I’m Sorry, But….

Posted: August 23, 2013 | Author: | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: , , , | Leave a comment

On the front page of today’s Washington Post (print edition), there is an article on Army PFC Bradley Manning, who was just convicted of releasing hundreds of thousands of classified documents damaging to the United States, revealing that he suffers from gender dysphoria.  In other words, he wishes to live the rest of his life as a woman and is concerned that he may not get the desired treatment in the jail at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas.

Right next to the article on the front page is a picture of an honor guard carrying the remains of Army Master Sergeant George Bannar Jr. upon their arrival at Dover Air Force Base in Delaware.  Master Sergeant Bannar was killed during his fifth tour of duty in Afghanistan.

Whether or not PFC Manning is sincere in his desire to become a woman, I cannot say.  It may well be the case.

However, I do know this.  There is no moral equivalency between the alleged suffering that PFC Manning or his family may be going through and that of Master Sergeant Bannar’s family.

I’m sorry, but I hope that we do not hear anything more about PFC Manning.

Looking For The Greater Good

Posted: August 19, 2013 | Author: | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: , , , , , | Leave a comment

I really enjoy sports.   Every four years, or more accurately since 1994 every two years, I enjoy the Olympics.  Although the Summer Olympics are my favorite, there are many winter sports for which I have a high level of interest in the competition and I marvel at the determination of the athletes to press on through demanding conditions and tough competition.  I just have to watch.

The next Winter Olympic games will begin on 6 February 2014 in Sochi, Russia, a city of approximately 400,000 people on the Black Sea.  From the original announcement of the city’s selection as the host, controversy has surrounded the decision to have the games at that location.  In the beginning, there was significant skepticism that the appropriate infrastructure could be built to support the needs of the athletes, fans, media and countless others descending on the city for the games.  Of course, there was also a small matter of sufficiently winter-like conditions necessary to hold outdoor competitions such as the skiing and sliding events.  To many people’s satisfaction, these obstacles seem to have been overcome, although no one will know for certain until the games actually begin.

Recently, the Sochi Games have become the focus of political protest with significant pressure for the United States (and other countries) to boycott the 2014 Winter Olympics.

Some of the calls for boycotting these games in Russia come from concerns about the lack of Russian willingness to cooperate with the United States in curtailing the fighting in Syria (Russia is a main supplier of arms to the regime of Bashar-al-Assad), Iran (no help from Russia in curtailing their nuclear ambitions) and other trouble spots around the world.  More recently, President Putin’s decision to allow Edward Snowden, the individual that secretly stole highly classified information from the National Security Agency (NSA), to stay in Russia was clearly done to embarrass the United States.  However, the most pressure for a boycott is the result of a June 2013 law passed by the Russian Parliament and signed into law by Putin that makes it illegal to “promote” homosexuality to minors (whatever that means, and that’s part of the problem as it is not at all clear how the Russian authorities will enforce that law).  The Russians have provided mixed signals as to what the new law could mean to non-Russians traveling to/from/and in Sochi and the possible arrest or deportation of those expressing disagreement with the Russian law.  Understanding that the Olympics are non-political, the reality is that the games are often used to gain attention for a cause or to protest injustice — usually in subtle ways, but it still occurs.

Unfortunately, the anti-gay law is not a hold-over from the litany of restrictive legislation passed under the Soviet regimes.  It was just passed and approved this summer.  It does, however, reflect a long-standing Russian bias against gays and lesbians and a general lack of concern by the government over human rights in that country.  Even a cursory review of events in Russia over the last few years reveals a troubling pattern of abuse of its own citizens in a variety of ways.

Which brings us back around to calls for a boycott of the 2014 Winter Olympics to protest Russian human rights abuses and specifically, their strident anti-gay laws.

To this writer, a boycott would be wrong.  The United States, and other western nations under pressure to boycott the games, should participate to the fullest.  Many commentators have likened the current situation to the 1980 boycott of the Summer Olympics in Moscow by the United States and a few other countries.  That protest was in response to the Soviet Union’s invasion of Afghanistan.  The boycott did not change anything other than to crush the hopes and dreams of the US Olympians that had trained for years for this one opportunity and did not get to compete.

Am I saying that sports are more important than human rights, national security or other serious problems in the world?  No.  I just think that more can be accomplished by participating and sharing our way of life and respect for every individual than can be accomplished by staying home.

Other controversial venues for the Olympics were Beijing in 2008 and Berlin in 1936.  It was hoped that the need for Chinese authorities to clean up their own act regarding human rights in China while the world beat a path to their door would have a lasting impact.  The 1936 Olympics demonstrated the myth of the Aryan race as a master race embodied by the Nazi Party.  Most famously, Jesse Owens showed that Hitler’s propaganda was false.

There is a larger question that is continually debated in our national security circles as it regards various states around the world.  Is it better to isolate a nation or to engage it in order to change or shape their policies and actions?  While no single answer ever solved a foreign policy challenge, in general, engagement is superior to isolation.  I think that as the old saying goes, “it’s hard to keep them down on the farm once they’ve seen the lights of the big city.”  Exposure to our way of life, values and the benefits that accrue from them is the best way to combat human rights abuses.  This is especially true where everyday American youth — our athletes — can interact with their counterparts and not incidentally circumvent the propaganda machines and an inhibited Russian  press.

Whether we go to the Olympics or not, there may be no short or medium term change in Russian policy or the outlook of the Russian people on homosexuality.  But it is still worth the effort.  This past Sunday the 2013 World Championship in Track and Field was completed in Moscow.  During that competition there were several subtle, but unmistakable, protests of the Russian stance on homosexuality.  People got the message.

I agree with the many people who support our participating ranging from President Obama to former Olympic champion Greg Louganis.  The greater good will be served through our athletes’ presence in Sochi.  The best way to debunk the myths and stereotypes is to demonstrate how false such beliefs actually are — and that can only be done in person and through our actions.

Go to the 2014 Winter Olympics.

Political Decisions Have Real Impacts

Posted: August 10, 2013 | Author: | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

Whether or not one believes that the sequestration is good for the country, I suspect that many people don’t get much past the political arguments to see that it has real impacts.

One area that is feeling the full force of the Budget Control Act of 2011 that brought us the current budget sequestration, or across the board spending cuts, is the United States Armed Forces.  This was brought home once again this week with the announcement that the USS Miami (SSN-775), a nuclear attack submarine, will be scrapped rather than repaired following an arson fire while in the Portsmouth Naval Shipyard in Kittery Maine.  The reason given for this decision is, basically, the fact that there just is not enough money in the Navy’s budget to make the repairs.  More accurately, if they spent the money to fix it, there would be insufficient funds available to do needed repairs to a significant number of other ships, many of which have already had their planned maintenance deferred past the normal limits because of the shortage of funds.

Additional damage to the military’s ability to adequately meet its mission requirements is exacerbated by a less understood budget trick used by Congress in many instances over the past few years.  Since the Congress cannot agree on Authorization and Appropriations Bills (a budget) in a timely manner, or perhaps not at all in some cases, they pass continuing resolutions that keep spending levels at, or below, those of previous years.  Additionally, the bills normally include very specific limitations and specified uses for the money that is appropriated.  In other words, critics that say the military should know how to manage its finances better do not seem to take into account that Congress severely limits the leadership in the Pentagon (and other federal agencies for that matter) in their ability to move money from one area to another as needed.  They cannot manage their money because in many cases, they are not allowed to do so.

Only when the pain to the individual representatives in our national legislature becomes too much, as happened in April 2013 when reduced manning in air traffic control towers was cut back, will Congress act.  In this case they passed the Reducing Flight Delays Act of 2013 that allowed the Federal Aviation Administration to move funds within the department to eliminate traffic controller furloughs, thus saving themselves from flight delays when trying to leave Washington’s National Airport.  Recently, in some individual cases within the Department of Defense, Congress allowed exceptions to the “no exceptions” legislation, such as allowing the US Air Force to move some funds to begin training aircraft squadrons that would otherwise have been grounded indefinitely.

Outside of the issues that get the most headlines (civilian employee furloughs, cancelled fly-overs at football games) there is an insidious side to the combined impact of sequestration and continuing resolutions.  In addition to the leadership having no idea what their budget numbers may be, and therefore they are unable to enact any kind of meaningful long-range plan, there is also a direct bearing on the men and women in the ranks with a resultant negative impact on morale and motivation.

Traditions “to do more with less” not-with-standing, there is only so much that can be done without the proper support to get it done.  Under the current conditions the military’s leaders are focused on training and equipping those units on the front lines.  But since there are insufficient funds to adequately support the military our nation says it wants, the result is those that have returned from their deployments do not get the same level of training and support.  Put another way, if I work on a ship’s radar — and am a certified expert that takes pride and satisfaction in my work — what is the organization telling me when it says I need to wait six months to get the repair part needed to get my equipment in top operating condition?  Is it saying I’m not important?  My equipment is not important?  My unit is not important?  What happens when there is a contingency and we are told to set sail and I know that my equipment — the piece of the ship that is my responsibility — is not in top operating condition?

On top of that, training exercises are being cut back or eliminated.  What our military men and women can do better than any military in the world comes from practice, practice, and more practice.  When key training is cut, it takes twice as long to regain that skill.  Tanks, airplanes, ships, and other high-tech gear does not operate itself.  People operate the gear, and without the right training the most technologically equipped military cannot use it to its full ability — not to mention that under even benign circumstances, the military is a dangerous profession.  Without consistent use and improvement of aviation, ship-driving and other skills, basic evolutions become ever more dangerous and people are killed or injured needlessly.

With two wars putting incredible stress on our citizens in uniform and their families, why do we want to create a false sense of crisis that only puts more stress and additional unknown problems on top of those that already exist in an inherently dangerous profession?

The budget “crisis” is a false crisis that some in Congress created and use for their own personal political ends.  Patriots?  I think not.  If the mess doesn’t get straightened out soon — and the odds for that are low given that our legislators went home for five weeks without a budget in sight — the impact will create other USS Miami situations and do what our enemies could not — knock powerful units of our Armed Forces out of the battle.

Why Don’t They Print That?

Posted: August 6, 2013 | Author: | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

Technology is a good thing — mostly — even if  I don’t always use it.  Remember, I’m still lost in the 90’s.  It seems to me that email may be becoming passé with the advent of texting, Facebook and Twitter.  That’s too bad in some respects.  Although I was not always a big fan of email, it served a purpose of getting information to one or more individuals quickly, precisely and without having to track each one down.  Of course email still serves that purpose, but one thing that it was used for quite a lot has, in my experience, gone away.  Thank goodness.

What I almost never experience anymore is the unsolicited emails from acquaintances that mindlessly pass on “facts,” usually of a political nature, that make no sense or are demonstrably false.  It was so easy to fact check the information through a number of independent, apolitical web sites such as “Snopes” or “Factcheck.org” or others, but apparently vast numbers of people never did (still don’t) bother to do that.  I’m not sure if that’s because they are too lazy, don’t think of it, or because it reinforces some pre-conceived idea or viewpoint.  At any rate, I don’t see much of it anymore, especially because I am not on Facebook or Twitter.  A member of my household is, and she gets plenty of that stuff now from “friends” on Facebook.  I’m sorry that Facebook is now inundated with that mindless stuff, but I’m glad it doesn’t come over the email anymore.

Still, the accuracy of the information has not improved.  I also suspect that if folks checked out the source of the information that they “like” they would be surprised.  It’s a whole lot easier to just click on a button without thinking because the picture is “pretty” or “patriotic” or “cute”  than it is to actually find out where it is originally sourced and more importantly, the organizations that are supported by those “likes.”   Many are down right scary.

In the old email days, much of the junk I would receive would be prefaced with words to the effect that “you won’t see this in the media” or “why don’t they print this” or similar types of refrains.  Usually such complaints have something to do with a positive story about the military, or some other related (although often incorrect) perceived slight to our nation and those that serve.  I was and am baffled as I try to understand what they are complaining about because as a 28 year veteran of the naval service, I am acutely attuned and often seek out articles and national news reports about the military and surrounding policies and am absolutely convinced the stories are there.  Many are positive in nature, or as they used to be called, “human nature” pieces or feel-good pieces.  There are, of course, plenty of hard news stories covering events and policies surrounding the military and the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, but the complaints seem to be focused on the fact that there are never any positive stories or reports of the many contributions that military families make to their communities and the like.  I read different newspapers and watch different news stations so that I get different points of view on subjects and sometimes a story is reported in one that does not appear in others, but the stories are there. So I thought that we must be reading different newspapers and watching different television news stations because there are plenty of those kinds of stories out there.  And then it dawned on me, that is exactly what is happening.  They aren’t reading the same newspapers or watching the same news stations that I am, so no wonder they don’t know about them. 

I’ll resist the easy conclusion that people just don’t do much anymore other than get their news from a social media source, although I suspect for some that is probably the case.  I’ll even ignore the likelihood that they don’t read or watch stories that do not confirm their pre-conceived notion of the facts.  Rather, I think it has as much to do with the nature of the traditional media, especially newspapers, as it does with their willingness to look for the information.

When I hear someone say that they “never” see any of these types of stories in their local press, they may be right.  I had the good fortune to take a five-week trip by car from the east coast to the west and back again.  A great trip and a great experience, but that story is for another day.  What I noticed during our travels is that most newspapers from the cities we stopped in and visited are very thin with a lot of local news (nothing wrong with that) and very little national or international news and even less on the types of stories that run regularly in the “name” papers such as the Wall Street Journal, New York Times, Washington Post, Los Angeles Times and a few others.  Not every big city has a big time newspaper and it becomes increasingly less likely that they are going to give the in-depth reporting of the breadth that papers of record are going to provide.  Unfortunately, those papers are suffering financially and I rue the day that they cease to publish, or worse, in my view, change their editorial policies to become more pop oriented with a primary focus to make money.  In the last few days the venerable Boston Globe and Washington Post  have been sold, for example.  The new owners vow to keep the papers the same and to retain key writers, editors and most importantly, to keep their editorial integrity.  I hope they do.

For those that claim they don’t listen to the “lame stream media” because they are all in collusion and only trust Fox News, I will merely point out that Fox News is part of the largest media conglomerate — In. The. World.  Incidentally, Rupert Murdoch also owns The Wall Street  Journal, so I’m not sure why one is lame and the other is not, to cite only two examples of his world-wide empire. 

The fact remains for the moment, however, that if you get your main source of news from Facebook, Twitter or other social media sources, you just plain are not going to get it all and certainly not in the depth required to understand and assimilate the implications of what you are reading.  Unfortunately, more and more news organizations in our country are going in the same direction.  If an electorate educated on the issues and able to understand the nuances and consequences of our national polices is the best kind of electorate, I’m not sure where we are headed if we only get 140 characters to understand it.

Shaken, Not Stirred

Posted: July 30, 2013 | Author: | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

“The optimist proclaims that we live in the best of all possible worlds; and the pessimist fears this is true.” — James Branch Cabell

With apologies to James Bond for borrowing his famous tag line, I would say that despite the deep divide within our Congress today, when put into historical perspective it’s bad, but not historically bad.  We are shaken in our belief in the ability of the system to accomplish anything meaningful, but we are not stirred to action to undo it or, seemingly, to even vote for someone new.  It is however, no less frustrating that important, if not easy, issues get side-tracked over partisan political bickering.  (Of course like many of us that take to the internet to blog, I think that all right thinking people will agree with my view of things.)

Recent opinion polls rating Congressional job approval are abysmal with an average across five different polls of 15.8% approving and 76.2% disapproving of the job that our representatives in Congress are doing.  The President’s approval ratings are better (46%) but still historically lower than average for this point in a president’s term, at least since Gallup began polling in 1938.

But keep it all in perspective because we often forget as a nation that the absolute worst period in our history has to be the years leading up to and including the Civil War.  We may have a war of words in the political circles of our capital, but no one is talking about secession.  Or at least no one that the main stream citizenry takes seriously.

It wasn’t just the Civil War.  In the period immediately following our independence serious disagreements existed among our Founding Fathers as to how the country should be run.  Washington and Adams were Federalists with a distinct view of how government needed to operate to preserve our hard-fought independence.  The Republicans (a different flavor of political party in those days),  represented by Jefferson, avowed that as president he would undo nearly everything his predecessors had implemented in forming a new government and differed greatly on how it should operate.   (As with many politicians, reality set in once in office and he found that much of what took place before him could not, and should not, be undone without hurting the country more than the sting of  his distaste for some of their policies — also true today.)

When did this letter arrive at the White House?

“You have brought the government to the jaws of destruction. I do not undertake to say whether by supineness, timidity, or enthusiasm. The effect is certain.”

According to Jon Meacham in his award-winning biography of Thomas Jefferson (Thomas Jefferson: The Art of Power) those words were written in  February 1809 to the President as he was preparing to leave office.  There were more from people of many walks of life that were even more critical of his time in office.

Even our Founding Fathers found that politics in the United States is a full contact sport.  The nature of our democracy (often grossly misunderstood by adversaries past and present) is that we are a contentious people as we strive to make our country better.  Our history and current events support that view.

But, come on guys and gals.  Seriously.  I think you can do a lot better than 16%.

Is This A Turning Point?

Posted: July 28, 2013 | Author: | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Even though it has been over two weeks since the jury acquitted George Zimmerman of second degree murder and manslaughter in the death of Trayvon Martin in Florida, the discussion about the trial continues in a variety of ways.

I do not intend to discuss the pros and cons of the trial process or what the jurors subsequently said of their deliberations or any of the legal issues at stake.  The bottom line (or lines) remains the same.  A young man is needlessly dead.  The trial was, by all accounts, fair and conducted in a professional manner.  The verdict stands.  Two families’ lives have been changed forever.

What I initially struggled to understand was the role that race may or may not have played in the emotional reactions that followed the trial.  Followers on both sides were passionate in their reactions, but clearly this touched a raw nerve in the African-American community.  And I didn’t quite get it.  I got that some people disagreed with the verdict and thought (rightly or wrongly) that Mr. Zimmerman “got away with murder.”  That would definitely create an impassioned reaction.  But the intense reactions across nearly the entire political and socio-economic spectrum of African-Americans told me that there was more to it than that.

What helped me to understand why the African-American community saw this as one more time that the justice system let them down came from an unlikely source — the President of the United States.  President Obama’s unexpected remarks at the White House on 19 July was my “now I get it” moment.  I thought his remarks were fair — he didn’t question the trial or its outcome — and helped to put into perspective what many African-Americans experience in their daily lives and, as he said, the context within which those reactions are formed.  In my view, he did it in a facts-of-life kind of way without placing direct blame on one portion of America or another.  He also acknowledged that statistics show that young black males are more likely to have some contact with law enforcement, sometimes due to their own actions, but also sometimes because of where they happen to be or who happens to see them.

So back to the question at hand — is this a turning point in the discussion about race in our country?  Can we move forward from this and have a real discussion about the causes of the intense feelings on both sides of the issues?  Actually talk and more importantly, listen and see where common ground exists?  The answer:  a weak “I don’t know.”  I’m not particularly convinced that this will be a turning point — or at least a turning point where anything dramatically changes.  Things are changing — as the President and others rightly pointed out — and changing for the good of all Americans.  But that doesn’t mean that the work is finished.

Discrimination in this country exists.  It is unreasonable to pretend that it doesn’t.  Everyone of us likely has  been discriminated against at one time or another — it’s basic.  Life isn’t fair.  It may have been racial discrimination, or gender based discrimination, or maybe based on religion, or perhaps our social or economic status.  It happens.  It doesn’t make it right — it just is.  And that may be where some of us come from when we claim that other groups are “playing the race card” or are being “politically correct” or “over reacting” or whatever.  We think we know what’s going on because of our own experiences.  But to state the obvious, we don’t know unless we’ve lived it.  As someone close to me pointed out, subtle discrimination plays out in quiet and perhaps even (sometimes) unconscious ways.  The problem is not necessarily what happens or who it happens to, it is a matter of the frequency that an individual experiences discriminatory behavior.  How is it conveyed that they are “not one of us?”  This, I believe, is the point of the President’s remarks, the “context” that he talked about.  It’s not that it happened to him, it’s that it happened a lot and over and over.  It was a fact of daily life and it altered his (and others) behavior in ways that most of us have never experienced.

And now I get it.  Or at least I get it a little bit more.

The Royal Baby

Posted: July 25, 2013 | Author: | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Okay, honestly?  I never thought I would comment on anything that has to do with the royal family, much less comment on anything of the entertainment news variety, barring some modern-day crisis.  But all of the excessive coverage aside, I noticed something watching the evening news.  Prince William is just like any other new father.  Not exactly earth shattering news, but let me explain.

Note: Before I go any further I have to assure my “old salt” seagoing friends that I am not talking about THAT Royal Baby — the one that all of us trusty Shellbacks know about.

What I mean is that like any new father I’ve ever seen, this one included back in the day, Prince William holds his baby son like his (William’s) life depends on it.  Take a look at the video (it’s everywhere!) and notice the wrestling envelope hold that he puts on that poor child when Kate hands it over.  Moms never use that hold — there is something much more natural about the way that they hold a newborn than the dads do.  Probably something in the genes.  Dad’s aren’t afraid of the child, they are afraid they’ll drop it or do some other hideous thing through no fault of their own.

And no, I’m not going to talk about new age fathering or which sex is better suited to be a better parent or any of that.  I just thought it was interesting to see and it occurred to me that I’ve seen it many times before.

And let’s give the guy some credit.  His first time in public with his wife and new son, and the whole world (seemingly literally from all the media coverage) is watching and critiquing his every move.  He got the baby in the car seat (check!), buckled him into the car (check!), in the back seat (check!), put the bags in the trunk (okay, the boot) (check!) — all the right moves.  And better yet, after all that concentration and serious attention to detail, he didn’t drive off and leave Kate standing on the sidewalk.  Well done Captain Wales.

Keeping Some Perspective

Posted: July 23, 2013 | Author: | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: , , , , , , , | 3 Comments

As a news junkie, especially political developments and political opinion pieces, it is sometimes easy for me to lose my perspective on just what is really important. When we are able to keep things in the right context, the news of the day over some political maneuver or another is really quite unimportant in the larger scheme of things. And sometimes it is just as important to remember how lucky we are to be living in the good ol’ US of A.

This was brought home to me yet again on Sunday night while watching a piece on the CBS news program 60 Minutes.

Sunday night the program re-visited the “Lost Boys of Sudan” 12 years after the original report on their travails. The segment sought to catch up with the many young men airlifted to the United States to find out how they are getting along after living in the United States for many years. The catch-up piece originally aired on 31 March 2013 and was re-aired last Sunday (21 July). You may remember the lost boys — the roughly 5.000 children that left Sudan during that country’s murderous civil war to walk nearly 1,000 miles over the course of five years to refugee camps in Kenya. Extraordinary. And heart-breaking — their stories are incredible and many did not survive the journey.

What struck me was their unfailing optimism and faith that things would work out. In particular during the piece, one of the boys (now all men) was asked about how he and the others could keep going against such overwhelming odds. With a smile on his face, he replied that even though people called them the “lost boys” he knew that he wasn’t lost because God knew where he was. Even today, despite the fact that not every one of those airlifted to the United States was successful in his life here, all of those interviewed in the piece were uniformly optimistic and eternally grateful for the opportunity to come to our country.

Their story reminded me of my time in the naval service in the early 1980’s operating in the South China Sea (map) on transits between the Philippines and the Indian Ocean. On several different occasions we came upon single boatloads of Vietnamese refugees adrift at sea. Entire extended families and friends would load up a small boat (usually a wooden junk about 40 feet or so in length with 40 or 50 people of all ages and both sexes) and set out to sea in the hopes that a US Navy ship or a friendly merchant captain would spot them and pick them up. Many did not make it and are presumed lost at sea. Not every merchant captain was keen to pick them up either as it could become a significant bother to take care of them and because of the need to divert to an acceptable harbor to drop them off. Some of the ship’s Masters just looked the other way and kept going. Many did the right thing. US Navy ships always stopped — when we saw them. I often wonder how many we inadvertently passed in the night or in poor weather because we simply did not see them. (Small wooden boats don’t show up well on radar and in that part of the world there are nearly always numerous small fishing boats at sea so, without a visual cue, those on watch would have no idea that they were passing someone in need.)

Remember that the open sea is very much like the wasteland that the lost boys crossed — very little chance of getting food or water except what you bring with you. And like the lost boys, they were beset by many dangers stretching from terrible weather to pirates that would board the boats and take whatever (and whomever) they wanted with them. When we would find the refugee boats — and I need to point out that our mission was not to look for them, we would come across them purely by chance — they would be so grateful that it was gut wrenching. They had literally nothing, yet were indescribably happy knowing that they now had a chance at a better life.

Like some of the lost boys, some of those Vietnamese refugees made it to the United States. In my later years in the service, Sailors would report for duty on my ships that were Vietnamese and of an age and background where it was possible that I and my shipmates, or others like us, picked up their parents or even they themselves as children at sea those many years ago.

I cannot imagine what it must be like for someone to leave their homeland like those in Sudan and to set off on a walk of unknown duration, or to put my family in a boat and head out to sea knowing that if the right ship did not find us, we would all perish. They had no way of knowing that they would survive, much less dare to hope that someday they would make it the USA. Yet, they all remained positive, put their faith in a higher power and are eternally grateful for what help they got along the way.

What a powerful statement about the hopeful and determined nature of mankind and a testament to the basic humanity that knows no racial, national or ethnic boundaries that so many of us exhibit when given the chance. What a powerful lesson about our nation and how lucky we truly are to be citizens in this land. Sometimes we just need to keep things in the right perspective.

This Is Your Life

Posted: July 21, 2013 | Author: | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: , , | Leave a comment

Have you ever had your life flash before your eyes? I have. Well not exactly “flash” if that means you are in danger and in an instant you remember all the things that you’ve done and should have done.

My “flash” took place over the course of about a week. And I wasn’t in danger. Let me explain.

I’m a hoarder. Not the kind that will ever get his own reality show or that you will read about in the morning paper when the police finally have to knock down my door to save me from myself. No. I’m the kind that collects files, especially personal files such as bills, cancelled checks, receipts that go with tax returns, that kind of thing. Oh. And notes and cards. And maybe key pieces of paper from volunteer Boards and Committees that I’ve served on. I’ve learned that there is really nothing that doesn’t come back around again and it helps to not have to re-invent everything every time. If I throw it away I’ll probably need it. (And please remember that I’m sooooo 20th century.) But sooner or later, reality — not a TV show, but the real thing — catches up to you and you realize that those cancelled checks from 1980 probably aren’t necessary anymore.

So I decided to clean out old files and get rid of everything. Well almost everything, some things you really do need to keep for future reference. Realizing that this is the 21st century and that much of it can and will be used against me if found by the wrong person, I needed to shred everything that I was throwing away. You would be surprised what additional personal information was collected in the “old” days before everything was automated and you could actually rely on the neighborhood banker or business not to sell your information.

Shredding checks takes a long time and is terribly boring as well. As a result, I actually started looking at specific pieces of what I was shredding. A big mistake, I know, efficiency experts really would not approve. What I found was that the events of my adult life could be traced by those checks. Who they were made out to and where they were written sent me careening down the road of my past. Fortunately, it was about 98% positive. But it was all there. Courting and marrying my wife. Establishing our first home. The travels that we took. Moving around the country as job requirements dictated. The birth of my son. The many schools that he attended and the subsequent school events we supported. Dealing with reliable child care or after school care. Sports (his and mine). Family vacations. Splurges. All of it there and it was an amazing, untapped, unknown accounting of nearly every key event in my life.

A mind-numbing process as much as could ever be turned into a pleasant and nostalgic review of the highlights of my life so far. A surprise and a lesson in taking in and enjoying the little tasks that pop up with unexpected treasures.

Welcome to My Blog

Posted: July 21, 2013 | Author: | Filed under: Uncategorized | Leave a comment

This is the start of a new blog — mine. Some might say that the world is already saturated with blogs — perhaps. But given that there is really nothing new under the sun, a blog isn’t much more than an open letter to anyone that cares to read it. The real value of a blog — at least I hope this one — is a chance to articulate one’s views on a variety of issues and have them tested by others with an interest in the topic whether or not they share the same viewpoint.

So, why this blog? Primarily because I have things to say, observations to make, and points to bring home that I think are important in my life. Perhaps you, the reader, will agree or disagree but we may both grow a bit in our outlooks and thoughts and we may even come to change our views.

So, what is this blog about? Just about everything. I have a wide background and have been fortunate in my life to experience and see a large swath of things that make life interesting. I’m sure that like most bloggers, over time I’ll find that my posts focus on a particular topic, but to begin I hope to make observations (with luck, including a bit of humor) on sports, families, neighborhood foibles, cultural developments, politics and whatever else defines our lives today.

Here we go on another most excellent adventure. I hope that we both enjoy it.

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