Archive for June, 2009

A TOUCH OF GRAY

Monday, June 29th, 2009

As of this writing, the world barely knows the full scope of what is happening in Iran.  We have heard of, or worse, seen, the footage of a young girl being shot through the heart by regime forces.  We know that the election was clearly a fraud, that people took to the streets by the tens of thousands in protest, and that the only reason the entire ocean of people wasn’t mowed down, was because the world was watching.

The Iranian “government” closed internet and cell phone service to the best of their ability.  Journalists were banned, or simply knew better than to try and be there covering the story.  There was the story of the military charging a father $3,000.00 for the bullet that killed his son, a protester.

If nothing else, from the safety of our free perch thousands of miles away, we were given collective pause at how fortunate we are.  While our government is as broken, incompetent and hell-bound as any on Earth, it is still a far cry better than what we are witnessing.  There is also the unsettling, at least for me, image of that many people whose frustration has brought them to the streets, facing weaponry with bricks, bottles and rocks.  As one protester cautioned…”you will rue the day that we are armed.”  I believe him, though that day is unlikely to ever arrive, unless this coup is somehow, miraculously, victorious.

So why the tepid response from our President?  Why did days pass, with the announcement from Washington finally rising from cool disappointment, to, finally, outrage, or as close as this President is able to get to outrage?  Even Bill O’Reilly agreed with Obama’s understated response.  I disagree.  While we clearly don’t want to entangle ourselves politically, or militarily, with the events unfolding, why is it out of line to issue a no-nonsense opinion?

I give this President credit when I feel it’s due.  The recently signed legislation regarding tobacco is long overdue.  Obama is frank and honest about his own struggle with nicotine, which I appreciate.  I don’t think he is an evil, plotting, man.  However, in the case of Iran and North Korea, the reticence to issue a frank statement escapes me.

For years the United States was kind of the father-figure for the world.  In spite of our blemishes and failures, our successes and morality far exceeded our mistakes.  In any world disaster, we have always been, and will always be, the first to arrive with help of all kinds.  This goes largely without recognition.  We have freed scores of people from oppression, indeed countries, from the same, and are the world-watchdog for human-rights violations.

Maybe that was then, and this is now, the new, politically-correct leadership which is promised to bring “change”.  Still, Iran is a country that, in 2009, still stones women to death for exposing their face or features.  Married couples are forbidden from holding hands in public.  As in Afghanistan, on rural roads, one can plainly see the walls, with chains and shackles, where infidels of every measure, age and gender are bound, and then stoned or shot to death.

I consider these things and see no gray area at all.  It is a world of pure evil, of human life suppressed to its most minimum, where even the slightest violation of “code” may find you dragged from your home and executed.  Like North Korea, also trying us with their wandering vessel, Iran flaunts itself in the face of our known financial and political weakness.  It seems, just when we most need a firm response to both situations, what we instead dispatched was a Hallmark card.  “Hope things get better soon!”  If you’d like to send a card to Iran or North Korea, I would suggest something a little more edgy, like…”don’t forget who you’re poking in the eye…”

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MULE SHARKS

Monday, June 22nd, 2009

Just when you think you’ve heard it all, you hear one more thing.  Last week, a story surfaced about a shark being found with a couple of pounds of cocaine in it.  My first reaction was anxiety.  As someone who generally has a black cloud hovering just above my head, I fully expected that some day, I would be attacked by this shark.  See, it wouldn’t be bad enough to endure a normal shark attack, surmounting the incredible odds that one must overcome just to be part of that event, but I would be the guy who got attacked by a shark ripped on “coke”.  How unlucky do you have to be to encounter a shark that was grinding his teeth ten minutes before he got to your torso?  Imagine the humiliation of being eaten by a shark that won’t shut up.  Think Gary Busey with a Dorsal fin.

Then, as the story developed, it turns out that it was a frozen shark.  Actually, a lot of frozen sharks, intercepted during their “shipment” to the frozen shark processing facility.  I’m not sure if this is better, or worse, than the thought of live sharks being used as drug mules.  It is still unclear, at this writing, whether or not the sharks were fished and killed expressly for use as cocaine containers, or they were a usual shipment, providing a double purpose on this particular trip.  If you find yourself a little extra chatty and unable to sleep after your next shark filet, then we’ll figure this is an ongoing operation.

And if sharks are indeed being used as drug mules, does this serve as an evolutionary bookmark where mules will become violent, unpredictable man-eaters?  Whereas up to this point, tried patience is usually the only hazard when dealing with mules, we could be in for a whole new breed of donkey.

Imagine the re-write for “Jaws”.  Roy Scheider talking to the Mayor of Amityville.  “Sir, you know this beach is not safe…” The Mayor, sleazy little man that he was, replies, ” all we need is for one person out here to yell ‘ Get out of the water, Mule!’, and our entire tourist season goes up in smoke”.  The haunting “Jaws” theme begins to play, slowly at first, then quickening in pace, until you hear that dreadful “hee-haw” and you see the young swimmer go under.

More seriously, the fact that our demand for drugs continues to make every conceivable kind of shipment necessary, is the sad reality.  Depressing, that we have to add dead fish and animals to the already disturbing list of shipment methods.  It is one of many usually unremarkable footnotes to the trail of debris left on the journey to sate every American appetite.

It struck me, during the endless arguments about closing Guantanamo, that one of the premier arguments was that it was a stain on America’s record.  That may be true, but it was a small coffee stain on a t-shirt compared to the oil spill that so many other cultural foibles represent.  Our rampant drug consumption is one of the bigger stains, both illegal and prescription.  We hear very little about that anymore.  If only that one could be fixed by simply closing down a few buildings.

How about the still uncurtailed sexual exploitation of our children on the internet and otherwise?  That’s not a stain on America?  Our unbridled exploitation of women, young and old…not a black mark on our report card?  Maybe the political and moral division of our population, which may soon lead to a scene not unlike that unfolding in Iran right now, maybe that, too, is a stain, or at least a pesky smudge.

You know, in the end, man-eating mules may be a merciful end for us.  We don’t bat an eye at much of anything anymore.  We’ll spend a week hashing out a late-night comedian making a disgraceful comment, but it is minutiae in the large scheme of things.  Look, I just got done making fun of a bunch of dead sharks, but make no mistake, I am keenly aware that they may very well have had the last laugh, and he who laughs last, laughs loudest.

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AMANDA WRITES

Monday, June 15th, 2009

Amanda writes? Amanda writes what, I wondered, and who is Amanda?  Then I realized I had heard it wrong.  Well, I heard it correctly, but I hadn’t heard the context.  I was flipping through the radio dial looking for bigger news than Miss California and her crown.  What the announcer was talking about was Miranda Rights, and the context was an initiative being launched by the Obama administration.  Miranda Rights, as most know, are the rights read to a person being placed under arrest.  I have had special training with them in the past, having had a variety of law enforcement people read them to me, in a variety of circumstances.  That was a long time ago, but I remember a little of it.  “You have the right to remain silent.  You have the right to an attorney.  If you cannot afford one, one will be appointed to you.  Anything you say can be used against you in a Court of Law…”  Sound familiar?

The other thing most of us know, is that it is an integral part of the protection afforded all of us who are American citizens.  We are presumed innocent until proven guilty, a markedly different approach from many other places in the world, where judge, jury and executioner may well be the same person.  We also associate, correctly, these “rights” to be associated with the domestic criminal justice system.  The White House is proposing something quite different.  Their proposal is that battlefield combatants, that is, “the enemy” in wars in which we are currently engaged, be read their “Miranda Rights” as they are “arrested” and taken into custody from the battlefield.

I will give Obama credit for his position on refusing to release pictures of detainees being “questioned” at Guantanamo.  It is the right thing to do.  Release of these pictures, regardless of how innocuous they may be, risks flaming the fires of radical Islam and surely puts our military people at more risk.  Classify the pictures and get it over with.

Then Obama suggests something like this “Miranda Rights for Terrorists” thing, and he loses me again.  I’m trying to give this guy a fair shot, but he makes it difficult.  He is shiftier than mercury on wax paper, just days ago scolding Congress for their rampant “borrowing and spending”.  Hello?  Isn’t that your signature on the most recent bailout bill…around 800 billion bucks?

This latest attempt at trying to set the war on terror to Kenny Rogers music may be the straw that breaks the camels back.  Washington can’t be suggesting…they just can’t be…that we are going to provide the same legal rights to international combatants, most of whom wear no uniform and may or may not belong to any organized militia, that Americans receive.  Think “International Thug”.

Worse still, that we would introduce them to our already over-burdened court system, rife with corruption, deal-making and its own whole set of problems…the same legal system that couldn’t convict O.J. Simpson for murder.  It  may be cheaper and easier to simply not capture anybody.

Recently, in Nashua, NH, a judge threw out a heroin case.  It was the largest bust in the States history.  Pounds and pounds of heroin, two guys caught red-handed.  Hold on…the original search warrant did not have the word “heroin” listed on it in the proper place.  The entire case was dismissed, the criminals walked, the state spent a bundle of money bringing the case to that point, and then…poof!

Now imagine our soldiers trying to secure a “crime scene” on the side of a mountain in Afghanistan or in the middle of a hail of gunfire in Iraq.  Drawing chalk outlines in the sand and collecting spent casings in evidence bags.  The notion is laughable, it is so flagrantly un-doable, but that isn’t even the kicker.

The real violation, is the assault on our sovereign rights as citizens.  Our forefathers shed blood and soul for those rights, those hallowed institutions.  They are the ideals that set us apart from the rest of the world.  They were not given to us, they were fought for and demand constant protection.  Americans should be outraged at the thought that we will spread these rights around the world like McDonalds restaurants.

Miranda Rights?  How about “Montana Rights”.  That’s what I would give to a “soldier” whose only mission on any given day is to kill an American or a Jew or anyone else who is not “them”.  Montana Rights…you have the right to escape, we will give you a 6 hour head start, then we will hunt you on horses and drag you back.  The only problem?  Montana doesn’t want them, either.

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FIVE STONES

Monday, June 8th, 2009

Don’t get your hopes up. This is not a column about wall building or a children’s story about five rocks.  It is a conglomeration of stories that are significant to New Hampshire.  Five stepping stones, if you will, towards a different kind of state, and mostly in the right direction, in my opinion.  Each story is worthy of a column, but they are news today, so I decided to do a literal drive-by on each one.

Naturally, topping the list, is the fact that this week we became the sixth state in the country to legalize gay marriage.  A giant step for what was once a conservative state, some might say, but there is a different perspective.  Some of you may know I have interviewed Governor Lynch on two occasions, spoken with him many times, and voted for him three times.  He has always struck me as bright, centrist, pragmatic, and the best choice in the last three elections.  It is odd, however, that he stated clearly several times that he believes marriage is between one man and one woman.  That works for me, and I had felt that the civil union law provided the legal benefits that were sought.  It wasn’t enough, the Governor waffled, and passed the law with a few caveats, primarily that all religions reserve the right not to recognize, or officiate, gay marriages.

As a second generation New Hampshire native, I offer this perspective…that I believe this may have been passed here even fifty years ago.  Despite being viewed as once staunchly conservative, New Hampshire is also fiercely independent and protective of individual rights.  Always has been.  I think you would find most old-timers non-plussed by this new chapter, and I like to think that it was in that spirit that Governor Lynch decided to put ink to paper on this one.  Live Free or Die, after all.

Second stone is a new program starting in Rockingham County that will allow non-violent prisoners to provide a certain number of hours in State Parks, cleaning up debris from the ice storm, litter, and other duties usually hired out.  This is a great idea.  According to County Attorney James M. Reams, “I’m trying to create a meaningful community-service component to sentencing for people who would not be candidates for jail, and for non-violent inmates.  I think they owe society for the costs of processing the case, and all the costs they’ve imposed on us.  This is a way for them to repay that debt.”  Now that, is Yankee pragmatism.  At a time when budgets are being slashed, there is less money than ever for such work to be done, this is a progressive idea that bears watching.  Did I say there were bears watching?

Stone Three:  Canadian hydro power may finally be coming to New Hampshire.  Federal regulators have approved an agreement between three power companies, including PSNH, to construct transmission lines from Canada’s Des Canton sub-station in Quebec, into New Hampshire, particularly for the southern part of the state.  We have the highest electricity rates in the country and relief is long overdue.  There is a long way to go on this, but a major hurdle has been passed.  We may now pause to ask ourselves why we have not made use of our own rivers, but that is a question for another day.  I once saw a documentary on one of Canada’s biggest hydro plants.  They are amazing in their mass, but also in their relative simplicity.  Once constructed, a laughably small crew of men watch over the uneventful facility.  The turbines whine and there is plenty of time for whittling.  So remarkably effective, efficient, clean and infinite, that one must wonder why the entire country doesn’t run on water.

And then there were four.  Anyone who reads these columns knows that I was directly involved with a citizens campaign to bring tougher child-protection laws to New Hampshire.  That campaign eventually led to the NH Child Protection Act, signed into law in January, 2007.  I have watched cases tried under the new law and have not been convinced that stiffer sentences are being handed down.  Some are, some aren’t, they simply seem all over the map.  One part of the new law, however, just got a test drive and worked perfectly.  New Hampshire’s law was the only one in the country that maintained that a sexual predator, even after serving his or her entire sentence, can be deemed “still dangerous” by a panel and then held, involuntarily, for another five years, at a secure psychiatric facility.  Another five years can be given after that, and so on.

That portion of the law was put to the test last week when child-molester William Ploof was to be released from prison after a ten-plus year stay.  He had refused treatment in prison, and had even had sexual assault incidents while incarcerated.  He claimed to have molested more than fifty children when he was originally convicted.  A panel deemed him “likely to re-offend” and remanded him to the state psychiatric facility, which is essentially a prison with band-aids.  This marks the first time I have been sure, without question, that my efforts, and the efforts of all of those who worked so diligently to bring about this new law, paid off.  There is little question that this guy, if released, would have harmed another child.

Stone Five…drum roll, please…goes to Clark’s Trained Bears up in Lincoln, New Hampshire, who this weekend will celebrate their 60th year of providing live bear shows to the public.  They began as a sled dog ranch, 75 years ago, in the same location, and now the third generation of Clarks continues the tradition.  You have to have been there to appreciate it, and to appreciate them, but the Clarks continue to embody everything that is good about New Hampshire.  Family, hard work, enterprise, perseverance…they are a North Country icon and I wish them Happy Birthday.  Or, as W. Murray Clark, the 82 year-old matriarch says it…”Happy Bear-thday”.  I wish them, and New Hampshire, another 60 years of health and prosperity.

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DON’T ASK, DO TELL

Tuesday, June 2nd, 2009

It has been no secret that the military policy regarding sexual-orientation has been an ongoing train wreck.  It’s not something I ever paid a whole lot of attention to, figuring, like most, that better minds than mine were at work on it.  It has also been no secret that the kind-of unspoken policy is, and has always been, “don’t ask, don’t tell”.  In other words, keep your private life private.  That, of course, is increasingly unrealistic in the technologically advanced world in which we live.  I imagine myself trying to have kept secret, for my entire adult life, that I am a married, heterosexual male with children.  Just think about how ridiculous…and impossible, that would be.

Furthermore, I am not in the military and regret that I never served in the military.  That said, I recognize that any thoughts I have on the matter are nothing more than that…thoughts.  Opinions.  So I want to be clear that I may be completely “wet” on this one, because I am not, nor am I likely to be, the guy under fire on a battlefield, having to rely on a fellow soldier to aid in my survival.  So I approach this on that foundation, that I am expressing an opinion, and that it was a particular situation that piqued my interest in the subject.  Also, as a starting point, it should be known that since President Obama was sworn into office in January, it is estimated that over 200 service members have been discharged from the military under the “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy.  Discharged because they were homosexual.

Now, consider the story of Lt. Col, Victor Fehrenback, a pilot with the U.S. Air Force 389th Fighter Squadron.  Fehrenbach has flown for the Air Force for 18 years.  He is the winner of nine air medals for courageous service in flight, including one for heroism during the taking of Baghdad International Airport in 2003.  For 18 years he did exactly as the policy required, keeping his private life private, not letting anyone know he was a homosexual.  He has been, by all accounts, an outstanding member of our military.  He is two years away from a well-deserved retirement.

Then, a year ago, an acquaintance dropped a dime.  He is now in the process of being discharged from the Air Force.  “I thought, o.k., maybe I can hang on and President Obama will change the policy and it won’t matter.  That hasn’t happened.”

Fehrenbach has known no other way of life than the Air Force.  He is the 39 year-old son of Air Force veterans.  His father was a Lt. Col. who died when Victor was only 9 and his mother is a former military-nurse.

Fehrenbach remains on active duty at the Mountain Home Air Force Base in the Idaho desert.  He plans to talk openly with the national press about his case.  Since the “don’t-ask” policy was enacted in 1993, some 13,000 service members have been discharged under the policy, and most choose to leave quietly.  “I will fight this in uniform and I will fight it without”, Fehrenbach says.  It will be interesting to see if he can expedite a change in policy, or at least some reasonable dialogue.

As I indicated, I have no desire to be the one who writes the new policy for the military regarding the sexual orientation of it’s members, nor am I remotely qualified to do so.  I do know, after reading the case of Lt. Col. Fehrenbach, that it doesn’t seem to make a dime’s worth of sense.  One has to assume, by virtue of the fact that these people chose to serve their country, that they are patriots in the truest sense of the word.  That being the case, should it matter who they love?  Of the 13,000 who were discharged, I wonder how many never came home, or who came home without legs or arms and continue to keep their secret?

I can tell you one thing for sure.  Lt. Col. Fehrenbach did a lot more for this country than I ever did, and the idea that he should be disgraced, stripped of his retirement, and humiliated, really, because of who he is, seems shameful to me.  He seems, to me, like a guy who should come home to parades and confetti, not to a military courtroom.

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