Month: July 2014

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Funny, I write a lot, But…

 

Veteran waiting

A lot of what I write doesn’t make it to these pages.

You can thank your lucky stars about that.

I see stuff on the TV news or read something in a paper, and I think what the hell?

There’s stuff that pisses me off because it’s just wrong, and offends my sense of decency and morality.

Then there’s stuff that is simply factually wrong, mis-worded, misspelled, or spun, in such a convoluted way that I know it’s misleading a large percentage of the population.

First Ammendment

I read about our Veterans begging for medical care and about Illegal immigrants complaining because they don’t get enough free medical care.

I read of people making cases for “rights” that aren’t “rights” but are privileges, then read of those same people claiming “Rights” enumerated in the constitution, aren’t “Rights” at all.

To be clear;

Having a drivers license is a privilege.

Freedom of Speech is a Right.

Being fed because you’re poor or hungry is a humanitarian act, being performed for you by the people who are feeding you because you can’t feed yourself. But you don’t have a “Right” which legally compels someone to feed you.  Worse yet, demanding better cuisine and expecting it of your generous hosts isn’t your “right,” it’s just plain rude.

Israeli leaflets

Your “Right” to practice your religion is exactly that, YOUR RIGHT. My choice NOT to practice your religion or any religion for that matter is just as much my “Right”.

My exercise of my “Right” to free speech in denouncing your practice of your religion, based on your behavior is not hate speech, it’s simply a matter of calling it as I see it.

I think Israel is right and I hope they burn all of Hamas down.  No, not because I particularly agree with all of Israel’s policies. I happen to think that Israel is fighting a stand up fight while Hamas isn’t. Look at this simplistically, Israel tells Hamas when they’re going to bomb or move into an area.

Crying Palesteinan

In the history of warfare has there ever been an Army that says, “We’ll be bombing this area at 15:00, and moving our troops into the area at 16:30.”

Nope, and Hamas sure as hell doesn’t give any warning. So I can’t perceive of Israel as a bully.

I see Israel behaving as honorably as possible, given that they’re fighting a war. I see Hamas as a bunch of childish schoolyard bullies tossing rocks at the athletes from behind bleachers filled with kindergarteners.

Eventually even the best, fair minded, and most honorable athletes get pissed off and go on the hunt.

That’s when Hamas runs to the UN crying and saying Israel is mean. Twintowers

Hey, Israel is just exercising their “Right” to kick some ass.

Contrary to what the Obamas think, Muslims didn’t have a lot to do with building this country. They did apparently have a lot to do with a nasty bit of urban renewal in Manhattan.

Lunchtime

The Puritans, and Irish, English, Italians, Germans, Swedes, Spanish, French, Chinese, Japanese, Africans, Native Americans, (and a whole lot of other determined folks who dreamt of freedom) built this country with blood, sweat, tears, and a fuckload of hard work.

There’s an impact crater in Pennsylvania that bears testament to the gumption, determination, and grit of the descendants of those people. The passengers on flight 93 believed that protecting their fellow citizens was more important than their lives being lost in vain by allowing a plane to be used as a weapon. They did honor to their ancestors and to God only knows how many innocent citizens on the ground.

Flight93memorial

I think about that every single time I hear about the so called “Religion of Peace.” Or hear some assholes like CAIR saying that Muslims are being oppressed because they’re offended by a Christmas decoration.

I grind my teeth every single time I see our sitting President ignore a salute from his Marine escorts.

These kinds of things go through my head all the time and sometimes I wonder if I’ve stepped onto the “CRAZY TRAIN” because so much now days, makes so little sense.

Offtherails

It’s because I wonder if I’m nuts, that I often let blog entries sit and simmer for days or weeks. Sometimes I reread them and think, “Yeah I was wound up when I wrote that.” Then press delete.

Other times I press Publish letting the chips fall as they will.

And sometimes, as I’m doing tonight, I condense the hell out of several posts and what you get is something that’s more akin to stream of consciousness.

No salute

Mind you, this is far more edited than the normally chaotic stream running through my head. I doubt even my computer could keep up with that. I certainly don’t expect you to.

Let me just say this, I’m here even if I’m not writing or tweeting out loud. I’m observing, and thinking, and writing things that maybe, you’ll never read.

I do appreciate the occasional comment or email, because often, I hear from someone that says, “Yeah, I get you. You’re not alone brother.”

Marine

Other times I get a comment or email that tells me I’m off the rails and need to have a drink, and take a deep breath. Rarely, I’ll get a really pissed off email or comment that tells me I’ve hit a nerve, so keep those cards & letters coming.

Good Night,

Sleep well everyone, and remember what Eleanor Roosevelt said;

Marines not sleeping

“The Marines I have seen around the world have the cleanest bodies, the filthiest minds, the highest morale, and the lowest morals of any group of animals I have ever seen. Thank God for the United States Marine Corps!”

 ― Eleanor Roosevelt

I sleep well, embraced by Marines around the world, who are not sleeping.

Wait for the next ride

I’ve been privileged to watch over a few Marines through the night, so they could sleep soundly.

Yeah, I think about stuff like that too…

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Night Rain

Maninrain

You don’t appreciate something until it’s gone.

Its been that way around here. I’ve had enough of the endless dry dusty days. This drought is like the party guest that just won’t leave.

There have been some really evil teasers over the past few months, cloudy days, huge thunderheads building against the mountain, lots of noise but not a lot of action.

All we’ve gotten out of it has been humidity followed by more steaminess than we had before.

I can take heat, with low humidity. I can take high humidity like you get in the South, at least you know that rain is coming.

I can’t take the nasty humidity followed by sun followed by more humidity with no breeze. That’s brutal and what the early evenings have been like for the past few days. 

Oppressive heat and humidity permeating what should be a comfortable time of the day. Not quite hot enough to run the air conditioning, but sticky like a Florida summer day without the afternoon thunderstorm.

Maninrain3

Being naked doesn’t help, because you can’t get enough sweat to evaporate to cool. You lay there sweating, wondering if the $$$ you’d spend on the A/C is worth it.

I was sleeping fitfully on the couch. Then about an hour ago I woke to the smell of rain on hot asphalt. It’s not raining a lot, more of a drizzle but it’s being fairly consistent and the temperature has dropped about 10 degrees. 

The rain isn’t hitting on the roof hard enough to make much of a sound, but I can hear it on the leaves and if I listen real hard, I can hear drops hitting the decks.

Maninrain2

I wasn’t naked when I fell asleep on the couch, I’m naked now.

Standing at the sliding door listening  to the rain through the screen I had an overwhelming urge to be naked, feeling the rain on my skin.

Thank goodness the decks are more or less private at this time of night!

For however long this gentle shower lasts, I’m grateful.

I can see myself wrapping up in a sheet then falling asleep listening to the crickets and gentle shower hitting the parched ground.

It’s worth losing a little sleep to enjoy the rain.

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Uh OH, Guess White people are going to be driven into poverty…

Images 2

It’s only fair, right? After all White folks MUST be punished for their hard work and success.

All you young white males out there.  GIVE UP! You’re fucked!

Learn to drive that forklift, and don’t forget Military Careers are gone now too.

Whatever you do, you’re not going to be allowed to work in technology firms anymore. Probably should look at leaving this country too. I hear the Russians, Germans, & Chinese, are looking for skilled technology workers.

Here’s the deal. During the past few months, Silicon Valley has been called upon to release “Diversity” reports and BIG surprise… Those reports are showing that overwhelmingly White Males, followed by folks from Asia, are at the top of the food chain in technology.

The latest report is from Twitter.

Honestly I don’t find this at all surprising. I noticed a long time ago that the Captains of industry were predominantly white. It actually makes a kind of sense. The civil rights movement was in full swing only 50 years ago.

Black Sales Manager

If you factor in the time needed to improve and integrate the schools, and make sure that black kids had all the same opportunities that white kids had then get the black kids interested in education and prepare them for college… You still come up short. You have folks especially in the early years that simply couldn’t afford college so they didn’t go. Plus you had a mind set in the black community that wasn’t educationally focused. Those issues take time to fix. 

Figure that you lose 15 to 20 years while minds, beliefs, and financial issues get taken care of. Which leaves you with a good 30 or so years during which black kids were being educated right along side white kids. Then hopefully moving on to college. Which means that two maybe four groups of black kids have been educated start to finish through college, with all the same opportunities as white kids. So now they’re waiting in the wings to move up the corporate ladder.

Except that no-one is moving up the corporate ladder except H1B1 Visa holders. That’s another issue entirely.

Then along comes Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton demanding to know why there aren’t more black faces in the pages of Forbes. 

Well, looking at President Obama’s management style perhaps we can see why there aren’t more African Americans in management. Having some experience with a supervisor who was far more interested in not rocking the boat and doing anything to keep peace, I can tell you, this isn’t the way to promotions. In any business situation, sometimes you have to take risks, and stand up for what you believe in. Not taking risks or maintaining peace at any price, makes you anything but management material.

Corporate ladder

It also tends to cause a lot of turnover in employees working for that supervisor.

Some employees have goals and want to move up the corporate ladder.  They can’t do that under a milquetoast supervisor because in addition to keeping peace at any price, this kind of supervisor also limits upper management’s view of their employees, Typically the supervisor takes all the credit for good work, and hangs an employee out to dry if a project or other work goes bad.

Lots of employee turnover tends to limit how far up the corporate ladder this type of supervisor can go. Which suggests management classes may be in order for African American supervisors and certainly for President Obama.

I don’t think this bad management style is a personal style choice, I think it’s endemic to most African American managers. I can only assume it’s a style born out of fear of losing a hard won job, there’s probably a psychology paper in there somewhere.

Which brings me back on point.

There aren’t that many African Americans in upper management for a couple of reasons.

1 Poor management style limits access to higher management responsibilities.

2 We’re still waiting for seasoned African Americans to come up through the ranks from entry level positions to upper management.

The two issues are inter-related but I think, subtly different.

These diversity reports are going slam midlevel white male workers the hardest. Regardless of these workers qualifications, they’re going to lose out to institutional racism.

Poor white people

The equation is simple, businesses fear bad publicity. Bad Publicity hurts the bottom line and so must be avoided at all costs. Even if the cost is hiring people who are not qualified for a job. It makes good business sense to isolate someone from management decisions and pay them a salary to look pretty, if their presence spares the company bad publicity.

It even makes sense to hire a lot of people who are unqualified or barely qualified for a series of jobs peppered throughout departments to make your diversity numbers look better. Some of the barely qualified folks will catch on and become good employees. The rest, a company takes as a write-off in productivity.

All of which means, White Males aren’t going to get tech jobs for the foreseeable future.