Now Is The Time

29 Saturday Nov 2025

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In an usual twist of this blog I would like to talk about great places we have been and encourage readers to get in their vehicles and see them while they can. The “while they can” is two fold. One is Climate Change is in the process of destroying the sites and biodiversity. The other is mobility although I must say we were never the hikers that would have exposed us to greater views.

As a geographer and historian I recommend Civil War Battlefields. The best would be those around Chattanooga, Tennessee, Antietam, Vicksburg, and Gettysburg. I would like to go back to Gettysburg to ask the experts what would have happened if Meade had let Lee have the Ridge and then surrounded him without food, water, and ammunition. The war could have been over much earlier saving tens of thousands of lives. Go see the aquarium and butterfly collection in Chattanooga.

We have been in most of the National Parks in the lower forty-eight states so I recommend Yellowstone, Everglades, Big Bend, Zion, Arches, Grand Canyon, Crater Lake, Death Valley, Mount Rushmore (better before the modernizations were added.),Mesa Verde, and Carlsbad and Mammoth Caves. Those are the “Do Not Miss!

Other places are the Pink Coral State Park in Colorado (dust sized pink sand dunes), Roosevelt National Park for Buffalo (although the Elk and Buffalo Refuge in Kentucky’s Land Between the Lakes is often better for real eye ball to eyeball viewing.) Great Sand Dune National Park, Pike’s Peak, Florida Keys, Rocket Launch, Museums in Washington DC, Williamsburg, House Tours in Natchez, Mississippi, Meter Crater in Arizona, the Real London Bridge at Lake Havasu, Okefenokee Swamp, Yosemite, Kings Mountain, Bad Lands, Monument Valley and the Air Force Museum in Dayton, and of course Niagara Falls on the Canadian side. You can go under the Falls in Tunnels.

We have never done a Bed and Breakfast because it is uncomfortable to be in someone else’s home, or staying even in a relative’s home much less a total stranger’s. Of the couple hundred of places we have stayed, we recommend the duplexes overlooking the Ohio River on the cliff in Cave-In-Rock Illinois State Park with a cafe across the lane, the Malanga in Mobile (Great story), Cabins in the Keys, in North Cabins of Fort Stock, Texas, The View in Monument Valley Navajo Tribal Park in Oljato-Monument Valley, Utah (second and third floors have terraces and Navajo Food Restaurant owned by the tribe).

We liked Zoos in Milwaukee, San Diego, Atlanta and Washington DC but seeing “caged”
animals became a turn off. A safari in Africa would have been nice. Oh, Yes, I forgot the Australia Zoo North of Brisbane (Allowed to pet the creatures).

Never wanted to be on a ship with a few thousand of my best friends so we have rafted the Yellowstone River during a very white water, boated the Bayous in Louisianan and the Okefenokee Swamp in a small guided tour boats. We have ferried the Mississippi and Ohio Rivers, Puget Sound, Long Island to Groton, and most exciting was Swash Inlet to Ocracoke Island (we were the center car, with the rocking five feet up and down and four feet bow to stern – we were hugely lucky in our position), we took a small boat fishing Florida Bay for sharks (great jaws story), and whale sightseeing tour in Monterey Bay in California. Additionally a small ship to the Great Barrier Reef and a submarine in the reefs.

I like to drive in real mountains on exciting roads and we have been on big roads with several thousand foot drop offs with wrecked cars below. We were the first one through and early heavy snow was on one side of a mountain and dry on the other. We drove Pike’s Peak with 75 curves up and 75 down with a ranger checking flatlanders who rode their hot brakes, and hundreds of other miles that flatlanders would creep on. My million plus miles go from -270 feet to +14,110 feet in elevation.

My advice to all Americans is put down all your devices and go see America. Go to the Smokey Mountains before seeing the Rockies and Sierra Mountains. See our volcanoes and Western National and State Parks. Meet the locals in little cafes and over breakfast at your hotel. People love to talk about their home area. Stay away from franchise food and experience local cuisines. Ask the Hotel staff for ideas and not your device. Drive through big cities and stay in the small ones and towns. Look out the car windows and see life. Maybe be only inches from a bison or see a cougar running across the road, or stop for a herd of deer, elk, or antelope standing in the road. Maybe you might be lucky enough to see a black or grizzly bear or a moose. We did motor a small boat through alligators and shark infested water.

Memories and pictures will be enjoyed for the rest of your life. It is disappearing fast so spend the time and money now. Experience Real Life!

History Repeating … Again

24 Monday Nov 2025

Posted by in Adolph Hitler, Putin, Ukraine

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Few people know the importance of March 7, 1936. That was when Adolph Hitler ordered his army to invade the demilitarized area of the Rhineland. The area was a manufacturing area with large coal reserves allowing heavy equipment like tanks, ships and planes to be built. The army chiefs were afraid to do so with their tiny army because they would be crushed by the neighboring countries. Nothing happened telling Hitler he was free to do as he wanted so he started building up his military.

His next target was to the South of Germany. Being Austrian he invaded Austria on March 12, 1938 declaring it a Province of Germany. There was no response from the rest of the World and his agents had worked with the Austrian leaders to allow a peaceful takeover.

Next he wanted Czechoslovakia. The Czechs didn’t want to give him a part of their country. Hitler’s threats to invade created a fear of another war so an agreement was reached on September 30, 1938 between Germany. England. France and Italy giving him the part of Czechoslovakia he wanted. The Munich agreement negotiations did not involve any Czechs. March 12 he got thirty-eight percent of the country including its defensive positions. Later, on March 15, 1939 he invaded and took the rest with little resistance. He declared it a Special Province of Germany.

After signing the Munich Agreement Neville Chamberlain, England’s Prime Minister, declared “Peace In Our Time”. All the appeasing made Hitler think he could take the Eastern half of Poland (Stalin and Hitler had agreed to divide Poland) without any military response from the rest of Europe. He was wrong and war was declared by the allies on September 3, 1939.

Does Putin’s playbook sound just like Hitler’s. He has already incorporated parts or all of other countries so is Ukraine a fighting Czechoslovakia or will it be invading NATO and the Baltic countries causing the next war? He has plans for many countries?

History Repeats Itself

04 Saturday Oct 2025

Posted by in Palistine

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        As I write this I am very tired of hearing the Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu throwing the Holocaust up as the reason for some criminal activity he has committed. Purposely killing tens of thousands of people living in Gaza with bombs and artillery is okay because they wanted another Jewish Holocaust and he is defending Jews. He allows right wing Israelis to kill West Bankers without any attempt to apprehend them. He has broken agreements on not building houses in the West Bank where the Palestinians live using the Holocaust and Jewish right to the land.

            According to the history of their people by Jewish Archeologists, they were a savage tribe that neither the Hittites nor the Egyptians want to mess with. Ramses I wanted to invade the people to the South and expand his empire to get resources. In order to protect his East Flank he hired that savage tribe to relocate there. They flourished with the yearly payments and not having to work on state projects like all Egyptians not in the army. In a matter of a few generations they quit being fighters and became lawyers, doctors, administrators, store keepers, etc. and worshipers of the Egyptian Gods. Some of the people thought their new life was against their heritage and persuaded the people to leave their lives of luxury. A good portion was forced by their new leaders to leave. They got out before the current Pharaoh could gather enough forces to go after them. They did not cross the Red Sea but the Reed Sea which was actually a tidal swamp. (Much of it is now the Suez Canal and Its infrastructure.) They left during low tide and the Pharaoh got caught during high tide. After they crossed over they split up for forty years to relearn their warrior ways. Their children absorbed the ways of their hosts. One family learned of a new God and its religion spread.

            Now comes the “It’s Our Land” Netanyahu uses in his pronouncements.  According to Jewish History they swarmed down the Golan Heights and slew every man, woman, child, and animal in what is now Northern Israel. As they expanded South their reputation caused tribe after tribe to leave or die. That’s how they got their land. Soon many of them were back into the professions who the Babylonians captured and took back to help grow their own intelligentsia group.     They were captive about fifty years before being returned along with their families.

The Tigris River’s yearly flood may have been the basis for Noah and the Flood scribes would later use. The river people used large family and animal sized square boats made with reed and tar during each year’s flood.

            Isn’t it interesting the war Netanyahu is waging against the Palestinians is very much like what those people did to the Tribes several millennia’s ago?

Times Have Changed

24 Wednesday Sep 2025

Posted by in Lies, Lies and Graft, President Trump

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        Times have changed since I was a little kid. If I told lies like Donald J. Trump does almost every day my Mother would have burned my butt with a belt. Today we elect people who lie, cheat, harass, demean, and threaten people and companies with dire things.

            Millions of Americans have come to believe half truths and lies as being factual. The constant barrage of these non-facts and lies has caused the majority of Americans to believe we have been screwed by all other countries, that climate change isn’t happening in spite of what we can see, and vaccinations are dangerous among other fictions.

            A few decades ago Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan made a statement which applies in today’s culture of lies. He said, “Everyone is entitled to his own opinion but not his own facts”. Today anyone with any sense can tell the President lies to cover the lies he has already said. He has built a fantasy world which is getting farther from reality every day. Bad things happen to anyone who goes against his reality.

            Trump has not just changed today’s reality he has ordered Federal, State and Local Museums and organizations to change history to suit his views. Slavery gave poor people good jobs and other rubbish. Of course, all reference to his losing an election or any of his crimes and lies about trying to overthrow the election must be removed or be closed.

            I saw a cabinet meeting where Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said, “You’ll like these numbers Mr. President! The tariffs have produced over 300 million dollars on the way to your planned 500 million.” The next week the Customs Agency said they had collected 72 million. So where is the other 218 million?

            One other thing this administration has in common with other authoritarian governments is control of the news media. Putin, Xi, Erdogan, Un, and a few others mostly or completely control all media so lies and other misinformation can be dispensed. Putin killed or locked up reporters who didn’t follow his line. Trump threatens to stop mergers or pull licenses if they continue to print or televise the truth about him or ridicule him. A bad precedent was when ABC gave ten million to an entity under his control. Since then Trump has sued for billions to try to keep newspapers, magazines, and authors from dispensing the truth.

                An old saying is “The Truth is out there.” Unfortunately the truth is way out there and I fear it may not come back in my lifetime.

Dim Future

25 Monday Aug 2025

Posted by in Inactivity, Politics

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        The future is not bright because our elected officials of both parties are more concerned about how to make sure they are re-elected in the next election than the distant future.

            Everyone knows we are running full speed into a debt disaster yet they keep cutting taxes and exempting more and more income from individuals and businesses. The longer those sitting in the capitol building run up the debt, the harder it will be to fix it. Remember, the economy boomed during the President Clinton Presidency and that tax rate while paying down the debt. Congress should go back to that rate and do away with more corporate exemptions lobbyists paid for. The longer they worry about re-election, the more painful it will be to ninety-nine percent of us.

            Social Security and Medicare are not being replenished by today’s workers. Again Washington knows how to fix it and most of us know also. A quick change to push the problem farther away is to remove the salary cap so all incomes pay into it whether it’s a wage or an investment. Cap all payouts to anyone with an income of over $150,000. As more robots replace humans, the human cannot pay into Social Security so a solution would be for the company to continue the social Security payment for that replaced human.

            Only a duped fool cannot see global warming is here and getting worse every day. Today’s Congress is bent on increasing the country’s contribution of carbon dioxide and methane. It seems we read every day they have done something to peel back laws and regulations designed to try to save humanity from a very ugly future. The future is much worse than today.

            Congressional members need to be more concerned about us than keeping their chairs.

Youngsters and Inflation

16 Saturday Aug 2025

Posted by in Inflation

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        What is inflation and how does it affect people? I am 77 years old and I didn’t understand what it was until I was in my late twenties. A friend told me it was better to own a home than to rent because the value would go up and I could write off the interest on the mortgage. Then when building it I noticed a clipping under a glass countertop about how much a pair of tennis shoes would go up based on the inflation rate. The house we built has quadrupled in value plus some.

            In the early 1960s Dad was filling the Pick-up with $.27 a gallon of gasoline. When I got my GTO in 1967 I paid $.33. My first year at Murray State University the tuition had gone up a third to $120 a semester. My entire cost for a dorm room, five day meal ticket, and books was less than $1,000. My girl friend, now wife, and I drove the 125 miles back home on every other weekend for less than five bucks.

            The second year we didn’t get a full meal ticket and ate at restaurants for dinner. Several places had specials on certain days. Gino’s plate of spaghetti was less than a dollar, KFC on Sunday was a three piece for $.89, a big boy sandwich was large and it was still less than a dollar with a drink; fries and two drinks was just $.50 more. We became friends with the Thoroughbred Drive-in became we ate there several times a week. I could buy us 6 corn dogs or 7 hamburgers for a dollar. Fries and two drinks was $.50 more.

            My taxes for our house were $620 for the first few years. Now with our senior deductions we pay over 12 times more. My two year-old GTO cost $1,800 including taxes and today the taxes would equal that much for most two year-old ones.

            Yes, I really understand inflation now.         

Nuclear Power in Illinois

14 Thursday Aug 2025

Posted by in Nuclear Plants, Nuclear Power

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        I worked at the Braidwood and LaSalle Nuclear Stations as a construction engineer and did inspections of the company’s equipment at Dresden and Quad Cities. Braidwood was supposed to be a twin of Byron but the Braidwood Superintendent for Commonwealth Edison decided to put in piping systems in a different order than Byron did. If we encountered a pipe that Byron had installed in one route we might have to change its route to avid one we had already installed. Designing while building increases time and cost.

            Byron, Braidwood, and LaSalle are 1,000 plus megawatt nuclear generating stations. Each has two reactors with two turbines to generate electricity from the steam produced in the reactors by fission. Byron and Braidwood are pressured water which does not go through the rod bundles and thus does not have a chance of becoming contaminated. LaSalle is a boiling water system which the water goes through the reactor producing steam.

            Both types take a couple of decades to build from the start to producing power. Theoretically a cookie cutter design and construction could shave a few years off the time. Pre-fabrication of some systems and hangers might shave a few more months off but I can’t see the time being cut to less than 15 years.

            The next generation reactors China is producing takes a lot less time and they are supposed to be building at least twenty now. We are looking at building smaller 300 megawatt reactors and micro ones producing 50 megawatts. Both could be mostly pre-fabbed in a shop and shipped to the site. My concern is one of safety. Existing stations are full of security people and equipment. Will the smaller ones be as safe or an easy terrorist target?

Imminent Disaster

14 Thursday Aug 2025

Posted by in National Debt, President Trump

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        Donald J. Trump is famous for business bankruptcies and leaving partners and banks with losses. He is doing it now for the United States. His tax cuts benefits him while running up the National Debt even with a good economy. As we all know every good economy is punctuated by a poor economy which cuts tax income.

            A simple solution is for all the tax cuts to be rescinded when the debt reaches forty trillion dollars and stays rescinded until the debt drops to twenty trillion. If the debt continues to grow the corporate tax and the personal taxes will increase two percent for incomes over 100,000 dollars when it reaches forty-two trillion and two percent for every trillion afterward.

            American has a choice; fiscal responsibility or collapse of our economy by bankruptcy. It is a little pain now or a total disaster later. There is no third choice. Both parties are responsible and voter pressure is all that can avert disaster.

The Future Has Many Roads

23 Wednesday Jul 2025

Posted by in President Trump

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        At least four plots and one attempt to assassinate President Donald Trump have already occurred. How many more will take place before he leaves office is completely unknown. Many people and groups feel they cannot wait until 2027 to see if the expected majority of Republican Representatives and Senators will be kicked out of office and another impeachment occurring. Many remaining Republicans would vote for removal.

            The question is would Vice-President Vance be the same or might he see his time would be short if he went down the same road. After President John Kennedy’s death, President Lyndon Johnson kept JFK’s people, who didn’t like Johnson or him they. They were gone later and he had new ones after his election. Congress has the power to remove them thus making Vance put acceptable people in charge of agencies and departments. They can undo Trump’s destruction that he did without legal consent from Congress. Would Vance be like President Gerald Ford and just finish the term of a disgraced President? No Trump supporter would be confirmed as the new Vice-President.

            If Vance kept following Trump’s advisors and those who wrote the 2025 document he would be subject to impeachment also. If that happened before a new vice-President was appointed and confirmed, the Democratic Speaker of the House becomes the Forty-Ninth President.

            The question is how much commotion will happen if someone kills Trump. He has yet to sacrifice his militant supporters like the Neo-Nazis and the other far right militias. What supporters he still really has could be expected to protest with marches and burn up the internet sites. Would the Trump haters march too, or just be satisfied with staying home?

22 Tuesday Jul 2025

Posted by in Maurene Comey, President Trump

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Well Said

        Sometimes I am impressed with how someone says or writes something that I can’t believe there could be a better way of getting the point across. The writer I so admire is a lawyer and trained to put words together to get her point and mine across to the masses. The writer is Maurene Comey, a Department of Justice Prosecutor, who was fired on President Donald Trump’s orders. Why, since she was very good at her job. Was it because she had been the prosecutor on the Jeffery Epstein case or because her father is the former FBI Director, James Comey, which Trump fired for doing his job correctly?

            Quoting some of her letter she wrote to colleagues, she elegantly said: “Fear is the tool of a tyrant, wielded to suppress independent thought.”     In advising other Federal Prosecutors, she wrote: “Instead of fear, let this moment fuel the fire that already burns in this place. A fire of righteous indignation at abuses of power. Of dedication to truth above all else.”

            Comey is just the latest in the series of firings of DOJ Prosecutors who ran cases Trump was worried about. Those fired are all the January 6 insurrection prosecutors, any who worked with Jack Smith on Trump’s crimes, and, of course, anyone involved in the Epstein sex crimes. The FBI investigators were transferred to far off offices in this country and some to other countries.

            Even the people Trump has appointed are fearful of his ire and kowtow to his every wish without any hesitation. Remember Comey’s words which are so well elucidated in her letter because it is so true. “Fear is the tool of a tyrant.” American across the political spectrum must stand up and put the tyrant into a cage before it is too late!