Black Friday

While reading various post and news stories over the Thanksgiving holidays all one seemed to find was news of the shopping madness of Black Friday.

Then I came across this photo.

Source of the original photo: http://cache.viewimages.com/xc/77981368.jpg?v=1&c=ViewImages&k=2&d=17A4AD9FDB9CF1936ED6F4FE2F3F40DC1C97CCB9C86F3152284831B75F48EF45

The little girl is the daughter of a soldier, Staff Sgt. John Linde that was killed in action early in November in Tal Al-Dahab, Iraq. He and three of his friends and co-troops were also killed that day. One of them an Army Medic on her third tour to Iraq, she left behind a husband and three sons.

Being a dad and a grandpa of a little girl about the same age, of course my heart went out to this little girl and her family. Dry eyes are hard to maintain here.

Don't have much to say about it other than while all the media was covering our shopping madness, this little girl was attending her father's burial at Arlington National Cemetery on November 23, 2007, other wise know as Black Friday. This date will always be the blackest Friday in her heart.

May His Peace be with her and the many other fatherless and motherless children this war is creating. Both American and Iraqi.

Hot Rods in Sweden

From 1996 until the telecom meltdown I worked for Ericsson Inc., involuntarily retiring from them in late 2004. During this time I made no less than two dozen trips to Sweden, mostly Stockholm.

On one of the trips in August of 1998 I traveled with my good friend and co-worker Rodney. On this trip we arrived at Arlanda airport mid morning and took a cab to our hotel, The Royal Viking, in down town Stockholm. The cab pulled up between the hotel and Central station. As I got out of the cab fumbling with a laptop and suitcase I glance towards the road and to my surprise I saw this car. Suffering with a lot of jet-lag I rubbed my eyes and took a second look. Yeah, a hot rod in Sweden cruising down a street in Stockholm. Amazing.

This is a 40-41 vintage Chevy coupe. Had a very solid sounding V8 under the hood, it was that sound and sight that grabbed my attention in Stockholm on Saturday morning.

As it drove on and I turned to go to the hotel entrance I saw an advertisement for this hot rod show -

The show was going to run all weekend, what a deal for an old car and hot rod buff like myself. Rodney of course could care less. I would have to motivate him. After some arm and counter arm twisting he agreed to go with me on Sunday if I would help him find a friend of his living in Stockholm. An American married to a Swedish lady. We had an exciting weekend. His friend "found" us and took us on such an adventure. We meet his daughters ages seven and eight or so and a complete family and extended family of Gambians living in Stockholm. This story I shall continue another time, let us move on to the hot rods.

So Sunday we caught a local train and found our way to the show. After about a ten minute walk we found the park where the show was going on. I did not know what to expect, but upon seeing these two Fords I knew I had found a real show.

The quality restoration on these two I have not seen even in some of the best Street Rod Shows in Oklahoma City. Just look at the interior of the convertible.

Not to be out done by the 55-56 Ford guys the show had its vintage 40 coupe and convertible also.

Of course the Chevy guys were not slackers either.

Note the little travel trailer in the background, I saw many of these over there and believe they would be very marketable here once we get to $4.00/gallon gas - HA.

And for us older guys there were these two classics -
A nice 32 roadster -




And this bright red 32 coupe.



And of course Elvis would not let the truckers be out done.


All in all a very interesting trip to Sweden. One of many.

I have since found that Sweden is a hot bed of hot rod shows and car enthusiast, any quick Google search will find many shows and references. In fact there is a company in Sweden where one can buy new sheet metal parts for the old 32 Fords. And in France you can find "new" Ford V8 flathead engines! (The French Army used these engines in their trucks up until just about ten years ago.)

Update: I found a link http://www.ssra.org/ for the Swedish Street Rod Association where a person can find a lot more information than my little blog about hot rods in Sweden.

Carpet Bagging - Reconstruction

The Republican Southern Strategy - Carpet baggin Reconstruction

“"The South historically was just a poorer part of the country and didn't have the focus on education that other parts of the country had," said Jeff Kuhner, a spokesman for the Fordham Foundation, an education think tank in Washington.
"Part of its strategy for the past 25 to 30 years has been cheap, undereducated labor, they don't have labor unions. But human capital is just as important as investment capital."”

Source: http://www.mcclatchydc.com/homepage/story/20922.html Study: Most students in South are poor.

The Republican Southern Strategy is to have all American except for the have and have mores to be “undereducated labor” void of labor unions or representation in the government is working. Note the number of Americans now living in that breeding ground of “undereducated labor” – severe poverty.

http://www.mcclatchydc.com/staff/tony_pugh/story/15655.html

“WASHINGTON—The percentage of poor Americans who are living in severe poverty has reached a 32-year high, millions of working Americans are falling closer to the poverty line and the gulf between the nation's "haves" and "have-nots" continues to widen.”

And as always the south leads the way.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/16/us/16mississippi.html?_r=1&th&emc=th&oref=slogin
“In Mississippi, Poor Lag in Hurricane Aid
By LESLIE EATON
GULFPORT, Miss.,
Nov. 14 — Like the other Gulf Coast states battered by Hurricane Katrina, Mississippi was required by Congress to spend half of its billions in federal grant money to help low-income citizens trying to recover from the storm. But so far, the state has spent $1.7 billion in federal money on programs that have mostly benefited relatively affluent residents and big businesses. The money has gone to compensate many middle- and upper-income homeowners, to aid utility companies whose equipment was damaged and to prop up the state’s insurance system.”

These three articles need little expansion. Notice the relationship between Mississippi and this poverty creeping across the country. In the Study: Most students in South are poor the authors point out that twenty years ago it was only in Mississippi that the majority of school children were poor. Now after the example Haley Barbour, the second only Republican governor elected in Mississippi since Reconstruction not only has Mississippi become the poster state for this strategy but with his Republican and Bush ties carpet bagging Reconstruction is spreading rapidly throughout not only the south but the entire nation.

The NYT’s article about Mississippi points out the special attention that the state of Mississippi got from Barbour’s old friend G. W. Bush.

“Mississippi is the only state for which the Bush administration has waived the rule that 50 percent of its Community Development Block Grants be spent on low-income programs, according to the Department of Housing and Urban Development, which administers the program. It is also the only state to ask for such waivers. “

To continue the Republican attack on the poor Barbour vetoed a sales tax on reduction bill on groceries in 2006. Yes, groceries. Can you see it spreading, reduce upper levels of income taxes on the rich, remove the estate tax and make up the difference by taxing groceries.

Not to bring too much religion into the discussion, but some of the biggest supporters of this Southern Strategy are Christians in the south. They seem to skip over the admonishment of James, considered in many circles as the brother of Jesus, when he said, “But you have insulted the poor. Is it not the rich who are exploiting you? Are they not the ones who are dragging you into court?” (James 2:6) It seems to me that not only the Christians are being lead to serving the richest among us at the harm of the most in need, but our whole country is, if we continue to allow the Republican’s Southern Strategy to expand.

Secret Gardens

After retiring to Texas in 1993 and suffering through the summer of in 110 degree F heat we had a pool built in the early part of 1994. Only problem was that the pool took up 80 percent of our yard. Not much gardening area left.



There was one little piece of 'dirt' with a big cotton wood tree that filled my neighbors pool and mine with leaves in the fall. Down came the tree, but what to do with that little piece of dirt?

Looking into the garden.
First came some fill dirt as there was a four foot slope away from the upper edge. Then I found some extra, not so good flat stone from a contractor. With that I laid a small rock deck. Of course a garden needs a garden shed, so I had this one built. While flea marketing one weekend I found the antique door and window and installed them. This gave the shed a little more rustic look befitting a garden.

The rocks are laid out in an arch which leaves a strip about four feet wide on the north and east sides for planting.

Looking out of the garden back towards the house.

At this point the view shows the entrance to the "dog run" which is stone and lose river gravel. Requiring only raking now and then. There is another small piece of grass at the end of the run area for the dogs constitutions.

The palm tree was added late last summer, survived a winter and looks none too bad. If we can avoid a harsh winter for a couple more perhaps it will survive even longer.

In the pot is a bay leaf plant that comes inside during the winter months. In fact many of the herbs come inside then also. The little iron fence near the center of the photo was bought at a Farmer's Market in Dallas, where they have not only farmer's products but vendors from Mexico. These come in very handy in directing the dog traffic and protecting my little planting areas. Notice the grass is green. Before the little iron fence and stone path our dogs kept the hill void of any grass.

A view of my prize fig tree.

The iron arbor was also bought at the Dallas Farmer's Market. Notice the very large (wooden) rooster, he keeps an eye on the inner garden for me. Plants in view are various herbs such as oregano and basil.

The fig tree was a lunch time find near my Ericsson office in Richardson, Texas about four years ago at a little nursery. The early fruit was good, but ones developing now are very sweet. In that same little nursery I found on another lunch time adventure a nice clump bamboo plant. It now takes up the N-E corner of the garden planing area. Mornings there one can enjoy their coffee to music of some nice song birds that hide in the bamboo.

A bird house is built and will be placed on a pole next to the bamboo very soon. Possibly a couple of houses will be placed around the area.

One of the garden protectors.

Misha is a mix breed collie-black lab. Rescued by my grown son in Alvord, Texas. She moved in with us a year ago while her master went to school. She joins two others, perhaps soon I will do a "dog" entry.

Here is wishing all a great week to come and hope you enjoy the garden photos and story.

McCain, Torture and Chickenhawks

Reported by the AP today McCain has come out and said that the current Republican candidates without military experience are not qualified to lead a country nor make decisions about torture. About torture, McCain was very specific about waterboarding in a response aimed at Giuliani.

"Mayor Giuliani just contradicted himself because anybody who has experience in warfare knows that waterboarding is by any definition torture and cannot be condoned."

The article also mentioned the draft avoidance of Giuliani who stayed out of Vietnam by going to law school and working as a judge. I bet there were a lot of good law students and judges that now have their name on that memorial wall in Washington, Giuliani owes them a thanks. The best, I think was Romney's deferment reason, service in FRANCE as a missionary. Wow, now I know there are about 50,000 names on that wall who would have loved that task.

Article: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20071102/ap_po/mccain_military

Of course my question for McCain is what makes him think the current leadership or drafters of this war in Iraq are capable of making decisions about war or torture? The king of the bunch has to be five-deferment Dick Cheney. He had other things to do. Accumulate $100 million personal wealth at the government hog trough, and a couple of years working at the government-parasite company, Halliburton. Halliburton loved him so much they convened a special meeting of the board to waive the retirement requirements to give old Dick a nice little retirement package.

Then of course we have our currant occupant, Dumbya Bush. He was a mighty guard member flying a plane that would never ever have been deployed to Vietnam. And of course before his bedding down with the Bush crowd Collin Powell had this to say about the draft and guard system in place during Vietnam in his book, "My American Journey."

"The policies determining who would be drafted and who would be deferred, who would serve and who would escape, who would die and who would live, were an anti-democratic disgrace." He went on: "I am angry that so many sons of the powerful and well-placed … managed to wangle slots in Reserve and National Guard units."

Thanks John for pointing out the obvious to us today, many of us have been pointing this out now for seven yeas.

Where is our economy going? Ask the Irainians.

Where is the economy going? Not to mention the wars.

Well for working folks it is not looking good. With oil nearing $100 a barrel the price of gas at the pump will be looking backwards to see $3.00/gallon. Our Currant Occupant of the White House is scratching his trigger finger again aiming for Iran. His trigger finger has all but removed the Iraqi oil from the market; I imagine a strike by him on Iran would remove their oil from the market. Then one has to consider what would the Iranians do?

One of the issues always facing the Navy in the Persian Gulf is that they would be in a very movement restricted “fish bowl.” In Gulf One they came to the conclusion, “yes, we can operate in the Gulf.” But what happens if all of a sudden they are facing two theaters of action, Iraq and Iran, not to mention Afghanistan. The only way in or out of the Persian Gulf is the Strait of Hormuz. A quick check will reveal an area of water that would not take very sophisticated weapons to block. From my Navy post yesterday I talked about the Malacca Strait being a path of much of our oil. Hormuz is THE choke point where the western world could be cut off from most of its oil supply. Would the Iranians attempt to block Hormuz if we bombed them? Look at the history of their war with Iraq. They are capable of fighting long and hard, and an attack on their sovereignty might just trigger all kinds of nasty events. So what does this have to do with our economy? Ask yourself what $200-$300 a barrel oil would do to the price of gas? Heating oil?

One would think with all their oil business savvy that W and his VP have they would know all this. Well maybe they do, if oil hits those moon-high prices you can bet some of their benefactors will be pocketing a lot of profit.

Of course if the Current Occupant pulls the trigger it very well could open up a lot of combat jobs, jobs that those 12,000 workers at Chrysler being laid off could apply for.

For the job loss story check out the following link:

http://money.cnn.com/2007/11/01/news/companies/bc.chrysler.jobcuts.ap/index.htm?cnn=yes