The Blizzard of "Ought-Four", Part 3.

Today's Top Story:
At the time of this posting, 1324 US soldiers have died in Iraq.
Source: http://icasualties.org/oif/ No change for the last 3 days. A very welcome development.

(Why is this "The Top Story"?

1. Each of these soldiers died in a war that was initiated by a President who intentionally misled the American people about the reasons for war in Iraq, (and
2. Like Gen. Anthony Zinni, I believe that this has got to be more important than "American Idol").

Today's Feature: The Blizzard of "Ought-Four", Part 3.


Friday, December 24, 2004

7:45 am: We get up for the pets and are discouraged to look out the front windows and see no change in the street. Mary sees our neighbor Bill outside shoveling the distance between the base of his driveway and the track in the middle of the street. A bit later, I call next door and ask Bill if he has heard when our street will be plowed. He replies that he saw a private vehicle with a plow go down our street the previous evening around 6:00pm. It cleared a single lane on our street only – did not touch the side streets. He’s not sure why this happened, but we agree that it’s probably the best we’re going to see for awhile. He has already dug out to the path. That will be my next task. We need to get out to buy a few groceries.

I spend an hour or so digging out the last 10 feet from the base of our driveway to the plowed track. It’s not very difficult since I’ve finally figured out which shovel to use when. We have an ergonomic snow shovel, with a curved handle and a deep bucket. It’s great for scooping the top layers. It allows you to lift and pitch the snow with your arms and shoulders – sparing your back – but isn’t much good down close to the pavement. The other snow shovel has a straight handle and shallow, flat blade – good for digging the last couple inches close to the ground. I also use a standard square-blade shovel from my garden tools – great for breaking up packed snow and ice.


The last 10 feet. 

It is a beautiful day, even if the temperature refuses to top 10 degrees. A sunny winter day in Indiana is rare!


Clear and cold. 

12:00noon: We head out to run errands. Our macro plan is to go to the grocery store across from the drug store with a good wine selection. Before or after, depending on traffic, we’ll also hit a bank to make a deposit. Once we’re out of our neighborhood, we find most streets plowed, packed, and passable – and being thoroughly tested by everybody else in town who’d been cooped up at home for a couple of days. We ditch the idea of going to the bank and head straight for the grocery. The parking lot is bounded by huge piles of plowed snow. (We’ve heard that the city is trucking snow out of the downtown area because there is no place let to park it. It’s later in the day before we get a newspaper delivered and can verify this story. It’s true.) The parking lot is bumper-to-bumper. We find a spot far away from both destinations and agree to split up. Mary will do the grocery shopping. I will go to the drug store and select the wine, then will catch up with Mary at the grocery check out.

We find long lines in both stores, and expect to encounter short tempers and rude clerks. Surprisingly, in both stores the cashiers are friendly and cheerful, almost amused by the scene unfolding before them.

1:00pm: We get home and put away the groceries, then lay out lunch. The girls arrive shortly after and report that they had no problem getting in from Indianapolis, except for a stretch around Whiteland where traffic slowed down to 20 to 25 mph. We have heard a report that traffic coming north on I-65 from Louisville is also limited to that speed. Imagine a 5 hour drive from Louisville to Indianapolis (100 miles).

Other news stories report on a number of people complaining that nobody rescued them when they were trapped in their cars in bumper-to-bumper stalled traffic during the blizzard. Given that the roads were impassable, and that ample warnings had been published telling people to stay home, I find it difficult to have much sympathy. I can, though, imagine how frightening it would have been, but remain dismayed by how irresponsible we can be…unable to take responsibility for our own actions, no matter how stupid. “C’mon kids, let’s ignore all the warnings, hop in the minivan and drive through blinding snow tonight.”

6:00pm: Katie makes a trip back to Greenwood (on the outskirts of Indy) for a party at the home of her boyfriend’s parents. She gets back home by 11, without incident. While she is gone, the rest of us enjoy a dinner of Steak Diane, mashed potatoes, and broccoli. Mary got the recipes from a new Cuisine magazine. It’s a tribute to Julia Child. Delicious! Bon appetit!


Steak Diane...prepared under the watchful eye of Chef Oscar 

10:30pm: The doorbell rings. It’s Will’s friend Max. When he got off work at the new Chili’s restaurant, he drove over to our neighborhood to see Will, but got his car stuck on a side street when he tried to turn around. We round up Will and several other friends and get Max unstuck, after helping another motorist who got stuck trying to avoid Max’ car. It’s nearly zero degrees outside. We work quickly. We need to get back inside before Santa comes….


Saturday, December 25, 2004 – Christmas Day.

No weather worries today. It was a day to stay indoors and celebrate with family.


What's better at Christmas than new slippers? 

Sunday, December, 26, 2004

7:30am: Will has to be at work at Fazoli’s this morning at 8:00am. Yesterday he dug a path to the street to get his car out. We hear him up and moving, and get up ourselves, expecting there might be a problem getting his car out of the driveway. Sure enough, he gets stuck in the middle of the street, blocking the exit of a couple of neighbors headed to early church services. They help us dig him out and get him back in the driveway. Two more tries later, and he is on his way to work and I’m headed back in for a first cup of coffee.

That sturdy old Mercedes Benz he bought is REALLY HEAVY!!

The local paper says that all street will be plowed by tomorrow morning. We’re hopeful it will happen during the day today so we can clean up after.

9:30pm: Street still has not been plowed. Guess we’ve got something to look forward to tomorrow.

The Blizzard of "Ought-Four", Part 2.

Today's Top Story:
At the time of this posting, 1324 US soldiers have died in Iraq.
Source: http://icasualties.org/oif/ No change from yesterday. A welcome development.

(Why is this "The Top Story"?

1. Each of these soldiers died in a war that was initiated by a President who intentionally misled the American people about the reasons for war in Iraq, (and
2. Like Gen. Anthony Zinni, I believe that this has got to be more important than "American Idol").

Today's Feature: The Blizzard of "Ought-Four", Part 2.

Thursday, December 23, 2004

7:00am: We woke up early (for a vacation day) this morning, but knew we would have a challenge taking care of the pets. Mary says the wind howled all night. It’s still dark, so we can’t tell how much snow fell overnight by looking out the upstairs window.

We head downstairs and let the pets out of their kennel. The morning routine for the dog is eat first, then go out. We set out the food and then open the front door to see how much snow we got. We are amazed to see a foot of snow packed up against the door and drifts shaped like gentle waves flowing across the front yard.

Mary says she’ll go out and dig out the crapatorium, but there is so much snow piled up against the door of the back porch that she can’t get out. She decides to go out through the side door of the garage and around the side of the house. A moment later she calls me – “Mike, come QUICK!” – and I find howling with laughter in the garage.

“Look at the imprint from the door!”


A big surprise at the garage door.

She steps over the packed snow and into the side yard. One step toward the back and she is in snow up to mid-thigh. Still laughing with amazement, she heads around to the back.


Mary getting in deep.

It takes several minutes for her to dig out a 5 foot round opening in the snow in the back yard. Then several more minutes to dig a path up to the porch door and get it to open. It’s almost too late: While I’m watching Mary’s progress through the back window, the dog squats next to me in the kitchen and prepares to relieve herself. I yell (which does no good – the old dog is deaf as a post) and poke her in the side (which gets her attention and stops nature in its tracks). Using dog sign language -- a combination of gestures: waving towards my chest, slapping my thigh – I manage to coax the dog out onto the back porch just as Mary gets the door freed. The dog is happy, as am I. We dodged a ..um… “bullet” that time….

Back inside, we flip on the tv and listen to the weathermen excitedly describe the overnight accumulation. Every few minutes they switch to some poor sucker who got the remote location assignment. They are set up at the outlet mall 5 miles from our house, right along I-65. It’s about 10 degrees outside. Traffic on the Interstate is reduced to a one-lane crawl. They say that Seymour, Indiana (25 miles south of us) got 18 inches of snow. I figure we got at least that much, further complicated by the drifts created by the overnight winds.

Mary says she heard we had “thunder snow” overnight. I’ve never heard of such a thing, but it’s clearly a week of firsts. I’ve never seen this much snow, either. We decide to focus on indoor activities for the morning. While it’s unlikely that the girls will be able to drive down from Indianapolis tonight as planned, we still need to finish cleaning the house, preparing the guest rooms, etc.

10:00am: The housecleaning done, I decide to start on the driveway and front walk. I take a minimalist approach with the front walk, clearing a shovel width up the walk to the front porch.


A different look for the entrance.

Before starting down the driveway, I stick a yardstick into the drift at the top of the drive. It shows 19”. The good news is that most of the drive has less than that. I take a couple deep breaths and plunge in. Yesterday, I wanted to get all three lanes of the driveway cleared. Today, I have much less ambition. One lane clear to the street will be an accomplishment.

Mary and Will both join me a little while later, and I’m glad for the help.


Two more shovelers...just in time!

Together it takes us til 11:30 to clear one lane down to the street. We don’t bother to try to dig out past the curb, figuring that the snow plow should be along sometime today (we hope!) and will cover the base of the driveway with its discharge. We know we’ll have to dig out again.


About 16" deep at the curb.

Will takes a photo of me and Mary before we head in for lunch.


"American Arctic"

2:00pm – After lunch I decide to get started on the other side of the driveway, where Will parks his car. That will leave only the middle lane with snow on it. Will comes out to help, and we get into a pretty good rhythm. After a few minutes, Will gets manic – probably from the music pumping into his brain from his MP3 player. He starts shoveling at high speed, flinging snow high into the air. After a few minutes of this, he looks back at me (I have retreated a safe distance so I’m not struck by flying snow…or flying snow shovels), grins, lets out a whoop, and leaps backward into the snow pile beside the driveway. I resist the urge to pitch a shovelful of snow on top of him.

Within 45 minutes we’ve cleared his lane down to the street.


Another lane clear.

Will heads back inside. I stay out for a while longer, working on the center lane, cutting a diagonal path that links to the lane we cleared this morning. Before going back inside, I peek around the side of the house and take a photo of the drifts against the wall.


Where did the A/C unit go?

The tracks in the snow mark Mary’s path from first thing this morning. Somewhere underneath the snow is the gas meter.

3:30pm: Back inside, I get a shower to warm up, then help Mary with the Christmas cookies. I get to help make the peanut butter mice.


Plenty of Christmas treats!

I also get to sample the others. Yum!

We hear from the girls in Indy. The parking lot at the condo has not yet been plowed. They can't get out.

6:15: We make the local news. Bartholomew County is mentioned as one of the “hardest hit areas”. We see aerial footage of snow-covered streets, cars in ditches, and the Interstate highway at a crawl. Our street has still not been plowed. But there’s no place we need to go tonight.

The Blizzard of "Ought-Four", Part 1.

Today's Top Story:
At the time of this posting, 1324 US soldiers have died in Iraq.
Source: http://icasualties.org/oif/
That's almost 90 more than at my last posting 3 weeks ago!

(Why is this "The Top Story"?

1. Each of these soldiers died in a war that was initiated by a President who intentionally misled the American people about the reasons for war in Iraq, (and
2. Like Gen. Anthony Zinni, I believe that this has got to be more important than "American Idol").

Today's Feature: The Blizzard of "Ought-Four", Part 1.

Wednesday, December 22, 2004

6:22am: The phone rings, 40 minutes before we are planning to get up. Alarm set for 7am, since I’m on vacation, Will is out of school, and Mary only needs 30 minutes to get ready for work. On the phone is Mary’s boss, the doctor, telling her that he is closing the office for the day because of the snow. He is going to call all the patients to let them know not to come in.

We get up and look outside. It appears we have gotten 3-4 inches of snow overnight, and it’s still coming down, hard and fast. It’s 6:30am and we’re up, so we get the day started. Coffee brews, breakfast gets made. We watch the local and national news. I send an email to my family, emphasizing that the local forecast is calling for up to EIGHTEEN inches of snow. I’ve never seen this much snow at one time. But I’m on vacation and don’t have to be anywhere at any specific time til January 3rd, so let it snow, let it snow, let it snow!

8:30am: Mary and I go outside to shovel the driveway. Mary is skeptical that we need to do it so early, but I’m convinced. There is at least 6 inches of snow on the ground already, and I’m worried about how hard it will be to get it cleared off the driveway. I’m trying hard to appreciate Indiana weather – mild summers, all four seasons, not too much snow in the winter…it could be the ideal climate – but this is a stretch. My last collision with Indiana weather was after Thanksgiving, when high winds blew some shingles off my roof. I bought replacements and spent two weekends replacing shingles and 6 weeks nursing a sprained back. The doctor prescribed naproxen and muscle relaxants. This morning I do a quick evaluation of the relative risk factors: Naproxen was all over the news this week as a possible contributor to heart attacks. I’m also aware that many middle-aged men drop dead of heart attacks every year while shoveling snow. My back isn’t back to normal, and I need to shovel snow. Since I haven’t had any naproxen in a week, I figure the odds are in my favor, and take one before starting to shovel. I take it easy…not going too fast or too hard. My goal is to get the driveway cleared without wearing myself out. It takes us 45 minutes to make one pass through the driveway.


An optimistic shoveler -- first pass through the driveway on Wednesday. 



Mary being a good neighbor and clearing a path to the mailbox - Wednesday. 


It’s a losing game, though. By the time we clear the driveway from the garage down to the street, we can’t see the driveway at the top. The snow is falling faster than we can shovel it!


Didn't we just clear this driveway? 

We measure the snowfall on the top of Will’s car and see that we’ve had 6 inches of snow.


Wednesday morning measurement on the roof of Will's car. 


10:00am: I bring the snow shovel through the house and into the back yard and clear out a spot roughly 10 feet by 10 feet so the dog has a place to relieve herself. I name it the “crapatorium” and force the dog to go out there. Mary starts working on Christmas cookies and I start cleaning the downstairs to get ready for all the company we're expecting this week.


Mary and Oscar make cookies. 

1:00pm: After lunch it’s time to shovel again. Mary asks if I really think it’s necessary. I open the garage door and stick a broom handle into the snow. The snow depth equals the length of my Swiss army knife, which turns out to be three and a half inches when I measure it back in the kitchen. Another 3 ½ to 4 inches is on the ground, and more continues to fall.

I decide to clear the driveway again to try to keep up. It takes me until 2:15 to get it done. Will comes out and does his lane of the driveway. I measure the snow on top of his car – 8 inches, total.


Wednesday afternoon measurement on Will 

I think I’ve shoveled more total inches. Mary comes out and tells us that the revised forecast is for another 8 – 12 inches. Gee, something to look forward to.


A clear driveway - Wednesday afternoon. 

Back inside, I help out a bit with the cookie making, sprinking sliced almonds on some of the absolute best sugar cookies I’ve ever tasted. Then I head to the basement to do some painting. We’ve got company coming and I haven’t finished the trim down there.

5:15pm: It’s nap time. After a long day of shoveling, baking (and tasting!) and painting, it’s time for a rest. We each hunker down under the covers with a good book. I manage two or three paragraphs, then have to put mine down and turn out the light. Nighty nite.

6:00pm: The phone rings. It’s the doctor…waking me up for the second time today! He talks to Mary and says he’s going to close the office on Thursday…does she have the list of patients that are scheduled? No? Could she go retrieve it and call them? We bundle up and head out. The office is about a mile and a half away, over several main streets. We slide out of our neighborhood – our street has not yet been plowed. The main streets have been plowed, but snow is accumulating rapidly. We get to the office without incident, and spend an hour or so making phone calls. When we leave, I have to scrape the car windows and I can’t see the tracks we made in the parking lot when we arrived.

8:00pm: We get back home. Will is there with two of his buddies. They’ve been out sledding all afternoon and have picked up a pizza and a movie. We’re all chatting in the kitchen, lots of milling about and noise, when we notice the dog in the middle of the group, squatting and peeing all over the kitchen floor. I’m not sure I ever saw those high school boys move quite so quickly. We decide we need to do a better job monitoring the crapatorium…

9:00pm: An alert comes over the cable tv network, advising that a “snow emergency” has been declared. This is something new to us. The message is simple: You should only venture out in an emergency. We have nowhere we need to go. Will’s buddies emerge from the basement and say goodnight. They saw the announcement and are heading home.

9:30pm: The snow is pouring down. A group of kids trouped through our yard in mid-afternoon, dragging snow shovels, but I can’t see any sign of their passing as I look out the front window. Tomorrow should be interesting.


Hard snowfall at night.. 

Cleaning House & Mind

Today's Top Story:
At the time of this posting, 1235 US soldiers have died in Iraq.
Source: http://icasualties.org/oif/

(Why is this "The Top Story"?

1. Each of these soldiers died in a war that was initiated by a President who intentionally misled the American people about the reasons for war in Iraq, (and
2. Like Gen. Anthony Zinni, I believe that this has got to be more important than "American Idol").

Today's Feature: Cleaning House & Mind

I hope I have waited long enough since my last posting that any comments about the election are unnecessary. You've already read it somewhere else...and it was probably funnier/pithier/more insightful there.

But I can't resist just one complaint about the statewide results in Indiana: Joe Kernan seems like a man of tremendous integrity and conscience. It is a terrible shame that we have replaced him as governor. One of my daughters has been working in state government for over a year, and has had lots of opportunity to interact with Mr. Kernan. I haven't met him, but have listened to Sarah's stories and feel like I've come close. I hope he will find a way to remain involved in public life. We need more people like him.

On the home front, we have begun preparations to sell the house next spring. Mary and I have spent two weekends in the basement - purging the bookshelves, painting and cleaning. For the first time in months we filled both trash cans this week. The trunk of Mary's car is full of things to be donated to Goodwill. And we've barely made a dent in it!

My dad used to say that you should move every 7 years to clean out your closets. He was right. We've been here 6 years now, and our closets (and store room and garage) are bulging. We'll take our time this winter and get rid of it, little by little. We'll spackle and paint and generally "spruce up" the place. Then in the spring we'll put it on the market.

We have not made any decisions about where we'll live next, other than to say it will be a smaller place. Our thoughts swing to the extremes. One day we talk about a small country place with room for a big garden. The next day we're thinking about a condo in Indianapolis. Somewhere in between we think about a small house in Indy. The good news is that we don't have to make up our minds anytime soon.

Along with the house cleaning we're also working on "mind cleaning" or mental de-cluttering. We find ourselves awash in printed matter -- newspapers, magazines, and since it's the holiday season -- catalogs by the dozen! And most of it goes unread, sitting in stacks that silently add another "to do" to our already too long lists.

Earlier this week I started downsizing. I'm allowing all my magazine subscriptions to expire. (Most of them I can read online anyway, with the added advantage of a Google search to help me zero in on topics of interest.) I've cancelled the Wall Street Journal. We're going to keep the Sunday New York Times. It's enough newspaper to last a week.

Except for this week. They didn't deliver today! Oh well...just one less thing to do. I feel freer already.

Election Night Reflections

Today's Top Story:
At the time of this posting, 1123 US soldiers have died in Iraq.
Source: http://icasualties.org/oif/

(Why is this "The Top Story"?

1. Each of these soldiers died in a war that was initiated by a President who intentionally misled the American people about the reasons for war in Iraq, (and
2. Like Gen. Anthony Zinni, I believe that this has got to be more important than "American Idol").

Today's Feature: Election Night Reflections

It's been nearly a month since I've posted anything to the blog. Two reasons: Lots of other things clamoring for my attention, and a sense that others had more important things to say...and a forum to say them.

Now it's election night. The campaigns are effectively over. All the claims and counterclaims come down to one night of watching the scores accumulate on the tv screen. We voted at 6:10am this morning, and there was already a line forming...in the rain. By the time we finished, the line stretched out the door. We saw lots of our neighbors and co-workers. It was Will's first opportunity to vote - he turned 18 late in October. We went out to breakfast afterwards.

Tonight Mary read me an email she received from our friend Rosa in Ft. Lauderdale. I asked her to pass it to me, and I've copied it verbatim below. I think it provides a fitting summary to this campaign period. During the campaign I have been rabidly partisan, and have made no secret of my views in this forum. Tomorrow I can be elated (if my party wins) or deflated (if they lose). But for the moment tonight, I'll reflect on what the democratic process really represents, and find comfort and strength in Rosa's commentary. It's good to have friends who are so coherent.

"Today"

Ever since I became a citizen of this country, in 1994, I have voted in every election available to me. I have found myself in tears many of those times. I don't think it was maudlin sentimentality. It is just that when you live with 220 or so million other people in one country, you realize you are a little speck, yet on election day, I have always felt like I was somebody. That my voice was getting added in and counted for something. The elections of 2000 and the way in which the final decision was made about who our next president would be were strangely--quietly--devastating to me. There had been other elections where the people I voted for lost. I like to think that I am not a sore loser and am respectful of the democratic process. But in those weeks following the 2000 elections, for the first time since I immigrated, I lost trust and hope in this country. I didn't allow myself to think about it much. I muttered here and there, but mainly, I tuned out the deep and real despair I felt, and went about the business of living my life as a citizen of this country with as much integrity as I could.

In June of this year, the despair turned to determination--determination that to the extent possible, I would engage the political processes of this country to make sure that whatever happened next, I was not a passive observer--and receiver--but rather, that I could go to bed at night with some sense of certainty that I had done my bit to make this the country what I believe it is capable of being. I began to make financial contributions to the candidate I support. I began to find ways to volunteer--in my precinct, by having a national staffer stay in my house for the last 2 weeks leading up to the election, by voting early, and finally, this morning, by serving as a poll watcher, an observer in a predominantly African American precinct up in one of the poorer sections of Fort Lauderale.

What I saw this morning made all the effort worthwhile--no matter what the outcome of these elections. As poll observers, I and my counterpart were given chairs to sit on where we could get a birds-eye view of the polling area w/ 6 machines. The polling area was nicely air conditioned and my seat comfortable. There were close to 200 people waiting in line when I came in at quarter till 7 (am) and the sun rose hot, bright, and strong early. Most people had to wait 2 hours outside. I wish I could convey to you the quiet dignity, determination to vote and polite patience. One young man's voter registration papers had gotten terribly messed up and he kept getting bounced back and forth between precinct 4K and precinct 5K. He was angry. He was visibly upset. But he did not stop trying until he got to the voting booth and when he did the whole room cheered for him. Another woman had waited for 2 hours in the hot sun. She was 90 years old, thin as a rail and frail as a leaf at the end of the autumn. I gave her my seat where she waited another hour to cast her vote. Her daughter wanted to help her at the voting booth but she said she could do it herself and shuffled over while the poll workers and watchers held our breath not sure she'd reach her destination.

I had come with some fairly serious concerns about the role my counterpart from the other political party would play in terms of accosting and challenging voters. He's a good ole boy from Georgia, served 2 tours of duty in Vietnam and came from Georgia to be a deep sea fishing guide inFlorida. That business failed and when he didn't make it he got into the business of Real Estate appraising. We all make our compromises and settle with our disappointments, don't we? He was polite. He was not threatening to anybody. About 40 minutes after the polls opened, he looked at me and said, "these folks aren't cheating anyone around here. Hell--they're to busy surviving to have time for that. I think neither of us should be here." It broke the ice and helped us both because we were able to cross check w/ each other what our counts were (that was part of the drill). After bantering back and forth for a good part of the morning, he asked me what my job was. I told him I was the Director of Religious Ed at a church. My answer left him speechless for about 20 minutes. He literally turned away from me and got busy doing something else. Then he came back and asked me: "Is that a Christian Church you work for?" And I said, "yes." "So how do you reconcile being a Christian and voting for your candidate." We talked some about that. I don't believe I changed his position any more than he changed mine. I want to hope that I left some cognitive dissonance for him--I could certainly hold my own quoting Scripture and and using theological arguments for my position. Ultimately, we changed the subject back to safer matters like "ain't it awful how the Dolphins are doing." We parted ways wishing each other luck. Perhaps more than anything, I deeply appreciated the fact that we could have fundamental disagreements with each other and still have some sense of kinship. Some sense that we are not bitter enemies. My sadness, however, is that in the larger political discussion of our time, "us and them" seem to keep cancelling each other out, instead of creating something bigger and better than either side is capable of being.

The people who voted in the precinct where I kept watch are not politically powerful. Neither am I. Neither is my friend, the Georgia goober. But I believe that today changed us all and we changed the country back a little in the direction of who it is that we are capable of being. We all made sacrifices. We all cared enough to be there. We all shared a determination to be heard, to have our votes count and to have a fair process. Maybe this is like the kingdom of heaven. From the tiniest of mustard seeds...

I am proud to be an American.

Much love, Rosa

Eisenhower on Kerry...

Today's Top Story:
At the time of this posting, 1076 US soldiers have died in Iraq.
Source: http://icasualties.org/oif/

(Why is this "The Top Story"?

1. Each of these soldiers died in a war that was initiated by a President who intentionally misled the American people about the reasons for war in Iraq, (and
2. Like Gen. Anthony Zinni, I believe that this has got to be more important than "American Idol").

Today's Feature: Eisenhower on Kerry...

Earlier this week, my friend Lynne sent me a link to a recent Doonesbury cartoon on the website of the Louisville Courier Journal.

(We don't get Doonesbury in our local newspaper. Lynne made a cynical comment about that, but since I don't read the local paper anymore, I'll let it pass.)

I was, however, interested in the link shown in the cartoon strip. Figuring that any link that Gary Trudeau publishes is one worth following, I found a great article by John Eisenhower, son of Dwight Eisenhower, on "Why I Will Vote for John Kerry".

It's worth a read. One more long-time Republican who has made the connection that George W. Bush is wrong for the country.

Today's Picture: The Six Pack That Made My Head Hurt at Work!

No, I haven't begun sneaking drinks under the desk. I'm in the second week of Six Sigma Green Belt training this week. My company has adopted the Six Sigma methodology of process analysis and improvement. On a strictly objective level, I can say that I have seen tremendous benefits come from our use of this tool set. On a purely subjective level, I'll just say that at 3:30pm this afternoon, after several hours of training on statistical methods, I thought my head would explode. The software we use to process our data produces a "Six Pack" report of graphs that are useful and important...

The"Sixpack" 

Let's just say that after looking at THAT six pack for a while, I was really dreaming about one that was more like this...


A different sort of 6 pack... 

What Else Do You Need to Know?

Today's Top Story:
At the time of this posting, 1064 US soldiers have died in Iraq.
Source: http://icasualties.org/oif/

(Why is this "The Top Story"?

1. Each of these soldiers died in a war that was initiated by a President who intentionally misled the American people about the reasons for war in Iraq, (see below) and
2. Like Gen. Anthony Zinni, I believe that this has got to be more important than "American Idol").

Today's Feature: What Else Do You Need to Know?

The following item is reproduced verbatim from Misleader.org

BUSH CONTINUES TO MISLEAD ON WMD

In the lead up to war, President Bush argued that America must invade Iraq because it possessed weapons of mass destruction. For example, on 9/28/02 President Bush said, "the Iraqi regime possesses biological and chemical weapons."[1] On 10/7/02, President Bush said, "Iraq is reconstituting its nuclear weapons program."[2] Long after it became clear that there were no stockpiles of WMD in Iraq, President Bush has continued to insist that before the invasion "Iraq was a gathering threat."[3]

A comprehensive 1000-page report to be released today by the Bush administration's handpicked weapons inspector, Charles A. Duelfer, will reveal "Saddam Hussein posed a diminishing threat at the time the United States invaded and did not possess, or have concrete plans to develop, nuclear, chemical or biological weapons" according to the Washington Post.[4] According to Duelfer's report, U.N. sanctions prevented Hussein from reconstituting his weapons programs.[5]

Sources:

1. "Radio Address by the President to the Nation," The White House,
09/28/02, http://daily.misleader.org/ctt.asp?u=1240587&l=61151.
2. "President Bush Outlines Iraqi Threat," The White House, 10/07/02,
http://daily.misleader.org/ctt.asp?u=1240587&l=61152.
3. "Remarks by the President at Victory 2004 Rally," The White House,
09/16/04, http://daily.misleader.org/ctt.asp?u=1240587&l=61153.
4. Report Discounts Iraqi Arms Threat, Washington Post, 10/06/04,
http://daily.misleader.org/ctt.asp?u=1240587&l=61154.
5. Ibid, http://daily.misleader.org/ctt.asp?u=1240587&l=61154.

Visit www.Misleader.org for more about Bush Administration distortion.

Any questions?



Today's Recommended Blog:

Way back in May, when I started this rant, I recommended my daughter Katie's blog. Since then, my other daughter, Sarah, has begun a blog to record her experience and reflections on the process of applying to law school.

Check it out. Sarah may be a better writer than anyone I know. (She's certainly better than me.)


Finally: In Memoriam

The news today is filled with the news of Rodney Dangerfield's death. A sad day for all of us who were fans of the man and his movies. Maybe he didn't "get no respect", but for millions of bad golfers, like me, Caddyshack is in our all-time top 10 list. Thanks for making us laugh, Rodney!

Reflections from the Southern Hemisphere, Part 1

Today's Top Story:
At the time of this posting, 1054 US soldiers have died in Iraq.
Source: http://icasualties.org/oif/

(Why is this "The Top Story"?

1. Each of these soldiers died in a war that was initiated by a President who is intentionally misleading the American people about the future prospects in Iraq to serve his own ends, and
2. Like Gen. Anthony Zinni, I believe that this has got to be more important than "American Idol").

Today's Feature: Reflections from the Southern Hemisphere, Part 1

I'm back in Sao Paulo, Brazil again this week. Long days at work, followed by late evening dinners and conversation with my hosts and colleagues. It is both invigorating - I really enjoy being here with these people - and exhausting. By the end of the night I have little time to do much more than crawl in the hotel bed and hope I can sleep all night.

Tonight, though, I wanted to jot down a few notes on topics I've been thinking about since before I left Indiana on Sunday afternoon. I make no promise that they are connected...or that the result will be coherent. Here goes...

When I was in college -- long ago and far away -- I had a subscription to Rolling Stone magazine. It was one of my all-time favorites. Having grown up in a small, rural Kentucky town, Rolling Stone was a window into a whole 'nother world. There was no Internet in 1973, so I got my news about the stuff that really mattered -- sex, drugs, rock-and-roll, politics -- from RS.

Fast-forward to the present. I haven't seen a copy of Rolling Stone in 30 years. My 17 year old son gets a subscription. A recent issue arrives with a large spread on the classic photos of rock-and-roll. It's fun to look at. Photos of all the folks I grew up with - Hendrix, Jim Morrison, Elvis - and a bunch that I've learned about since. Some of the old feeling came back. This is nice.

But what I started to write about was an article titled "Heavy Metal Mercenary" about a guy named Wolf Weiss, one of over 20,000 "for-profit contractors" (aka "mercenaries") operating in Iraq. According to the article, these "corporate soldiers [are] the second largest contingent in Iraq after the U.S. military". Weiss is an ex-Marine (I know that's incorrect...once a Marine, always a Marine) -- ok, he's no longer an active-duty Marine. But he's plenty active, with a small corps of like-minded souls in heavily armed SUV's racing around Iraq, escorting convoys and generally doing lots of jobs we might otherwise expect our soldiers to be doing. The biggest exception - Weiss makes upwards of $20,000...a month.

The story has a real Rambo kind of feel to it. Lots of fast driving, pointing guns at people, shouting curt commands, and relishing the adrenaline rush. There's a movie to made from this.

Having read the story, and thought about it for several days, I still have conflicting thoughts about the situation it describes. I'm mostly disturbed by what appears to be another example of our incursion into Iraq going out of control. How did we get ourselves into a situation where we have to depend on private contractors to run a war? I'm not bashing Weiss, here. He saw an opportunity and pursued it. I have no doubt he's earning his money. God knows it's a job I wouldn't do. But I also wonder about the cumulative effect of 20,000 Weisses and what their kick-ass-and-take-names style does to the perception of Americans in the minds of the Iraqi people.

And it seems to be inextricably related to the same failures of leadership and accountability that resulted in the government giving Halliburton a blank check.

Money...money...money. Is this the common denominator that underlies the whole botched "war on terror"?

Here's the flip side of the same coin. In Monday's New York Times, James Glanz wrote about American truckers who have gone to Iraq to drive in supply convoys - risking their lives to double or triple their take-home pay. As one driver put it, "It's all about the money".

I'll forego another rant about lack of controls on spending, lack of oversight and controls, etc. (Yes...I'm in Brazil doing Sarbanes-Oxley audits...controls are on my mind.)

The most striking thing about both of these stories is the sense I have that these men (and maybe some women...none were identified in the stories) have taken jobs in the middle of a war zone because it pays better than the jobs they can find in the United States!

Something's desperately wrong with this picture.

But it's getting late and I've only touched on one topic this evening.

Today's Photos: Political advertisements in Sao Paulo.
Banners like these adorn lamp posts and telephone poles. They are hand-painted on the walls of houses and businesses. On the surface, it appears as though there are thousands of candidates for local offices. Each one has a registration number that appear on his or her advertisements. The larger the number, the smaller the offce -- 2 digit numbers represent the mayoral or gubernatorial candidates while a 5 digit number reflects a candidate for the local council.


Election time in Brazil 


Election time in Brazil 


Election time in Brazil 



BTW, the election is next Sunday.