Southwest ablaze

Wallow Fire in Arizona and New Mexico

John McCain set off a firestorm recently by blaming out open borders and illegal immigrants on the fires in the southwest.

He has a point. They certainly cannot check into hotels so they do camp and in forests both Arizona and New Mexico have closed because of the very dry conditions. This hurts the economy of locals that depend on tourists this time of year. And this is where are homes are . . . or families and our pets and our friends. We are all on edge and very aware of the restrictions. I, who does not live in the forest but a meadow near its edge, cannot have a barbeque in my yard even or celebrate the 4th with fireworks.

We are all living in terror of illegal campers. And they could be US citizens from another state just unable or unwilling to read the signs warning of new camp fires, no smoking, no fireworks. But, Senator McCain is right, there is a higher possibility they are illegal migrants seeking to stay off of main roads and hide in the woods, set signal fires for others to meet them, etc. There is a piece of privately owned property near the national forest that has been used for years as a "gathering place" by the coyotes.

But to be fair it is not just illegals we are angry with. As our governors seek to ban the sale of fireworks as we approach the 4th of July we know the Indians will continue to sell them on their reservations knowing full well that is not where the buyers will set them off. And state officials of New Mexico and Arizona have no standing on reservation lands. But fireworks can be brought across state lines by visitors.

I think it is long past time that we ban fireworks and their use by anyone other than licensed individuals that set off public displays in closely controlled circumstances. Let's ring bells on the 4th of July instead. I have had enough flash, band and boom. We in the southwest are sitting on the front lines of a battle for our forests and the way of life they provide not just here but to the global climate.

Pacheco Fire in Pecos

I have been watching the smoke from the Pacheco Fire go 30,000 feet into the air. It was started by someone that went into a forest that was closed.

Whether an illegal immigrant or not it was someone doing something illegal but it is us and not them that will pay. And if our governor bans the sale of fireworks it is legal vendors that will lose money while the Indians continue to make it.

The 4th of July used to be about all men being created equal.

Closure

“I mourn the loss of thousands of precious lives, but I will not rejoice in the death of one, not even an enemy. Returning hate for hate multiplies hate, adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars. Darkness cannot drive out darkness: Only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate: Only love can do that.” – Martin Luther King, Jr.

A blog friend of my from Australia opened his blog with that quote. The citizens of the United States took a lot of flack yesterday for what the rest of the world sees and vengeance. This blog is a response to that.

The news media (and not just ours here in the states) has blown the "celebration" of Bin Laden's death all out of proportion. From what I can determine it was the drunken young emptying the bars and dancing into the streets in New York City. It was their city which was forever scarred. And 9/11 was the first bump in charmed lives of that generation. He was their boogie man and he was dead. Still his body was not hung from the portico of a hotel for days like Mussolini's at the end of WWII.That done by his own people.


Most American citizens behaved quite quietly upon hearing that Bin Laden was dead. For us the report of his death was closure. Not unlike hearing the pronouncement of Ted Bundy's successful execution whether you believe in capital punishment or not. And for many of us it was a subtle proof that former President GW Bush didn't try to get him. In the frontier days of the United States it was believed if you killed the chief of the tribe the fighting stopped. Perhaps on some level we still believe that. We don't want the wars we are currently fighting. We don't want wars. And we would like to hope that killing the chief of this war on terror would bring peace.


And I certainly do not believe (even though I do go along with some conspiracy theories) we faked this. I understand the burial at sea was in keeping with the Muslim tradition of burial within 24 hours and that at sea his body would not risk being dug up and mutilated. No doubt our Navy Seals got the proof the wicked witch is dead.


As for the eye for an eye bit that seems to pervade several major religions in the world, Bin Laden argued that 9/11 was an atonement for sins of the American people. GW called our invasion of Iraq a holy war. But that we could have put both on a gallows and hung both at the same time. The leaders that create war, and not the innocent among their populations should be the ones that wage it and pay the ultimate price for it.

VOTE NONE OF THE ABOVE

It is not a new idea. In college I voted for Pat Paulson one election and Snoopy another. I just didn't feel that I could vote for any of the candidates offered. Up until President Obama I frequently voted for the lessor of two evils and that isn't good. In state elections I when I cannot bring myself to vote for the candidates for a particular office and do not vote for any. I was surprised in a recent off year election when a newspaper article made note of how many left that particular position blank. But the politicians don't seem to get the message.

Obviously we are going to have to be more direct like the voters in Nevada where I got this image for the blog.

After the very childish behavior of our representatives in the United States Congress I suggest a national JUST VOTE NONE OF THE ABOVE campaign for 2012. And we stick to our guns for every election until everyone in congressional office at the moment is out and the laws for campaigns and financing to get in the office are drastically changed: NO professional politicians, NO smear campaigns, NO ten second sound bites, NO professional fund raisers, NO to running for office over and above running our government, NO to partisan politics, NO repeated terms in office. JUST SAY NO.

Let us get back to what our founding fathers had in mind.

So in 2012 and every election year to 2018 just vote NONE OF THE ABOVE for every representative or senator running for office. I personally am going to do it on the state level too.

Note: I was going to advocate t-shirts and buttons but it seems there are a lot out there already so just Google NONE OF THE ABOVE and have fun. I personally want coffee mugs. And an OFF WITH THEIR HEADS t-shirt. Anyone?

Only one of ten die in the dentist's chair

 

I come from a family of dentally challenged. I was the one with the perfect teeth as a kid. But every time another member of the family came home from the dentist there seemed to be a new horror story. I was threatened with braces when I was 11 and was so terrified that I chewed gum to develop my lower jaw and read books with my head leaning down against the heel of my palm to push my upper teeth back.

I was ecstatic when family circumstances sidelined my dental checkups until 16. Then I had four cavities which the dentist filled all at once on the same day without word one of explanation or preamble. I only had my father's joke of only one of ten die in the dentist's chair for company during the ordeal. I managed to tap dance around dental health issues until my late twenties and a couple more cavities and a root canal.

The root canal was done by Igor in a office that looked like Frankenstein's laboratory without a word of preamble or explanation. I fainted. I had a huge infection which was into the sinus cavity and inner ear upsetting my balance. I got absolutely no sympathy or rest because my significant other at the time had a knee injury. I had to fetch and carry for him and work days. I remember thinking death would be easier as I waited for the infection to clear so the huge hole in my tooth could be filled.

The dentist that sent me for the root canal was thrilled when that day arrived because now we could "attend" to the impacted wisdom tooth. That is a horror tale for another day but it is when I discovered that when I am under I am never quite under and my memories of having my tonsils out were memories and not dreams as my parents insisted. I can repeat every single word ever said in an operating theater where I am the main course.

I am at constant war with myself over the need for regular dental checkups to insure dental health and my total animal brain need to run for hills. And ever present is that memory of Dad saying, "Don't worry, only one of ten die in the dentist's chair. Yesterday sitting in the plush examining room of a man that makes his living pulling teeth I read through the release from I had to sign which included the list of all things that could go wrong. I stopped at number 12: Broken jaw. The extraordinarily sunny disposition hygienist assured me that would not happen to me. And I smiled while thinking: They lie to you all the time.

All that said the oral surgeon knew his business. The tooth was out in three minutes. Numbing me up took longer. He explained every step before he began it but not so far beyond I could escape. He probably earned about $100 a minute for his time but I walked out. I was not one of the ten.

I am totally broke till payday but out of pain, and find myself wondering about dental costs, why they are not covered by medicare, and why there is not an affordable dental insurance option out there for us Yanks. Anyone know?

Unclear on nuclear energy?

Diablo Canyon Nuclear Power plant

While everyone is worrying about an earthquake generated meltdown at a nuclear generator (or three) in Japan the nuclear energy people here in the United States are all upset that it will cause negative reaction (pun intended) to plans to expand nuclear plants in this country. Like it is all our fault?

The Diablo Canyon Nuclear Power Plant in California sits on top of one of the most geologically active (read that as earth quake prone) areas in the United States. And one plant in California was shut down because of earthquake activity. The 63 MW Boiling Water Reactor at the Humboldt Bay Nuclear Power Plant in Eureka was in operation by PG&E from August 1963 to July 1976. It was the seventh licensed nuclear plant in the United States. It was closed because the economics of a required seismic retrofit could not be justified after riding through a moderate earthquake.

California law now prohibits the construction of any new nuclear power plants in California until the Energy Commission finds that the federal government has approved and there exists a demonstrated technology for the permanent disposal of spent fuel from these facilities. California's existing nuclear power plants provide a significant amount of California's non-fossil fuel based energy and power but produce significant amounts of spent nuclear fuel. Continued operation of these plants will require substantial investments in replacement steam generators, turbines and other major pieces of equipment, ongoing recruitment and training to maintain an experienced nuclear work force, and accommodation of evolving federal policy regarding nuclear technology, in addition to other requirements.  

All, well and good, especially since everyone wants to store those spent nuclear rods in caves in New Mexico and Nevada.

However, this 1978 action, makes no mention of the San Andres fault and the tendency of power companies to build their plants on such unstable and shifting bases. And in high population areas. On the map below white is where it would be safe to build. But when I was living in Missouri we were fighting to shut down the building of a plant on the New Madrid fault. That is that red oval on the Mississippi and Missouri rivers.

The track record of companies proposing to build nuclear power plants is not good. The old joke was would you want to go on a rocket ship to the moon built by the lowest possible bidder? The bidding system on construction projects in the United States is about cheap. That New Madrid Fault plant was using substandard materials and rusty rebar. It does not inspire confidence. And some of the problems that occurred in the Three Mile Island near melt down was due to inadequately trained personal hired on the cheap.

So if we here in the United States are seemingly anti nuclear power may I suggest the fault is not in us but in the companies that build and maintain these plants. Look not at the population but at yourselves. Show us you can be responsible and also that you won't lie to us.

WE NEED UTILITY REGULATION NOW

Many of  may have missed the huge emergency in northern New Mexico. Some of you don't even believe we are a state. And during the huge storm that brought record low temps (-34F at my house) even the Weather Channel said it covered from Texas to Maine.

We were all huddled down in our homes and getting our news from each other via Internet, Facebook, and telephone. We are an area that has only weekly papers and spotty coverage on radio. Our television is from some other place. But news quickly spread when the natural gas began to run out beginning in Albuquerque and spreading north up the Rio Grande valley to the Colorado border.

First the media lied when they shut down schools. It was because of road conditions. Then various agencies began to make calls quietly offering vouchers to people that might be suffering from the lack of heat. Taos got hit particularly bad because they depend on natural gas and have all the stores we all use. After being house bound for a couple of days everyone hopped over the mountain to shop. Smith's pipes were frozen, and the gas was out everywhere. The electrical coop was in a state of emergency planning for a sudden surge of electrical use do to dependence upon electric space heaters. They quickly sent around e-mails and had mayors in the area post on the internet rules for conservation of energy. They included staying off the internet. This rather reminded me of the Egyptian crisis.

How do you run out of natural gas? Especially in New Mexico where there are huge deposits of it. The explanation was that Texas had shut down the compressors to the gas pipelines to the gas utilities in New Mexico because of rolling electric black outs in Texas due to the cold. Why was this reminding me of the Enron scandal in the early days of GW's presidency? Enron, a Texas based firm, pretended a shortage of electrical power in California and created black outs to enable a raising of the rates. But surely this gas crisis was just a lack of planning and consideration in the wake of a huge unexpected storm?

Evidently not. I was wondering why conservation of electrical usage would necessitate the shutting down of compressors. Surely they could be isolated from the blackouts and kept up and running? And evidently they were. The gas company just chose to send New Mexico's gas to Oklahoma. Why should that have even been their choice?

Some of our residents are beginning to get gas back. Natural gas is being obtained from other pipelines. Residential lines have to be re-pressurized and checked and relit. It is a slow process and natural gas companies from the surrounding area are sending in technicians to help in the laborious process. No doubt this will mean rates get raised. Businesses in Taos and Red River have been shut down since last week and may not have heat until Monday or Tuesday when a new Arctic cold front is coming our way. We are still in a state of emergency especially if this can be pulled on us anytime a corporation decides they want to to increase their profits.

There needs to be a congressional investigation of this and it needs to be now. And I have to ask why wasn't deregulation of public utilities stopped after the Enron scandal? Clearly we cannot depend upon people with a profit motive to act responsibly.

End of our side versus your side?

I "watched" the President's State of the Union Address this year with friends on Facebook.

I don't watch what passes for television these days but instead get my media fix via the internet. A Facebook friend had posted a link to the yearly address and I opened it in another browser window on my computer monitor. This allowed me to see and hear the speech while commenting to my Facebook friends about salient points. Let me say that I do believe HOPE is a strategy FOX.

In these iffy times in world history we need hope and not doomsayers or sowers of negativity and venom. We need our lawmakers to make good use of their time in office and by that I don't mean in planning for their next run for office but to insure the well being of the nation and its citizens. We need you to put aside the rhetoric and work together. My friends and I discussed the points of the speech openly on Facebook even though we clearly had different stands on some of the initiatives highlighted. During the Bush years I became a closet Democrat for fear of being burned at the stake. That wasn't good for me or the country.

One of the best things about the President's State of the Union, was for me not the speech. It was the bipartisan seating arrangement. There are reasons that college stadiums put the home team fans on one side and the visitors on the other and it isn't the spirit of cooperation. It is to foster an adversarial atmosphere. And the Republicans on one side of the House and the Democrats on the other (a few scattered independents down the center) only made the US vs THEM atmosphere in American politics worse. It even allowed one Republican  in Obama's first State of the Union to feel supported enough to Boo. OMG was that embarrassing.

So while FOX is calling this a ploy or trick I am calling it a first step not unlike our first step by man for mankind on the moon.

Hatched last week by Sen. Mark Udall, D-Colo., the idea caught fire over the weekend after a poll showed a big majority of the public wanting lawmakers of both parties to sit together at the presidential address. A spirited round of private phone calls and e-mails among lawmakers followed, and by Monday at least five dozen House members and senators had announced they had bipartisan dates for the big dance.

Bravo! Let's make America work again.