There is no such thing as a little blessing.   Every blessing has merit and those we over look or take for granted are the ones with the most value to our lives and happiness.  Here are a few things that are the blessings in my life, hopefully you have your own list.   If you don’t, you need to take another look at the world and your role in it.

I love the smell of new-mown grass on a hot August day.  It reminds me of my youth and those first two-a-day workouts for fo0tball.

I am blessed every time one of my granddaughters smiles at me.   Those little ones love me without judgment.  Their love is a blessing and I am blessed they haven’t learned my faults.  Such unconditional love is staggering.

The rain is my blessing every time it makes its patter upon the earth.  We are water, the earth is water.  It is the stuff of life.  It is a sign of renewal and hope with every rain shower.

When the Sun cracks the horizon cleanly on a cold crisp winter morning, I am blessed.  That old Sol is the fountain of our life.  It is easy to understand why so many of the ancients worshipped it.  Without knowledge of the electromagnetic fields they sensed it life-giving force.  Its return each day is and was a symbol of rebirth.  We have a chance each day to have a rebirth.  Those sins and errors of the past do not have to be part of the new day.  It is our choice.  As the saying goes–”It is a new day”.

When they play the Star Spangled Banner before kick off at one of my high school games I realize the blessing of my citizenship.  The families gathered to support our youth and our future.  Because we were the home of the brave for two centuries we have our freedoms and rights.   No mean thing in a world oft in turmoil and strife.

Every birth is a blessing for parents.  It reminds us of our beginnings and the better angels of our spirit.  Children are our finest creation.  No Da Vinci or Rodin will construct an image to match the squirm of your new-born.

I was blessed to have a wife that would endure me.

I was blessed to have a wife that loved me.

What a blessing it was to have sons to teach to hunt and fish.  To show them how to track their first game and learn the rules of safety and to respect the prey.  Their eyes so wide with wonder and excitement the first time they walk at your side into the woods is a moment not to be forgotten.

I am blessed to have smelled the salt air on the coast and know that brave men in times past were daring enough to venture forth and explore and expand our horizons. 

It is beyond compare to know the blessing of helping someone less fortunate than yourself.  Maybe it is karma but I think it is more than that.  It is nice to feed the stomach but it is vital to feed the soul.  Doing a kindness is being blessed in your soul.   You won’t regret it ever, no matter the worth of the one in need.

We are blessed that we are not judged on our worthiness to others as often as we deserve and  to God, never.

I am blessed to believe God loves me.  Me.   Receiving that love without condition should spur us to be better men to our families and to our friends. 

You can find blessings walking in your neighborhood, going to work, being with family.  We sometimes look so closely at our footsteps that we forget the path we are taking.   Yes, we have to watch those steps so we don’t falter but losing your way is worse. 

Count them and rejoice in them.    www.olcranky.wordpress.com

Forget for the moment the merits economically or socially of the current proposals for the health care reform bill(s) wending its way through Congress, lets talk only about the administration of the new program and the agencies created by the proposed bill.  It is not for nothing that the Washington executive branch and administrative departments have been referred to often as the gang that couldn’t shoot straight.  Whenever there is any criticism of federal or government employees I notice how the Chris Mathews types also start talking about policemen and firemen and teachers and how valuable they are to our society and that we sure wouldn’t call them lazy or inefficient bureaucrats.  Wow, such a revelation.  Nope the criticism of the typical government employee has much more to do with the Post Office, the IRS, FDA, USDA, the Depts. of Commerce, Interior, Education, Labor, Social Security, Fannie, Freddie, and all those other countless agencies, boards, commissions, Congressional staffs that are the creatures of Congressional programs.  It literally would take more than these article to simply list all of them.  Think of that a moment, merely to list them.

I do hope you have noticed that the current plan is for the IRS to administer the new health care program.  It boggles the mind to think how many new employees will be added to the Federal payroll for that service.  The IRS can’t even keep up with its mail and documents that you send them.  If you have ever had any dealings with them at all you are aware of this.  They ask for something, you send it and then they ask you two months later for the same thing.  They are so incompetent that they won’t even accept responsibility for the advice given to you by their own employees.  Did you know that?  Really, if you have a question about your tax situation and go directly to the IRS for help filing out your return and follow the advice given to you by one of their agents and you get audited a year later regarding the same question the IRS is not bound by the advice given you.  They can and will take a contrary view.  If they don’t have enough confidence in their people to stick by their recommendation then why should we have any confidence in them?

If you get frustrated now trying to navigate you way through a phone menu when you “call” the IRS then just wait until you have to make a call to them regarding a medical procedure you want and are having to get their clearance so it will be paid for under your new Federally mandated health insurance policy.  How long will it take to talk to a live human being?  When you get them they no doubt will ask for more paperwork that you have already furnished and will tell you to go to the local IRS-Health  Care office to see a case officer.  Notice how they always come up with those titles rather than simply calling them what they are which would be clerks.   “Press One for English, Press Two for Portuguese, Three for Spanish…and Interpreter will be provided.”   I wonder what they are going to interpret, languages or the Health Care bill. 

This is the same outfit that can’t get the swine flu vaccine delivered on time and now they will be in charge of your emergency appendectomy.  One wonders how the phone menu works for those emergencies.   In future you will have to work things out with your insurance carrier, your doctor and the hospital and then Government, Inc.  The same folks who brought you the Katrina rescue efforts will be in charge of this program.  The people who thought it was a great idea to try KSM in Manhattan will be coming up will all the new medically approved procedures and deciding which ones to eliminate.  I already find it very frustrating trying to read and understand my health policy as it is with my private carrier.  Do you think the process will be more explicit and easier to comprehend when the language of every policy is drafted by our new Health Commissioner?  It will be a one size fits all program.  From looking at the news at night when I see any kind of street scene I do notice that we Americans sure do come in a variety of sizes.  It is going to be like the Army, everyone wears size ten shoes, if not,  then you can wait until the size 9’s arrive and good luck with that. 

A Federal bureaucrat has never met a form he didn’t love and one that he couldn’t figure out how to add a few more lines to “for clarity”.  I challenge you to order a Medicare brochure that allegedly explains how it works when you are ready to sign up and your options.  It is more like trying to read Shakespeare in ancient Greek.  The guys who manage the TARP slush fund (that is what it will be if Government, Inc. gets its way) will be running your local hospital.   The men who dreamed up the PIPP program will be managing the hundreds of billions of dollars annually that will flow through the Federal coffers.  Those folks who turn a blind eye to the fraudulent accounting for Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid will be handling all the nation’s health expenses and expenditures. 

Maybe they will operate it like we are doing with GM.  Since we own it and are propping it up for the unions and their votes and even paying with tax credits for people to buy their cars, maybe we can steal a page from that playbook.  Who knows, maybe someday soon they will pay you to get sick with a tax credit so long as you  will use their program; of course, that assumes they believe you really should have a job and some income.  It would be so much easier on them if we all would just cooperate and work where we are told for what they believe is “reasonable compensation”  and hand it all over to them.  They will spend it wisely no doubt for our benefit.  www.olcranky.wordpress.com

Today health care, tomorrow the entire economy.

A glance at his watch told him it was 09:55.  How could all that have happened it such a short period of time?   They turned the gun to the correct heading.  He could see the enemy planes but thankfully they were off on the far southern side of the convoy and not attacking but stalking again it seemed.  They were out of range for the 50’s and 20’s but the  5 inch guns could reach them.  He quickly went over the drill with the two merchant marines.  They were nervous.  They had only practiced a few times and that without enemy planes in sight.  Now it mattered and he tried to calm them down and make them repeat their duties and station.  He got the one seated correctly for the elevation control and the ammo loader and showed him how to set the fuses again.  Just as he finished the order to fire came again.  They were firing out to about maximum effective range.  It was only for the 5 inch guns in the convoy plus the weapons on the warships. 

The gun roared again.  The flash and sound scared the new men but they responded well after a moment.  The flak pattern they were putting up blossomed over the far side of the convoy a second later.  Re-load, fire again, repeating the steps again and again.  They were slower but still doing their job.   As he watched the planes got lost in the smoke and puffs from the shells and he never saw them again.  The cease fire order came.  He did see some tracers from the very edge of the convoy streaking up but that lasted only a few minutes.   They secured the gun and made ready for the next round.   But that never came.  They stood their watch at the battle station ready.  All eyes were scanning the skies and horizon.  Even those without the binoculars.   He noticed he was getting cold.  He hadn’t been cold for a while during the attack.  Now it began to seep back into his bones.   The merchant marines had on very light gear and were freezing.   He reported and they brought some extra clothing and parkas for them.    They manned their stations for another two hours and then the order to secure was given.  They cleared the gun and wrapped it and cleaned the pit and he made sure all the gear was in its place.   The PA announced it would be the regular watch duty so he would be off for a while.  His next regular watch wouldn’t be for four hours.  He desperately wanted to get off the deck and inside but he dreaded it also.   He knew they wouldn’t be doing the usual routine after a watch or  after securing from battle stations.   He headed back to his locker to remove his gear.  As he passed the foremast he recalled the men tied to one just like it on his first voyage to North Africa.  Why would he think of that now?   Two sailors had broken into the liquor locker.  The Navy didn’t allow any liquor on board but the merchant marine Captains could and did bring some for themselves and maybe the first mate.  When they were discovered as they were bound to be on a small ship the Captain ordered them chained to the foremast and on bread and water for three days.   He let them in after about a day and half as the weather turned colder.  The Navy Lieutenant on that ship did not object and affirmed the order with a drum head court-martial while they were still reeling.  Life at sea could be rough and even cruel.  But he understood that lack of discipline put them all at risk.  He didn’t feel sorry for those guys. 

The galley was quiet.  He and the Lieutenant and three others were there.  The merchant seamen had already laid out Tom on one of the tables.  He was lying on a piece of canvas the size of a sheet for a bed.  They had undressed him.  The Navy took care of its own and it was the responsibility of the Navy crew to attend to Tom and prepare him for burial.  As the acting pharmacist mate he was his duty to attend.  They brought out buckets with water and rags.  They began to clean his body.  He shivered as he touched Tom.  No one talked much.  The words were limited to “here”, “lift his arm” and only the necessary ones to get the job done.  He guessed they were like him and didn’t really know what to say.  They put on a clean uniform pants and just laid his blouse over his chest.  It was too disfigured to put it on.  When they were about done one of the men took his comb and starting parting Tom’s hair and pulling it back from his face.  He cried then.  He didn’t know why that gesture bothered him any more than everything they had already been doing.  When they finished dressing him as best the could they took the canvas and pulled it over him and sewed it together from the bottom up.  At the last moment before they closed it they added a length of anchor chain inside. 

The Lieutenant announced they would bury him within the hour before dark.   They brought in a stretcher and lifted him onto it.  Everyone left then to go dress.  They all went back to their lockers and got their dress blues out.  He had never worn them onboard any of  the ships.  They were strictly for leave onshore and formal occasions.  Later they were assembled on the quarter-deck.  The entire Naval detachment and a few of merchant seamen not on duty.  The Lieutenant read the sailor’s prayer and they committed him to the deep by lifting the plywood support under Tom’s body.  It seemed so final.  It was final.  The time for sorrow and worry was brief.  You could feel those pains but you had to carry them with you to your next duty.  The enemy sub in the area flag was still  flying and the port of call was still days away.   www.olcranky.wordpress.com

The current administration announced with great fanfare that it will try Shiek Mohammed and his cohorts on criminal charges in Manhattan.  This is for his part in plotting the 9/11 attacks that killed 3,000 Americans in a matter of a couple of hours.  It was a military type operation and designed to inflict the maximum civilian casualty rate and cause the most harm to our economy.  It was carried out with cold bloodied and maniacal precision.    By any historical or common sense definition it was an act of war against the US.   This is not the first war our nation has fought.  It is the first time however that we have chosen to treat our enemies like common street criminals with the rights and protections afforded by our Constitution. 

I suppose we shouldn’t be too surprised once the current gang in the white house decided we were no longer fighting a “war” but engaged in some type of vigorous diplomatic strategy to win the hearts and minds of the Muslim world.  It is reminiscent of the “police action” that Truman used to refer to our battles in Korea.   You can give a duck another name, call it something different but if it quacks, flies, and has feathers it is still a duck.  We are at war.  We have an enemy.  That enemy tries to hide within populations and remote regions but their like of overt presence does not make them any less an enemy.

You don’t give an enemy during a war a trial.  You kill or capture them.  If you win the war you decide later what you will do with the prisoners.  Just as after WWII we had a decision to make regarding the hundreds of thousands of German prisoners in the US.  We decided eventually to let them return home.  Some of them did commit crimes while they were captives and they were tried by military courts.  They weren’t take to the local state or federal court for trial like an American who had committed murder or rape or arson.   They were not entitled to a trial in our courts.  If we had been fortunate enough to capture the Jap officers responsible for the Bataan Death March in 1943 would we have brought them to Los Angeles for a trial?   The question itself reveals the answer. 

The first and most obvious problem with a trial is picking a jury.  As you know only those who have no preconceived ideas or notions about an alleged crime can be on the jury panel in a criminal trial.    In New York City I would think that would be very hard to do.  How could a New Yorker not have str0ng feelings about 9/11?   Who wouldn’t already have made up their mind about the guilt of those responsible.  Yes, I know they are qualified even if they have strong feelings as long as they can examine the evidence fairly and without prior convictions of opinion but that would be next to impossible.  If you can find 12 people plus Lord knows how many alternates jurors who have really no idea about the “crime” or established feelings about how it occurred and who is responsible then can you imagine what can of people they would be?  They would be zombies who have taken the concept of “hermit” to the outer limits of society. 
They truly would be the weirdest people you can conjure up in your mind.  For 3000 good reasons every American should have strong feelings about 9/11.   We had pretty strong feelings about Stalin, Hitler and all their cronies during our wars both hot and cold with them.   These people are beyond or laws and protections.  That is why we hunt them down and fight with them.  We don’t send the FBI to Afghanistan or Iraq to capture Al-Queada suspects for good reasons. 

To argue that a trial in our courts somehow enhances respect for American values is entirely beside the point and of no relevance during a war.  This trial will last for months at a minimum, it will cost millions to prosecute and will endanger our citizens during its course.  When we fought WWII, we did so without trials for our enemies and that was a war to protect and project our values in the world.  Those boys on D-Day fought for American values.  This decision is for domestic and international politics pure and simple.  I pray that saner and more American heads will prevail at some point and call off this sideshow.   Our values are secure as long as we honor our Constitution for our citizens.  That is what all our military personnel pledge to defend, our Constitution and to fight against our enemies foreign and domestic.  They didn’t sign up to be police officers. 

Where is General Patton when we need him?  Can you just imagine old “blood and guts” taking a German captive and then shipping him to Washington for a trial for shooting American soldiers?   www.olcranky.wordpress.com

With all the bailouts and Stimulus money floating around and the unimaginable amounts of money printed by the Fed being injected into our economy there is renewed debate about the best way to turn our economy around.  Many, especially those in the current administration, tout the idea that we need to keep pouring on the money machine or things would be worse and that only Government, Inc. can lift the economy from its depths.  Of course that is a political view as much as anything sense there are those who love big government and view it as benevolent and further they like the idea of folks being dependent upon government and placing all their faith in government.  Paul Krugman is an advocate of such an approach.   They are completely dedicated to the Keynesian model and method.   That goes well beyond merely deficit spending for a short period.  The government as the engine of growth and prosperity is their long-term goal.   Consolidating command and control of the economy into D. C. is their vision of Nirvana.

Those of this view are already talking about even more stimulus and more government programs to revive the economy.  They have floated the idea of bringing back a WPA type program.   So far all the stimulus money has done the way I see it is to prop up banks and financial institutions that should have been allowed to fail and go out of existence, create even more government jobs, facilitate the takeover of the bulk of the auto industry and make the granting and marketing of mortgages a Federal government program and all the people with mortgages the wards of the State.   Remember that more than 90% of all mortgage loans these days are made directly by the government (FHA, VA, etc) or held by the government (FHLB, Fannie and Freddie).   That can’t be a good thing.   The only growth industry these days is government.  D. C. continues to grow, literally in population and the amount of our national resources that it consumes and the stimulus money has been utilized thus far to primarily attempt to bolster payrolls of other government employees at the State level.   Now the push is on to completely control and regulate the health system, not merely insurance but the delivery of medical services.

Others prefer a so-called supply side approach to fix the current problems and as the best long- term program for expansion of our economy and the continued improvement in the standard of living for the people.  That approach basically calls for less taxation, less regulation and a tax code that offers real monetary incentives for investment into new business ventures large and small.  That was the approach that Reagan brought with him to the White House in 1980.  We had to suffer the pain a bit by squeezing out the inflation and stagflation that had gripped the country for the preceeding decade.    That same philosophy with a few ups and downs was followed by Clinton.  He mostly followed it because the Congress had enough Republicans that they wouldn’t allow tax or budget changes that would gut that supply side approach.  In fairness I believe he also thought it was a pretty good way to foster growth in the economy.  We had remarkable growth and upward mobility throughout the ’80’s and the ’90’s.  It was Clinton’s administration that repealed the Glass-Steagal Act to allow the commercial banks and investment banks to merge into one being and perform the complete gamut of financial services to the populace.  Another day we can discuss the cause of the current problems.  The biggest issue was 9/11 which is mostly forgotten by folks now.  The economist seem to particularly overlook it.  We were shut down and had to respond some way just as we did after Pearl Harbor.  Government mandates about how money could be loaned and who it was loaned to also poured poison into the economic system because so many of those mortgage transactions were not made on sound financial reasoning but to fulfill government edicts.  We reaped what Government, Inc. sowed.

Trying supply side economics is not something really all that new although to listen to some you w0uld think it had never been tried until 1980.  They may know a lot about economics but they sure haven’t studied their history. 

In the mid 5th century the Roman Empire was beginning to crumble. It had already been assailed by Attila and other barbarians and was now permenantly divided into the Eastern and Western Empires.  Things were rather bleak to say the least.  Roman power was diminished but it still had some swagger and the idea of a Roman Empire continued to command respect even if no longer deserved as before.   It was a weakened giant.   In this period one more citizen stepped forward to assume the mantel of the purple and rule as emperor over the Western empire, his name was Majorian.  He probably was the last of strong and decent emperors.  He wrote the Conscript Fathers of the Senate with his pledge to restore Rome.  They were called conscript fathers because it had been viewed for centuries in the Roman world that the nobles had a duty to fulfill toward the Empire.  They were “conscripted” to fill that duty as Senators to give back for the largesse they received as Roman citizens from the Empire.  In those days many of the subject peoples still under the rule of Rome were required to not only pay taxes for mostly local use but also had to pay an annual tribute to Rome for the use of the central government.  Upon taking power he required tax collectors to deal honestly and rooted out corruption and he also forgave the annual tribute payments to Rome from the provinces of Gaul.  The past due tribute was forgiven and the future ones put on hold.  Lo and behold,  the revenues to Rome actually increased.  The people had felt repressed and in despair over the burden imposed by these tribute payments; now they had hope for the future and felt their labors would be rewarded.  The economy thrived for those brief years under Majorian.  Alas, the decay and decadence of past regimes had eroded the foundations of Empire too far and the structure continued its decline.  There really isn’t anything new under the Sun.

“Dictators always look good until the last minutes”  T.  Masaryk   www.olcranky.wordpress.com

This holiday to honor our veterans of past and present wars often passes with little notice.  It should not be so.  Many don’t even recall the original holiday and its background.  It was Armistice Day.  It was a day to celebrate the end of the Great War.  That was the moniker for WWI before there was a WWII.  That mighty and titanic struggle to beat back the Germanic thrust into France and the Low Countries.  There was a  certain numeric alliteration to the  date.  The documents were signed for the truce the day before but it would take time to communicate the order to stand down to all the men under arms on both sides so the time was picked as the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month.  It was at that time that the guns fell silent on the Western Front and then throughout all areas of conflict.

The US entered the War late.  Our first troops didn’t really arrive until the spring of 1918.  There was a contingent of Marines in our forces that had been accepted reluctantly by Pershing.  The Army wanted no Marines, they wanted this to be an all Army show.   Later everyone would be glad that the Marines were there to fight in the Argonne Forest and other locales.  Our forces didn’t become fully engaged in the battles until that summer.   Until then we spent most of our time training under the supervision of the British and French armies.  They had three years of experience on us and we needed the help.  We also resented it.  We had rushed so quickly to prepare and ship our troops overseas with all the necessary logistical support that we didn’t have the time to manufacture cannon.   During WWI our army and Marines used 75’s that built by  the French. 

During the summer and early fall of 1918 the use of gas was still prevalent in the battles by both sides.  I personally knew a fellow who was a friend of our family that suffered from a gas attack during that summer.  It burned out his lungs to a great extent and he had bad health the rest of his life.  It was a close run thing.   The Russian had dropped completely out of the battle in the fall of 1917 due to the Communist Revolution and the Germans were able to transfer all those troops to the Western Front and with them they launched their last great offensive of the War in the spring of 1918.  The Germans had pretty good initial success but the British and French held with some support from us but it was not great in terms of the number of men involved.  The Germans were running out of everything by this point in the War including the enthusiasm and spirit to continue the fight.   Just as the Battle of the Bulge was the last great effort of the Germans in WWII so was this offensive and the Allies counter attacked with vigor and with the extra forces brought to bear by the AEF, the American Expeditionary Force.    From late spring of 1918 the Germans were on the retreat almost everywhere.  Other than local counter attacks they were retreating broadly.  Of course it was still in small increments. 

The battles were horrific to the end.  Our famous Sgt. York, who won the Medal of Honor got that award for action only days before the Armistice was signed.  Almost all our casualties came in those last few months of the War.  We were still planning a major assault on the German positions literally right up to the time of the Armistice.  That truce saved thousands of lives both Allied and German because that advance never happened. 

That was a grimy and seemingly endless war of attrition, dirt and injuries beyond most description.   Most of the casualties in that War came from cannon fire.  Regrettably it did turn out to be only a truce.  Yes, there was the Treaty of Versailles signed the following spring but all it did was lay the groundwork for and assure the inevitable coming of WWII. 

Those were only some of our veterans from our ages past.  That war was not glamorous and it is difficult with hindsight to discern the necessity of that war.  But they were our boys and they fought for our benefit.  Whatever the morality or politics of that war and its aftermath, a loss would have been far worse for our nation than the victory. 

All those who have served have come home victors and they deserve our praise and admiration and thanks.  Seek out a Vet today and simply tell him “Thanks” .  Most of us have never walked in those boots but we should be grateful that others trod in them for us.

“If all that Americans want is security they can go to prison.  They’ll have enough to east, a bed, and a roof over their heads.  But if an American want to preserve his dignity and his equality as a human being he must not bow his neck to any dictatorial government.”  Dwight Eisenhower.   www.olcranky.wordpress.com and see more at www.americanchronicle.com

When Clinton pushed for and got Congressional approval for the repeal of Glass-Steagal it allowed the distinction between commercial banks and investment banks to disappear.  Many hailed that as a great achievement.  The White House then took the position that the distinction was old hat and a product of an earlier era that no longer applied to the looming 21st century needs of the financial world or the economy of the US domestically and globally.   Those commercial banks were not allowed to make investments but performed the traditional bank function of taking deposits and loaning to individuals and companies.  The investment banks were not allowed to take deposits and advanced money for capital or for secured loans to businesses.  Yes, it was an old fashioned approach.  There was really nothing wrong with the idea of allowing the banks to take on all aspects of banking.  The problem was that Government, Inc. then pushed even harder with its regulations and the CORE type legislation and compounded the problems by allowing the Too Big To Fail doctrine to take root.  I have no problem with banks filling both roles but I do have a problem with them being bailed out if they make bad decisions. 

Less than generation ago the investment banks were all partnerships.   The partners had their own money at risk in virtually all their new deals they promoted.  Yes, they used others peoples money but they had some real skin in the game themselves.  You had to actually buy with real dollars your partnership position in those firms.  Needless to say they were more cautious when they had their own money at risk.  Contrary to the majority of the hedge funds today.  Now those banks do deals all the time by investing other people’s money and taking a commission in cash or cash and a piece of the deal for their services.  In addition they collect management and administration fees for their alleged work.  I like the old way better. 

The staffs in Washington are too darn big!   No Senator or Congressman needs more than two secretaries and three staff members.  Remember that each and every committee in the Congress also has a staff and some of them have dozens of people on the federal payroll.  That is ridiculous.  They all feel like they have to justify their position and are constantly planning their next piece of legislation.  Wouldn’t it be nice if someone running for Congress ran on a platform of repealing useless or even harmful laws.  How about eliminating the pointless agencies of government like the Depts. of Education and Labor.  Those are just starters.  We have labor laws, why the agency?  Education under the Tenth Amendment is strictly a State matter.  We could save billions and the States would have those funds to use as they see fit and tax their residents as they think best fits their local needs. 

When will the people make the government come up with the costs each year for the education and medical treatment of illegal aliens?  Not those estimates of the alleged benefits we get from their taxes they pay.  I mean what taxes?  If they are illegal they don’t have a social security number to pay taxes or if they do it is phony or even worse stolen.  I am proud of our nation and have no problem with any citizen receiving the benefits under any of our laws including those entitlements.  But I don’[t feel any obligation to pay one cent for an illegal that doesn’t even respect our laws.   Maybe 10 plus unemployment will change some more minds about the money drain they are on our economy.

Storms have influenced so many of the great events in our history.  When the Redcoats attacked Washington in the War of 1812 the greatest danger they faced and what really ran them back to Cheasepeake Bay was a huge line of thunderstorms they blew in after they burned the Capitol.   D-Day was postponed and almost ruined because of the weather.  The Spanish Armada was given a severe blow by the British in 1588 but they still had a formidable fleet after the initial encounter off the southern coast of England.  What brought them to total ruin was a great storm that drove their ships ashore on the coast of France and the Netherlands.  After that the threat was over for England.  The Spanish lost more ships in the storm than in the encounter with Drake.  Of course if helped that the English had longer range cannon than the Spanish.

Will Government, Inc. put up some new restrictions on the ownership of gold in the near future?  Don’t laugh, it has happened before in 1933 and again in 1971.  The dollar weakens and more people are turning to gold for safety.   The Indians just bought 200 metric tons of gold.  That is a huge amount.  They clearly thought carefully about that transaction.  Our mounting debt and the ever burgeoning debt is a legitimate concern for the value of the dollar in a few years.  At some point Government, Inc. will have to pay attention to the problem because others around the world are.  Using inflation to reduce our debt will only further weaken the value of the dollar and confidence in the dollar.  It won’t happen next week or even next year, but watch for it.  Invest wisely.

We all have First Amendment rights to speak our minds and express very strong opinions.  I have no problem with that.  You can’ advocate a Nazis view or even a Commie one.  But we don’t have a right to serve in the military.   Someone please explain how a guy like Hasan was allowed to remain in the military when he clearly was a Muslim extremist? 

Your home and the office building where you work in all likelihood has a lighting rod.  Such a simple device yet so valuable.  It has saved countless lives over the years.  You owe it all to Ben Franklin.  He didn’t even collect royalties.    www.olcranky.wordpress.com

The images were like angry wasps flying at them.  Mostly they were merely straight lines against the sky slowing growing larger as they angled down at the convoy.  He could see two of them.  They were the ones flying right at them.  He didn’t even look around for others.  Before he could even adjust to the idea that they were coming at him, personally, the ships in the two rows in front of them opened fire.  The tracers from the 50’s and the 20 millimeters were arcing into the sky like streaking meteors through the heavens.  They were all going to low and behind the planes.  That was always the problem he remembered being taught in training school, not leading the planes enough to make contact with them.  A funny thing to remember at that moment especially since he wasn’t even manning either type of gun but the 5 inch.  He had heard no order to open fire and they were always convoy-wide when given. 

He yelled at the gun crew to swing the gun around for open sight firing, anticipating the order to fire any moment.  He knew that firing like that over the open sight was very unlikely to hit anything but at least the extra shot and shell might spook the planes off course.   They were now with a half a mile he guessed and still coming.   The antiaircraft fire wasn’t diverting them at all so far.  He saw a brief twinkling from both of the planes as they opened up with  their on wing mounted cannon.  The enemy tracers struck one of the ships right in front of them.  Was he scared?  Excited? He couldn’t describe his feelings if he had to.  Now they were within a quarter of a mile and more ships were firing from port and starboard.  The sky was literally filled with color and puffs. It was hard to keep up with the flight of the planes.  Albert hollered –”Are we going to open up?”  He didn’t respond.  But then gave the order to open fire without any orders from the Lieutenant.   He briefly wondered if he would get in much trouble for doing that, they were strictly ordered to never open fire without orders from the bridge.  The thought was interrupted by the roar of the gun as it fired the first round.  The crew was working frantically and another round was fired within seconds it seemed.  He saw at least one bomb drop from the plane on the left at the ship directly in front of them but he never saw it hit.  His eyes became focused on the planes as they fired again with their cannon and now the shells were dancing across the water toward his ship.  They fired another round and the order came from the bridge to open fire at the same time.

Faster than he could think the thought, the enemy shells worked their way up to his gun pit.  Then nothing for a few seconds, milliseconds? A few minutes.  All he could discern was a loud sound.  Like being inside a metal barrel and someone banging on the outside with a hammer.  There was color, lots of color.  Something flew past his eyesight, what?  Had he flinched?  Closed his eyes?  He would never  know for sure.  He was leaning against the gun pit railing when he regained his senses and perspective.   Ridiculously he first checked the gun to see if it was still operational, it was.  Much later he would learn that the plane also released a bomb but it hit on the port quarter in the water.  Luckily it only loosened some bulkhead seams in NO. 2 hole and was repaired before he even knew it happened. Smoke from the barrel was drifting back over them he noticed,so only seconds had passed.  He felt something against his foot and leg and looked down.  It was Tom, the back up loader and man on the elevation control. Albert was saying something.   Moose was moaning and leaning against the far side of the pit and holding his arm.  He noticed that something was sticking out of his arm, it was big and reminded him of the cowboy and Indian movies like an arrow had been shot into his arm.  Tom wasn’t moving and blood was sloshing  under him on the gun pit deck.

He bent down to Tom and turned him over.  His stomach and chest were mostly gone and red, raw meat was exposed along with a lot of white stuff he didn’t recognize.  It reminded him of the -were he had worked one summer.  No breath, nothing.  Tom was dead.  Tom had been standing within two feet of him only seconds ago doing his work and now he was a lump of meat on the deck.  “Let’s move him” he told everyone in the crew.  They lifted him outside of the pit and then he looked to Moose.  It was a splinter of wood about 10 inches long and it had gone right through his forearm.  It was between the bones but blood was spurting.  Albert said we have to get that out.  From the gun tool kit he got a pair of pliers and pulled the splinter out.  It had come from some of the crates they carried on topside.  A shell had hit it and thrown the splinter into the gun pit.  He was the pharmacist mate on board.  He had no formal training for that but he had the highest rank of the enlisted men on board and Navy regs required every  ship to have someone fill that duty so the Lieutenant had given him the medial manual and told him to read it and practice his first aid techniques.   He grabbed the first aid kit and poured sulfur on the wound and then wrapped it in a battle bandage.   Moose collapsed onto the deck and was sitting in his own blood and Tom’s. 

He kept looking at Tom’s body, that was all it was now, a body.  He wanted to cry and praise God at the same time.  He had survived but why had Tom taken the hit?  Should he have told them all to duck under the metal railing as the planes got closer?  Would it have made any difference.  He didn’t really know much about Tom other than he as a quiet guy from Iowa.  He had to make sure the gun was manned and ready no matter the problems.  He reported the death and the wounds to the Lieutenant.  He never knew if the Lieutenant was angry about opening fire without orders.  The Lieutenant said he would send help right away and wanted to know if his crew could continue firing.  He said yes.  Within seconds help arrived and two of the merchant marines who were the back up support for the gun in an emergency.   That scared him and worried him because their training was minimal and they would slow down they rate of fire.  He and Albert could make it  but it would be slower.  As they pulled away Tom’s body and lead Moose below the order came for fire toward the starboard quarter and he readied the gun.

to be cont’d….www.olcranky.wordpress.com

Since last fall we have had a great deal of discussion and debate concerning the phrase of too big to fail (TBTF) which was a newly coined term created seemingly just for this current economic mess.  That concept led to the TARP; it also produced the TALF program, remember that?  Likewise, a substantial portion of the Stimulus bill was indirectly to support the same idea that some companies were TBTF.   Additionally, we must recall the Federal Reserve has gone to extraordinary lengths to prop up those institutions with their 1.5 trillion dollar purchase of mortgage-backed securities, treasury bills and the simple act of printing more money and keeping the funds rate a virtually zero.  Yes, some of those actions and some of that money was for the general economy allegedly but huge bundles went directly to those TBTF concerns.

First it was Fannie and Freddie, they were followed by AIG and after Lehman collapsed they blinked again even worse and the major banks were brought into the fold along with GM and Chrysler.   The worst of the panic is over.   The economy is still hurting badly and will continue to do so for years to come especially if the current proposals for cap and tax and health care and the other tax increases all take effect.  The theory was that these TBTF’s went down or any one of them it would destroy the economy.  Well, I am not an economist but I have dealt with bad times and struggling companies during my 43 year career and have seen over pretty severe down turns.  The ’70’s were no picnic.  That entire decade was a downer for those of you too young to know about it.  Here is not the place to examine in detail the likely results if we had let those institutions go under or some of them.  If Fannie and Freddie went down there would still be a demand for housing and house loans and a profit to be made there.  The S and L’s made money for decades doing just that.   Lots of big investment houses, many foreign might have lost lots of money on an AIG failure but all those policies would have been honored which is much more important to my mind.  The decision to bailout GM and Chrysler and have them become Government, Inc. entities was clearly a political decision not an economic one.  New smaller companies would have emerged from a Chapter 11 and no one would have been left without a car if they wanted to buy one. 

We made a mess of things by allowing ourselves to be duped with that concept of TBTF.  Yes, things would have been difficult if they had gone down.  But I can argue just like the White House that but for those actions things would have been better by now, not worse.    They say everything would have been much worse if we hadn’t taken all those actions.  An argument can be made to the contrary very cogently.  Remember that only 350 billion of the TARP  money had been spent by inaugural day.  Everything else came after that date.  The GM/Chrysler bailout, the extra money to the institutions, Stimulus, TALF and all the buying by the Fed at the urging of the WH.   Whether you agree or not is not important, but I bet most of you would agree that it hasn’t been handled well.  It could have been done better.  I favor letting any failing company to fail, others would promote more government regulation and takeovers.  Guess a lot depends on your trust level in the free market system vis a vis Government.  Take your pick.  I will trust a businessman any day over a politician.

However we now will soon face another serious problem of the same ilk.  All the current proposals for health care reform will raise taxes greatly and will severely cut back on expenditures to hospitals, insurance companies and doctors.  There will be special taxes assessed against the medical device makers and pharmaceutical companies.  Hospitals do go broke in spite of what you may think about them making way too much money. I have represented three hospitals over the years in Chapter 11.  Yes, the insurance companies will get more customers but they will also have to add many new ones that carry much higher risks and thus larger claim payouts.  Doctors facing cutbacks will make choices.  Many will decide to move locations, probably to the larger urban areas.  Not many will quit practicing altogether but those moves will further deplete the need for medical care in the rural and outlying regions.  Many of the health insurance companies are affiliates or subsidiaries of life insurance companies.  If some of them go under because they can’t make sufficient profits then that will impact the life company they are affiliated with.  Those life policies will be endangered and those annuities that many people bought.

We need to think long and hard now on the front end how we are going to deal with those hospitals, insurance companies and drug makers that are TBTF.  Will we even acknowledge that concept for any of them?  What about the drug company that has promising research for a specific cancer cure but then goes under due to the weight of the new taxes imposed on it and the reduction in the tax breaks for research.  Trust me there will some of these entities that do go under as the Government, Inc. health program develops over the next decade.   They are proposing a 21 % cut just for the doctors.  Would you like a 21% cut in your pay today?  How would that effect you?  For some such a cut would produce bankruptcy.  If you live in an outer suburb and have only two hospitals and one goes under then you might have to drive 50 miles for medical treatment or wait inordinate amounts of time at the survivor hospital.    Are we going to simply bailout these failing hospitals, insurance companies, and pharmaceutical companies like we did GM?  Where is that money allocated in the CBO report.   www.olcranky.wordpress.com

“The lust of government is the greatest lust.”   James Harrington

He noticed that the other gun crews were about done with cleaning their stations and most of the spent casings had been thrown overboard.  His gun was ready and he reported that to the Lieutenant.   What time was it?  He glanced at his watch–09:15.   It seemed like he had been out there longer than that.   That meant there was lots of daylight left and he knew the German planes would have already radioed back their position and more planes would be on their way.   Everyone was tense but alert.  They started talking about the last attack.  Albert was happy they hadn’t come at them.  Moose was really nervous.  No more than anyone else but he showed with his jerky movements and clipped comments.    The enemy planes kept coming in and out  of view off on the perimeter of the convoy.  He didn’t think that any of them had been hit yet with the gun fire.  He felt like they were being stalked.

He wondered when he would get this next letter from his wife.  They got mail on a very irregular basis, usually when they were at a port for a few days.  But often it didn’t arrive even then.  He worried about her.  She was young and with his son at home he was concerned if she could keep up with everything.  His son was a big joy for him.   Much more than he realized it would be.   He had been so worried about her during the pregnancy that he hadn’t given that much thought to the son.  He hated that they had to use the charity hospital but they didn’t have the money for anything else.  He promised her they would never be that hard up for money again no matter what it took.  The boy was quiet most of the time except when he cried for his dinner.   He did love holding him, just holding him and checking out all his features.  He didn’t get to do that very much with work and getting ready to leave.  He had joined up right at the time of birth.   It was time to go.  He would have gone sooner but he wanted to be there until the baby came.  Leaving two weeks after the birth was much harder than he imagined.  It was the worry of the unknown.  Strange he was the one going off to war but he was worried about her taking care of herself and his son by herself.   Somehow he was sure he could take care of himself but he was concerned about her.   She came to the train station downtown to see him off.  He was worried even then about her getting back home on the bus with the baby and the gear.  He seemed to require lots of gear.  

That was a very long two-day train ride to the Great Lake’s Station north of Chicago.   It seemed odd to him that he was in the Navy and going to the middle of the country for his training.  He had thought it would be some port on one of the coasts but no, into the heartland.   It wasn’t the official word from anyone but they could tell directions and they were going almost due north and the scuttlebutt was the Great Lakes Station.  As soon as they boarded the train they read them the Articles of War again just like they had done right after they were sworn in.  He wasn’t used to it then but soon got used to the reading at every new port and every time they boarded a new ship.  He figured they wanted them to have no excuses about knowing the rules of war and what was expected of them.  Obeying commanders, the definition of mutiny, cowardice in face of the enemy and punishments for all manner of malfeasance.  He could almost recite them now by heart. 

He wasn’t familiar with any psychological concepts but he understood after a while that the Navy understood what it took to motivate men.  Mostly fear of punishment and an indifference to any differences among men.  Being thrown in with thousands of others at the Great Lakes was a learning experience like no other.  He was amazed at what frightened some men and what they would do with their idle time.  He learned after one day how to avoid trouble and being idle.  He smiled even now thinking about that first couple of days.   He and four others were ordered to go around back and clean the ladder.  They went their but saw nothing but steps.  They decided to sit down and take a smoke break.  It wasn’t their fault if the ladder wasn’t there.  A Chief Petty Office came by and saw them smoking and asked what they thought they were doing.  They told him they couldn’t find the ladder to clean.  He informed them they were sitting on it!   He decided then to learn all those code words.  Having to clean the latrine for 12 hours that night focused his mind.

They all had to swim the length of a pool.  It was snap for him.  He was an excellent swimmer and diver and had even won some local city contests at the Fair Park pool.  Some guys had never learned to swim.   They were given a lesson.  It took about an hour.  Then they were expected to swim the pool.  Time didn’t matter but completing it did.  The Navy wasn’t concerned if you didn’t finish.  They informed the group that anyone who didn’t finish would simply be re-assigned to the next new batch of recruits and they would start their basic training all over again.  It was alright.  They could spend the entire war there going through basic.  When all was said and done only one guy out of his training battalion didn’t make it.   He hadn’t made any effort to draw attention to himself during basic, he just wanted to get it over with and move on.  He did take to seamanship, it seemed to come naturally to him and for some reason he enjoyed all the details and even excelled at the knot- tying lessons for the ropes.  He never realized there were so many ways you could tie a knot.  All the guys in his barracks were asking him for pointers on how to remember to do them because they had to pass that test too or start over.

His reverie was interrupted by the sound of gun fire.  The ship ahead and one in the starboard quarter had opened fire.  He had been given no orders but they had opened up.  He followed the direction of their tracers and quickly saw those angry bees coming in pretty low again.  They were straight line smudges against the pale sky, that meant their were coming head on.  

to be cont’d …..www.olcranky.wordpress.com