Author Archives: Commentary about the Blue Marble

Battlefield Casualties

19 Tuesday Apr 2022

Posted by in Gun Violence

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            A few decades ago the military started using WIA and KIA instead of using wounded and killed in action. The new media continues to use the same terms in their war news. Why don’t they use those terms for the wounded and deaths here? Granted the United States isn’t a real war zone but more people were shot here last year than in the Afghanistan war zone. IEDs and Bombs killed more there.

            It seems a soldier may have a greater chance of being killed here than any other war zone. A mass shooting is when four or more people are shot in a single event. We are having double digit numbers of those every week. Recently San Jose’s mass murder of nine made the news only because it occurred in a big media market.

            Congress and all of America would be livid if that many people were killed in repeated 737 MAX passenger jet crashes. Why not the 50 – 60,000 killed by guns every year? This year may set a record on numbers of deaths and mass shootings. We die from guns at the rate of one Viet Nam War each year.

            Why isn’t something being done? Money in political campaign chests buys our elected officials and an intense and expensive media campaign. The money is spent to convince people to protect themselves from others with guns. The gun lobbies aren’t non-profit organizations of poorly paid people but highly paid people diverting membership money to their own use.

            Maybe our gun deaths should be reported as WIA and KIA.

Gun Wrongs

19 Tuesday Apr 2022

Posted by in Gun Control

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            Chicago’s crime problem isn’t much worse than any other community on a per capita basis. It seems most cities and towns have a gang and drug problem. How to solve the problem is another thing they have in common.

            Let’s face it; Sheriff Andy Taylor in Mayberry doesn’t exist in today’s world. Andy didn’t usually carry a gun and even against armed bad guys he seldom used one. Today’s cops wear armored vests and carry semi-automatic pistols with high capacity magazines. Next is the controversial part of being a cop today: when to shoot and go home and when to think twice and go to the morgue. In the nano-second of the confrontation the cop must decide if the item in the person’s hand is a phone, a toy, or a gun. Does he or she still have the gun seen a few moments ago, and could that hand motion mean the gun is about to be pointed at the cop? Child or adult doesn’t matter since pre-teens are killers today.

            Too often well meaning people parade around protesting about crime one day and the next day police activity. Some prosecutors’ and judges think leniency is the solution. Low or no bail is the current fad which puts arrested people back on the street where they commit more crimes.

            We have more people in prison than any other country and the highest rate of recidivism. Clearly we have many problems in our criminal justice system. Much of it was passed for Andy to use in today’s world where little kids are given guns so they can shoot another kid in a drive by or an adult to kill a group in a park, store or church. No, we all have a problem!

Why Deny The Inevitable?

11 Monday Apr 2022

Posted by in Refugees

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            Why do people think their situation will become better if they wait? Law enforcement broadcasts tell people to leave before a hurricane yet they will wait until it hits. Then they will plead for rescue. People knew for months the allies were going to leave Afghanistan but didn’t try to leave until the last few days. Officials are always blamed for the stupidity of those who don’t “git while the gittin’s good.”

            Hundreds of thousands of Ukrainians have been leaving the Ukrainian cities every day because they were told what was going to happen. However many millions have stayed and are hoping they can leave after their city is surrounded and being shelled. Where in Putin’s history would these people think he would care about them? It just isn’t in the Russian way of fighting a war. Flattening the city being attacked and killing the civilians was Russia’s way of war against the Nazis and in every war since.

            As I watch the old and infirm trying to get out of Kyiv after being shelled for days, I wonder where they will now go since the buses and trains are being stopped. Why did they wait? How many Americans have stayed figuring American troops will come to get them? The Ukraine War isn’t a movie. The bad guys will win after thousands more of those people who should have left die. Thousands of American citizens are still there and will soon want to evacuate. They will want Biden to get them out and he won’t. It’s their stupidity to have stayed – just like in Afghanistan.

When Will They Come

01 Friday Apr 2022

Posted by in Refugees, Ukraine

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            When I was in the fourth grade in 1956-7, we had a refugee girl from the Hungarian Revolution in class. She was a light complexioned girl with blonde pigtails. I don’t remember her having a lot of English language skills to start but she was learning before she left to go somewhere else. I don’t remember if she was with other family members. I only said hello a few times because she was very shy. Her name was Magdalena.

            If our little community of 3,000 hosted a refugee family, will we all soon start to host Ukrainians? As I write this over two and a half million Ukrainians, almost all women and children, have left for other countries. The expectation is three times as many in the next few months will be refugees. I expect some will soon be coming to North America. Will they ever go back is the question. If Putin’s lackeys take over they probably won’t. The cities will be devastated for decades and they won’t have a place to live for years to come. Hundreds of thousands will make new lives and never go back. Will they still be welcomed in a few years?

When to End Sanctions

01 Friday Apr 2022

Posted by in Ukraine

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            When to end the World’s sanctions on Russia itself, its companies, and people is an important question. When the war is over? When the Russian troops have left Ukraine? When the Ukraine is whole and functioning again? How about when all the damage is repaired and paid for by Russia’s oil and gas exports?

            Putin has caused hundreds of billions if not trillions of dollars in damage to the private, public, and national government’s buildings and infrastructure. The Ukraine can’t pay for all the repairs and the rest of the world should not foot the bill unless a 70% rebate on Russia’s oil and gas exports is applied to the advance of funds by the rest of the world.

            Keeping the sanctions on until the payments are made in full will act as a deterrent to other countries invasion ambitions.

The Truth about Oil Production

01 Friday Apr 2022

Posted by in Production, Oil & Gas

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            This writer gets extremely tired of the ignorance of many reporters and the political lies about crude oil and natural gas production. Apparently the GOP big mouths want to keep it that way so their half-truths and complete lies will be believed. It can take millions of dollars and years to produce oil and gas.

            To get a barrel of oil out of the ground and to a refinery involves getting a lease to drill. Majors and wildcatters have thousands of leases they haven’t tested yet and thousands they have tested but haven’t drilled on yet. A couple of thousand have been approved last year by Biden’s agencies.

            Next the seismic tests are made to see if the rock layers below look like they may be shaped right to hold oil or gas. For the smaller companies they will require financing and the majors need to put the location into the potential’s hopper and request funding.

            If oil or gas is found then the drilling pipe must be replaced with production piping, fracked, and other down-hole work done. If the oil doesn’t flow out very fast then a pump must be brought in for long term use. Piping must be buried so oil can flow from the wells to the tanks battery. To get from the tank to the main pipeline requires additional piping or tank trucks.

            All of this requires hundreds of thousands of hard working people and they aren’t there. Canada and many other countries have the same labor shortage restricting development of new wells.             Now you know the truth. If the GOP big mouths want to help, they can get an oilfield job!

Always Another One

01 Friday Apr 2022

Posted by in Russia, Ukraine

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            During an episode of Hogan’s Heroes, Sergeant Schultz said “Women are like wars, there is always another one”. Europe used to have a big multi-national war every few years until World War II. Thanks to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, Europe hasn’t had a big war since WWII. After the Soviet Union broke up, the members got less scared and committed to war games and expenditures.

            Trump harassed the members to spend three percent of their budgets which was good but his pro-Putin discussions and statements agitated the other members. According to his Security Advisor, John Bolton, Trump’s second term’s objective was to leave NATO. Without the United States to keep the organization functioning and ready to defend its members, Russia would be able to pick off the old USSR countries and maybe all of Europe. They did nothing when Putin annexed part of Georgia and the Ukraine so Putin thought their weakness would allow him to take all of Ukraine and then Moldova.

            What has happened is the opposite. The old USSR countries and the rest of Europe have moved into lockstep with the other Europeans. The United States has reassumed the role as leader much to Putin’s surprise and agitation. Most of the world’s countries are sanctioning Putin, his cronies, and Russia. Switzerland joined into the efforts for the first time. Sweden and Finland are starting the process to join NATO. Moldova is considering its options to join the European Union and NATO.

            The war with Ukraine’s army has shown Russia’s army isn’t the image Putin proclaimed. After three weeks his invasion force is bogged down and wanting more help. The war has become a disaster for Putin’s plan of greatness for Russia and himself.

Problem With Sanctions

23 Wednesday Mar 2022

Posted by in Sanctions

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            This is the problem with sanctions. When and how does a country get free of them? Many severe sanctions have been levied against President Putin, his sycophants, and the country for the invasion of Ukraine. Do they come off when Russia has won, when they pull out but leave a pro-Russian government and military, after pulling out without winning, or after reparations are made for damages they caused?

            Could the sanctions be kept in effect until Putin is no longer alive, or no longer President but controlling Russia through a puppet, or just not President? Pressure will be on to a return to normal in a few months. People get riled up easily and quickly but they don’t stay that way for very long. Will the leaders of the NATO countries and others continue the pressure of sanctions when their countrymen have turned away from support?

            Currently, the big mouths of the GOP are pushing President Biden to do more. These are the same big mouths that said Ukraine was a terrible corrupt country and its leaders were worse. Trump’s followers said the same just a few weeks ago. Trump still talks about his friend’s genius. How long before they fall back in line and push to remove sanctions?

            Please respond with an opinion.

Mother Nature’s Revenge

23 Wednesday Mar 2022

Posted by in Climate Change

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            As I write this, pictures of the massive F4 tornado that hit Winterset, Iowa are on the television screen. My first thought is of the destruction of Mayfield, Kentucky. This one is basically a winter tornado and rare or at least, it used to be rare. Climate change has upset historical weather data used for projections.

            People don’t realize all that a minor change in the levels of carbon dioxide and methane are doing to day-to-day weather, world climate, and sea levels. Young people today have a base reality different than people of my age. I remember the ground freezing five feet down. I remember temperatures of 20-25 degrees below zero and trying not to freeze my lungs. During the last couple decades seldom have I felt a few degrees below freezing and the ground froze only a few inches.

            I remember ice breakers trying to cut through the arctic ice cap in the summer. Now ice breakers can get between the northern land masses and the thick ice of the cap in winter. I remember seeing glaciers in glaciers in Glacier National Park in the early 1950s. Now they are almost all gone. Melting of the world’s glaciers is raising the ocean levels around the world. By the end of this century many o the world’ cities will be flooded or diked as a temporary stop-gap measure.

Is Ukraine Putin’s Downfall

23 Wednesday Mar 2022

Posted by in Putin, Ukraine

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            Putin thought he could roll through Ukraine in a few days while controlling what his people know about it. A few bodies can be hidden as with his previous excursions.  The possibility of additional sanctions could be overcome until they are lifted. The ethnic Russians in the Ukraine would line the streets cheering his troops marching through towns and cities.

            None of the above has worked out as in his dream. He is fighting an information war to keep his disastrous invasion from his people.  In today’s digital world, keeping the truth from coming out is impossible so his people will slowly learn the truth and not his reality he has fed them.

            When bodies of the thousands of dead troops start coming home or go missing, people are going to react by questioning what Russia is doing in a friendly country. Statistics say the ratio of killed to wounded is at least one to three meaning over 25,000 have been wounded.

            Sanctions were not as easy as he anticipated and appear to be of a long duration. The hundreds of companies that have pulled out of Russia meaning the average citizen is aware of something going wrong and affecting their lives. Wiping out all the economic gains of the last two decades is going to create social problems.

            Thousands have been protesting the war against Ukraine. Over two thousand have been locked up and hundreds injured by police. What will Putin do when the protesters number in the hundreds of thousands or millions? Can he survive a general uprising?