIOD. Helping others is a Mitzvah and it is an important part of Judaism, but that does not require you to throw good money after bad.
Rebuilding New Orleans in the same fashion as before will only result in 10, 50 or a hundred years from now our grandchildren having to face the same type of disaster we are paying for.
The best thing that could happen at this point is to bulldoze the city under, return it to the swamps and give every homeowner $200,000.00 to move elsewhere. It would be cheaper and more efficient use of our tax dollars. The delta would eventually restore the area to its natural setting and we would not have to worry about the destruction of a city called New Orleans again.
Parts of the city remain uninhabitable, with clouds of mosquitoes, festering sludge and stagnant water, dilapidated houses and buildings, and a rescue and rebuilding effort in tatters. Who is to blame? The Mayor? FEMA? The President? The Governor? The French for being foolish enough to build a city on top of a swamp?
All of them, including the homeowners for not leaving the city. I understand the plight of many and how they were caught in the seemingly endless and empty-filled promises of assistance and fervently believe that once help is offered the agencies have a responsibility to provide that help and not take a year to do it. However, in looking back it’s important to realize the many mistakes that were made which will hopefully prevent us from making them again.
The French were / or should I say ARE the biggest idiots of all. Nobody with even the slightest amount of common sense would in their right mind build a city on top of what is basically a swamp. Of all the dumb things they could have done, this is the biggest. Swamps are by their very nature unstable, and with New Orleans sitting approximately 8 feet below sea level, you would think that someone would have stood up and said "This is crazy! We are asking for trouble here." Nobody did, and now we can see the result - billions upon billions of dollars in reconstruction costs which at the end will simply put us back at the same point we started at.
The Army Corps of Engineers for the most part is a solid organization that does their job and does it right; HOWEVER!, after spending this past year dealing with engineers, I have come to the conclusion that most of them have spent little time reviewing disasters and preparing for them. One aspect of software design and engineering that is beat into the heads of mush at every college and university is that you TEST, TEST, TEST, and TEST the TESTS. You look for problems; you consider every possible point of failure and make adjustments for each one of them. If a programmer can get it right, I fail to see why an Army Corps Engineer cannot. Their planning of the levee system and shipping channel was a complete disaster and had they considered and double checked their own work and that of their contractors they could not have possibly missed the problems that were inherently built in.
Hours before Katrina came ashore, Mayor Ray Nagin had at his disposal, hundreds upon hundreds of city and school buses which he could have used to ferry the residents out of harms way. Did he do it? Nope, he sat on his ass and played the blame game. Now, what I cannot for the life of me figure out is why after this debacle, the residents of New Orleans in their infinite wisdom reelected this fool. Nagin may be a nice guy, I have no issue with that; however, his inept handling of this tragedy borders on the criminal. He ** LEFT ** people to die whereas if he would have simply used the brains that G-d gave a horse he would have saved hundreds if not thousands of people.
FEMA - What can one say about this organization besides that it should be dismantled, everyone fired, and reorganized. Federal Emergency Management Agency should be renamed "Federal Emergency MISMANAGEMENT Agency. They screwed everything up from not preparing for the oncoming storm, to wasting hundred of millions of dollars, to making unfilled promises in a political attempt to cover up their own ineptness. I understand that the FEMA director is a political appointment, but come on Mr. President, this idiot had trouble managing horses let alone a Federal Agency.
The Governor of Louisiana completely and utterly failed in her job. I am not sure if Katrina was more than she could handle or if she simply froze? Either way, she failed and because of that failure people died. There is nothing else that can be or should be said.
I lay far less blame at the feet of the President, he has staff to handle these agencies and problems and he cannot personally respond to each and every single one; however, he committed hundreds of millions of dollars in reconstruction money (which I believe was a huge mistake), and then failed to deliver it. One tenet of Judaism is to not make promises and commitments unless you are willing and able to deliver on them. PERIOD. Helping others is a Mitzvah and it is an important part of Judaism, but that does not require you to throw good money after bad.
Rebuilding New Orleans in the same fashion as before will only result in 10, 50 or a hundred years from now our grandchildren having to face the same type of disaster we are paying for.
The best thing that could happen at this point is to bulldoze the city under, return it to the swamps and give every homeowner $200,000.00 to move elsewhere. It would be cheaper and more efficient use of our tax dollars. The delta would eventually restore the area to its natural setting and we would not have to worry about the destruction of a city called New Orleans again.
Thursday, August 17, 2006
sj-r.com article on dog shooting smacks with anti-semite comments
The State Journal Register posted an article today about a man who apparently shot a neighbors dog after the dog apparently chased after his turkey which was apparently running loose on the dog owners property. Now, if that is not enough to confuse the hell out of you; your better than I am.
As with most articles posted on the sj-r.com website, readers can leave comments on the stories which has certainly brought about some rather lively discussions. This one happens to have what appears to me (and this of course is only my personal opinion), a comment that smacks of anti-semitism.
This of course has nothing to do with the article or its subject matter, but the reference was clear to me.
"To: rondmon wrote at 8/17/2006 9:18:56 PM
Have them put up a yelloe flag & we will get to them...Do you want an Air Force jet(ours) or a F-16 piloted by a Jew?"
It is amazing how some people fail to stay on topic and then without any provocation, decide to bring up the "Jews". I would almost like to run into this moron just once, but then again its the Sabbath now, so I will mind my manners and just say "Shabbat Shalom".
As with most articles posted on the sj-r.com website, readers can leave comments on the stories which has certainly brought about some rather lively discussions. This one happens to have what appears to me (and this of course is only my personal opinion), a comment that smacks of anti-semitism.
This of course has nothing to do with the article or its subject matter, but the reference was clear to me.
"To: rondmon wrote at 8/17/2006 9:18:56 PM
Have them put up a yelloe flag & we will get to them...Do you want an Air Force jet(ours) or a F-16 piloted by a Jew?"
It is amazing how some people fail to stay on topic and then without any provocation, decide to bring up the "Jews". I would almost like to run into this moron just once, but then again its the Sabbath now, so I will mind my manners and just say "Shabbat Shalom".
Justice can be extremely slow
At the time of the Jon Benet Ramsey murder I was living in Wheat Ridge, Colorado; just a few minutes from her home and spent a considerable time in and around the Boulder area. It rocked the entire community including Denver.
I had little doubt then as I do now that the Boulder PD blew this case. They lost evidence, allowed police personnel to walk in discriminitely throughout the house and grounds, allowed Mr. Ramsey to wander through the basement area - and it was here that he found his daughter.
It has been ten years, ten years of a little girl going without justice, ten years of parents operating daily under a cloud of suspicion, ten years of accusations from wannabe reporters and freelance writers accusing Patsy Ramsey of her daughters murder, ten years of screwing up a case by the Boulder PD.
Justice can be slow, and although I have no idea if John Karr is in fact the killer, only time and the courts will tell us for sure, however if he is justice may be extremely slow but it eventually shows its face.
I had little doubt then as I do now that the Boulder PD blew this case. They lost evidence, allowed police personnel to walk in discriminitely throughout the house and grounds, allowed Mr. Ramsey to wander through the basement area - and it was here that he found his daughter.
It has been ten years, ten years of a little girl going without justice, ten years of parents operating daily under a cloud of suspicion, ten years of accusations from wannabe reporters and freelance writers accusing Patsy Ramsey of her daughters murder, ten years of screwing up a case by the Boulder PD.
Justice can be slow, and although I have no idea if John Karr is in fact the killer, only time and the courts will tell us for sure, however if he is justice may be extremely slow but it eventually shows its face.
Monday, August 14, 2006
Cease Fire - will it last?
Doubtful, you need to remember what the purpose was behind the Hezbullah attack to start with. They had two primary goals in mind, extract prisoners Israel is currently holding for crimes they committed against the Israeli people and to create a backlash against the Israelis from within the Muslim community. As a secondary goal, if they could goad the Israelis into attacking it would whip up anti-semitism throughout the world and thus continue their quest in destroying Israel.
By crossing the Israeli and kidnapping two members of the IDF (Israeli Defense Forces), they thought they could extract some prisoners from Israel through an exchange (which Israel has mistakenly done in the past). How did Israel react? They hit back this time and hit back hard; unfortunately not hard enough.
What amazes me is that if Hezbullah had done this with any other country, the reaction would have been far different and certainly more devastating. Could you imagine what the United States would do if Canada or Mexico without provocation, crossed our border and kidnapped two of our soldiers? Now you say "Well, Hezbullah isn't Lebanon". To which I would reply - BULLSHIT! Hezbullah has been allowed to control the entire southern region of Lebanon for better part of the last 20 years, if that does not make them a part of Lebanon, nothing will.
Israel has also been very restrained in their response. Case in point. During WWII the Germans launched well over 4,000 boms and missiles at the civilian areas of England; their goal was to completely destroy England. They did this over an 18 month period. That time frame is important here. The Allied response was to drop bombs and missiles in such a manner that they killed over 100,000 military and civilian personnel. That included men, women and children.
In less than 31 days, Hezbullah has launched over 3900 bombs at Israel; bombs packed not only with explosives, but glass, metal fragments, nails, staples, etc. In effect creating the worlds largest claymore mine. These bombs have been specifically directed at civilian areas with the purpose of exacting as much civilian loss as possible on the Israeli side. Israel's response has been to target known military and command positions. What hezbullah has done (which is a war crime in and of itself), is position these military and command operations right in the middle of civilian areas.
Now, what is Israel supposed to do? Not destroy those operations and allow them to continue bombing their country? You cannot possibly think that any other sane country would allow the same would you? I thought not.
The cease fire that has been in place for a few hours now will calm the region down some, but with Hezbullah's refusal to disarm and their penchant for causing havoc and their blood thirsty desire to completely destroy Israel will unfortunately cause this case fire to fail.
Lebanon made their bed with Hezbullah and now is suffering the consequences of that action. You may feel for them and understand their plight, but they made the bed and it is up to them to fix it themselves. Without fixing it, they will never have peace.
By crossing the Israeli and kidnapping two members of the IDF (Israeli Defense Forces), they thought they could extract some prisoners from Israel through an exchange (which Israel has mistakenly done in the past). How did Israel react? They hit back this time and hit back hard; unfortunately not hard enough.
What amazes me is that if Hezbullah had done this with any other country, the reaction would have been far different and certainly more devastating. Could you imagine what the United States would do if Canada or Mexico without provocation, crossed our border and kidnapped two of our soldiers? Now you say "Well, Hezbullah isn't Lebanon". To which I would reply - BULLSHIT! Hezbullah has been allowed to control the entire southern region of Lebanon for better part of the last 20 years, if that does not make them a part of Lebanon, nothing will.
Israel has also been very restrained in their response. Case in point. During WWII the Germans launched well over 4,000 boms and missiles at the civilian areas of England; their goal was to completely destroy England. They did this over an 18 month period. That time frame is important here. The Allied response was to drop bombs and missiles in such a manner that they killed over 100,000 military and civilian personnel. That included men, women and children.
In less than 31 days, Hezbullah has launched over 3900 bombs at Israel; bombs packed not only with explosives, but glass, metal fragments, nails, staples, etc. In effect creating the worlds largest claymore mine. These bombs have been specifically directed at civilian areas with the purpose of exacting as much civilian loss as possible on the Israeli side. Israel's response has been to target known military and command positions. What hezbullah has done (which is a war crime in and of itself), is position these military and command operations right in the middle of civilian areas.
Now, what is Israel supposed to do? Not destroy those operations and allow them to continue bombing their country? You cannot possibly think that any other sane country would allow the same would you? I thought not.
The cease fire that has been in place for a few hours now will calm the region down some, but with Hezbullah's refusal to disarm and their penchant for causing havoc and their blood thirsty desire to completely destroy Israel will unfortunately cause this case fire to fail.
Lebanon made their bed with Hezbullah and now is suffering the consequences of that action. You may feel for them and understand their plight, but they made the bed and it is up to them to fix it themselves. Without fixing it, they will never have peace.
What a weekend
What a weekend this has been; all in all it was a very enjoyable one. Unfortunately the kids did not have the level of success they experienced on Thursday or we had hoped for; however, we did enjoy watching them go through the program and hopefully will have better success in Louisville.
Since the schedule for them was relatively light, we were able to get out and around the fairgrounds on Saturday and Sunday. I would like to congratulate all the 4-h'ers on their respective projects, there was nothing there that I did enjoy. You made the effort, expended the time and resources and even if you did not win you can take away the knowledge that you have improved yourself because of it. Good luck next year!
I have to say that the conservation area has been greatly improved! although there are a few tough hills in the area, all in all Dawn was ab le to get around with just Oxford (service dog) assisting.
I would be remiss if I did not at least say hello to Bo, it was good running into you and hopefully you won't lose my number AGAIN!
Since the schedule for them was relatively light, we were able to get out and around the fairgrounds on Saturday and Sunday. I would like to congratulate all the 4-h'ers on their respective projects, there was nothing there that I did enjoy. You made the effort, expended the time and resources and even if you did not win you can take away the knowledge that you have improved yourself because of it. Good luck next year!
I have to say that the conservation area has been greatly improved! although there are a few tough hills in the area, all in all Dawn was ab le to get around with just Oxford (service dog) assisting.
I would be remiss if I did not at least say hello to Bo, it was good running into you and hopefully you won't lose my number AGAIN!
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