Congress.

I don't understand why Congress is so upset about the un-balanced budget.

THEY approved all the spending bills. Every dollar that the US spends THEY approved.

THEY also set the tax rate. THEY decided NOT to collect enough in taxes to cover what THEY had decided to spend!

So what are they so upset about?

As THEY decided not to collect enough in taxes to pay for what THEY had decided to spend they KNEW that they would have to borrow to cover the difference.

Therefore it is entirely the fault of Congress. Not my fault, not your fault, not even Obama's fault - CONGRESS approved everything that got us into this mess.

Or am I missing something?

Politics - and a balanced budget.

What to do, what to do? How do we balance the budget? Cut spending? Cut taxes? Increase taxes?

When I meet such dilemma's I try to "go small", in other words what do I do in my own budget situation?

Well now, all of a sudden it becomes easy - well as easy as balancing a budget can become.

We have an income, and we spend it, some for necessities like housing, food, transportation, etc (For the USA that would be taking care of the poor and disabled, agriculture, infrastructure of roads, airports, rails, etc.)

Then there is entertainment, an occasional dinner out and a movie, a vacation, a sports event, visiting friends etc. (For the USA that would be NASA space exploration, the Arts, public radio and TV, the National Parks and Wilderness areas, Wars etc.)

Then there is charitable donations, volunteer work, putting something into savings, etc. (For the USA that would be foreign aid - which is one tenth of one percent of the USA's GNP! Much, much less than we give personally. And also the lowest of the 22richest countries in the world, some of who give one percent, or more, of their GNP, ten times as much as we give! So cutting that would make no difference to us at all. Not to mention that most of it is not really foreign aid as most countries would define it, most of our "Foreign Aid" goes to Israel, Egypt, Pakistan etc in the form of military aid - so even what we give them is actually charity to our own weapons manufacturers! Yet we call it "Foreign Aid", which I used to think was food etc for poor countries! We do give money to starving countries for food, but with the proviso that they must use it to buy food from the USA! So it is no help to their farmers who cannot compete by growing food for their own people, as their government must use the money to buy the food from the USA! So they are even worse off! It turns out that the "Aid" is charity for our own farmers who sell their surplus food to the Aid countries! Where was I? Oh yes, volunteer work, that would be the Peace Corps, Doctors Without Borders, Mercy Ships etc, And Savings, well of course the USA doesn't have any savings for a rainy day? Shame on us.

If we have something come up that is not in the budget, where we need a little more money we take it from our savings, or we borrow it from a bank. (For the USA that means as they have no savings they have to borrow it.)

We then pay back the 'loan' to our savings account or to the bank where we borrowed the money. Here, we and the USA differ. We pay back the money and we do it as quickly as possible to minimize any interest payments, which is a total loss to us. You could say that interest is of no interest to us at all! We would rather have that money for our use than give it to the bankers. But the USA continues to borrow and to accrue interest payments. Why? At first I was going to say "That is easy to explain." but of course it is not easy, but I will attempt to give my reasoning's. It all comes back to Politics, Politicians and Greed. Quite simply they, the Politicians, think we, the people, are stupid and that they, the Pile of Shitens, can fool us, the people, all the time. Even if they can't fool us all the time they can throw us a bone - they can use the old war cry "Cut Taxes" as a sure fire way to get elected. Having cut taxes, all they have to do then is borrow more money to fill the hole left by having less income from taxes.

This obviously does not work. Here the ability to compare my "Small" budget with the budget of the USA becomes impossible because they, the USA or more accurately the Politicians, do not act intelligently or even reasonably. Whereas I can talk to my partner and come up with a plan, the two political parties, who are in no way partners, cannot talk. Like partners in a divorce they can only fight. And we all know where that leads to in a divorce - disaster - more accurately financial disaster for everyone. (Except the lawyers.)

So the two parties, who should be partners in guiding our country through its trials and tribulations instead fight amongst themselves, completely unaware, or not caring, about what they are doing to their country and their countrymen. It's like fighting while on the edge of a cliff, they will both fall, whereas if they co-operated they could save each other.

What hate. Can you imagine such hate, to hate the "Other side" so much that you would destroy not only them, but yourself, AND 300 million other men, women and children?

Hey, I got away from my comparison between my small budget and the USA's budget. I am almost finished - as will the USA be if our politicians don't straighten up and become, if not friends, at least partners.

So what I was going to say was that if we can't get our budget balanced we negotiate among ourselves - my wife and I - about what to do. And what we do is we cut expenses where we can and if that does not work we increase income. By getting another job. (For the USA that means, cutting expenses, preferably excessive or wasteful spending, and if that doesn't work - which it obviously cannot as we are spending almost DOUBLE our income!!!!!! In other words we could cut ALL of our "Discretionary" spending and still nowhere near balance the budget! We have to get more income, in the form of taxes. Now, one of the options I mentioned right at the beginning of my Blog was to CUT taxes! Anyone with more than an IQ of 50 should realize that will not work! The only thing it would do, which its proposers know, is destroy the country, which is what they want so that they can get back into power and SAVE the country. Now, it should also be obvious that NONE of them are able or even interested in saving the welfare of the USA. They are only interested in getting into, or staying in, power. Why? Why indeed would anyone be interested in being in charge of a sinking ship with no captain, no rudder, that is full of holes and in a storm being driven towards sharp rocks? Who? Why? And neither "Party/Partner has ANY interest in correcting the situation. Or at least they are making no attempt to correct it.

The way I see it is we have to cut expenses, but only excessive and wasteful spending and we have to raise taxes, but only on the rich.

Here's my reasoning, I hear one side say "OK, we need to cut spending and raise taxes. We are prepared to talk about cutting discretionary spending, military spending, and social spending, or 'entitlements', but we also need to raise taxes on the wealthy." The other side says, "We need to cut discretionary spending and cut taxes on the rich."

I have no problem with picking a side here!

The "reasoning" on the cut taxes side is that if you cut spending you will have more money to cut taxes. And if you cut taxes you will have more jobs. That does not work, has never worked and can never work.

Fist, if you cut spending you will cut work. For every $30,000 to $40,000 that you cut spending you cut one job. Cut the EPA $3 billion, easy, that's 100,000 jobs at $30,000 each. Cut the IRS $4 Billion, that's another 100,000 jobs at $40,000 each. Cut road works, cut NPR, PBS, NASA, it's easy, BUT for everything you cut, you lose jobs. You CANNOT cut money from any area without cutting jobs. I thought the main problem nowadays is jobs. BUT, if you increase taxes, you don't lose any jobs. Someone making $250,000 a year (Which is 5 times as much money as I ever made) or $500,000 or $10 million or whatever, is not going to let his housekeeper go because he has to pay a little more in taxes is he? Can you imagine the situation in the home if he had to tell his wife "We can't afford to have the cleaning woman in any more, we have to clean the house ourselves"? How is making the rich pay their fair share in taxes going to cut jobs? We keep hearing that the rich are going to spend us out of the recession. Bull. We have been in this recession for what, at least 5 years, we have cut taxes several times and we are still in a recession. Do you see any sign of the rich spending us out of it? If they are going to do it then they need to get on and do it.

The top tax rate at present is 35% - the lowest that it has been in at least 60 years - and we have the lowest rate of job creation in 60 years. The top tax rate under Clinton was higher and he created I think it was 22 million jobs, Under Reagan the top tax rate was 50%, no problem with jobs then, under Nixon the top tax rate was 70%, again no problem with jobs. Want to go back even further? Under Eisenhower the top tax rate was 91%, lots of jobs then!

I can remember under Nixon, Ford, Carter, Reagan, Bush 1 and Clinton, trying to hire workers for my small business, it was hard to find people. The unemployment rate was low and we were competing for workers. Some weeks I spent $1,000 advertising for help (We were a small company with only 30 or so employees at our max.) This was when the top tax rate was higher. Now that it is at its lowest the job creation rate is also at it's lowest. Following that path, if we cut taxes on the rich even more, the unemployment rate will go even higher. BUT, the rich will be richer! And who makes these kinds of decisions? Why, the Rich of course! Now in order to cut taxes on the rich - who already pay at a rate half that of the average American - we have to take money from somewhere else to give it to them. And where do we get that money? The only place you can get it, from the poor and the middle class. And you get it by cutting benefits to them, cut their Soc Sec (The rich don't need Soc Sec so that is OK), cut food stamps, welfare, unemployment pay, cut discretionary spending - roads, etc etc, where the workers work, and give it all to the Rich. The Rich then take that money and spend it. And save the country! And if you believe that I have this bridge in Brooklyn that you might like to buy!

How can the Rich spending their money (Your money) solve our problems? For one thing they spend it by going to Paris and buying French perfume, French Gowns, eating in very expensive French restaurants and staying in expensive French Hotels. How does that help us here? They then do it all again in Switzerland while skiing, and again in Australia and on and on. Oh, and lets put our money into a bank in Switzerland or the Cayman Islands, so that the tax man can't get at it.

I have been berating the Rich, but I really don't think all rich people are bad people. I am sure that many of them appreciate that they live in the richest country in the world and it has been good to them. But hey, if the country wants to make it even easier for them by giving them more and more tax breaks, why would they argue with that? I am sure that many of them would step up to the plate and have no problem with paying more taxes if it were asked of them. If I were making a million dollars a year I'd have no problem paying more in taxes and I'm pretty sure you would not either.

Not only is the top tax rate in the USA at the lowest it has been in at least 60 years, but the top tax rate in the USA is also the lowest in the World! With the exception of Japan which is about the same as our top tax rate, every other country in the world has a higher top tax rate than we do. What do they know that we don't ? Apparently they are right and we are wrong because we can't balance our budget. (There are of course some exceptions out there, mostly a few countries that have tried to emulate the USA by borrowing too much.)

Anyway, I was about to say that many of the wealthy realize the problem and I am sure would like to help. Warren Buffet, the second richest man in the USA said "The tax system is the USA is crazy. I pay less tax than my secretary."

What we need to do is give them, the wealthy, the chance to help the country that made them rich.

When you go to a bridal shower or a baby shower you receive a list of things that the happy couple needs. You can then choose a gift from that list according to your wishes and your means. I suggest that the Country get together such a list and encourage the rich to select one, or more, things from the list and use their remarkable powers to solve the problems presented to them.

Here is a few ideas from me to start the list off, I'm sure that you could come up with hundreds more!

One of our biggest problems with our balance of payments is all the money that goes to buy oil from abroad. Any way we can replace oil is money saved from being sent to people who hate us and use it, our money, against us. To that end : -

Develop cheaper and more efficient solar panels.
Develop roof shingles that double as solar panels.
Develop a more efficient, quieter windmill that people could afford to use at their homes.
Develop more efficient insulation.
Pay to insulate the homes of the poor.
Develop a paint that acts like a solar panel. It could be used on cars and homes.
Develop a device to retro-fit in cars to measure the MPG you are achieving NOW - this very second, and also since you installed it and on trips. It could be like a GPS. I drive a Prius and seeing the MPG I am getting as I accelerate hard or drive carefully helps me to reduce my gas use. (When I drive my pick up, which does not have such a device I don't try so hard to cut my gas use!) At present I am getting 53.4 MPG on my Prius. If everyone got an MPG like that we would probably not have to import any oil!
Find ways to produce everyday things in the USA at competitive prices - shoes, clothes etc.
Put together a drive to make "Made in the USA" a source of national pride. Make it so people want to "Buy American". Perhaps we could even waive sales tax on things that are "Made in America." The loss in sales tax would be more than made up for in the taxes paid by people at work and the savings in unemployment pay.

Can you add to this list? I'm sure you can. But will you?

Numbers.

Units, tens, hundreds, thousands, millions, billions, trillions, quadrillions, quintrillions, sextillions - big numbers - that last one, sextillions, is just about the number of grains of sand on all the beaches in all the world! No, I didn't go out and personally count them all, it's an estimate that was done done by other people.

What I find even more extraordinary is that there are more stars in the universe than that! Just go down to your local beach and check out the sand, see how many grains there are! Now imagine all the grains on all the other beaches in the world and add them all together. All those beautiful beaches in Florida - lots of sand there - and Hawaii, and of course the Caribbean, we even have beaches in Europe, and I'm pretty sure that they have them in Africa and South America too, and don't forget the nude beach at Bondi beach in Australia! Add all those grains of sand together and the total doesn't come close to equaling the number of stars!

Some more facts for those of you not familiar with stars, our Sun is a star. It is of average size, there are some smaller and there are some bigger, some stars are 1,000 times, or more, bigger than our Sun! Our group of stars is in a galaxy called The Milky Way Galaxy. The Milky Way Galaxy has about 200 Billion stars in it. As you can imagine there are different sizes of galaxies, some of just a few million stars to some with hundreds of Trillions of stars. Our galaxy is a bit bigger than the average sized galaxy.

With numbers like these I like to think about things and play with the numbers. For example, we have telescopes now that can see planets around other stars, well they don't actually 'see' them, I think that it's more like they see the interruption in light as a planet passes between us and the star. They have examined several thousand stars now and found that at least 50% have planets. As of now we can only detect large planets - the size of Jupiter for example - so the chances are that most stars have planets. If they were small like the Earth or Mars we would not be able to detect them yet. But I am sure we will soon, and as we are already above 50 % I suspect that most stars have planets.

Still thinking, I wonder how many of those planets have life? I cannot help thinking that as life has managed to survive just about everywhere on this planet from the highest mountains to the deepest oceans, from the coldest lands to the hottest desserts and even in hot springs and in ice it seems reasonable to assume that life also exists on other planets. Most of the stars that we have examined have about 5 planets. Our star has 9 and as 4 of those are very small they most likely would not be detectable from the kinds of distances over which we are looking - tens to hundreds of light years. (A light year is the distance light travels in one year - a long, long way when you consider that light travels at a speed of 186,000 miles in one second! That's more than 11 million miles in one minute. So light can travel to the moon, and back again, 44 times in one minute! Just imagine how far it can travel in a year!) Anyway, I am going to go out on a limb and say that life does not exist somewhere around every star (Even though I suspect that it does) Lets say it exists at one star in a thousand. I'm sure that it is more common than that, but. OK, now, on how many of those planets is there intelligent life do you suppose? (Always assuming that WE are intelligent!! Now there's a thought! Sometimes I wonder seriously about that, especially when I observe our Politicians!) But back to my subject. Lets say out of every one thousand planets with some form of life just one has intelligent life. Now we are at one star out of every million having some form of intelligent life existing on one of its planets. If we assume 10 planets per star we are now at 10 million planets and only one out of those 10 million planets has intelligent life.

OK, as I said earlier there are 200 billion stars in the Milky Way Galaxy. With an intelligent form of life at just one in every million stars that means there are 200,000 intelligent life forms in our galaxy! Now surely this HAS to be a minimum, one out of every million?

But I continue, lets extrapolate that to the other galaxies. It is generally accepted that there are at least 200 billion galaxies! So lets multiply the 200,000 life forms in our galaxy by the number of galaxies - 200 billion - and you get 40 Quadrillion. That is 40 quadrillion intelligent races in the universe! Now that is a whole lot!

Aren't numbers fascinating? Or do they give you a headache? You can go all kinds of places from here. How about how many "People" - we have 7 billion people on Earth - so why not multiply that number by the 40 Quadrillion intelligent races? for the total number of "people"? Or how about if there are intelligent races at one of every one thousand suns instead of every one million. Wow.
How crowded does that make heaven? How would we ever find anyone there amongst, how many people?

And yet another thought, I am talking about our Universe, some say there may be other Universes, even billions of other universes. Ooops, headache coming on!

Oh, wait, one more thing, a year or two ago some astronomers decided to point a very powerful telescope at a point in the sky that was completely black, entirely devoid of any sign of any stars. This point was the size of a grain of sand held at arms length - got that? A grain of sand held at arms length, that spot was completely dark, they wondered why it was so black. They set the telescope and left it there turned on for, I forget if it was a week, or more, anyway for a long time. At the end of the week, or whatever, they developed the film, and found, ta da, TEN THOUSAND GALAXIES!!! Not ten thousand stars, ten thousand galaxies! Don't forget our galaxy has 200 Billion stars, and they found 10,000 galaxies in that tiny dark area!

Now is that fascinating? Does that make you feel insignificant? It surely does me.

So that I don't feel too insignificant, how about sending a comment to me? Does anyone out there enjoy reading my blog? Or do you hate it? Or are you, most likely, indifferent?

David.

National Debt, how to fix it.

Our country has expenses - police, roads, protecting the health and well being of its citizens and a host of other expenses just as we all do on a smaller scale.

These expenses have to be paid for. They are paid for with taxes that our country collects from us.

We cut taxes.

Not having enough money now to pay these expenses we borrowed money. We now need more money to pay interest on the loans.

So we cut taxes again.

We go further into debt.

Taxes are low, money is short, what to do? Republicans say cut taxes again, that will solve the problem!

You have a job, it pays for your house, your car, food, your children's schooling and care, taxes, and a host of other expenses.

Then your employer cuts your pay. You still need to pay for your home, car, food etc. So you borrow money. Now you need more money to pay interest on the loan.

Your employer cuts your pay again. You go further into debt. What to do? Republicans would say, ask your employer to cut your pay again, that will solve the problem!

What is the difference here?

We presently have the lowest tax rate in more than 60 years. Especially on the wealthy, they pay a lower rate of tax than anyone else. Our highest tax rate under Obama is 35%, under Bush it was 35%, under Richard Nixon it was 70%, Under Reagan it was 50% and under Eisenhower it was 91%. When tax rates were reasonable - yes I do call them reasonable because they are the HIGHEST rates, you only pay those kinds of taxes on incomes that are in the millions, and not even on all of it. You only pay the higher rate on amounts above certain levels, below those levels you pay lower amounts. In other words you only pay what you probably call exorbitant rates on exorbitant income (Or what I would call obscene amounts of income.)

It is simple, if we don't pay enough taxes we can't pay our expenses, we borrow money and get into huge amounts of debt, the answer is even simpler, raise taxes, especially on those rich people who pay very little. The average American pays 30% of his income in taxes, the richest 1 or 2% of Americans pay only 16% of their income in taxes. How much simpler can the solution be?

The country has the lowest tax rate in more than 60 years, we don't have enough money to pay our expenses. The solution seems simple to me - do what every other country in the world, including us, has done since time immemorial - raise taxes, and make the rich pay MORE taxes than the poor and middle class.

But the Republican solution is to lower taxes on the richest and raise taxes even more on the poor and middle classes. By taking away what they have worked all their lives for - Soc Sec and making them pay AGAIN for Medicare - privatising it makes it a For Profit business like Health Insurance Companies and would cost us as much as 2 or 3 or 4 times as much as we pay now, for LESS coverage - remember those terrifying words from your privatised health insurance company, "It's not covered." or "You got sick, so we can't cover you any more." or "Profits are way up, so we are paying an even bigger dividend this year. And our CEO will be receiving $60 million in compensation this year." Yes health care is VERY profitable. In my opinion if anything should be non-profit it should be Health care, as it is in every other country in the world!

A Bald Eagle.

Yes, great excitement here at The Lake and in the Liddle household as we observed a Big Beautiful Bald Eagle in our little backyard! I was sitting in our bedroom, which has an expansive view of our garden, The Lake and its Flora & Fauna, when all of a sudden a large bird flew straight towards me and landed in a tree not more than 50 or 60 feet from me. I shouted to Julia to come. She grabbed the binoculars and confirmed my diagnosis - a Bald Eagle was standing proudly in a maple tree just outside of our bedroom window! How exciting is that?
We watched breathlessly as it bobbed up and down, appearing and disappearing behind the dense leaf cover. Then it took off and landed in a dead tree next door. A perfect view. But more to come, ANOTHER Bald Eagle appeared and landed in the dead tree. At first I though it was the mate of the first bird, but Julia soon corrected me, it was in fact an immature Bald Eagle. We watched them both for several minutes, small birds seemed to be dive bombing them. I guess they are a danger to their nests. After a few more minutes they both took off and landed in yet another dead tree several hundred yards away before flying off.

I missed the GOP debate last night.

I meant to watch it, but something else got in the way, I think it was the sunset or something.

But I remembered it when I got up this morning and thought I would put in a couple of cents worth of my opinion.

The last time we had a Republican president - George W Bush - here are some figures that should be of interest. He took over from Bill Clinton (Democrat) who left office with a budget SURPLUS!!! Unheard of. He also had in place a plan to pay off the National Debt within 10 years. Bush immediately sent everyone in the country a check for $300 (Remember his promise, "If you vote for me I will send everyone $300.00."?)

The Dow Industrial Average was 14,000 when Bush came in to office. It was 6,000 when he left. (It is now 12,000)

Gas was $1.25 when Bush came in and $4.10 when he left. (It is now $3.50)

The National Debt was $5.7 Trillion when he came in and $10.7 Trillion when he left - almost DOUBLE.(It is now $14 Trillion, a long way from double, and not even as much as Bush added to it)

The reason for such a disaster? He gave RICH people a HUGE tax cut - at least $1.3 Trillion, cut taxes to Big Business, gave free drugs to senior citizens and started two wars. He did all of these things and made NO provision to pay for ANY of them!

That was his huge failure, no provision to pay for any of his largesse. If you cut taxes in one area (Say to your rich friends) then you need to raise taxes on another sector (As the Republicans want to do - on the poor and the middle classes.) or you need to cut expenses elsewhere. (As the Republicans want to do by cutting services to the poor and the middle classes.

Bush cut taxes to the rich, on the theory that it would get the economy going again. It's been more than 10 years now and it has not worked. It never worked when tried in the past. The only thing that happens is that the very wealthy get even wealthier and the poor and middle class get poorer. Oh yes, and the greedy Politicians get rich too from a grateful bunch of rich people!

One final rant. The income gap in the US is bigger than it has EVER been, and not just here in the US but ANYWHERE, in other words the income gap HERE, in the US, NOW, is bigger than it has ever been at any time anywhere, including anywhere in the entire World!! The rich are richer than they have ever been at any time in our history AND they pay less in taxes than they have ever paid at any time in our history!! They pay less in taxes than you and I pay!! The top 1% to 2% in the US pay only 16% of their income in taxes while the average American pays 30% of their income in taxes!!!!! What kind of sense does that make? AND THE CONSERVATIVES WANT TO CUT TAXES TO THE RICH EVEN MORE!! They want to cut them even further! Insanity. These people are already obscenely rich and we want to give them even more of our money to make them even richer. Are we mad?

It was a British Movie.

What was? "Men Behaving Badly." was, and how appropriate a title is it nowadays?

I am not even going to try to list the l o n g, l o n g list of men who have behaved badly! It would take up too many pages in my always too long a Blog anyway. But you know most of them, from Presidents to Governors to Senators to Congressmen, to Representatives, to Leaders in other fields such as Sports, Religion, etc.

When you were thinking through the list of these men who cheated on their wives with women, men, prostitutes and so on, did you notice that they were all men?

When was the last time that you read a story about women in politics, who behaved badly? I can't remember one, can you?

Lets think about it. Obviously women must have affairs with other men, other women etc. So why don't we hear about them? Could it be that they are smarter than us men? Could it be that they realize that if they are in the public eye they should not indulge in that kind of behaviour? And if they do, is it possible that they don't tell about it, that they don't Tweet, Facebook or e-mail about it - reveal it ON LINE!!! If that is the case, I put it to you that yes, they must indeed be smarter than us men. In which case it is more than obvious that we need to have more women in politics and other positions of power.

When was the last time you saw Sarah Palin, Hillary Clinton, Nancy Pelosi or any other woman politician biting her bottom lip, in the glare of the TV lights, while making a teary eyed confession and apologizing for their infidelity, lies and mistakes?

I put it to you that the world would be a better place if we had more women politicians. Right now we are depending on these "men" to make decisions for us about our Health Care, our Money, our Children, our Taxes, even War & Peace. You only have to look at their marriages to see the quality of their decisions making powers! With this kind of decision making judgement do we really want them making other more important decisions affecting us, (Like the decisions they make in apparently, to them, unimportant areas of their lives like their wives and children.)

(An aside here, did you know that out of the 180 other countries in the world the USA ranks 90th in the number of women politicians? Countries with a larger % of women politicians include Uganda!, Argentina, India, Bangladesh, Eritrea, Tanzania, Egypt, and even Iraq, Iran, Cuba, South Africa and on and on!!)

Our Lake is a nursery.

We were seated in the sitting area of our bedroom this morning watching The Lake and its inhabitants when the pair of Canada Geese with the three large babies swam into view near our pier. As we idly watched them, Julia with several Oh and Ahs, another pair of the beautiful birds swam into view with two Goslings. But something was wrong, these two were almost as large as the triplets that we could still see. We knew that there were two tiny babies, but they could not possibly have grown to the size of their large cousins in just a day or two. As we pondered this mystery the two tiny babies paddled into view. The mystery was solved - we now had three sets of baby Goslings!

How these two had escaped our notice we do not know. Apparently these birds must spend large amounts of time elsewhere on The Lake, and have only just got around to visiting us here.

So, it is a wonderful sight indeed to now see three sets of young Geese, each being displayed by their proud parents.

It is still a mystery why there are such small broods this year, usually there are batches of 8 to 12 Goslings in each group and we do usually have 2 or 3 groups. So the question is have they had fewer babies this year because that is a natural cycle or because an animal ate some of the eggs - which seems unlikely, they would probably eat them all - or did the DNR oil some of their eggs leaving just a few to relieve pressure on The Lake. Or is there yet another explanation?

Meanwhile we continue to enjoy it all.

Three more Goslings.

Yesterday three more Goslings showed up. They were right outside on our lawn with their parents. So now we have two sets of "Families", one has just two babies - very small - and the other has three larger babies, we wonder where the older ones have been as they are quite a bit older than the two tiny ones.
Even now as I look out at The Lake I can see both sets of babies and their parents gliding by in a perfectly straight line. In the lead are the three older babies sandwiched between their parents and following directly behind are the two small goslings.
So it is a straight line, first a parent then three babies, another parent, another parent, two babies and then another parent, all in a line.
Across The Lake, well actually on the left side of The Lake is a group of about 15 adult Canada Geese. It is a bucolic scene indeed.

Late arrivals.

Two Canada Geese Goslings have just arrived. We usually get two or three batches of 8 to 10 goslings each, but this year nothing. They normaly arrive in the middle to the end of May, here it is June 7th, so we had long since given up when Julia saw these two tiny chicks just yesterday. They are out there again today, each with it's own 'guardian'. We have no ideas why they are so late this year, or if these two will be the only two. Julia is holding out hope that there are more waiting to be born. If this is to be all, we wonder what happened to the otheres - did the DNR oil the eggs because there are too many for The Lake to support? Did the Fox get the eggs, or the babies? Did a Pike or two get them as they were swimming? Do Osprey like Goslings for a meal? Or dogs? No doubt we will never know, but for now there are two babies for Julia to enjoy.

We also look forward to the annual Carp "run". This usually happens in early to mid June, but perhaps everything will be late this year? We will see. I keep looking anxiously for the Carp spawning in The Lake. These huge Carp thrash aorund in the shallows. It is unbelievable to me that there are three and four foot long - or longer - Carp swimming around in The Lake without us ever seeing them except in June. Or do they come into The Lake just to spawn in June and then leave?

Who knows?

That IS a question by the way, if you do know, please tell me.

Dave.

Jobs, and taxes.

Driving home the other day I noticed that the grass in the middle and sides of the roads was not cut. The road surfaces were poor and bridges in bad shape.

We were recently in Europe & the UK, and not so recently in Asia, New Zealand and Australia. Returning to the road system of the US was like going to a third world country!

There are millions of people out of work. The roads and bridges need fixing. The grass needs mowing. The Internet in Asia is 100 times faster than it is here. We need to "Go Green" to save our environment and our balance of payments - solar hot water, solar electric, insulation, electric and hybrid vehicles. We went to the Moon, we can surely develop efficient solar electric, efficient insulation, and efficient vehicles that can free us from our billions of dollars of payments to people who hate us, for oil that is polluting our country, our planet, our air, our water, our lungs and our bodies.

Millions need work, there is much to be done. But instead we have millions and millions of people getting richer and richer at the expense of millions and millions who are losing their jobs and their homes. We don't need more rich people, we don't need more tax cuts for the already filthy rich, we need jobs.

The CEO of Wells Fargo made $53 Million last year. If he were paid $1 million it would be more than he is worth. Way more. Tiger Woods makes $100 Million a year. If he made $1 million it would be way too much.

The extra $52 million more than he is worth that the CEO of Wells Fargo makes would pay for 1300 jobs paying $40,000 a year. The extra $99 million that Tiger Woods makes more than he is worth would pay for 2500 jobs paying $40,000 a year. And on and on, CEO after CEO, and crooked sports figure after crooked banker and crooked wall streeter and soon you would have people making closer to what they are worth, no unemployment, the infrastructure fixed, millions of people paying taxes and buying goods, a balanced budget and a positive balance of payments for our exports/imports.

The tax system in the USA is severely broken. The average American pays 30% of his income in taxes. The top 2% of "earners" in the USA pay 16% of their income in taxes. And yet we want to cut taxes to the wealthy!!! Are we insane? We need to tax the wealthy, not cut their taxes even further. Bring them back into the realm of the average American. They must be laughing their heads off when we vote to cut taxes to the rich even more!

The wealthy in America pay less in taxes now than they have ever paid in our history! The wage gap in the US is higher now than it has ever been in our history - and it is higher here than anywhere in the world!

Insanity, we are killing our economy to give a few wealthy individuals more wealth than most of us can even imagine. And somehow they - the rich - are convincing us - the poor - that they deserve even more!

Why? Is it because we think that one day we will be rich and when that day arrives we don't want to pay any taxes either? These people, most of them anyway, are greedy beyond belief. If you had billions of dollars, would you do what one multi BILLIONAIRE did recently, he did some insider trading (That's stealing) to make an extra 60 million dollars! Now think about that, he already had BILLIONS of dollars and he was prepared to steal in order to get another 60 million. Lets put that into perspective in the real world - our world - lets say you have $4,000, would you now risk stealing $60? Me neither.

Not all rich men are the same, Warren Buffet for example says that the US tax system is broken. He is incensed that his secretary pays a higher tax rate than he does. But he and Bill Gates have put half of their wealth into a foundation and are looking for ways to do good with it. Finding cures for illnesses, treating illnesses like Malaria and AIDS, feeding the hungry and teaching them to feed themselves. They have both pledged to put virtually all of their wealth into this foundation and are actively trying to get other wealthy people to do the same.

Meanwhile, the tax system needs to be changed so that those fortunate enough to have been able to work the system to practically print money, pay at least their fair share, which should be way more than we pay. Not way less.

A little tip to save money - and oil.

Most people know, I hope, that the heaviest user of energy in our homes is heating and air conditioning.

I thought you might be interested in how we keep down our use of energy in this sphere. As the A/C part of the "problem" is at hand I will start there.

We have set the time to start using our A/C as June 1st. So we don't start using our A/C until at least June 1st. If the weather co-operates it could be later. It is usually no problem to do this, rarely is it really hot before then and we find by opening windows - with the screens on - and wearing light clothing we have no problem, we might eat salads instead of a hot meal and pull curtains across if the sun is shining in and heating up the house. Eventually, in any year it will get to a point where the A/C is pretty much a necessity. (Here I must tell you of one year back in the late 70's or early 80's when we were here at The Lake in our little redwood cabin on July 4th with our friends John and Norma Hergenroeder and it was so cold that we lit up the wood stove!) That is a true story. So it is not always so hot in the summer!

Anyway the heat eventually arrives and we turn on the A/C and set it at . . . . drum roll here . . . . 80 degrees! Yep 80. Most people will no doubt find this completely unacceptable, but it is just fine with us. If we have guests coming we will turn it down to 78. It might be of interest to know that your electric use drops by 7% for every degree that you set the thermostat up. (Or down in the winter.) So if you normally set your A/C at 65 you will be using about 100% more electric than me! In other words if my bill is $10 a day for A/C yours would be $20 a day. Quite a savings. Some people do have their A/C set at 65 - I've seen it with my own eyes. Most set it at 68, some "frugal" people at 70. Another interesting little fact is that if it gets hotter people will turn their A/C down to a LOWER setting! "Ooh it is 90 degrees today turn the A/C down"! If you have it set at 70 because that is where you like it, it will be 70 in your house if it is 75 outside or 90 or 100, it is not necessary to turn it down even lower. In fact even before we came up with 80 as "our setting" and were using 72 or whatever, if it got really hot I would turn the temperature setting UP. Hey if it is 95 outside, 80 or even 85 is going to feel nice. If you set the thermostat say 10 degrees lower than outside it is always going to feel comfortable, certainly more comfortable than outside, because the A/C removes the humidity which is what makes heat so uncomfortable. And don't forget the 7% rule. If it is hotter, your cost goes UP by 7% for every degree warmer that it is. So if you turn your A/C colder by 5 degrees you are adding 35% to your electric cooling bill PLUS whatever is added by the hotter temperature of the day. To sum that up - if the temp outside is 85 and it goes up 90 - and we are both set at 75, you turn your thermostat down to 70. I turn mine up to 80. Your bill goes up by 70%, mine stays the same! No increase. (I was 10 degrees away from the outside temp - 75 to 85. I am now still 10 degrees away - 80 to 90. But you were 10 degrees away - 75 to 85, but are now 20 degrees away - 70 to 90. So the additional 10 degree difference in your setting is 10, or 10 times 7% equals 70% higher cost.

In the winter we try to wait as long as possible before turning on the heat. (Another little story here, some friends on Gibson Island had the same "game" and one year boasted that they managed to put off turning on the heat "Almost until Christmas."!) When we do turn it on it is usually to 68 degrees. We keep it this "hot" because Julia has arthritis problems and feels the cold. 68 degrees is too cold for most people, but we temper that by wearing warm clothes, long pants and a sweater. Julia will put a blanket over her legs while sitting watching TV in the evenings. It is a lot cheaper to put on a sweater than to turn the heat up. At 72 you are spending 28% more than I am at 68. If you like 75 your bill is 49% more than mine!

As It happens we recently, last winter, installed a wood stove, so our house, especially the living room, where we spend most of our time, is very warm and cozy and the heat rarely comes on at all, we set it at 65 or 62 - it will only come on if the fire dies down and the temp drops below 65 or 62 degrees. This might happen at night, when we are cozy in our bed with a nice warm over sized Duvet on the bed.

Can you imagine the drop in oil use by the US if everyone did this? We would probably have to cut our oil imports by a huge percentage! What would that do to our balance of payments?

F U

It seems to me that the GOP - The Party of No - has "Progressed" to The Party of F You.

Maybe you are wondering why I would say that?

You will doubtless have noticed that a number of contenders for the Republican nomination for President have dropped out. Some of these 'dropouts' were the more reasonable of the Republicans. Mike Huckabee and Mitch Daniels for example. Mitch was a reasonable governor. He seemed to put important matters ahead of ideology - a no-no nowadays for ANY politician, but especially for a Republican. I think they dropped out because they did not want their carefully nurtured reasonableness to be attacked by the Republican Party of today.

Even they can see, as I can, that the GOP of today is a party of lies, distortions, incorrect 'facts' and "birthers". Prejudice trumps fact, any expert is pooh poohed, any truth or reality is a Liberal or elitist plot.

Their world of False Reality is nurtured and created by themselves, Fox "News", Rush Limbaugh and other "fair and balanced" far right extremists.

For the first two years of Obama's administration, while he was trying to correct the problems and excesses of the Bush years, when both parties should have been pulling together to put the country back on its feet, they were instead The Party of No. Any attempt made to put the country back onto a sound footing was sabotaged at every possible opportunity. Any attempt by Obabma to extend an olive branch was rejected. If Obabma tried to close the gap between the parties and made concessions they made no concessions back.

If my neighbor's house was hit by a truck or a tree or a flood or a fire I would go to help, as he would, if such a disaster were to hit my family. We would do this without first asking, "Are you a Liberal or a Conservative"? I compare the countries present position to my neighbors position. But The Party of No, far from helping, is instead parking their truck in the road blocking the fire trucks, turning off the water, calling the authorities to stop sending whatever help they can stop them from sending.

Anything for political gain. They cry "Cut taxes", a cry guaranteed to get people on your side, even though you know it will only make matters worse. Even worse, cut taxes to the rich, they will spend us out of this recession, something that has never happened before and has not happened this time, in spite of repeated tax cuts.
Now the GOP has embraced a new party, the Tea Baggers, who are even further to the right than the modern Republican Party! The Far Right Tea Baggers are wealth-and-business-obsessed.

Now we have The New Republican Party which has morphed from The Party of No to The Party of F You.

In 2010 they campaigned on jobs, deficits, tax cuts and health care. Who wouldn't vote for that? But now they are in power their tune changes. If you are a wealthy individual or a big corporation like big oil, big agriculture, big banks etc, anyone with plenty of money, they have nothing but hugs and kisses for you. For the rest of us? The GOP offers a Big F You.

Out of a job? F You. They blocked efforts to extend unemployment benefits. Instead, they wanted to cut taxes to the rich, so they could "spend us out" (an idea only accepted by lunatics and Republicans. An idea that has never worked before and is not working now.)

Worried about another financial collapse? F You, say the Republicans. Regulations on banks were enacted after the Great Depression and were kept in place for 50 years. But 30 years ago, since Ronald Reagan, the GOP started repealing the regulations that had prevented those same abuses for 50 years. Resulting in the financial collapse that we are all suffering today. (All, that is except the "Top" 1% who are even wealthier! Please note that you are poorer, and they are wealthier - has anyone else, other than me, noticed that?) After the disaster of the Great Depression, common sense says the banks need regulating, but The Republicans fought even the modest Dodd-Frank regulations that were passed, in spite of their fight, in 2010. They continue to fight to weaken or delay it!

Worried about cutting the deficit? The Republicans say they are, but they are not. Instead they say F You. They don't care a toss about deficits, why else would they vote to keep the Bush tax cuts for the wealthy? This added billions to the deficit. And no, we are not overtaxed, the the overall tax burdens of Americans is at it's lowest level since 1958. The Republicans want to cut taxes to the rich and to corporations, making the deficit even WORSE, and then they want to cut all government spending to pay for the tax cuts to their rich friends. Medicare and Social Security - that Corporations and the wealthy don't need, will be cut as will anything that the poor and middle class depend on. To pay for tax cuts to the rich! (A couple of figures here, the richest 1% of Americans have more wealth than 50% of Americans COMBINED. The top 2% of Americans, in income, pay 16% of their income in taxes. The average American pays 30% of his income in taxes!! CEO's of giant corporations pay less tax than their secretaries!) And the GOP wants to cut taxes to these unbelievably greedy people even more!)

Worried about health care in your old age? F You, says the GOP. Thought you could just make it if you could just reach retirement age, because then you would qualify for Medicare? F You. Worry more, the Republicans and the Tea Baggers are attacking Medicare relentlessly. It will be privatized, which means your health care will still be FOR PROFIT, just as it is now, when you are paying through your teeth for health care, and just as Obama won a small victory for you - making the insurance companies continue to cover you even if you got sick! The richest country in the world, and the only one without universal health care for it's citizens, is about to fall back even further. Medicare - one of the few government programs that by far the majority of Americans like, is about to be snatched away from you. And replaced with a voucher system which won't begin to cover the cost of most old people's insurance costs. This means that, unless you are rich, you won't be able to afford health care. If you can just afford to get health insurance, it will be as it was a few years ago - don't forget it will be privatized insurance - you will start to get the letters that we all dreaded, "It's not covered", "You got sick, so we have to raise your rates.", "Sorry, you got sicker, we have to cancel your insurance." That is the way the GOP wants it. They have to pay for more tax cuts for the rich somehow!

If you are a woman, it is definitely F You. The GOP wants complete control of a woman's body. Elimination of the right to an abortion, even if it is not paid for by the government is right at the top of their agenda. If you were raped, they are even redefining rape. They want to redefine all women's health services to be even more detrimental to women. I've seen this defined as "The Republican War on Women."

I hope you don't expect the GOP to manage the countries finances responsibly? The debt ceiling needs to be raised. To the Republicans that is just another bargaining chip. They don't care - F You.

High gas prices, do they affect you? F You, say the Republicans. The Republicans in the Senate voted to protect subsidies to Big Oil who have made billions in windfall profits thanks to high prices. Here they had a chance to help the American people, but they showed their true colors - the colors of their corporate benefactors - over the red white and blue colors of the American people. Here they also had a chance to cut our dependence on oil, and thus cut our economic, environmental and national security risks tied to oil. But it was the same old, same old. They know which side their bread is buttered. They know who to to suck up to, and it's not you and me and the American public, it's BIG OIL - as in BIG MONEY.

Want me to go on? I didn't think so, so I'll stop with just a quick list of F You's from the Republicans. Global warming deniers, birthers, union busters. In fact F You to virtually everyone except the wealthy and the big corporations. They have moved so far to the right that they are way way beyond the American mainstream. And they don't care because they have the ear of everyone who matters - the obscenely rich and big business. And for some unknown reason a lot of people are going along with it. Why? Is it because they think that they too will be hugely rich one day?

I think Daniels dropped out because he really doesn't want to be a part of the F You Party.

Persistance or habit?

Every year - well every year for the 3 years that we have lived here - a little bird, a wren, has built a nest in the wreath that Julia hangs on our front door. Julia has a selection of silk wreaths that vary with the season and her whim. Sometimes it is even a real wreath, made with some of natures bounty. Each year the wreath has been different, but each year that persistent little bird does not vary her routine. She builds her nest and lays between 3 and 5 eggs. We then have to stop using the front door for several weeks, entering and leaving our home via the garage and trying to intercept any visitors before they bang on the door. We don't always manage this and we have taken to checking the progress of the tiny feathered creatures daily. We do this by going out the garage door and over to the front door - afraid that if we open the front door the mother will fly into the house. The babies are remarkably quiet. I always thought they would chirp to attract the mother's attention and to ask her to give that tasty looking grub to ME. But the silence is uncanny, they never make the slightest noise, which I think is very wise, as 'There be Dragons here.' Well OK, cats. Which would result in their demise either way.

This year she laid 5 eggs of which 4 hatched. (We discovered the 5th unhatched egg after they had all left) So there were 4 babies, all looking very cute, and fluffy - well OK, feathery - then when they were all pretty much fully grown and really, really crowded in the tiny nest suddenly there were only three! We saw no sign of the fourth sibling, so don't know if she fell out or was pushed (A case for Detective Poirot - did she fall or was she pushed?) Anyway it could be that she made a tasty snack for a passing cat, raccoon or even a dragon? Or perhaps she was very precocious and left early, we hope so. The others were all gone when we looked yesterday, which was about 5 days after the Mysterious Disappearance of the Fourth Sibling.

Then it was clean up time. It is remarkable how much mess a few little birds can make on a door.

But all was not over. More persistence. This time in the form of wasps. For the third year running wasps started to build a nest on the front door, using some remarkably strong adhesive. They build it not just on the front door but in exactly the same place each time. But these guys are not so welcome. The first time the soft hearted Julia said "Leave them". So we did, but "They" got got obnoxious, buzzing us every time we went out or in. Opening the door produced a swarm of wasps some of who came into the house and had to be ushered out again - a hazardous duty. Visitors encountered them with varying degrees of alarm. They had to go. A can of wasp spray, and they were history.

But each year they still return, and I dispose of them quickly before they terrorize us and our guests again. How or why they keep coming back to that one spot year after year I do not know. Some must survive each time.

To return to this post's title - persistence or habit, what do you think? Or is it a routine, like the routines that we all have? I think I vote for instinct. All those other labels are human qualities, animals don't have them. Or do they . . . ?

Riddles.

What, could no one solve my two little riddles? Go back 4 posts to see them, two little riddles, easy. Well the second one is easy, the first one could occupy you for a few minutes. Why not give them a try?

Corruption.

I was reading recently about the corruption that exists in some countries. I was horrified to read that elected officials will take bribes. They can be bought with money, having been bought they will then do the bidding of their owners, passing laws in favor of the people who paid them!!

Wait, isn't that what happens here?

In some of these 'other countries' this bribery is done in secret. In others they are quite open about it, everyone knows 'how it is done'.

Here we do it both ways. In Congress and the Senate for example people called lobbyists meet openly with our politicians and regularly hand them money. The Health Insurance Industry for example spends one million dollars A DAY bribing them. (What else would you call it?). Why do they willingly hand over this princely sum of money every day? Is it because they like our honest, upstanding officials? No, I don't think so either. It is because they want OUR Congressmen to vote for THEIR industry. And they do. What would you do? The Health Insurance Industry is just one business that conducts business in this way. So too do the Oil Industry, Farming, and dozens, maybe hundreds of other big, and small, companies. It is accepted. Unbelievably it is accepted by us!!!! We sit by while the people that we voted into office to run the country for us, in the way we wanted them to run it, and in the way they promised to run it, do nothing that they told us they would do. They can't, they are too busy lapping up all this money. Who can find time to work, especially for the lousy $200,000 a year that they are being paid when there are lobbyists lined up at their doors BEGGING them to take money!

Hard to make ends meet on $200,000 a year, and a virtually unlimited expense account, not to mention free health care (That is real health care - not the bullshit health care that they voted in for us poor schmucks, and which they will doubtless soon be taking away from us so that their friends in the health care INDUSTRY can rip us for 2 to 4 times as much as we pay now. Oh and don't forget the letters that say "Sorry that is not covered", or the letter that says "You are sick, we can't afford to cover you any more." Those kind of letters will be back soon.) No that kind of health care is not good enough for the likes of them. Instead they voted themselves a REAL health insurance - that they do not pay for of course. We pay for it for them. While I am at it, the health insurance continues for them, and their families for the rest of their lives, paid for by us. Oh, and don't forget the pension scheme - wouldn't you love to have this pension - 100% of pay for LIFE. For your whole family, health insurance for life, and at no cost to them. (We get the bill) - and don't forget most of them can more than afford to pay for it, most are wealthier than you or I could even dream of. Did I forget to mention that their children get to go to the best schools for free. Well not for free, we get the privilege of paying for that too.

All this for a bunch of, mostly, scumbags who do nothing all day except take money from lobbyists, raise money from other rich people, people who they can help, for their re-election. Oh yes, you bet they want to get back in. And there will not be any time at all left over to do the work that we put them in there to do. They have to fly all over the place, stay in fancy hotels, eat expensive meals and entertain "important" people, all at our expense, in order to get reelected. Yes the next 4 years is spent getting re-elected. Well any time that they have left over after the main business of collecting money.

Yep, there is no doubt in my mind that the good old USA is the number one most corrupt country in the world.

THEY are in charge, THEY get to vote the laws, and there is no way THEY are going to change any of the laws - unless it is to make it even easier for them to steal from us.

Unfortunately, they will never make it illegal for Congressmen and Senators to take bribes from special interests. They will never vote in a law making, say, a 6 year term for Congressmen and Senators, so they can get on and do their jobs, instead of spending all their time (and all our money) working on getting re-elected. Have the same health insurance for them that we have, and pay for it themselves.

No, as an old saying goes - "We have the best politicians that money can buy."

I am going to advise my grandchildren to somehow or other get elected to Congress, for just one term. That is all you need, then you are set for life. You don't even need to take money from Big Business etc. Just do your job for 4 years and retire with an indexed pension and health insurance for life.

Well back to the fight. I got a new health insurance and prescription insurance on Jan 1st this year, making sure that it covered the one prescription that I take - it did. Here we are 5 months into the year and I am still fighting to get them to pay for the first months supply! They assure me that it is covered. I just have to go through special channels to get it. Five months! Once I get the first months supply, do you suppose it will take me another 5 months to get the next months? And this is before we get Medicare ripped out from under us - I'm sure it is coming - how long will it take to get it then?

I get more depressed with the system every day. And it looks like it is going to rain today! I was going to plant some seeds, so that we can get "Free" food from the garden.

Insider Trading.

Finally - some good news from the courts. I don't know how it happened but a BILLIONAIRE was finally found GUILTY - I know, I know, sounds impossible doesn't it? It seem this Billionaire decided that a billion (or two or more?) wasn't enough and he could steal another 60 Million using insider trading. Well he was caught. And found guilty! Faces up to 19 years in prison!!! Yeah, way to go. I hope he gets the full 19 years. He deserves it. No, not just because he is rich, but if you already have a BILLION and you try to STEAL more from people like you and me who have very little, then you are greedy beyond any hope of redemption.
I say lock him up and throw away the key.
You still don't belive that it happened do you? Well OK it did, it's true, just not in the USA of course. It happened in Britain. It will be a long, long time before any banker, politiion or super rich person in the US will ever be found guilty of anything.

Jobs.

I was thinking about our "Politicians" and wondering how it would work out if we hired our workers the same way we hired our politicians. Here's a couple of ideas about how it might work : -

Wanted Shop Assistant. Must not like people. Must give the product to the rich for free and charge the poor and middle class double - thus forcing the lower paid people to pay for the rich. Must be able to take "gifts" and bribes and kickbacks. Must work short hours and take long breaks. No experience necessary.

Wanted Car Mechanic. Must hate Cars and Car manufacturers. Must be mechanically inept. Prefer no experience.

Wanted Accountant. Must be unable to handle the job. Must not be able to balance the books. Must not be able to do simple addition. Prefer person with no business experience at all.

Wanted CEO. Must be able to steal from your customers, ruin your company and then be able to take a multi-million dollar bonus for "Good Performance" without laughing. Must have a hard heart and be able to lay off workers and hire workers in another country. Must be happy to pay no taxes - for you or your company.

That is how we would be running our businesses if we hired our employees the same careful way we hire our Politicians.

A riddle for you.

What am I?

Pronounced as one letter,
And written with three,
Two letters there are,
And two only in me,
I'm double, I'm single,
I'm black, blue and gray,
I'm read from both ends,
And the same either way,
What am I?


And another one, easy this time.

From the beginning of eternity,
To the end of time and space,
To the beginning of every end,
And the end of every place,
What am I?

Good luck, let me know when you get them.

David.

Budget.

Last week a cross section of the public were asked how much of the Federal Budget was used to subsidize NPR (National Public Radio) - in my view a public treasure that reports fairly on US and World happenings and has a veritable treasure trove of programs designed for every age and class of people. The average thought was 5%. They actually thought that 5% of the Federal Budget was used to subsidize Public Radio! The real figure is less than .01%.

I thought in view of this I would give a few figures that accurately reflect just how the Federal Budget is divided up.

The Military Budget is 54% of the entire Federal Budget! This figure is more than is listed on the budget because in the "Official" budget the amount spent on wars is not included in the Military budget. In other words the Federal Government does not include in the Military budget the money that is spent in Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya and probably a host of other wars that we are engaged in around the globe. It also does not include interest spent on the Military Debt, which is interesting because obviously if we did not spend so much on the Military we would not have any debt.
So, including those figures, the Military takes 54% of the entire US Federal Budget. Then there is 30% spent on Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid. This leaves 16% for EVERYTHING ELSE. By everything else I mean everything else the government spends. I will list just a VERY FEW things that are included on that list. Infrastructure - including roads, bridges etc, NASA - space exploration, The IRS, subsidies for the oil companies and agriculture and a host of other companies, the Courts, police, fire, the Treasury, the White House, Congress, The Senate, science, astronomy, PBS/NPR, all government regulatory departments, foreign aid - * (See note at bottom regarding foreign aid) and literally thousands of other federal departments.

So the 16% that covers everything except The Military, Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid is the only part that Congress is willing to cut. The Military and The Entitlements are sacred cows that cannot be touched. Obviously there is not room there - in the 16%, even if every thing were cut by 25%, which would devastate most of the programs, we would only shave 4% off of the entire budget!

Not voting to continue the 4% Bush tax cuts to the rich would have covered all of the cuts, and more! (And the rich already pay only 16% of their incomes in taxes compared to the average Americans 30% in taxes!!) They would hardly have noticed it. Instead so that they can keep even more money and be even richer than they were, we all have to suffer. We have to put up with eviscerated libraries, NPR/PBS cuts, roads that need fixing, cuts to police, fire, cuts to science, medical research, and a thousand other things that make life easier or more enjoyable for the poor and the middle classes - just so that the already disgustingly rich can have even more!! Did you know that the richest 400 Americans have more than half of what all Americans have combined? Let me put another way - the richest 400 Americans have more wealth than 155 MILLION Americans COMBINED! Now that is greed beyond belief, an Income Gap never seen anywhere else ever. The gap now is wider, by far, than it has ever been.

OK lets make the rich richer, forget trying to make them pay their fair share. We could still get around the cuts, by cutting the Military budget by 4%. Surely they would hardly notice a 4% cut. Certainly not as much as we would notice cuts of 25% to 50% in some of the programs more important to us.

Or there is yet another way. Social Security, Soc, Sec. taxes are deducted from the earnings of everyone earning up to $107,000. That means that I and probably most of you reading this pay Social Security tax on all of your earnings. Why should it only be the lowest earners that pay it? If everyone paid Soc Sec Tax on ALL of their earnings, problem solved. I pay it on all of my income, you pay it on all of your income, why should Tiger Woods not pay it on all of his income ($100 million a year! For playing golf!) The US has been good to him - and to all the Billionaires out there, they should be happy to help out and contribute to the country that gave them their wealth.

If you think that is taking too much from them - boo hoo - reduce the overall rate, I think it is 6% now, cut it to 5% or 4%, but deduct it from 100% of every ones earnings. (Then you and I would pay less!) Make it a rate that would take care of Soc Sec, and maybe Medicare and Medicaid for years to come.

We could also raise the retirement age, slowly, when Soc Sec was started, 65 was the age that most people started dying at! Now we live into our 80's and even 90's. If the retirement age were raised to 70, over a period of years - say increase it by 2 months every year, that would help tremendously.

Maybe a combination of the several suggested solutions? Or implement them all and pay off the National Debt. As President Clinton had planned! I think under his plan, it would have been almost down to zero by now! You may remember that Clinton left office with a surplus! Has that ever happened before? I'm not sure. Anyway, George Bush gave it away, remember? He said elect me and I will send everyone %600. He just barely got into office even with that offer! He sent out the checks and that was the end of any chance of getting rid of the National Debt. (I was thinking I might run for office and say "I will send $5,000 to everyone if you elect me." Do you think I would get in?)

There are other areas where money can and should be taken to pay for the running of the country. Boeing Company had a pretax profit of 10 Billion dollars from 2008 to 2010. During those three years they paid NO federal taxes! (They were recently given a 35 Billion contract to build planes for the Federal government. A nice reward for paying no tax!)
G.E. 2006 to 2010 $26.3 Billion pretax profit. Tax rate? Negative 15.8% - they got a REFUND of $4.2 Billion - after paying NO taxes! GE has more employees abroad than in the US! Their pretax profit abroad? $67.7 Billion - on which they paid tax, at the rate of 19.6%. Put another way, they get a REFUND in the US on their earnings. They pay TAX abroad on their earnings! Oh by the way they cut 20% of their work force in the US - and sent the jobs abroad! This IS a US company - I think. More greed!

* I promised to tell you about US foreign Aid. A lot of people think if we did not send aid abroad we could balance our budget. Not so.
It is a minuscule amount, especially compared to what most other countries in the world give - we are 22nd on the list of 22 richest countries in government aid to other countries as a percentage of our GDP (Gross Domestic Product.) The countries of The United Nations agreed on a figure of .7% of the GDP of the 22 wealthiest nations. Denmark gives the most with 1.1% of its GDP, most of the Scandinavian Countries give around 1%, The US gives .1%! (To repeat, one tenth of 1%, the lowest of the 22 richest countries.) And most of our foreign aid goes to places like, Israel, Egypt, Pakistan etc! Almost all of it is military aid. The little bit that goes to countries that really need help, like starving African Nations get what is called "Tied Aid" which means they have to use the money to buy from the US. This would seem to make sense until you realize that if a starving African Nation has to buy food from the US it's own farmers are not helped at all - they could work, grow food and sell it to their own government, but that is not allowed, their government must use the aid money to buy only from the US. So the "Help" is no help at all to the citizens. 90% of US aid is "Tied", The UK and Norway "Ties' 10%. Also, of the Foreign aid that the US sends, 80% of it goes to American Companies in those countries!

So, to sum up, stopping foreign aid would do nothing to help our budget woes. It is only .1% of our GDP, almost all of it is military aid to Israel, Egypt, Pakistan etc - not really what foreign aid was intended for, which was to help poverty stricken countries. What does go to countries in that category is "Tied" - it must be used to buy from the US, which hurts their economies not helps them. And finally 80% of the money goes to American companies in those countries anyway. You don't hear about these things here because US news is about the US. If anything is reported about non-US things it tells how it affects the US. European news, tries to give news about the whole world.

Sorry, if I sound bitter or anti-US, but I am telling it the way it is. And it is getting worse. Congress will cut and cut and cut, and they will be angry because it doesn't matter how much they cut they will be almost completely unable to affect the budget. Because they cannot touch the sacred cows of the Military, Soc Sec etc which represents 84% of the budget!! They will eviscerate everything that makes life worthwhile for many people and only be able to reduce the huge budget deficits by tiny amounts - even after crowing how they cut WICK, PELL, and goodness knows what else by huge amounts, they will have to admit that they have barely affected it at all. And then they will blame their idiocy on "Someone else".

Then they will continue to serve the Rich. That is what Congress and the Senate does, in case you hadn't noticed! They serve the Rich, they have no interest whatsover in anyone else, their entire reason for living is to make the Rich richer. Because of this the Rich throw crumbs to them when it is time for them, the Politicians, to retire, with just 100% of their salary for life and the best medical care money (our money) can buy! (Even if they only serve one term they get this incredible package!)

Enough already, I am so upset by our "Pile of Shitens", sorry Politicians, that I can barely see straight. Night, night.

Six Osprey.

What's that you say? Six Osprey? Yes, six, can you imagine. I looked out at The Lake yesterday morning and there they were, six of them, hovering - you know, the way they do, and swooping and diving into The Lake, all in the vicinity of Sunset Cottage. I could hardly believe my eyes. Fortunately they were not successful with every dive!

What with the three Great Blue Herons that I could also see from the vantage point in my living room, by the fire, and the Cormorants dotted about The lake I was wondering if we would ever have another home caught fish dinner! There just seems to be too much competition out there for the few remaining fish for me to succeed in "bringing home the bacon" in the form of a fish dinner.

Well, to heck with the fish dinner, lets just enjoy the birds.

Speaking of birds, the Canada Geese are still here, we should have a great lawn this year - if Goose poop is good lawn fertilizer!

The two Swans are much in evidence, with the male Swan going Ape sh*t every time he sees another bird that could imperil his offspring. That is, his offspring in the form of egg(s) being patiently sat on by his beautiful mate while she is perched on the top of a mountain of a nest. Unfortunately, as we know, they will never be born, the eggs having been oiled again. Baby Swans would be a delight to see but I think we can understand the danger that they would all be to the ecology of The Bay and The Lake in particular. As aggressive as this one pair of Swans are I cannot imagine if there were several pairs of them here. They would undoubtedly drive all the other birds off. They eat and destroy, by tearing up large quantities of The Bay's grasses too, which The Bay can ill afford, as most of it's grasses have already disappeared.

As most of you know, my own theory about the disappearance of The Bay's grasses is that they have succumbed to the onslaught of the hundreds or thousands of tons of weed killers that are poured onto the lawns surrounding our Bay. These lawns, in my humble opinion, especially the ones directly on The Bay front should be banned from having weedkillers or fertilizers of any kind being put onto them. They might as well pour it directly into The Bay. And of course, possibly not quite as bad, but almost so, are the weedkillers spread onto the lawns, gardens and roadsides all over the six State area that drains into the Chesapeake Bay.

When a National Treasure like The Chesapeake Bay is plundered day after day by so many rapists, with no restraints put on them, it is sickening. I compare it to pouring poisons and acids onto The American Constitution or The Mona Lisa. The Chesapeake Bay is even more irreplaceable than those treasures, but we act as though it were a bank with inexhaustible funds that we can withdraw at will.

If only we would stop raping her she could repair herself. Surely it would be cheaper to leave the Oysters, the Menhaden and the other natural cleaners to do their jobs and clean up The Bay, rather than for us to have to live on the shores of the World's Largest Cess pool?

Hail.

Hail to what you say. Why hail to me of course.

Yesterday was in many ways a typical day, busy. Let me a take a few minutes to tell you about it. It was quite warm when I woke up and I did the usual chores, made coffee for me, got the wood stove going, opened the chickens, turned on the computers, collected the newspapers, fed the cats. Usual stuff. Then I made tea and took it in to Julia. We watched The Lake. There was a large bird in a tree close to the house that we finally determined to be an Osprey. It was hidden by branches and the emerging leaves. Another Osprey landed in another tree close by and they seemed to be sizing each other up. Yet another Osprey was hovering close by over The Lake and it made a successful dive into the water, coming up with a nice sized fish. It flew off. When Julia said "Why are they just sitting there and not fishing?" they seemed to take the hint, and flew off.

Meanwhile elsewhere on The Lake the flock of Cormorants that appears every morning and then disappears was in evidence. As on most mornings today's crowd was about 40 or 50 birds strong. They are a delight to watch as they swim along mostly submerged with just their heads and necks above water. When they dive they stay submerged for as much as a minute. I assume they can swallow their prey under water although sometimes we see them come up with a fish and swallow it while they are on the surface. If we get the numbers that we have had here in previous years we could see as many as 100 or even 200 birds. As I said they are enjoyable to watch, but it is scary to think of all the fish that they consume. Will they leave enough for me?

There were a number of other birds scattered around, including what may be favorite, the Great Blue Herons.

Anyway, we had to leave our little bit of Paradise and head for the Accountants Office. It is tax time in the US and Julia and I had spent much of the last three days preparing for the annual assault on our income by the dreaded IRS! That over, we headed for the library, then the bank, Trader Joe's in Annapolis and finally to Koontz Toyota, also in Annapolis, for our first service, 5,000 miles, on our "new", now 6 months old, Prius.

While they did whatever it is they do to cars when they "Service" them. Screw them up? We decided to have some lunch. Julia remembered a little cafe that was just a few blocks away and we walked there. As I said earlier, it was warm today. WAS warm, being the operative words, it was now cold and getting colder. It was so warm earlier that I had forgotten to take a coat with me! Anyway The Wild Orchid Cafe was warm and inviting and I enjoyed a Guinness with my Bison Burger while Julia sipped a glass of wine with her Crab Cake.

Then it was a quick walk back to the dealer, while observing that 'it looked like snow', and indeed it did look like snow. But it didn't snow here, although we later heard that much of the East Coast north of us did in fact receive as much as several inches of the white stuff. But not us.

We headed home, stoked up the fire and had a little rest. Soon, lightening, followed quickly by rumbles of thunder and then an ominous drumming on the house. Turning on the outside lights and looking out I saw - - - Hail, Marble sized and heavy, the ground was soon completely covered. Julia had no sooner voiced her worry for the fate of our flowers than it had stopped. Barely 5 minutes long but the damage was done. Some of the Daffodils and Primroses were broken, but her main worry, the Lenten Roses seemed this morning to have survived unscathed.

It is cold again today and the forecast calls for temperatures only in the 40's for the daytime this week with it being right around freezing at night. We are hoping that our proximity to the waters of The Bay and our Lake will keep us above freezing.

Soon, very soon we hope, spring and summer will be here.

My favorite daughter.

It is daughters week and Sarah is my favorite daughter. You don't have to worry about my other children being jealous, because she is my only child, but if I had ten daughters or a hundred I'm sure that she would still be my favorite. She is a winner in every way. Works two or three jobs. Takes care of four sons, two dogs, a husband and a home. I don't know how she does it, but I sure hope that I had something to do with it. I know her mother did.

It always brightens up my day when I see her, she has a beautiful smile that lights up the room. But like a beautiful flower she attracted pests too! Boys. Watching her being picked up by a boyfriend felt like handing over a stradivarius violin to a gorrilla.

She's a survivor too. She survived a major earthquake in California that happened just a few days after she arrived there. She survived a major bout with cancer. She has survived four boys - including two teenage sons! There have been many more life changing episodes that no one person should have to go through but she has survived them all.

Far from me teaching her, I think I have learned more about life and how to live it from Sarah. And she looks great.

It is hard to believe she is 29 already. (I'll never tell)

I love her with all my heart and I always will.

War, War, War. (The Swans are at war.)

Well we have a war in Libya against a maniac killing his own people, war of course in Afghanistan, wars no doubt in many other countries, a sort of war in Japan against radioactivity and other tragedies, whilst here on The Lake the male Swan has, as usual in the Spring, declared open warfare on everything on The Lake.

Anything swimming on The Lake is fair game as far as he is concerned. I have been working outside today and every now and then I hear a tremendously loud sound, the beating of wings. He chases any Goose, Duck or Cormorant and even the occasional Kayaker until they leave. It seems to be in vain. While he is busy chasing off the next offender they casually walk back down into the water and start paddling around again until he has chased off everything else and gets back to them once again.
The male Swan is a very large bird and I have no doubt that if he were to attack me he could inflict considerable damage. A blow from his wings could probably break an arm or a leg.

In fact there are quite a few Canada Geese here that have injuries, mostly to their legs. At least they seem to be the most obviously damaged parts. I have no way of knowing if he did the damage but I did hear from someone that he was seen to kill one of the young geese a few years ago.

The problem is that his protective warfare continues for a long time. The local animal control authority oils their eggs, thus rendering them unable to hatch. The Swans don't know this and so instead of her sitting for the usual 5 or 6 weeks she sits there for several months and the male continues to wage his protective battle. It might be kinder to break the eggs but I suppose she would lay more then.

They stop the Swans from breeding because they are not native birds. They also do considerable damage to the grasses of the Chesapeake Bay, eating and pulling up a large amount of the grasses - which are in very short supply already, probably killed by all the weed killers that are poured into The Bay. Well OK, they weren't poured in, but they might just as well be. The millions of lawns surrounding The Bay are looked at as proudly by their owners as the Swans look at their huge eggs. The war by neighbor against neighbor to have the greenest most perfect lawn, takes no prisoners. Whether it is Swans, Canada Geese, Falcons, Owls, Osprey, Fish, Crabs or any other creature of our wonderful Chesapeake Bay matters not. They would willingly sacrifice every wonderful animal, bird, fish or insect just to have their lawn greener than Joe's lawn!

Meanwhile the battle goes on, Swan against all other birds threatening his mate and their offspring, conservationists against the killers of our flora and fauna and Ghadaffi against his citizens, when will it ever end?

Albania.

I can hear you now, Albania? Well, Albania is in the news lately. It is slowly becoming a part of "The Real World", and I am remembering my first 'contact' with Albania.

It was in 1964 - 47 years ago - I was on my honeymoon with Julia, 'The Girl Of My Dreams', as she was then, and still is now.

We had gone to Budva in what was then Yugoslavia. Yugoslavia was under the control of Tito at the time. He was what I would have called then a Benevolent Communist, he had control of the country, he was in fact a Dictator, but the country worked, and it was open to the West.

Anyway, we were on our honeymoon, Budva had been a good choice, it was a beautiful country, and Budva was a charming, small, walled town with friendly "natives", wonderful weather, beaches and food. And it was an 'adventure'. In spite of being "open" to the west, it was still a mysterious and backward country.

Even getting to Yugoslavia had been an adventure to us. We flew there, on our first air flight. The plane was a DC-5 - I think - ancient even then! The interior of the plane was bare metal with thousands of rivets visible, every one of which was loose! The 'windows' which were even smaller than those on today's planes, if that is possible, were covered with metal mesh, I hate to say chicken wire, but that's pretty much what it was. The noise from the old engines, the loose rivets and the wire on the windows was so loud that conversation was difficult. But we barely noticed - did I mention that we were on our honeymoon, our first flight and an adventure?

Our arrival in Yugoslavia was not on time. We were in fact about 12 hours late. After waiting at Gatwick "Airport" - think of today's Gatwick, one of the world's busiest airports and then think of a field with a small building on it. That was Gatwick in 1964. The flight was at first late, then delayed, then had not yet left Yugoslavia!

We were bused to Brighton, to the Grand Hotel. Yep, the very same one where an attempt was made on Britain's Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher's life 15 years later, in 1979. Interestingly enough, exactly 15 years to the day after we stayed there on September 19th 1964 the Assassinee (What is the title for an attempted assassin?) checked in, on September 19th 1979. He dug a hole in the wall of his room, planted a gelignite bomb, covered it so well that no one noticed it, maybe in our old room? and it went off 22 days later on October 11th when Margaret Thatcher was there - at 2.45 am - it did not kill her, but it did kill 5 other people.

So, we stayed there for the night. Well not really, we arrived at about 1.00am, the porters etc came out and got our bags, they had obviously just got out of bed! They then got us up again at 4.00am to be taken back to the airport! When we opened our bags in the room - at 1.00 am - it was to find it stuffed with confetti, which promptly fell out all over the floor! For some reason or other we picked it all up. Why, I will never know, what did we care if they knew we were just married? But we did. Imagine us, on our hands and knees on the floor of our hotel room at 1.30am, picking up confetti on our first night! I could say we were tired, and I think we were, but we were young. And we should have been tired, after an early rise, to get ready for our wedding. A drive, for me, with my best man, Den Lee, a stop at a pub for a "quick one", then a stop at Julia's house, oops you are not supposed to see the bride before the wedding, where a large glass of whiskey was pushed into my hand by Julia's mother with the admonition, "Go away". Then the wedding, I don't remember much about it, except she looked fantastic, oh yes and the heel on one of her gold shoes broke off as she entered the church. She managed to 'walk' down the aisle without anyone noticing. The offending shoes were removed in the taxi cab after the ceremony. They had very high stiletto heels. (And the shoe store would not replace the brand new shoes, worn once for about 50 feet!) Gold, you are saying? Yes, something you probably already know about Julia is that she is different. The wedding dress, a true work of art, made by one of the Queens Dressmakers, was of gold brocade and she had gold accessories. Stunning is the Understatement of the Year.

When she arrived and stood next to me, she looked at me, and could apparently tell that I had been drinking - I had promised not to - I blurted out, "Your mother gave it to me." This seemed to satisfy her, although I didn't relish hearing what she would say to her mother later, and the ceremony continued. Whew, a close call.

Where was I? Oh yes, back to the airport and our ancient plane, which delivered us safely to Yugoslavia.

Our bags recovered, they put us onto a coach, also ancient, but not as ancient as the plane. We left Dubrovnik airport on a new four lane highway. After about 1/2 a mile, or maybe only a 1/4 of a mile, the coach slowed down and bumped off of the highway onto a dirt road. Oh, we thought, they haven't finished it, there must be a space before it begins again. One hundred miles later, well maybe it was only 60 or 70 miles, we reached Budva!

But what a ride! The scenery and the ride were breathtaking. The road went along the coast in places and across mountains in other places. We saw unfamiliar trees, bushes, plants, flowers, birds and animals and dust, lots of dust! The edge of the road was never very far away, sometimes you could not see the edge of the road, it was somewhere under the bus. Then we arrived at a river - with no bridge - what to do now? Had the bridge been washed away? Were we lost? The bus stopped and waited. Then a raft appeared. A raft? Well, it was a big raft. We were all told to get off of the bus. The bus was driven onto the raft, and we all got onto the raft. But not onto the bus!

After more dusty miles and more adventures we arrived in Budva. At the Hotel Avala. (Which incidentally is still there, although much bigger now. We saw it just last year, on our first return trip there, in 2010, 46 years later.) The difference in the country - - - -, well another story for another day. if you want to hear it, ask me. It was dark, The Hotel staff welcomed us with trays of Slivovich - a local alcoholic drink - in small, very small, glasses. We were hot, dry, dusty and very thirsty. we reached for the welcome beverage, wanting to slake our thirst, and tossed it down. Have you ever tried Slivovich? No need to go out and buy some, use a small quantity of gasoline mixed 50/50 with rubbing alcohol to get a rough idea!

The next morning, and all the other mornings in Budva were like being in Paradise. Did I mention that we were on our honeymoon? The hotel was great. I was not very familiar with hotels, but in today's parlance I would call it a 4 or 5 star hotel, adjusting for the year. There was a wonderful beach right outside of the Hotel, a 30 second walk from the entrance of the hotel to the water. A walk of a few hundred yards along a path carved out of the cliff led to another, hidden beach. The walk went along the edge of the sea with waves breaking over the rocks that had come from cutting the walkway into the cliff. The town of Budva was a two minute walk, or less, and looked the same as it must have looked centuries ago. Open sewers ran along the middle of the "Roads", which were 10 to 20 foot wide, there were a few shops, an occasional market that sold local fruits, vegetables and meats. There were no stalls the wares were on the ground and the 'Shopkeepers" were women dressed in all black head to toe robes. The wares were not at all appetizing looking.

We wandered the streets. Some of the gardens had laundry hanging up, and there were the womens black robes drying in the sun alongside brightly colored underwear! Red Bras, slips, stockings and underpants. Looking into the dirt floored houses we could see children sitting on the floors watching TV.

Some evenings were spent in the underground nightclub under the watchful eye of "The Commissar" as we called him. Especially after he insisted that one of our number pay for a glass that he accidentally dropped onto the floor! Or we had parties on the beach or at one of the rooms that some of the guests had in small cabins up on the hill above the hotel. I lost most of one day after I discovered that one of my favorite liquors at the time -rum - could be had for about $1 for a large bottle. Sure it was a local brew, but how different could it be? Well I don't know if it was the quality or the quantity, but lets just say I was unwell for a day or so!

Another day we sat on the cliff at a Cafe and ordered coffee. Have you ever had Yugoslavian coffee? Don't bother, it is a very strong 'coffee', in a very small cup. Approximately half is 'coffee', the other half, in the bottom of the cup, is a sort of mud. Anyway, language was a difficulty. I took seven years of French in school and spoke about seven words of French, really. Julia's French was a little better, but she also spoke some German and a little Dutch - which was of no use at all. The other couple with us were similarly language inhibited. We got together and put together a sentence which I delivered. It was partly in French and partly in German, they seemed to speak some of each, but not much English. The sentence went something like this, "Quatra Cafe, deux mit milch and deux mit out milch", This produced gales of laughter from us, which lasted for several minutes, but no reaction from our waiter. The Mit Out was the part that had us almost rolling on the ground. Mit was OK - with. But how to say without? Anyway, the coffee did arrive.

On yet another day we borrowed a rowing boat, no need to rent, just ask! And we rowed out to a small Island off of the coast. It was too far to swim, about a 1/2 mile, but ideal for a small row boat. The Island of maybe 20 acres or so had a beach at one end, the end we were going to, and rose steadily to a height of maybe 150 to 200 feet at the other end. We reached the beach and "Explored", there was a tiny chapel on the beach. It was about 10 foot square and contained nothing. Outside were a number of cactus plants, they were everywhere in Yugoslavia, some had fruits on them. We carefully removed some ripe ones and cut them open, they were surprisingly tasty. Back to the mainland.

Snorkeling, our new friends Margaret and Ed had a snorkel and face mask. We took it in turns to explore a New World. Right off the beach in front of the hotel was a whole New World! We were fascinated, and have since snorkeled in many parts of the world. There were fish swimming around right where we were swimming.

Got to finish up. I hope someone has stayed for the punch line - Albania.

Albania, there were trips from Budva, we took one one day to Lake Scutari which is on the border of Yugoslavia and Albania. The day was grey, Lake Scutari was grey, Albania was grey, and definitely CLOSED. We were happy to not go there! There was a lonely French lady on the small boat with us and no other French people. Julia and I pooled our very limited French and composed a short sentence - "La nage sur la montagne". I spoke in my halting "French" as I pointed at the mountain with the snow on it! (For those of you as limited in the French language as we are, "The snow on the mountain" - I think!) The French ladies eyes lit up and she started spouting French at an incredible rate. It was apparent to her that we did not understand. We said "Un peau", "Un petit peau", which I think means "A little", "A very little." She went off again, a little slower, but we could not follow, it was like trying to follow a Nascar on a bicycle, we were hopelessly out paced. After a while she gave up and slumped back into her depressed mode.

The rest of the vacation was as wonderful as the first. We returned to our new home. I carried Julia over the threshold and continued on into My Life With Julia.

And what a Life! If it comes to an end soon, it has been a great one. I have been blessed with a beautiful, amazing wife, a host of wonderful friends, an adventure of a life, and two loving, clever, superior parents who raised me and taught me right.

Remembering Three Mile Island.

The present tragedy in Japan reminds me of Three Mile Island. Even after living through those scary times in 1979 I cannot begin to imagine the horror of living through one of the strongest earthquakes ever, plus a huge tsunami and then the "Problems" with 4 of the 6 nuclear reactors at the site.

I was working at The News American at the time. The News American was one of Baltimore's two newspapers at the time, the oldest one, now defunct. I was a District Manager and part of my work included collecting money from the carriers. This was done at various times during the month, I had 60 or 70 carriers in my district. One day in March I was due to head to the office for meetings, paper work and to deposit my collections from the previous week. The story was on the early news. The presses were stopped and the new headlines began to run.

I decided that in view of the happenings I would not deposit the money that I had collected, I think it was 2 or 3 thousand dollars, but instead I would hold it and deposit it next week - if we were still there! Fearing an evacuation of the area - they did evacuate the area around the reactor - not knowing if it would happen or how far the evacuation would stretch and having not only a wife but an 8 year old daughter I decided that it would be prudent to hold onto the money in case we had to drive to Florida or something. In such an eventuality food and gas prices would be very high!

Compounding the situation was a movie that had come out recently called "The China Syndrome" - starring Jane Fonda - in which a nuclear reactor comes close to a meltdown. There are stories that if it does melt down the core would go through the Earth to China! They also said that an area the size of Pennsylvania would be uninhabitable for centuries, etc, etc.

Nothing like that happened and I deposited the money the next week.

Disaster averted, what will happen this time? Eventually my guess is that we will have another disaster at least as bad as Chernobyl.

Is it possible that we will eventually decide, that if we do continue to build nuclear plants, just maybe we should not build them on fault lines? Seems like a good idea to me!

We just narrowly, perhaps, avoided a meltdown of our financial system, for now, brought on by greed and a lack of controls. Will we continue to reject proper controls in the area of Nuclear Power in our lives too? I think maybe not. If the continuing problems at the Japanese reactors continue and really get out of hand, I think we will have stronger controls brought in. The Nuclear Power Industry does not have anything like the power of Bankers, Wall Streeters and Politicians who we cannot restrain at all, but I am sure we will put curbs on Nuclear Power, and continue to limit our citizens rights while giving our Bankers and Politicians Open Season on us!! (Well, we don't GIVE them control over us, they just TAKE it. Of course we do nothing. Remember we voted for them to KEEP the 4% tax break that George W Bush gave them, even though the richest top 2% of Americans already pay only 16% in taxes compared to the average Americans 30% in taxes.)

I say send the Bankers and Politicians into the next Nuclear Plant Meltdown to control it. All those in favor say "YES".

P.S. If anyone is reading my Blog would you mind indicating it by making a Comment or by e-mailing me at julia-david@comcast.net? I try to avoid political comments as much as possible, I really really do! Just look at my last half dozen posts. See, hardly anything political at all! Aren't I being good?