Will Trump Be Safe in Jail?

 

by Pa Rock

Citizen Journalist

(Note:  The title of this blog posting, "Will Trump Be Safe in Jail?," was borrowed from an article in The Daily Beast, an internet news site, by Justin Rohrlich, which ran three days ago on May 6, 2004.  It was a speculative piece exploring the possible consequences for Donald Trump if Judge Juan Merchcan ultimately makes good on his threat to "consider" jailing Trump if he continues to flaunt the gag order imposed by the judge in Trump's New York "hush money" trial.  The speculation from this point forward is my own.)

In the event that Donald John Trump is ultimately ordered to spend some actual time incarcerated in a jail, will he be safe?   That's a silly question.  He's a celebrity who will be dragging along a very professional, taxpayer-funded, private security detail.  We should all be so safe!  That's not to say that I believe it will ever happen, because I do not, but if it did, the day or two that Trump would be required to spend on the inside would be a circus of secret service agents, lawyers, make-up artists, food vendors, food tasters, celebrity visitors, and God knows what all.

A better question would be:  Should Donald Trump be safe in jail?  Or, perhaps:   Shouldn't everyone be safe in jail?  Or:  Why should one old, tired, and gaseous politician with lots of money and power be treated any differently that some eighteen-year-old black kid who was sent to prison by a racist judge in Missouri, Oklahoma, or Mississippi for failure pay a court fine?

If our courts and our prisons treated everybody with fairness and basic human dignity to the point that only real criminals faced incarceration - and even they were safe - then celebrity safety would be a non-issue.

A multi-tiered justice system is, by definition, unjust.  If celebrity criminals were required to spend their time in real prisons rubbing elbows with the least among us, things would begin to change in a hurry.

A Bag of Snakes

 

by Pa Rock

Former Air Traveler

My first thought upon seeing the headline "Bag of Snakes Found in Air Passenger's Pants" on an internet site this week was that I had just come across a new (to me) collective noun, such as:  a herd of cattle, a murder of crows, and now, a bag of snakes.  Either that, or it was some unit of measure that had eluded me during my long and shameless education.  "Yes, I'll take a fifth of whiskey, a gross of M-80's, and a bag of snakes.  No, wait, I left my checkbook at home.  Better make that just a half-a-bag of snakes."

The story didn't amount to much, just a couple of paragraphs which seemed to intentionally lack specifics - and left people with sordid imaginations, like me, plenty of room to begin developing movie scripts worthy of some Hollywood action hero.

A man had been stopped at the Miami International Airport when it was discovered that he had a "bag of snakes" concealed in his pants.  The snakes had subsequently been turned over to the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission.

That was the complete story in the initial news release.  The man's name and fate were not revealed, nor were there any specifics given on the snakes:  type, size, quantity, or whether they were venomous or not.  Just a "bag of snakes."  It was just a titillating headline designed to draw people to the news site.  

Within a few days the journalistic mud began to clarify.

The "bag" was a small, draw-string, sunglasses bag, and the "snakes" were two, a pair of skinny, whitish reptiles each about a foot long.  (Photos began appearing on the internet, but, as of yet, I have not come across information on their breed or level of venomousness.)  

The story had been released in drips and drabs in order to lure in readers and fuel more "clicks" on the internet, while giving the news sites better figures with which to attract sponsors.

It turns out the guy not only lost his snakes, but also was barred from boarding the plane.

And now, as Paul Harvey used to say, you know the rest of the story.  The news sites posed a greater annoyance to the public with their crap headlines and lack of details than the actual snakes did.

(Could this be the opening salvo of a new collegiate fad?  Snakes - in a bag - in your pants!  It would probably be more exciting than swallowing goldfish!)

Another Dinosaur Refuses to Leave Jurassic Park, DC

 

by Pa Rock

Citizen Journalist

Eighty-two-year-old Bernie Sanders, an Independent senator from Vermont who is the second oldest individual currently serving in the United States Senate, announced yesterday that he would be seeking a fourth six-year term in the Senate this November.  

Of course he did.

Bernie, the man who made wearing mittens cool again, will turn eighty-three this September and will be a mere sprout of eighty-nine when his next term ends - if he hasn't been elected President by then!

I like Bernie Sanders and have been a fan of his for years - and years - and years, and I certainly sympathize with his need to feel relevant in a world ruled by hoary old white men who are younger than he is.  I would caution, though, that he should begin thinking about retirement.  Two more terms will bring 'the Bern' up to ninety-five, and the one after that will put him over one hundred - an age at which even a senator should think about packing it in.

In the meantime, Bernie, keep a toe-tag in your pocket and enjoy your days shuffling around Jurassic Park, DC.  I'm sure it beats the hell out of Shady Pines in Montpelier!

Boone at a Quarter of a Century

 

by Pa Rock

Proud Grandpa

My oldest grandchild, Boone Macy, is twenty-five years old today.  Boone was born during the last year of the previous millennium in West Plains, Missouri.  I had the honor of holding him on the day he  was born.

Boone lives with his maternal grandparents in southwest Missouri.   He is a college graduate with a bachelor's degree in elementary education.  Boone has recently been working as a tour guide in one of Missouri's premier tourist caves, and seems to be developing an avid interest in the spelunking arts.

In addition to caving, Boone also has an interest in music.  He taught himself to play guitar by watching YouTube videos, and he has been featured in music venues close to where he lives.

As Boone and I both age, it seems as though we see each other a lot less than we used to, a situation in which we both have ownership because the road between our houses runs both ways.  But I do keep up with my grandson and am very proud of all that he has accomplished!

Boone, your birthday card from me will be late this year.  I know that because I am headed to town right now to buy it - and it will not be going out until this afternoon.  Fifty-one years from now when you are the age I am today, your gears will probably be slipping, too.  Have a wonderful birthday - and stay in touch!

Tales from Soggy Bottom

 

by Pa Rock

Mowing Fool

I have already mowed twice this year, and the yard is in desperate need of a third cutting.  The mowings four weekends ago and two weekends ago were relatively easy affairs because we had experienced a dry winter and spring - which meant that overall the grass was dry, not overgrown, and easy to cut.  But not too long after the last mowing it began to rain, and it has rained at least some on most of the days in the interim.  Yesterday was the day that I should have begun the current round of mowing, but this area was under a threat of rain all day, and finally in the early evening the skies ripped open and dumped a heavy shower on our already soaked rural landscape.

A realtor would describe my yard as "plush," "green," and possibly "verdant," but as the homeowner whom society expects to keep the place presentable, I see the yard more in terms like "overgrown," "ragged," and "soggy."  

Alexa is warning to expect thunderstorms today, but she is holding out hope that tomorrow and Tuesday might be mowable.

I have a gnome feature in the front yard, twenty feet beyond my typing window, in which eight gnomes guard a circle of white rocks from which arise plant and bird-feeder stands as well as a birdbath.   Strands of grass have broken through the rocks which need pulling.    Perhaps I can get to that later today if the storms hold off.  The invasive grass has gotten so tall with all of the recent rain, that the gnomes now resemble a patrol of colorful misfits making their way through a jungle.

There is a lavender floribunda rosebush outside of the front door that has never done especially well, but it is currently supporting twenty-five full blossoms and looks amazing.  It is obviously a fan of rain.  But I have several other rosebushes, also in the front yard, that have yet to bloom at all.  The young trees in the yard - a pear, two oaks, five dogwoods, and a holly - all seem to be loving the rain.  I also have a nice patch of young paw-paw trees that are doing well, as are a handful of young sassafras trees.

The net effect of all the rain has been positive for the plants in the yard, but nevertheless, this tired old typist would still savor a day of sunshine!

More Dirt on Human Composting

 

by Pa Rock

Compost in Waiting

After penning yesterday's blog posting which centered on the current state of human composting in the United States, I decided to do a deeper dig into two of the Washington-based companies that were featured in the Rolling Stone article:  "Recompose," and "Return Home."  I wanted to know if they are accessible from the midwest, do they have pre-planning that would allow payment in advance, and what are the options with regard to the compost created in the process.  (I had learned from the magazine article that approximately one cubic yard of compost would be created through the process - or roughly a pickup load.  One of the websites that I visited indicated that could be anywhere from 500 to 1,000 pounds of compost.)

David Browne writing in Rolling Stone had described the price structure as ranging from five to eight thousand dollars, a price range that is below what I have personally experienced with regular funerals where grieving families pay for embalming services and a fancy box and cement burial vault along with anything else the funeral homes can shove off on them.  "Recompose" lists their price on their website as $7,000, and a representative from "Return Home" told me over the phone that they charge $4,950.  

For those of us who live beyond the Seattle catchment area for funerals, there would be, of course, an added cost of having the body shipped to the west coast.   I learned through my inquiries that is  coordinated with a local funeral home, and that the body must be shipped unembalmed, of course.  (I suspect that anyone who approached a local funeral home in my area with that sort of request, especially if they were to reveal the reason why they wanted their body shipped to Seattle unembalmed, would be the subject of intense conversation at every local coffee shop for weeks on end!)

Both companies had prearrangement payment plans, and each had a local nature-friendly area where compost could be deposited or scattered in the event that the family did not want it for their own uses.

Composting appears to not only be a better option for the earth and the environment than either traditional funerals or cremations, it also seems to be more economical - even for those of us who reside in the middle of the country, an area that is constantly late in experiencing the future.

I am quickly becoming a fan of the idea.   My future may well be as compost!

Human Composting is Gaining Acceptance

 

by Pa Rock

Friend of the Earth

The art of reducing organic matter to soil has been practiced in farm settings for decades, and many amateur gardeners now have compost piles or manmade composters that they use for turning table scraps, garbage, leaves, and other organic matter into compost which is then spread into gardens and flower beds.  Farmers and ranchers have also learned over the years that is is simpler and more productive to compost dead farm animals than it is to try and burn or bury the carcasses.  

Now, just within the past five or six years, a movement has been growing in the United States promoting the composting of human bodies.  

I first wrote of this phenomenon in this blog on May 23, 2019, in a piece entitled "Composting Gramma," in response to Jay Inslee, the governor of Washington, signing a law allowing the composting of human remains.  Washington was the first state to take that bold step.  Then, more than three years after that, on September 29, 2022, I wrote a second posting on the same subject entitled "Ashes to Ashes, or Guts to Dirt?" which discussed the human composting option after the process had been up and running in Washington with some actual experience to draw from.

This past week David Browne, writing for Rolling Stone, published an extensive essay on human composting entitled, "It Smells Like Earth:  Inside the Eco-Minded World of Human Composting."  Mr. Browne's article recapped the process and its benefits to the planet, and he used interviews with personnel from three human composting companies in the Seattle area as the "bones" of his story.  The article is a fascinating read and readily available on the internet.

The professionals refer to the process as "natural organic reduction (NOR)," but its common moniker remains "human composting," and it is a topic that leaves many feeling ill-at-ease.  Each of the companies discussed have their own special "recipes" for assisting bodies to decompose, but basically the process is this:  bodies are placed individually in large tumblers (sometimes called "vessels") along with a mix of organic matter (special combinations of things like wild flowers, sawdust, wood chips, alfalfa straw, and other vegetative matter) that will assist in the decomposition process.   Air is also occasionally pumped through the tumblers.  After thirty days or so the tumbler is opened revealing about a pickup load of compost,  The bones are removed, ground up, and added back to the mixture, and the compost is removed and delivered to relatives or to whatever place the deceased intended for his or her compost to be used.  

If the deceased or the family wanted a stone to commemorate the departed, there is no reason that they can't have one in a cemetery or wherever they would like, and the compost can go to any special family projects, such as a memorial garden or tree plantings, and some of the composting companies have special areas such as parks where the compost can be deposited.

Today most bodies are embalmed (pumped full of poison which eventually seeps into the earth) and buried, or cremated, a burning process that takes an inordinate amount of energy and then only produces ash which has no value to the planet.    Composting is proving to be an option that is especially popular among the younger generations.  It is opposed by the traditional funeral industry as well as some religious groups - like the Catholic Church - which sees a religious need for a body to somehow connect to the afterlife (although cremation offers no such conduit).

The movement has spread since Governor Inslee signed that first bill in Washington in 2019, and today the process is legal not only in Washington, but also in Oregon, New York, Vermont, Nevada, Arizona, and soon in California (2027).   Currently the only operational facilities for Natural Organic Reduction (human composting) are in Washington and Colorado, but the service is expanding quickly.

We are living in a brave new world, and the option of turning our mortal remains into nutrient rich soil is on the horizon for all of us.  It is an option that I find intriguing and personally appealing.  It would be comforting to know that I might be of benefit to the planet after I am gone, instead of just being pumped full of formaldehyde and left moldering in the ground.

Perhaps in the next life I could reach to the skies as a mighty oak!  I would like that.

Iron Heel Comes Down on Columbia, UCLA

 

by Pa Rock

Free Speech Advocate

It has been a difficult and noisy couple of weeks on many American campuses as students rallied in generally peaceful protest demonstrations to help insure that the arc of the moral universe actually will bend toward justice - in spite of Bibi Netanyahu's war on the Palestinian people.  As certain US politicians rushed to paint the protesters in broad strokes as being antisemitic and the dupes of foreign operatives, university administrators struggled with finding ways to retake control of their campuses short of calling in the police or the military and overtly trampling free speech.

Tuesday night, after losing control of one of their campus buildings, Columbia University officials invited a police takeover of their campus in order to end the student protests once and for all.  I was out being entertained at a Kansas City theatre venue when the second police assault on Columbia took place, but a friend (a college political activist from the 1960's) called after the play and recapped the news of the evening for me.  She described the NYPD's aerial assault on Hamilton Hall as "breathtaking."

(I don't care if the went in on a flying trapeze, they should not have been there!)

Today the Los Angeles Police Department is apparently storming UCLA and tearing down their encampment.  

Columbia and UCLA:  two big wins for the establishment and the status quo - at least for the time being. We'll see what happens in the fall if the slaughter in Gaza is continuing.

Brown University, an Ivy League school in Providence, Rhode Island, took an entirely different approach to dealing with student protesters and ending the encampment on their campus green.  In a meeting this past Tuesday, Brown University administrators agreed to let five student protesters meet with five members of the university's governing board this month in order to present their case for the school to divest funds from its endowment that support companies which are benefiting off of the war in Gaza.  The five board members will then make a recommendation to the full board in the fall for a final decision on the matter.   In the meantime students have agreed to end their protests for the current school year.

Brown University treated the student protesters like the adults they are instead of stomping them down with the iron heel of authoritarianism.  A smart move.  Universities are smart places - they should employ smart moves.

(Personal note:  I understand that my grandniece, who is a student at Barnard - the sister school of Columbia - and has been active in the protests, was not among those arrested on Tuesday night, but did spend the night outside of the police station in support of her friends who were inside under arrest.  Lauren, Uncle Rocky is damned proud of you!)

Feed Me, Seymour!

 

by Pa Rock

Theatre Fan

My son, Tim, and his family invited me to their home near Kansas City this week to see another fine theatrical production at the KC Rep Theatre on the campus of the University of Missouri at Kansas City.  The musical "Little Shop of Horrors" had a "pre-opening night" performance at the Spencer Theatre, the place where our family heads each winter to see the KC Rep's holiday presentation of "A Christmas Carol."

Last night's show was flawless and fun.  The cast, several of whom had regional and national credits including Broadway, knew how to tread the boards, belt out songs, and engage the audience in what was a heckuva fine performance.  The set was brilliant, and the special effects and puppetry were first rate.  Just watching Audrey II slowly devour the cast is well worth the very reasonable price of admission - she is a true theatrical treasure!

"Little Shop," as interpreted and performed by the KC Rep, is an extremely good production and one that theatre-goers in the Kansas City area definitely should not miss.  The musical runs through May 19th.  

Judge Gently Slaps Bully's Delicate Wrist

 

by Pa Rock

Citizen Journalist

Early this morning Judge Juan Merchan, an acting associate justice of the New York Supreme Court who is presiding over the "hush money" trial of Donald Trump, essentially held the American people in contempt when he fined Trump a paltry $9,000 for violating a court gag order on nine separate occasions.   

That would be like the Missouri State Highway Patrol pulling me over nine times for speeding on a single road trip - and the court fining me a total of ninety cents for those dangerous traffic transgressions.  My criminal behavior would cost me less than the price of a pack of gum.  Donald Trump has probably consumed several meals that cost more than $9,000 during his self-obsessed life on Earth.  (Some of his fundraising meals at Mar-a-Lago cost in excess of $800,000 each!)

The judge's fine may have been totally inconsequential - and it was - but it did come with a stern warning to Trump, you betcha it did.  If he doesn't start behaving better, the judge may order the loud-mouthed bully to be locked up.  A night on Rikers Island for each violation of the gag order sounds fair to this tired old typist - who never speeds - I swear to Mike Parson on a $60 Trump Bible that I don't!

(And if the Secret Service need accommodations at Rikers while Trump is there, let the Republican National Committee pick up that tab!)

Here's the deal, Judge Merchan.  Donald Trump is a businessman who is aware of the value of things, and he KNOWS that $9,000 is barely a slap on the wrist - when $140,000 would get him a full-blown ass-whipping with a rolled up magazine from a porn star.

You are seriously out of your depth, Juan!

And America, let's not hold our collective breath waiting on Donald Trump to ever suffer the kind of consequences that real people face.  It just ain't a-gonna happen - and you heard it here first!

(Note -:May 1st, 2024:  Kindly disregard the entirety to this blog posting. I learned this afternoon that $1,000 per violation of the court gag order was the most that Judge Merchan could impose.  My complaint, that there are different justice systems for the rich and the poor, remains, but in this case the fault lies with the law and not with the judge.  Apologies, Juan, and I seriously hope that on the next offense, which will come at any moment, you move swiftly to prove your judicial mettle by locking the verbose defendant in one of New York City's more common jail cells!)

The Sun, She Shines, at Least in Kansas!

 

by Pa Rock

Road Warrior

Rosie and I are back at the home of the Macys of Roeland Park, Kansas, after an absence of a couple of months.   We are in town to see a production of "Little Shop of Horrors" at the KC Rep with Tim and Erin and the kids tomorrow night.  I've seen the movie multiple times, and the extremely funny material should translate well to a live stage production.

"Feed me, Seymour!"

The drive to the Kansas City area was relatively quick today - I must have gotten behind faster pace cars than I normally do.  We didn't encounter much worthy of comment on the drive up - one dead deer and one dead black cow along the roadway.  One very large SUV roared past us, and I saw a sign on its door the said "FREEDOM" in big letters and then something below that I couldn't read in smaller print - and it had a plain "Trump" sticker on the back bumper.   It's been quite a while since I've seen a "Trump / Pence" bumper sticker or a yard sign.  A couple of months ago, somewhere down around Mountain Home, Arkansas, I saw a 'Trump" bumper sticker on a truck and could tell that the "Pence" part had been cut off.  Waste not, want not!

Today, a few miles south of Clinton, Missouri, I came upon and passed an old pickup truck with a camper shell.  The back window of the camper shell had been hand-painted in white lettering with three messages:  "Love My Country," "Read Your History," and "Fear the Govt!"  I stared into the vehicle's cab as I passed to gain a full appreciation of the messenger.   He was an old man, about my age, with long, stringy hair and wearing sunglasses.  He looked as though he might have good reason to fear the government!

Tim and Erin's neighbors have a large sign attached to the front of his house that says "Veterans Against Trump."  I know that he is a former marine, and their son is a current member of the US Marine Corps.  

I'm thinking about getting a bumper sticker to promote a poignant message on my drive west at the end of June, but haven't found one yet that is important - yet won't cause me to disappear along some North Dakota backroad. Suggestions are being solicited with his blog-posting.

It is a beautiful day in the Kansas City suburbs of Kansas, blue skies, trees already heavy with leaves of green, and yards that are lush and green.  It's been raining for several days, but today this area is catching a break - and hopefully will tomorrow as well.  We had been having a very dry spring in southern Missouri, but it began raining last Thursday and has been coming down fairly steadily for the last four days, with more rain expected this week!   Next weekend should be a busy one for me and the monster mower!

But for today I am just going to kick back and enjoy watching other people's grass grow - and occasionally smile at the neighbor's sign!

Semper Fi!

Bloodbath in South Dakota

 

by Pa Rock

Citizen Journalist

Cruelty seems to be a big part of the DNA structure of Republican politicians.  They use their power in government to actively interfere with women's most basic health care needs and place lives at risk, they defund schools and make it much more difficult for minorities and children of lesser means to get a decent education, they fight to curtail programs that feed, clothe, and house people in need, they complain about programs that feed children at school, they ban books and work to suppress free speech,  they fight against unions and oppose a livable minimum wage, they place public health at risk by actively ignoring or denying science, they ridicule and fight efforts to promote clean energy alternatives and deny climate change, they strive to tell people who they can and cannot love, they hustle immigrants onto buses and planes and ship them to remote parts of the country, they string razor wire along public waterways and encourage vigilantism to combat situations they personally do not like, they write and pass legislation to get more guns into the hands of more people,  and now, it would seem, they also kill puppies and pet goats.

South Dakota's Governor Kristi Noem, a 52-year-old Republican with a pretty face who thought she had a chance to be Donald Trump's running mate this year, has stumbled and fallen over her own words.  Noem, whose second autobiography, a book entitled "No Going Back," is scheduled to be published in May, gave an interview to "The Guardian" newspaper in which she went into detail over some of the things she had written about in her new book.

One of the stories Kristi Noem, a wife and mother of three, told was of "Cricket," a fourteen-month-old dog, a "wire-haired pointer," that she had bought to use for hunting pheasants.  Poor Cricket, whom the press has been referring to as a "puppy," proved to be too exuberant for hunting pheasants, so Kristi Noem took the sensible step of shooting the bouncy puppy dead and burying her in a gravel pit.   Apparently some construction workers witnessed the assassination, and that may be why the politician and author felt compelled to mention it in her book -  better to bring it up herself, in her own words, than have some scurrilous reporter dig it up and report it in a way that would make Noem appear to be cold and brutal while she was busy running for Vice President.

(Is a fourteen-month-old dog a puppy?  I have a thirteen-month-old dog at my house, and she is definitely a puppy!  The answer is yes.  They quit chewing things and begin to settle down at about two years - if you are lucky!)

The same day that Noem whacked her puppy, she went on to shoot the family's pet goat whom she described as "nasty and mean" - and foul smelling.  While sitting with the reporter from "The Guardian" recounting that day of unbridled bloodlust, the South Dakota governor also mentioned that "we"just had to put down three horses a few weeks before the interview that had been in "our" family for twenty-five years.

(Are there grandparents in the family that somebody should be checking on?)

It is unclear why Kristi Noem chose to mention the killings of the puppy and the goat in her memoir because stories like that tend to put most people off, but one reporter speculated that she may have been encouraged to include them by her very close personal friend, Corey Lewandowski, a political operative and Donald Trump's first campaign manager, who might have convinced the South Dakota governor that appearing tough would make her more attractive to Trump as a potential running mate.

Cricket would probably beg to differ.

Campus Protests are Rapidly Spreading

 

by Pa Rock

Citizen Journalist

The student protests which originated on the campus of Columbia University in New York City two weeks ago has been rapidly spreading across the United States and even beyond the country's borders and are now in evidence in literally dozens of universities and colleges.   The protests have been. controversial, especially among politicians seeking to use the turmoil for their own advancement, but for the most part they have also been relatively peaceful with most focused on calls for their own schools to withdraw their investments from companies that are supporting Israel's war effort and the on-going genocide against the Palestinians in Gaza.

Republicans in the US House of Representatives seem particularly distressed that the demonstrations and encampments have not resulted in more turmoil and violence.  Several Republican members of the House went to Columbia and spoke in what seemed to be efforts to convince Jewish students that they are victims on-going antisemitism.  And as those politicians try to stir up disorder and commotion on the one hand, with the other they are demanding that President Biden call up the National Guard to quell the conflict which they are trying to create.  That would make for some great visuals which they could then use in their campaigns as evidence that America is so off-the-rails that it takes the military to keep the peace on campus.

Sweet.

House Speaker Mike Johnson went to Columbia on Wednesday, again trying to stir some rage, and he was mildly successful with the student protesters turning on him personally and shouting down much of what he was droning on about.  "Mike, you suck!"  seemed to be the most popular chant of the day!

Donald Trump, a man who does not have the self-control to stay quiet even when it would be to his advantage, has, of course, weighed in on the campus protests.  Trump compared them to the major white nationalist rally that happened in Charlottesville, Virginia, in 2017 while he was in the White House.  Trump said that major gathering of racists and extremists in Charlottesville was "peanuts" compared to today's college demonstrations.  (One peaceful counter-protester in Charlottesville was killed and others injured when one of the participating white nationalists drove his car into a group of people carrying signs supporting racial justice.)   Trump also regards the rioters at the US Capitol on January 6, 2021, as "patriots," and has vowed to officially pardon them if he is again elected to the presidency.    The actions the January 6th rioters and insurrectionists resulted in the deaths of uniformed Capitol policemen - but Trump will pardon the rioters who harmed and caused the deaths of policemen.  It's the college kids that he regards as dangerous!

I skimmed several on-line publications this morning to get some idea of how far the campus protest movement over the horror that is happening in Gaza has spread.  Some of the schools have reacted more severely than others.    Some have called in police and arrests have been made - and in some places students have behaved worse than in others with things like graffiti, abusive signs, and taunts between groups.    But for the most part, things are staying peaceful.

What follows is a list of some of the schools where encampments and student protests over the war on Gaza are taking place.  They are in no particular order - just the order in which I came across them on the internet:

Columbia, Barnard, University of Pennsylvania, University of Illinois, New York University, Princeton, University of Southern California, University of Colorado (Denver), Emory University, George Washington University, Ohio State University, University of North Carolina (Chapel Hill), University of Texas (Austin), Virginia Tech, Yale, Arizona State, Brown, University of Michigan, MIT, UCLA, Northwestern, University of Virginia, Fordham, Purdue, Stanford, City University of New York, Emerson College, University of Massachusetts (Amherst), and the University of Florida.

There is also a student encampment and protest occurring at the University of Alberta, in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada.

The student encampment and protest movement is not a one-off thing that will disappear in relative obscurity.  It is here, it is big, and it is spreading.  Some politicians are trying to control it, guide it, and use it to their political advantage - and other politicians are trying to ignore it to death.  Both groups are very likely misjudging the determination and commitment of the young people who are literally putting their futures on the line to stand up for the rights of an oppressed and critically endangered people half-a-world away.

Fighting oppression and advocating for humanity is not antisemitism, it is basic human  decency.

If we want to battle antisemitism in America, and I definitely believe we should, let's go right to the heart of the matter and take on the Neo-Nazis.  

Student idealism helped to end the war in Vietnam, and it very likely may draw down the suffering and carnage that the Palestinians are experiencing in Gaza today.  Politicians would be well advised to pay attention, but if they won't, they should stand aside and make room for people who will.  

The students are articulating their message well, coast-to-coast and border-to-border (and beyond), and we all need to be listening!

Salute!

Fishing with Magnets

 

by Pa Rock

Citizen Journalist

On the rare occasion when this blog drifts over into the fine art (or is it a "life skill"?) of fishing, it usually involves something penned by Ranger Bob. the consummate angler who has a special affinity for trout-fishing and tying his own flies.  This past week my personal knowledge of the diverse nature of fishing expanded greatly when I came across an article on an internet news site (CBS.com) which highlighted a true crime - a double murder - that is now closer to being resolved because of a recent discovery made by a fisherman who was fishing a backwoods river in rural Georgia.

(Cue the soundtrack to "Dueling Banjos!")

The fishing enthusiast wasn't trolling the river depths with baited hooks or even hand-tied flies, rather he was using what was undoubtedly a very stout line that was dragging a magnet through the water and across the river bottom.  He was magnet-fishing and pulling in objects containing metal.

The fisherman, whose name was not given in the news story, was fishing Horse Creek in very rural Telfair County, Georgia, on April 14th,  when he pulled up a .22-caliber rifle and a bag containing a cell phone and some personal identification belonging to a couple who had been shot and killed in the area - with .22-caliber ammunition - in 2015.

The couple, who had lived more than three hours from Telfair County, had advertised trying to find a classic Ford Mustang to restore, and a local man from Telfair County answered the ad stating that he had a 1966 Mustang for sale - which he actually did not.   The man and wife drove to the remote county to look at the car, and their bodies were found in two separate locations a couple of days later.  A local man was arrested a few days after that, but due to a legal issue and the pandemic, he is still awaiting trial.  It is now anticipated that he will go on trial in August of this year, and prosecutors say that the new evidence provided by the magnet fisherman will be very useful in the trial.  Georgia is seeking the death penalty for the defendant.

The article at CBS.com also talked doubt some other catches by magnet fishermen in other areas of the United States, everything from unexploded ordinance to knives to historical artifacts.   One magnet fisherman even caught a motorcycle!

I find the concept of fishing with magnets instead of baited hooks appealing for several reasons.  First, perhaps most obviously, is the fact that, regardless of your level of success, you don't have to mess with gutting and cleaning fish.  Second, you might actually catch evidence and help to solve a crime like the fisherman in Telfair County, Georgia, did,  Third, you might come up with something of value which you could then peddle on eBay or at a local flea market.  And, finally, just removing metal from the rivers and lakes is of environmental benefit and makes the waterways safer for public and wildlife use.

This tired old typist would like to know more about the mechanics of the process and how it actually works.

(A practical challenge:  Randy Wayne Leach of Linwood, Kansas, disappeared on April 16th, 1988, after a party during his senior year of high school in an area known for deep rivers, big lakes, and large farm ponds. His mother's car, which Randy had driven to the party, also went missing that night and has never been found.  Could a few ambitious magnet fishermen finally put that mystery and family tragedy to rest?)

The Most Important Republicans of the Past Century?

 

by Pa Rock

Citizen Journalist

George Will is a well-known conservative commentator who at one time was a regular panelist on “This Week with David Brinkley” where he would spar with the host as well as with Sam Donaldson and Cokie Roberts every Sunday on ABC.  He is currently an opinion columnist with the Washington Post.  There was a quote by George Will in Politico yesterday which captured my attention.  It read:
 

“Tuesday’s Senate ratification of Ukrainian aid proves that Dwight Eisenhower’s baton of Republican internationalism was passed, via Ronald Reagan, to Mitch McConnell.  They are the three most important Republicans of the past 100 years.”

 
Eisenhower?  Probably.  The man who planned and executed the D-Day invasion of Europe certainly knew many of the international leaders, was familiar with the world stage, and managed to get us to a peace agreement in Korea.  Reagan barked a good game, such as when he was demanding that Gorbachev tear down the Berlin Wall, but he was also easily duped and led around by self-serving underlings like Ollie North who saddled him with the Iran-Contra mess.   

But Mitch McConnell?  Seriously, George?  Mitch, the court-packing weasel who has warmed his hands inside of the pockets of every lobbyist in the Free World?   Some of Mitch’s push for US aid to Ukraine is possibly rooted in a desire to maintain US strength on the international stage, but Mitch McConnell is a vindictive, political creature, and he was certainly also motivated to get even with the Trump loyalists in the Senate who pushed him out of his comfy and lucrative GOP leader’s post.    Mitch’s top priority is to take care of Mitch.
 
Surely Richard Nixon who “opened the door to China” would feel slighted by being left off George Will’s list.  
 
But, considering the list of notables that George Will had to draw from, perhaps he did as well as could be expected.  If the Republican Party suddenly came up with a way to rid itself of its Nazis, racists, homophobes, religious fanatics, sexual predators, serial liars, wannabe social media stars, criminals, and other human cockroaches, the leftover pickings would be damned thin.
 
Maybe George Will is right, and Mitch is the cream of the Republican crop.   Even if he is, that’s certainly not much to brag about.

Cher Finally Recognized as Rock and Roll Royalty

 

by Pa Rock

Cher Fan

The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland, Ohio, has finally, just this past week, moved to correct and egregious and long-standing error by announcing that recording artist and film star Cher will be included in its next class of inductees.   Cher's full-throated and and unique singing voice has been captivating fans around the world ever since the mid-1960's when she was belting out songs with her then husband, Sonny Bono, that quickly became rock classics.

I had the opportunity to see Cher at a very large concert venue in Kansas City ten years ago next month, and one of the things that I remember from the concert was that she bore a bit of resentment toward some of her fellow artists for what she saw as their inability to accept her a a member of their elite society.  She said that as a singer she was often not recognized by other singers as being a legitimate artist, and she was an actress whom other actors did not readily accept as one of their own.

(Cher has won a Grammy, four Billboard awards, an Emmy, three Golden Globes, and the Best Actress Oscar in 1988 for "Moonstruck," as well as countless other awards and recognitions.)

Last year while appearing on a national talk show, Cher bemoaned the fact that she has continuously been overlooked for inclusion in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, and said at this point not only would she not accept membership even if she was offered a million dollars to join the group, she also stated that the promoters of the enterprise could go have sex with themselves - but she put it a bit more colorfully, of course.

Well, it's happened.  Cher was nominated and was finally selected for membership in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.   Will she accept the honor, late though it is?  I hope so.

Cher, we are all getting older, and this honor is more than just about you - it is about your legacy, and the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame is one more important place where that should be preserved.   You should allow the group to graciously turn back time and allow you in.   Claim your place in the pantheon of rock and roll royalty by grabbing your well-earned spot in Cleveland.

Do it for your fans, Cher, and do it for you.

Make Cleveland rock!

Cotton and Hawley Seek to Send Military to Campus

 

by Pa Rock

Citizen Journalist

US Senators Tom Cotton and Josh Hawley, both Republicans, are calling on President Biden to federalize the National Guard under the Insurrection Act and send those troops to Columbia University in New York City to deal with student unrest.   Tom Cotton, a senator from Arkansas, tweeted on X:

"If Eric Adams (the mayor of New York City) won't send the NYPD and Kathy Hochul (the governor of New York) won't send the National Guard, Joe Biden has a duty to take charge and break up these mobs."

"Mobs," Tom?  So far it's all been peaceful, including the one hundred student arrests that happened when the NYPD were already called in earlier this week.  If you want to see what an actual mob looks like, Tom, visit the Springdale (Arkansas) Walmart on Black Friday!

Using military force to control peaceful demonstrators is not a good idea, Tom.  It was also a bad idea four years ago when you suggested the same thing in a New York Times editorial as a means of dealing with people who were demonstrating against the police execution of George Floyd.  Is your answer to all domestic discord to bring in the military?  Are you a one-trick pony, Tom?  A flagrant fascist?

Josh Hawley, a senator from Missouri who pays his property taxes to Virginia - and is also known for being a world-class sprinter - harkened back to the days of Eisenhower with his own tweet on X:

"Eisenhower sent the 101st to Little Rock.  It's time for Biden to call out the National Guard at our universities to protect Jewish Americans."

Josh, you do know that there are Jewish groups and Jewish students actually supporting the current wave of student protests, don't you?  And they are all protesting in a peaceful manner.  Do we really need - or want - a military response to peaceful demonstrations?

A better and far more appropriate use of the military would have been for Trump to have called them in to quell the havoc, destruction, injury, and death that the insurrectionists and anarchists loosed on the US Capitol on January 6th, 2021.  Of course, Josh, you might have had a problem with the military responding to that non-peaceful demonstration - since you were outside with your fist in the air egging  the rioters on!  Your hypocrisy is matched only by your abject cowardice!

Run, Josh, run!

How would a military intervention impact what is happening on American campuses?  History would suggest that the result could be tragic.

Ohio Governor James A. Rhodes, a Republican, called in the National Guard in early May of 1970 to deal with demonstrators at Kent State University in Kent, Ohio, after the ROTC building had been set on fire.  (Tensions had recently escalated when Nixon announced that he had expanded the Vietnam War into Cambodia.)  Many of the guardsmen who were brought in to contain the demonstrators were no older than the students they were trying to face down, and the young guardsmen were undoubtedly scared and not emotionally prepared for the situation into which they had been thrust.  On May 4th, 1970, national guardsmen fired into a student demonstration and panic ensued.  Four students were shot and killed and nine others wounded.

That's history, that happened.  We do not need or want it repeated at Columbia, NYU, Yale, MIT, Harvard, Berkley, or Missouri State.  We've been there and done that.    Never again!

If students are protesting and demonstrating, let's figure out why and address that.  If the  demonstrations are spreading from campus to campus, as these appear to be doing, then their causes should be a matter for national attention and discussion.  That would probably get the demonstrators back in their classrooms quicker and more safely than any police or military action ever could.

There are some very bright young people who are trying to tell us something - and we need to be listening!

Putin Bootlickers Fail to Stop Ukraine Aid

 

by Pa Rock

Citizen Journalist

The US House of Representatives put in a rare weekend session this past Saturday to pass a trio of foreign aid bills - one each to benefit the military needs of Israel, Taiwan, and Ukraine.   All three passed, but aid for Ukraine proved to be the most problematic with 112 members of the House, all Republicans, voting against the measure.   Supporters of the bill argued that aid to Ukraine is critical to repulse the continuing Russian invasion of that nation, and ultimately for the preservation of democracy and a free Europe.  But former President Donald Trump is an ardent admirer of Russian President Vladimir Putin, and there has been pushback against US aid to Ukraine in Congress from Republican members who are ardent admirers of Trump.

American politicians making critical spending decisions with an eye toward helping Russia grab territory in Europe.  What's the world coming to?  

The aid bill for Ukraine passed 311-112 with one member voting "present" and seven not voting.  It was a good day for democracy.

One of the negative votes on the Ukraine bill was from my own congressman, Jason Smith, a Republican from Missouri's 8th congressional district.  In his weekly email newsletter which came out this morning, Congressman Smith noted his negative vote without explanation, to wit:

H.R. 8035, Ukraine Security Supplemental Appropriations  Act, 2024: totals $60.84 billion to address the conflict in Ukraine  and assist our regional partners as they counter Russia. PASSED, REP. SMITH VOTED NO

What Jason did not mention in his weekly newsletter was that his district is one of 88 (out of 435) across the United States that will benefit economically from that aid package to Ukraine.  In an opinion piece earlier this week in the Washington Post, columnist Marc A. Thiessen identified two congressional districts in Missouri (the 3rd and the 8th) which will receive a portion of that aid money for the production of:  

"MIM-104 Phased Array Tracking Radar to Intercept on Target (Patriot) Missiles"

That sounds important, and expensive, and if Jason Smith had his way the money associated with it wouldn't be headed here to his own state and district - and Vlad Putin would have that much more of an advantage over the freedom fighters in Ukraine.

I admit to being old, perhaps a dinosaur even, but I still see regard democracy as vital to the world functioning in a humane and just manner.  I want leaders who operate with the consent of the governed and who don't stifle dissent through brute force and dropping people out of skyscraper windows.  Democracy is far more important than building a Trump Tower in Moscow.

Thank you to the members of Congress who stood up for Ukraine in its on-going struggle to stem the Russian invasion of that peaceful nation, along with strong appreciation to the 101 Republicans who had the courage to buck those in their own party who would abandon a democratic nation in order to appease a politican who is promoting his own self-interests over those of humanity.   

Those brave souls - 212 Democrats and 101 Republicans - did the right thing in voting to aid Ukraine.

Salute!

Life in the Wild

 

by Pa Rock

Farmer in Spring

It was a relatively mild winter and the spring rains have so far been largely non-existent, all of which seems to have led to an uptick in ticks, and my little patch of the Earth has an abundance of them this year.    I went to the local pharmacy earlier this week to buy a tube of overpriced ointment to dislodge and kill ticks, but when I stepped up to the counter and asked where that product was located, the nice lady told me that there was no such thing.  Sensing my disappointment, and not being swamped with customers that late in the day, she whipped out her cellphone and did some research for the pathetic, tick-addled, old coot, and quickly told me that the two "cures" for ticks were fingernail polish or petroleum jelly.  "Or,' she added helpfully, "When I have one I just grab a pair of tweezers and pull it out."

I explained to her that the ticks who find me always head to places that I can neither see nor reach.  When she didn't volunteer to grab her tweezers and help me out, I left.   I take ticks seriously because one of the little bloodsucking buggers sent me to the hospital a couple of years ago - and, as everyone knows, hospitals WILL kill you!

I managed to get half of the yard mowed yesterday, the second mowing of the year, and I will finish this afternoon.  The mowing won't kill the ticks, but it does keep them stirred up and undoubtedly pisses them off.  I don't understand how the grass keeps growing without rain, but it does, and in just two weeks since the first mowing some of it was already nearly knee-high.

Gypsy took me for a pull the other morning, and while we were out near the old chicken coop she suddenly went into hunting mode.  Her nose went to the ground and she was quickly vacuuming about a ten-foot square, hot on the trail of some varmint that I couldn't see - but Gypsy knew it was there.  Finally she lunged her snout deep into the grass and came up with a large field mouse in her mouth.  By the time I got the poor thing away from her it was dead.  The goofy dog is a mouser!  Great.  (Gypsy gets absolutely crazy when she spots ground hogs - which are also rodents - so perhaps she was a cat in a past life!)

Speaking of wildlife in my big yard jungle:  yesterday afternoon while mowing I stirred up a nest of little brown bunnies.  They were apparently in an open burrow that I failed to see.  I spotted one running toward the fence in an absolute panic, and a few minutes later I saw a second heading out in the same general direction.  Then I found an injured one on the ground that had been caught by my monster mower.  He was dying and I placed him in a sheltered area.  The final one, the fourth, was disoriented and ran in several directions before finally making to the safety of the brush in the fence row.  I never did see the mama rabbit, but she had to be close by.

And there's more . . . 

This morning while standing at the back door and looking out at all of the mowing that I have left to do this afternoon, I spotted three beautiful wild turkeys walking across the width of the backyard.  Fortunately Gypsy and Rosie were both inside, and the big, regal birds were able to enjoy their morning walk in relative peace.

All of that and the dogwoods are still in bloom and so are the pawpaws!

Eat your hearts out, city slickers!

Schickelgruber's Birthday and Related Thoughts

 

by Pa Rock

Citizen Journalist

Adolf Schickelgruber, who would later change his name to Adolf Hitler, was born on this day in the Corinthian Province of Austria in the year 1889.  If he was sill alive and living on a ventilator somewhere down in the wilds of Brazil or Uruguay as a few fantasist conspiracy theorists probably still believe, today Adolf is celebrating his 135th birthday.

I knew that today was Hitler's birthday without having to look it up when I heard a news story on the radio this morning saying that this was the 25th anniversary of the infamous school shooting at Columbine High School in Littleton, Colorado, and I remembered that Hitler's birthday was at least part of the reason that the two student shooters, Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold, had chosen that particular day for their heinous crime.   Harris and Klebold both fancied themselves to be admirers of Nazis and white supremacists.  They killed twelve of their classmates and a teacher before killing themselves.

And I bring all of that up in response to the royal fit that some GOP members of Congress are currently pitching as they demonize college students who are speaking out against the genocide being perpetrated by the Israeli government and armed forces against the Palestinian people of Gaza.  When college students carry signs or use other peaceful measures to draw public attention to the on-going extermination of an entire race of human beings, some members of God's Own Party in Congress clutch their pearls and declare that certain institutions of higher learning in America are condoning and fostering anti-semitic dissent among their students.   Those politicians use their outrage at school policies which protect free speech as a cudgel to threaten the loss of government aid to the schools.

Dissent and free speech be damned, right Elise?

Just because people worry and even demonstrate about others - often families with children - who are forced to scurry about in bombed-out rubble like rats while digging through garbage hoping to find enough scraps to live on for another day, that does not make them anti-semitic, but it does prove they are human.

But do you know who are anti-semites?  Nazis, that's who.   The members of the Nazi (National Socialist) Party in Germany in World War II and others who blindly followed the insane ravings of Adolf Hitler and stood by and watched in guilt and silence as six million Jews were gassed and killed on the direct orders of a madman.  Those people were and are anti-semitic.    And today's Neo-Nazis who admire the Nazi "culture" and history, and adorn themselves in the fascist paraphernalia while carrying their tiki torches down American streets shouting racial slurs are no better - and certainly not friends to Israel or the Jewish people.

Dry those crocodile tears you bloviating congressional hypocrites.    Don't worry about what the kids on America's campuses are saying until you have purged your own house of its anti-semitic elements.  If your house is still standing after you're run all of the rats away,  then come back and share your sanctimony.

Shades of the Sixties

 

by Pa Rock

Citizen Journalist

Students at Columbia University in New York City made national and international news in April of 1968 when they swarmed the campus and took over five buildings including the president's office as a protest against US involvement in the war in Vietnam.  The students were also protesting the university's work in military research, racism and discrimination on campus, and the proposed expansion of the university into a local park with the construction of a new gym.   There were some injuries to both students and police during the protests and campus takeover, but it ended peacefully after several days.   The event was a defining moment of the times which helped to galvanize public opposition to the Vietnam War.

Fifty-six years later and once again in the cruel month of April, Columbia University is back in the news with another student protest, the focus this time being the on-going genocide in Gaza.

This Wednesday morning while the President of Columbia University, Nemat "Minouche" Shafik, was in Washington, DC, testifying before Congress regarding congressional concerns over anti-semitism on campus, students and faculty members were busy setting up an encampment of tents and signs on the university grounds.   Some of those involved in the protest were from Columbia's sister school, Barnard College, a women's liberal arts school that is adjacent to Columbia.

According to an article on CNN.com this morning, the "Gaza Solidarity Encampment" was focused on Columbia University's investment in "corporations that profit from Israeli apartheid, genocide, and military occupation of Palestine."   The protest was organized by a student-led coalition of over 120 campus organizations.  A competing group in support of Israel also gathered at the scene.

It was a formidable protest, so significant, in fact, that the university felt compelled to call in the New York Police Department yesterday to break it up - and more than one hundred arrests were made, mostly on a preliminary charge of criminal trespass with Columbia University being named as the complainant.

Shades of the sixties.

There was a news story yesterday stating that three Barnard students had been suspended for their involvement in the encampment and protest, and one of the three was Isra Hirsi, a 21-year-old junior at Barnard who happens to be the daughter of US Representative Ilhan Omar of Minnesota, one of three Muslim members of Congress.  That should certainly give the conservative extremists in Congress something tangible to chew on for a few weeks.

This old hillbilly retiree actually knows a Barnard student, one of my grand-nieces who is finishing her first year at that exceptionally fine academic institution.  I'm sure she is keenly aware of all that is happening around her and learning from the experience.  A major portion of a college education happens outside of the classroom.  Grab it all, Lauren, grab it all!

And damn it, Joe, either rein Bibi in or cut him loose.  I don't want my tax dollars being used for the extermination of a race of people!

Don Snoreleone

 

by Pa Rock

Citizen Journalist

Donald John Trump, the elderly politician who is presumptive Republican nominee for President in 2024, once reportedly paid a porn star to spank him with a copy of Forbes Magazine.  Now he has again been spanked with a major publication, only this time assault on his dignity was more figurative than it was literal.

Trump's first criminal trial began this past Monday morning in New York City, and the consummate performer showed up where he predictably played the victim for the press before going inside and making history as the first former US President to ever be prosecuted in a criminal trial, this one alleging that he used his business accounts to hide hush money payments to a porn star (the same one who claims to have spanked him with the magazine) to keep her from revealing their months-long sexual relationship to the press and possibly cost him votes in the 2016 presidential election.  

The first day of the trial centered on hearing instructions from the judge and getting the jury selection process started.   It must have been tedious because, according to Maggie Haberman, a reporter for The New York Times, Trump fell asleep during the process.   Haberman, who is obviously not one of Trump's favorite reporters, shared a fairly graphic description of Trump zonking out while sitting at the defense table.  She noted that he "appeared to nod off a few times" with "his mouth going slack and his head drooping onto his chest."   Haberman's description ended with this jewel:  "Trump has apparently jolted back awake, noticing the notes his lawyer passed him several minutes ago."

Maggie Haberman's unflattering description of Trump was already being read by the general public by the time the trial recessed, and it was certainly not helpful to an aging politician who routinely refers to his opponent as "Sleepy Joe."

"Drowsy Don," anyone?

One internet hitman even went so far as to refer to the GOP political boss as "Don Snoreleone!"  

Priceless!

Now instead of just being able to brag about having his butt beaten with a copy of Forbes, Trump can also boast about the spanking he just took from The New York Times!

Savor the moment, Don.

Glory days!

Pa Rock's Plan to Save the U.S. Postal Service

 

by Pa Rock

Man with a Plan

With the advent of "forever" stamps seventeen years ago, many people no longer have any idea how much money they spend to send a letter.  We used to know, when the price of first-class postage was printed right on the stamps that we would affix to our letters, but those days are long gone, and now we are forced to use a mail system whose rates are cloaked in government subterfuge.

In 1948 when I was born, the cost of mailing an ordinary first-class letter from any place in the United States to anyplace else in the United States was three cents.  Three damned pennies!  It had been that way since 1932 when it was raised from two cents for a first-class letter stamp, and the two-cent price had been in effect since 1885 - with a one-year exception during World War I when it had skyrocketed to three cents.

And it wasn't the occasion of my birth that started the out-of-control rise in the cost of postage.  I was several months past my tenth birthday when the price of a first-class stamp went to four cents, an event that caused a national howl that was almost as loud as the one five years after that when the mail service introduced zip codes.

I was getting ready to go into fifth grade when postage went to four cents, and I was in high school less than five years later when it was bumped to five cents.  Postage was kicked up to six cents per first-class letter while I was in college.  The cost of mailing an ordinary letter was eight cents when my oldest son was born in 1973, thirteen cents when my daughter was born in 1976, and fifteen cents when my youngest son arrived in 1979.  Postage was literally increasing faster than the size of my family!

And since then, of course, it has gotten even crazier.

Postage rose from fifteen cents to twenty-five cents during the 1980's, twenty-five cents to thirty-three cents in the 1990's, thirty-three cents to forty-four cents in the 2000's, and forty-four cents to fifty-five cents in the 2010's.  

The price of a first-class stamp did not rise again until August of 2021 when it went to fifty-eight cents.  Postage for an ordinary letter jumped to sixty cents in July of 2022, sixty-three cents in January of 2023,  and on to sixty-six cents less than six months after that in early July of 2023.

This year, 2024, the cost of mailing an ordinary letter went up two more cents in January to sixty-eight cents and the postal service has already announced plans to bump it another nickel in July.  In less than three months Americans will be paying seventy-three cents to mail a first-class letter, whether they realize it or not.

Party hearty, Louie!

The United States Postal Service struck gold on April 12th, 2007, when it launched the concept of "forever" stamps.  The price was removed from the stamps so consumers were often  unaware of how much they were spending to send individual letters, and instead the stamp, once printed and sold, was good "forever" even if the price of postage went up before it was used.  It was a short-term bargain and a long-term clandestine operation.  If the price of a stamp suddenly jumps a nickel, no one is the wiser unless they happen to notice  something in a newspaper or on-line - and then it isn't an immediate concern because they have a sheet of forever stamps in a drawer at home.

The rising cost of "forever" stamps is obviously a postal racket, but it could also be an income stream for wise investors because clearly the cost of postage stamps is rising faster than the interest rates that banks pay on savings' accounts.   People could conceivably buy "forever" stamps en masse, secure them someplace safe, and in a few years offload their stamps for a nice profit - if they could find a ready buyer.  The US Postal Service currently WILL NOT buy them back - I checked!)

But how about this for an option:

The government has already been talking about the notion of returning to some form of postal banking where people could do their general banking right at the post office.  What if the post office could be used for investing as well?  Instead of just selling stamps at the going "forever" rate,  What if Congress passed a law directing the post office to sell stamp stocks at the same rate, one stamp (or one hundred stamps) equals one share, and then have the post office buy those shares back at the new going rate whenever a stockholder wants to sell.  The post office could continue to make their revenue off of its stamp sales, and savvy investors could get in on the action as well while providing the postal service with another revenue stream for running its day-to-day operations.  Win, win!

In the end  '"Pa Rock's Plan to Save the Postal Service"  might even help to tamp down the exorbitant cost of postage - and that would certainly be an unexpected helping of gravy!

Gettysburg. Wow.

 

by Pa Rock

Citizen Journalist

The original Gettysburg Address, one of the most famous speeches in American history, was penned by President Abraham Lincoln on the back of an envelope and delivered at the dedication of the Soldiers' National Cemetery near Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, on November 19th, 1863, the site of one of the bloodiest battles of the Civil War.  Lincoln's speech that day was known for its brevity and eloquence, and it was such a masterpiece of writing and oration that school students for generations were tasked with memorizing and reciting it.

Ninety-eight years later there was a second Gettysburg address connected to the American presidency, a physical location, when Ike and Mamie Eisenhower left the White House in January of 1961 and moved to the small farm that they had purchased which was situated on a Gettysburg rural route.

And now, sixty-three years further on, another American President has chosen to return the nation's focus to Gettysburg, Pennsylvania.  Donald Trump went off in a wandering diatribe about the Civil War battle at Gettysburg last Saturday while he was attempting to give a political speech in Schnecksville, Pennsylvania.  I had seen his basically incoherent remarks not long after they fell from his mouth, and chose to disregard them, but today a favorite cousin in California emailed them to me (thanks, Susanna!), and I decided that they were of such a unique nature that they should be preserved in The Ramble.  It is very doubtful, however, that any remarks of Donald Trump's will ever merit being memorized and recited by school children.

You might want to tighten your seat belt because Donald John tends to swerve while he talks, but here is what the former President had to say about Gettysburg:

"Gettysburg, what an unbelievable battle that was.  The Battle of Gettysburg.  What an unbelievable - I mean it was so much and so interesting, and so vicious and horrible, and so beautiful in so many different ways.  It represented such a big portion of the success of this country.

"Gettysburg.  Wow.   I go to Gettysburg, Pennsylvania to look and to watch.   And the statement of Robert E. Lee - who's no longer in favor - did you ever notice that?  No longer in favor - 'Never fight uphill, me boys,  never fight uphill.'    They were fighting uphill.  He said, 'Wow, that was a big mistake.'  He lost his big general, and they were fighting.  'Never fight uphill, me boys!'  But it was too late."

Mondo bizarro!

Do the parents of America's young men and women really want their sons and daughters fighting in a military that is under the control of someone with such an amorphous mind?  Shouldn't all people who work in the White House, and especially the President, have the ability to speak in complete sentences that make sense?  Is it too much to expect a President of the United States to at least have the equivalent of a third-grader's knowledge of American history?

Three former United States Presidents (all Republicans) have connections to a Gettysburg address.  Two were recognized dynamic leaders who worked tirelessly to bring our nation together and make it stronger and better, and the third was Trump.

Gettysburg.  Wow.

Gypsy Goes on Another Walk-About

by Pa Rock

Dogsitter

Two days ago I had a really good morning with Gypsy, our large, playful pup who loves the Great Outdoors.  I could not find her leash, and consequently let her run free outside twice, and both times she did her business promptly and returned to the house.  Sometimes Gypsy has selective hearing issues and cannot hear commands or pleas to return home, but Saturday morning was not one of those times.

Sunday morning, however, was a different story.  

Yesterday I did have access to Gypsy's leash, but since I don't like being pulled around the yard by an eighty-pound dog any more than she enjoys pulling me,  I let her out at 6:00 a.m. without the leash.  Rosie and I walked with her, and Gyspy behaved - for a while.  Gypsy had disappeared by the time Rosie and I were ready to go in, so I brought the little dog into the house and went back outside, leash-in-hand, to look for the truant canine.

I couldn't find "the Traveler," as I've taken to calling her, and eventually came back in the house to deal with other domestic chores.  At 10:00 in the morning when Gypsy was still not home, I got in the car and drove a couple of miles in three directions looking for her.  One of my stops was a Galloway Park where she had spent a morning on a previous walk-about playing with people in the park.  Gypsy is especially fond of kids, of which we have none at our house.  At Galloway I drove along the edge of the park for about a half-mile, and drove into the facility's parking lot and turned around, but did not see the runaway anywhere.  

I came home without the dog, and for the rest of the day would occasionally go outside and walk the property line calling her name.  But no luck.  By the end of the day I had convinced myself that she had probably hopped in a car with strangers and gone to live somewhere else.  I had caught her hopping in a car with strangers one other time, but they did not want her and threw her out.

Later, at around 7:00 p.m., I heard a light tapping on the front door and knew before I ever up to open the door that the missing canine had probably found a ride home.  Two high school students were standing on the front porch with along with Gypsy.  "Is this your dog, mister?" the boy asked. "We've been to several houses and nobody knows her."  

"I know her," I admitted.  "This is her home."  

The kids told me that Gypsy had spent the day playing with them at Galloway Park and that she had eaten well all day long.  (She is on a diet when she is at home.). As we were talking, the very tired Gypsy stepped out into the yard and fell asleep in the grass.  When I finally got her into the house, she promptly ate Rosie's dinner and then fell asleep for the night.  She arose for an hour or so this morning and is now back asleep.  Playing all day must be really hard work!

I still suspect that Gypsy is preparing to live up to her name and move on down the road, which is a shame because she has had a really good run here whether she realizes it or not.  She has had her shots and been spayed while living at our house, and she has a new bed.  She also has an abundance of yard to run and play in, something which once was plenty but now seems to be too confining.  But, alas, the grass is always greener on the other side of the fence.

This is real life, and we'll just have to see how it plays out.  I hope Gypsy decides to stick around.   We are just now getting used to each other's obstinate behaviors.

War! What Is It Good For?

 

by Pa Rock

Citizen Journalist

Late yesterday evening the country of Iran launched a drone and missile attack against the country of Israel in retaliation for Israel's strike against an Iranian consular building in Damascus, Syria, earlier this month.   The Israeli attack had killed members of Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps including two senior commanders.  It was widely assumed in the international community that Iran would retaliate, and US President Joe Biden had been saying for days that an attack by Iran against Israel was imminent.

To the surprise of literally no one, that attack occurred last night.

Israel has a supposedly "impenetrable" air defense system which they call the "Iron Dome," but even with that they were glad to have US and British assistance in warding off the attack.   Iran launched more than 300 missiles and drones toward Israel and all but a few were shot down before they reached Israeli air space.  One ten-year-old Israeli girl was reportedly seriously injured in the attack, and thirty-one other Israelis were given medical treatment for anxiety or injuries received while rushing to shelter.

Israel, of course, has promised to retaliate for the retaliatory attack.  That's the way war goes.

Clearly the only winners in last night's flare-up in the Middle East were the world's arms' manufacturers and weapons' dealers.    War has always been, and apparently always will be, good business, and it trades well on the stock market.

And what politician isn't pleased to pocket political donations from these merchants of death?

The 1960's were a lot of fun, but obviously nothing got fixed.