Really, I'm still a great fan of Barack Obama ... but his reaction to the oil spill leaves me aghast!

Wearing a dress white shirt and examining a 4 mm diameter spot of oil with 400 "actors" dressed in oil-cleaning gear nearby to impress him as to the efforts being made by BP (Bastard Polluters), Barack Obama takes a few minutes off from his fund raisers to see what all the fuss is about

I highly suspect that most (if not all) of my VERY progressive children and their spouses are aghast AT ME for suggesting that the moderate (corporate--bought and paid for) Democrat, Barack Obama, might not be doing his very best to protect the Gulf of Mexico and just might be covertly acting in the interests of BP and Big Oil.

But what am I to believe as he and his A-team continue to be fooled and bamboozled by the simplest and most obvious of ploys to insure that BP's liabilities are minimal when this disaster is behind us ... if ever? Migod! Did he really fall for the 400 oil cleanup "workers" who coincidentally showed up on the shoreline in costumes they had never before worn to work until shortly after he left. (Persons who have been there day in, day out reported to Anderson Cooper that there were seldom more than twenty workers in that area until just before Obama arrived.)

And how is it that neither Obama nor his A-team realized until sixteen hours later that BP's pumping of mud as a prelude to "Top Kill" (so far, about as successful as "Top Hat" was) had been shut off and that it was "oil as usual" for that long while the Coast Guard was reporting on both MSNBC and CNN that the mud was still being pumped.

Someone ain't talkin' to sumbuddy, I'd say.

It's time to get a leader who is willing to take charge of this situation--Bill Clinton or a resurrected Harry Truman (or George Patton) come to mind. Clinton would at least be down in Louisiana sharing in the pathos of the fisherman and others whose livelihoods are literally being pushed out to sea by gigantic oil plumes, and Harry Truman would have had half the US Navy, Marines, Army, Air Force, Coast Guard, Civil Servants between GS-5 and GS-11 and all of EPA working overtime in the Gulf after 40 days. He might even drop a nuclear weapon into the Gulf if a resurrected Henry Kissinger suggested it. (Please don't do THAT!!)

And you too should be there, Mr. Obama....you're needed ON THE SCENE NOW. Its was 25 days between your visits down to the Louisiana shoreline, but you're needed down there NOW ... even at the expense of the pinheads on Fox News bashing you for not speaking eloquently on Memorial Day at Arlington Cemetery. And for the love of chocolate syrup on ice cream, please show even a tad of emotion--sadness, anger, whatever!

And oh yes, should you find yourself distracted by calls from Rahm Emanuel, even if they involve the burgeoning problems in Korea or you own administration's lawbreaking vis-a-vis trying to get Arlen Specter nominated, put everything not related to that damned oil leak on the backburner.

Don't waffle on this one, Mr. President! More than the next election depends upon it.

Who is the REAL Barack Obama?

Barack Obama and Arlen Specter -- before the voters spoke last week!
Joe Sestak claimed more than two months ago that an "unnamed White House official" offered him a job if he would withdraw from the primary. Sestak officially announced his candidacy on August 4, 2009... so he was a candidate when the White House attempted to influence him with a "quid pro quo" job offer.

I would call that a "bribe," but then I'm simply an elderly Democrat living in the middle of nowhere in Ocean Shores.

HERE IS THE TEXT OF THE FEDERAL LAW:

Title 18, U.S.C. Section 595, which says, “Whoever, being a person employed in any administrative position by the United States … uses his official authority for the purposes of interfering with, or affecting the nomination of, or the election of any candidate for office of President, Vice President, Presidential elector, Member of the Senate, Member of the House of Representative…shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than one year, or both.”

Likely, some unknown minion in the bowels of the White House stepped over the bounds.

As to when Barack Obama knew what and when ... we'll never know, will we?

I still like Mr. Obama, but his slow response as regards getting BP off the potty and into the oily muck down in Louisiana/Gulf of Mexico and his support for his old buddies in Congress make me wonder, "Who is the real Barack Obama"?

Saying "goodbye" to a beach near you!

Before the Spill
After all of my previous postings castigating British Petroleum (BP) and its management for its 'less than transparent' actions post-April 20th, BP pulls another even grosser stunt. It seems their CEO, Tony Hayward, can't get enough of my angry postings; he wants more.

In perhaps the most galling stunt by British Petroleum, the feisty oil company has threatened to invoke "trade secrets" to stop the US Environmental Protection Agency from making public its written response to the agency's order to cease using the highly toxic Corexit dispersant. In a report published in the UK newspaper The Independent, the EPA is said to be "evaluating all legal options" to force them to reconsider, "so Americans can get a full picture".

US EPA data on Corexit show it to be one of the most toxic of the alternatives. I wonder if Mr. Obama can twist Dick Cheney's arm a mite to have him talk to his buddies at BP.

Wading upstream to a destination that now eludes me ...

Wading upstream, I suddenly froze.

Sauntering downstream and wading at a leisurely pace was a grizzly bear. My first thought was, “Migod! He’s so large. He could chew me to pieces in a minute.”

The bear came up to me sniffed me casually and shook his head.

From behind me, I heard someone shouting to the bear “Come here! Leave him alone!”

I turned and saw a wondrous sight. It was my brother, Tom, and his tiny two year-old (eldest) son, Tommy Jr. fishing downstream from me … maybe fifty yards away.

What made it wondrous was that my brother, Tom, passed away about twenty-two years ago of unknown causes and his son, Tommy, died in his crib when he was two or so—maybe a dozen years before my brother died. Little Tommy was sitting on a small dock. Tom was wearing waders and was in the water.

The bear walked up to them and allowed them both to pat him on the head before ambling out of the creek and into the woods.

Instantly, I thought that I must have died and asked Tom, “Am I in Heaven?” (I guess I thought of the Biblical image of the lamb lying down with the lion.)

My brother looked me square in the eyes and said, “No!”

“But then why were you unafraid of the bear? I must be in Heaven.”

He replied, “No, Joe … If you were in Heaven, you wouldn’t have been afraid of the bear.”

I woke up.

Now, dear readers, what was that all about? I really did wake up and can’t shake that dream from my deranged head.

Okay, BP ... Where is it anyway? (Referring to their public live-feed webcam!)

Well finally! It is now about five hours later than when I was only able to pick up the still of their videocam at the top of this posting ... or worse! But at 1:30 p.m. PCT I saw the horror. This is the URL of the live feed--at least at this minute: Live Feed from BP

All I was getting earlier was a black screen, but the live video was even more worrisome than the still I was able to get earlier. If they are collecting 5,000 barrels per day on the tanker above (from the tube they inserted into the leak), I have to believe that more than 10,000 (as a minimum) is continuing to further pollute the Gulf of Mexico.

It's hard to believe that they were collecting video like this for a month without our President (Barack Obama, 75% of the time) or the EPA even having access to the footage.

Whose Gulf of Mexico is it anyway--the world's or BP's?

At least Michelle Obama was totally transparent when she had no answer to the little seven year-old girl on Wednesday.

Okay, Mr. Obama ... what now?

I highly suspect that the question Michelle was expecting was to have been about healthy eating and was supposed to have been asked by the girl with her hand stretching fruitlessly in the air ... but instead, well most of you know the rest of the story ... Watch the video (by clicking here) for the most heart-warming exchange between a child and Mrs. Obama that you will ever see and hear.

The rest of the story:

Early in the day today, with TV cameras rolling during an event to promote healthy eating, a second-grader (the little 7 year-old in green) at a Silver Spring elementary school unexpectedly asked first lady Michelle Obama why the president was "taking everybody away that doesn't have papers."

That simple question shook the Cable News Networks in ways that yesterday’s primary elections couldn’t--and it caught both the President (within a few minutes, I’m sure) and both parties with their pants down.

And the video cameras rolled on.

Sitting helplessly with the little girl's question booming in her ears (and heart) in front of about a dozen schoolchildren and with the first lady of Mexico by her side, Michelle Obama told the girl: "That's something that we have to work on, right? To make sure that people can be here with the right kind of papers."

A good, politically correct response, I’d say.

But the little girl wasn’t finished. Totally unscripted, the little girl in the green cotton outfit in the picture above blurted out …

"But my mom doesn't have any papers."

In an instant, the spontaneous and innocent child’s voice crystallized both the power and complexity of the immigration problem.

What now, Mr. President? A beautiful seven year-old child and her frightened (by now) mother are waiting.

Millions of children just like this little girl have been waiting for an Immigration Law that will protect both them and their families.

PUT IMMIGRATION REFORM BACK ON THE TABLE NOW AND WITH THE ENTHUSIASM YOU SHOWED BEFORE NOVEMBER OF 2008!!

A thought from one sleazy liar (in the past, I surely hope!) to another: Pull out of the Senate Race!

Connecticut Attorney General Richard Blumenthal

Quoting from Jack Shafer in Yesterday’s New York Times:

“... [it was] ... revealed that in addition to inflating his military résumé to suggest [Richard Blumenthal, the Attorney General of Connecticut] endured a tour of duty in Vietnam as a U.S. Marine, he also availed himself of enough military deferments and ploys to avoid going to Vietnam that he appears to have set some sort of record. According to the Times, Blumenthal collected five military deferments from 1965 to 1970. And as deferments began to wane, he found a slot in a Marine Reserve unit where the hottest combat he saw was policing Toys for Tots drives in the Washington, D.C., area.”

The question, of course is whether or not this disqualifies him for becoming a United States Senator.

As both a former (I surely hope it is “former”!) sleazy liar and a non-combat civil servant (i.e., civilian Government worker) “veteran” of the Vietnam War I have a moderating thought. For one thing, I spent the entire time I was in Vietnam in 1969/70 in an air conditioned and bomb/mortar-proof bunker beneath the tower at Tan Son Nhut Air Base – that is, minus two R&R’s in Bangkok (don’t ask!) and a two-week Christmas leave back in Hawaii with my family. Even the house that the Air Force rented for me was sufficiently far from downtown Saigon so as to be safe from the nightly mortars and rockets that were almost an everyday occurrence for eleven straight months. Even TET was only a memory by the time I arrived in Saigon.

As regards the subject of dangerous activities, I should mention that I left my wife and seven (I think) children back in Hawaii, plus a younger teenaged brother who, in my absence, was taking those children--ages 2 through 8 or so—for rides on his/my Honda 250 dirt bike up and down Pepeekeo Place in Hawaii-Kai.

Since then, I have become a left-leaning liberal who is becoming more antiwar by the day. The years since my stint in Vietnam, BTW, included six-plus years in Saudi Arabia—before, including and after the first Gulf War during which I foolishly watched Scud canisters tumbling like fireworks in the sky through the atmosphere while the warheads went on into downtown Riyadh causing a scene that was left largely untouched by King Fahd to remind his subjects that the US was their friend and Saddam Hussein was a murderous infidel.

Long story about how the Royal Family finally allowed us “in” back then to recapture Kuwait.

In any event, that downtown scene was clearly visible from the modern overpass that wound around 1/3 of downtown Riyadh until I left for Dubai in 1996. Even the car windows of autos that were near “ground zero” were lying on all four sides of their vehicles where the overpressure caused by the explosions put them next to several destroyed buildings. Weird scene!

My five cats, who were cuddled in my arms or sitting on the front porch of my hooch, haven’t forgiven me for that foolishness even today. Yes, two of the five cats that I brought back to America are becoming the oldest cats in Ocean Shores (three have died of old age and only George and Ralph remain).

I even named George after President George H. W. Bush way back then.

But now I see two sides of Mr. Blumenthal’s dilemma today. Vietnam was as immoral a war as America ever fought—before Vice-president Cheney raised the bar for immorality with the Iraq War.

Thus, I have no problems with anyone who resisted the war or the draft, anyone who took every deferment known to man (I did!), or anyone who jumped into the reserves or National Guard to avoid the full service.

And that includes former President George W. Bush. Likewise, I have the utmost respect for those who did their duty and served in Vietnam, either as a volunteer or a draftee. There's room enough among my personal heroes the for both those who served and those who refused to serve in Vietnam--or any concocted "police action" anywhere in the world.

My mistake back in 1969 was in getting a job-related deferment to work at CINCPAC (under Admiral John McCain, no less) and then volunteering to take a $$$-bonus-based, guaranteed safe “tour” in Vietnam with a group of young USAF first lieutenants and captains working out the snags in something called Seek Data II (or the Silver Fox” as it was known by those of us who knew how inaccurate the data in the report were.)

There’s no hero living in my skivvies!

My only problem with Blumenthal is that he clearly continually and publicly lied to so many people over so many years. Whether those were sins of omission or commission, there's no denying that he knew people thought he served in Vietnam and that he at times actively promoted that false belief for his political benefit.

What I'm not sure of is to what extent this disqualifies him to sit in the United States Senate.

I would guess that it might, but I also think it's far more relevant to look at his record in public office when deciding whether he should continue to serve the public in office.

Unfortunately his largely sick-looking attempts these last few days to stem the uproar look either like more of the same dishonesty at worst and merely a lack of imagination and quick enough thinking at best.

Coming to a beach near you ... sooner than you think!

Rather than using golf balls to plug the leak, I suggest the heads (as in from the necks up) of the CEOs of all corporations involved.

Mygod! I'm babbling about four dimensions while the Gulf of Mexico is turning black with man's greed ... BP: Tell the truth!!

Dear Grandson: For the time being ignore the previous two postings. What's needed right now is for you to ignite your family and friends at school to write your Congressmen (including that jerk, Senator Lieberman, of the "Who Cares" Party) to pass legislation that stops all off-shore drilling off American coasts--including Alaska, Hawaii, Ocean Shores and Manhattan Island.

Federal wildlife officials are treating the deaths of hundreds of birds, dolphins and turtles on the Gulf Coast as only "possibly" oil-related because other factors (aside from the black goo covering the carcases) haven't been fully investigated.

The National Marine Fisheries Service said earlier today that the carcasses have all been found in Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama since May 2. Samples have been sent for testing to see whether that (oh, by the way ...) little oil leak at the bottom of the Gulf of Mexico helped kill the dolphins. Really? Goodness, I hadn't noticed. Someone might start to look at that "leak" about the time that both Connecticut and Ocean Shores, Washington are three feet under the oily slime that's coming ashore in Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama.

Who has believed BP's "experts" from Day One that "only" 5,000 barrels of oil per day are leaking into the Gulf, which happens to have been (before April 20) one of America's (and the world's) most beautiful treasures?

Who in hell is kidding who? It's bad enough that corporations continue to lie to the American people about just about anything it seems, but for our Government to opt to take British Petroleum's word for the extent of the spill ... that takes the cake!

And it's not just Republicans who are bathing in the luxury of oil; the bill under consideration right now (with bipartisan support) has provisions to relieve off-shore oil drillers from even paying royalties.

Mother love a duck!

Uhh ... On second thought, young grandson ... you might start off with something simple like a 4-dimensional cube!

Rather than beginning with something so "arty" as a Klein Jar, you might first add the fourth dimension in constructing a simple cube in four dimensions. Use toothpicks.

The key will be in adding the 125th toothpick while maintaining perpendicularity at all 90 degree edges. Email me a photo of your construction when you are finished.

One last hint: You might have your father pick up this excellent book for you on the subject!

Klein Bottle or Klein Jar? Either way, it's my grandson in Connecticut's 8th grade project to build one for me!

In 1882, Felix Klein imagined sewing two Möbius Loops together to create a single sided bottle with no boundary. Its inside is its outside. It contains itself.

Take a rectangle and join one pair of opposite sides -- you'll now have a cylinder. Now join the other pair of sides with a half-twist. That last step isn't possible in our universe, sad to say. A true Klein Bottle requires 4-dimensions because the surface has to pass through itself without a hole.

In this sense, a Klein Bottle is a 2-dimensional manifold which can only exist in 4-dimensions!

But let's not mention that to my grandson in Connecticut. This should keep him off video games and mindless TV until he graduates from high school.

Hint to grandson: The trick will be in getting the nose of the bottle into the inside of the bottle from the side without poking a hole in the side of the bottle.

But I'm still left with the question: When did they change its name from "Klein Jar" to "Klein Bottle"? Look in any projective geometry book published before, say, 1960 and you will see the above "bottle" referred to as a "Klein Jar." Next thing you know, they will be talking about landing a human on a comet. Crazy world, this is!!

My IRA Account Isn't Exactly a Picture of the World's Economy, but ....

Thursday did make my heart skip a beat ...

If it were an active volcano, we'd be 100% better off!

British Petroleum's oil rig burning in the Gulf of Mexico -- and spewing at least 50,000 barrels of oil per day aimed at our sea life, wildlife, Gulf beaches and ... our health! Yeh, oil evaporates into the air ... kinda like water, except toxic to birds and mammals including some endangered species who are going to be even more concerned with getting liquid oil out of their feathers, fur and (oh yes) their eyes, ears, tongues, beaks, teeth, nostrils, etc.

And this evening--even as the spill is reaching the shores of Louisiana, the White House Correspondents’ Association annual dinner is (to the best of my knowledge) coming to its conclusion with President Obama making the guests giggle uncontrollably after having eaten what may well be the last of the Gulf Shrimp for several weeks, months or even years and while wiping their mouths with recycled paper napkins.

This year's WHCA Dinner has been touted as the "greenest ever."

What's wrong with this picture?

Personally, I think that the guests should be given coupons for as many cases of recycled paper napkins as they think might be required to clean up this latest disgusting affront to Mediawingnuts' sensitivities. They should be told to get their butts down to Louisiana and Mississippi forthwith and begin by helping to wipe the oil from the water fowl, pelicans, turtles, humans and countless others of God's beautiful creations who are being overwhelmed by this disaster. They may just need more than their recycled paper napkins, but we can worry about that tomorrow.



Fossil fuels strike again!

Mother Earth edges closer yet to becoming the sewer that seems to be required of it for companies like Exxon, British Petroleum, Shell Oil, etc. to stuffing even more billions of dollars into their money vaults--airtight and maybe unsoiled by whatever pollutants (coal dust or oil for starters) are required to be produced for maximum profits.

And did anyone notice how quiet the four Republican governors of four of the five states making up the Gulf's US coastline have been the past four days? (Only Louisiana's governor--a Democrat--asked for help during the first 24 hours after the explosion.) Or how quiet Sarah Palin ("Drill Baby, Drill!") and the Tea Parties have been about the need for "Big Bad Government" to step in and work with the more directly related culprits (i.e., Big Oil in general) to both stop the damage from spreading and ... (hush) saying what surely is in the backs of even the minds [sic] of the bobble-heads holding the disgraceful placards at those Tea Parties ... yes, the words,

"STOP ALL OFFSHORE DRILLING!!!"