Thursday, January 24, 2013
Women in Combat
So now the bright minds who have taken it upon themselves to guide our society in the way in which it should go have decided to open the “combat arms” military specialties to women. This will place them directly in combat.
“If you read any ancient history, you know that centuries ago it was commonplace for women to fight side by side with men on the battlefield. This is not the stuff of mythology. It is fact.
Today, in Iraq women are on the front lines again fighting side by side with their male counterparts.
On a mission just south of Baghdad over the winter, a young soldier jumped into the gunner's turret of an armored Humvee and took control of the menacing .50-caliber machine gun. She was 19 years old, weighed barely 100 pounds and had a blond ponytail hanging out from under her Kevlar helmet.
"This is what is different about this war," Lt. Col. Richard Rael, commander of the 515th Corps Support Battalion, said of the scene at the time. "Women are fighting it. Women under my command have confirmed kills. These little wisps of things are stronger than anyone could ever imagine and taking on more than most Americans could ever know." (1)
Well this author is right . In Roman times a Briton Queen an Icenae known as Boudica was raped along with her daughters and saw her husband killed by Roman troops. The Celtic women were all skilled in the use of weapons anyway so it was not much out of character for her to strike back. And she did. Queen Boudica led the Icenae and several other Briton tribes against the Romans and fought the local legion to a standstill almost destroying them. Eventually Roman tactics won out and she was killed with her army. Who can forget those brave ladies in Corregidor who served under fire for so long before having to surrender to the Japanese. Then there were the women of the Soviet Union who fought the Nazis and the brave ladies of the Palmach many not yet old enough to be called women who stood against appalling odds in the Israeli war of independence. All through the Korean and Vietnam wars our women were caught up in combat. Since combat just seems to go and find you if you are in the area.
There are however certain problems that the modern armies have encountered with using women in combat alongside of men and especially quartering them with men.
“Thirty-six crew members of the USS Acadia were pregnant and had to be transferred during the supply ship's deployment to the Persian Gulf, naval officials said.
More than half became pregnant after the ship was underway, but Navy spokesman Lt. Cmdr. Jeff Smallwood said there were no indications of improper fraternization between men and women on the ship.”(2)
As this 1991 article says there was more than close quartering going on here. It is a problem that has always been there when women and men have been mixed into hazardous situations. In fact it is more than that. In a combat type situation privacy will necessarily go out the window. As a young Cavalry Scout I remember being able to take a break and placing my poncho on the ground and my steel helmet up on the side of my Armoured Personnel Carrier and filling it with water. I would strip naked and pull out my extra underclothes and socks and use the warm water in the helmet as an impromptu shower. I didn’t care that there were 7 or 8 other soldiers in the area in full view. Why should I we were all guys. We also shared latrine facilities and slept and did everything in close quarters. Privacy cannot be achieved or expected under such conditions. The fact is that after 4 or 5 days on patrol we would commonly return to the camp and hit the showers. What followed is very intimate. We checked every spot on our brothers bodies that they could not see to remove the ticks that got there. While I am sure that most male troopers would gladly offer to check the female ones somehow I just don’t see that as conducive to order. Sure separate facilities can be supplied and other female troops may be available but in many situations they just don’t exist and cannot be a concern.
I got into a discussion with a gender feminist farmer once and of course she knew a farm wife who could work any man into the ground. They always do. But putting aside the 7’ tall 300lb farmwife who has six teats and four children on the teat. She never sleeps, can toss wet square cane bales all day and cook all night and feed a cutting crew and her 20 member family with one hand tied behind her back. It is just not her that will eventually be called to serve. It will be your little blue eyed Suzie cutie that will be called. Forget that argument about they will never draft. Yes they will and little 5’6” 120 lb Suzie will be training to try to kill 6’3” 210 lb men. She will be required to carry water supply and rations and ammo and weapon and all other gear in her pack that any male trooper will be required to carry. But she may not be ready for it.
“Age may only be a number, especially in youth, but it has a major impact on physical capabilities, as does gender. Men are, generally speaking, stronger than women. In order to provide for all of the Army's needs for skilled personnel, the physical requirements are modified by age and gender, so as not to preclude skilled military personnel by unfair tests. At the same time, both men and women alike are pushed beyond their self-imposed limits while attending Army Basic Training.”(3)
I will never malign a woman’s ability with a weapon or her capability in unarmed combat if properly trained but reality is reality. Sure when we shot Modified Combat matches in the Army we dreaded shooting against the WAC that would occasionally show up at those matches. Women never came out of these things on a whim. They were always skilled and they had biological advantage. Yes they did! Find your favourite woman and lead her to the wall, have her face the wall a few feet from it. Place a chair sidewise against the wall. Have her walk up to the chair until she touches it. Then have her Bend at the waist and put her head against the wall. She needs to reach down now and pick up the chair. Yes she really will do it. Now you big brute, you do it. You probably can’t. She’s made for carrying babies she is built for balance and power in positions that you aren’t. But despite her ability to easily shoot the pants off of most men, like my wife does with me, and her innate ability to excel at Tae Kwon Do and Tai Chi and some other martial arts and her ability to double time till a man drops and some other built in specialties, she is still smaller and lighter. All things being equal a man of 6’ and 200 lbs will use her for a wet mop if he so pleases. The military has known this from the start. This reality has it’s problems.
“Rape in civilian life is already unacceptably common. One in six women is raped or sexually assaulted in her lifetime, according to the National Institute of Justice, a number so high it should be considered an epidemic.
In the military, however, the situation is even worse. Rape is almost twice as frequent as it is among civilians, especially in wartime. Soldiers are taught to regard one another as family, so military rape resembles incest. And most of the soldiers who rape are older and of higher rank than their victims, so are taking advantage of their authority to attack the very people they are supposed to protect.
Department of Defense reports show that nearly 90 percent of rape victims in the Army are junior-ranking women, whose average age is 21, while most of the assailants are non-commissioned officers or junior men, whose average age is 28.
This sexual violence persists in spite of strict laws against rape in the military and a concerted Pentagon effort in 2005 to reform procedures for reporting the crime. Unfortunately, neither the press nor the many teams of psychologists and sociologists who study veterans ever seem to ask why.
The answer appears to lie in a confluence of military culture, the psychology of the assailants and the nature of war“.(4)
When it comes to the dubious talent of killing other people it just helps allot if you have a certain mentality and an extra “Y” chromosome would help too. Soldiers do not take to sensitivity training well. They will sit politely and listen and parrot back what was told to them if necessary but it is in their nature to hunt and hurt and kill. Hopefully this nature is tempered by a code of etiquette and is brought under control to be used only against ones enemies. The man who is highly motivated in this end and is highly skilled in whatever his specialty is and can be directed by his superiors will do well as a military man. Unfortunately it is also connected to the sex drive which is made doubly hard to control when you dangle a tasty snack in front of the wolf. No excuses it should not happen and must not be tolerated but there should be no shock when the situation is rigged so as to encourage such behaviour. Bad, intolerable but reality.
It is and has always been my opinion and many others that the female psyche is best suited to and should be used for the nurture of children. Now this is generally speaking. I realize that today’s woman has been through a concentrated education designed to eradicate so far as possible the mother instinct. Yet we have to admit that we still need it. I also believe that intentionally injecting a woman into the daily stress of combat and exposing her to the blood and gore of that worst of men’s pursuits is debilitating to the female psyche in ways that a man cannot understand. As a believer in God and his design in creation I believe that the woman is and has always been intended to be the bearer of life and man if need be has the duty to hunt and kill and to protect that bringer of life that he so loves. But what if this being that was designed to give birth and bring forth and nurture life is exposed to horror beyond what she is intended to behold?
“we are starting see the effects women fighting on the front lines and studies are indicating that more women are suffering from more debilitating forms of PTSD. According to Paula Schnurr, a lead researcher for a 6 million dollar study on the effects of PTSD in women, “data indicate that female military personnel are far more likely than their male counterparts to have been exposed to some kind of trauma or multiple traumas before joining the military or being deployed in combat. That may include physical assault, sexual abuse or rape.” (5)
Yes the fact is supported by the VA Hospitals that women are more affected by the things that tend to warp men. And I know it is popular for the social engineers to spout off with “Well men can be sodomized too”. The fact is that in modern times yes some male prisoners of war have been sodomized but it is far more common for women to be raped by their captors who tend to be men. Yes we fight men. And no they don’t all go to sensitivity meetings and concentrate on how to be caring and thoughtful toward their female captives. They don’t give a damn. Yes that little pony tailed M2B princess jumped right in there and pushed the thumb lever down on that machine gun and drove off the bad guys. I could train a spider monkey to do that. Heck I trained new troops to do it. But in a fight it’s different. Someday that pony tailed barely 100lb darling that the Col. Spoke off will be alone and advancing on a stairwell looking to gain an advantage to see if she can spot her unit so as to rejoin them if possible. She comes around a corner and meets Mustafa a 6’ 195 lb Taliban tribesman who grabs her by the shirt and takes the M4 out of her hands and throws it aside. She is barely 100 lbs right well Mustafa’s lunch weighs more than that. Poor little gal gets stomped and raped and thrown off of the rooftop. Then I and a bunch of old veterans have to go and burry her because she just plain was not suited to the job. It happens and when it does we have to bury the evidence. The big media doesn’t tell you.
Sure Women can do all sorts of things but just because they can why in God’ name should they? The mission of the Military is to break things and kill people not to achieve new social restructuring no matter how progressive it seems.
(1)Democratic underground.com
(2)Washington Post, April 30 1991
(3)Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/3193862 Christine A. Harman
(4)Helen Benedict “In These Times”
(5)Women in Combat, More Prone to PTSD
21 March 2005
Tuesday, January 15, 2013
Friday, December 28, 2012
Just a thought before I go.
I was watching The Song of Bernadette recently. They used a phrase that I thought was very interesting. To those who believe no explanation is necessary and for those who do not believe no explanation will do. It is a neat phrase but it seems to refer to faith and completely excludes critical thought and logic from faith. What it seems to do, in my estimation is to divide the argument into those who blindly accept and those who absolutely reject the validity of a point outright without evidence to support their stand. I reject any such mode of thought. I accept the rule of The Church without argument, based on the fact that her rule stems from the personal teachings of My Master given to the apostles and kept by her and based also on her 2000+ years of eperience giving wisdom far in excess of mine. I however hold no such position on anything else. All things other than the magesterium of Holy Church are up for debate. In fact I believe that my views can be supported by critical thought based on the certain evidence. Not merely philosophy.
All to often today the idea of critical thought is tossed out of the window and actions and philosophies are based entirely on feelings or on ones personal thought no matter how lacking in merit. We started this, to the extent it has risen to, in the seventies.
People have always been prone to base their choices on emotion or "feeling over substance". One only has to look at the division in the Christian church to see the rise of the idea that an individual has greater wisdom than a Church founded by God that has been around for millenia. But in the past speaking against the insanity of "feeling over substance" was allowed. People used to be looked down upon for being ruled by emotion and not by logic. Today we reward errant illogical and biased thought, so long as it is biased the right way. We are so concerned about peoples feelings that we will not offend the poor dears by stating flatly that they are behaving like idiots. Furthermore we call them progressive and reward them. There is a use for people of this sort. In a Democracy a demaogogue will easily prey on the weak minded by a passionate plea to their base desires or at least to their emotions and steer them into voting for a certain policy based entirely on the emtional content of the issue. Whole world views and life choices of great consequence are decided on mere gut reactions. This fact is why we were given a Republic in the begining, with a constitution that set the rules of how the Republic was to be run and how the power was to be divided. Most of all to limit the power of the government so that the people always had enough purchase on the political power of the nation to limit the abusive nature of the government without using force of arms.
All to often today the idea of critical thought is tossed out of the window and actions and philosophies are based entirely on feelings or on ones personal thought no matter how lacking in merit. We started this, to the extent it has risen to, in the seventies.
People have always been prone to base their choices on emotion or "feeling over substance". One only has to look at the division in the Christian church to see the rise of the idea that an individual has greater wisdom than a Church founded by God that has been around for millenia. But in the past speaking against the insanity of "feeling over substance" was allowed. People used to be looked down upon for being ruled by emotion and not by logic. Today we reward errant illogical and biased thought, so long as it is biased the right way. We are so concerned about peoples feelings that we will not offend the poor dears by stating flatly that they are behaving like idiots. Furthermore we call them progressive and reward them. There is a use for people of this sort. In a Democracy a demaogogue will easily prey on the weak minded by a passionate plea to their base desires or at least to their emotions and steer them into voting for a certain policy based entirely on the emtional content of the issue. Whole world views and life choices of great consequence are decided on mere gut reactions. This fact is why we were given a Republic in the begining, with a constitution that set the rules of how the Republic was to be run and how the power was to be divided. Most of all to limit the power of the government so that the people always had enough purchase on the political power of the nation to limit the abusive nature of the government without using force of arms.
Monday, December 10, 2012
Don't step on the grass Sam.
Yeah that's the thing I'm thinking about right now. For those of you who are familiar with Steppenwolf, I mean the band not the book, and their song 'Don't step on the grass Sam" this is where I am headed.
I don't know whether to sing the praises of Cannabis or to simply acquiesce to the fact that it just won't go away. I guess I'll do both. You know another state legalized it. I think it won't be long before the whole of the United states will be turning toward Wash. D.C. with their thumbs to their noses and pipes in their collective fists. The only entity that will keep it illegal will be the Federal Government.
Won't that be interesting? The 50 states saying yes and the federal government trying to say no. Can you imagine another Obamaesqe character in the white house pissing and moaning about Arizona wanting to enforce federal and state law about illegal immigration but accepting their thumbing their noses at Cannabis law?
Where this will all go I am not sure but I am sure that so long as it sticks with cannabis there's no real problem. What?, you say, are you crazy endorsing the use of cannabis? No really I'm not. Before I straightened out and became a Catholic and started to something very like abiding by the law, I used to get stoned. Of course I did. I've been a biker of sorts for a long time. And one thing you can count on Scooter trash to do is exactly what they please. So I smoked and sold and grew. Yes officer that was over 7 years ago. More like 20 something. But the point is that if you grow up with a certain behaviour you either see the danger in it or see it as harmless. Or both. I personally see Cannabis as pretty harmless. It is no corrupter of youth beyond what the other dangers that beckon to the youth of this country are. And for heavens sake drop that line about it being a gateway drug. Gateway where? If a teen picks up a beer and drinks beer off and on for a while before he lights up a joint then the gateway drug was beer. But if he smokes cigarettes first then the gateway drug was cigarettes but if he is like the guys I did my last half year with in high school and has a ring in his back pocket from a snuff can. Well the gateway drug was Copenhagen or Skoal or Grizzly. You can blame all sorts of things on all sorts of things but if the person is going to take harder drugs then they will do it with or without Pot. I was into much more potent stuff a year before I smoked my first joint. When I had quit the other stuff and straightened out a bit I still smoked a bit. I quit that out of necessity. The people who were the type that I got in trouble with were the ones who sold or knew where to get pot. I had a promise to not get into trouble to keep so I had to switch playthings and playmates.
But think about it. If you have never smoked pot what do you think it does to people? Are you one of those who believes in the "Marijuana Madness" image of pot smokers? Do you really think that a person can be a real nice guy one minute and light up a joint and become a pot smoking sex fiend the next? No it doesn't do that. If you are a nice person before you light up you are a nice person after. It's sort of like having a few drinks. Except the police will tell you that except in extreme cases they would rather deal with a pot smoker than a drunk. It's been my experience that a pot smoker is much less likely to get violent than a drunk. That is if they are not violent to begin with. Marijuana use in the normal range just doesn't cause anybody to do something they aren't going to do in the first place. Sure the weed does lower inhibitions but like I said it isn't going to cause a Catholic Virgin to strip naked and "do it" if they don't seriously want to "do it" already. In fact what one can expect is a euphoria of sorts maybe a a bit of giggling if they smoke enough they will become uncoordinated and maybe confused. But you have to be pretty stoned or smoking some serious chronic weed for that. And no matter how much you use you will not overdose. I have been about as high on weed as you can get in the past and took a whole 12+ hours to come down and still did not overdose. A pot high usually lasts an hour to three hours unless you keep smoking. I got a terrible case of dry mouth but my life was never in danger. No one else was ever in danger either. And I never got addicted. In those days I could smoke. If I did that now I would have to have my albuterol inhaler handy.
Of course no one with any sense of responsibility would advocate that children of any age should use it unless advised by a physician. But it is safer even in the long term than Alcohol and diabetics can use it if they can get by the munchies, the propensity of pot to make you eat anything you can get your paws on. I remember a green variety the sellers said was from Mexico that we could get in the early 70's. It would make you feel very good, happy and contented and chatty and giggly and then as soon as we could find our way out of those bean bag chairs, bar the door Nellie. We were a holy terror for Moon Pies and Cherry Smashes and Dr Pepper. Point is that we smoked quite a bit of pot and had allot of fun and did no one any harm and never once endangered our lives because of the pot. We did stupid stuff but hey, we were crazy. We were gonna act dopey with or without the pot.
I like to watch that border wars series. I think the American people need to understand what kind of folks are causing the mayhem in that border war and what they are capable of. Used to be that we would saddle up and ride down to Ciudad Juarez and go partying. Sure it could be tricky then but if you didn't step out of line too bad there was just about nothing you could do that $50.00 couldn't buy you out of. The locals usually didn't cause you any mayhem because you were their source of income. A dollar would keep them running for a couple of days and running well. They could eat high on the hog literally for five bucks a day. But now if you go down there you run the very real risk of getting caught up in a Sinaloa / Zeta firefight. I've even heard of American women getting kidnapped and sold off down there. A large part of the money that funds these crazies who line the road to Monterrey with heads and decapitated corpses is from pot. Of course billions is consumed by our DEA and Border Patrol in stopping Pot, a stupid plant, from crossing the border. Even the local sheriffs and the forest rangers have a dickens of a time trying to stop the growing of pot. in the meantime there are Meth labs and crack labs going great guns using dangerous chemicals needing to be busted and they can barely get to them.If they didn't have the pot to contend with I think they could be freed up for the more dangerous stuff.
Did you know that pot is classed on a level with LSD? Since when did pot get dangerous enough to be placed on level with LSD oh yeah and Heroin? You have got to be kidding me you say. No I'm not. Sure there are anti-pot zealots out there that will announce their ignorance to the world and proclaim that pot is as dangerous as Heroin and as mind bending as LSD. I tell you that based on personal experience, no it is not even almost dangerous. But the Law will beat themselves silly trying to eradicate it. They will also proclaim the dangers of smoking pot and nearly wet themselves to haul in a hundred pounds from the smugglers. It looks like quite a bit on Tv but while they are busting the hundred pounds a half a ton is crossing elsewhere and is north bound. Then there is the home gardener who will install a set of grow lights and keep a few plants in the basement or the garage. Not the folks who rent a whole house for the purpose of growing a thousand plants but the old hippie who keeps a couple of plants in self defense. He never buys or smokes it in public but he nevertheless has at any one time a pound of prime bud. You cannot stop him unless you plan on ignoring the constitution and start searching the whole neighborhood one house at a time. The fact is America despite that silly war on plants you are surrounded by weed. Someone down the block is growing a plant or two. You can't stop it.
But why would you want to stop it? Okay smoking anything except BBQ is not good for your health. That is sure. But the use of cannabis is not dependent on smoking. There is a method called vaporizing. The pot is heated to just below the smoking temperature and it vaporizes. No kidding. there is also the tincture. You put a bunch of chopped buds into alcohol and let soak covered. Then strain and the alcohol has the active ingredients in it. You can either let it stay in the alcohol or add oil and let stand uncovered. The alcohol will evaporate off and viola Hash oil. Or you can use hash or hash oil or tincture in cooking. What's hash? Well it's like distilled pot. The part of the pot that intoxicates is a set of cannabanoids contained in resinous hairs called trichomes on the buds of the plant. If you cut the buds off and let them dry for a while then there are several methods that you can use to break those little nearly microscopic trichomes off. They will stick to each other and if you press them together into a shape you will get the traditional brick like appearance of Hashish. The hashish or hash can be smoked or eaten. Fat likes it. You can put it into margarine or butter when you are baking and make some powerful brownies or candy or whatever.
These alternative methods are popular amongst the modern medical users of cannabis. And if you are thinking that the idea of pot as a medicine is just a pile of "bovine scat", think again. Victorian doctors in the famously restrained country of Britain tested and saw that it did have valid medical uses. Queen Victoria used it to relieve female cramps and to help with her depression after the King died. I'll guarantee that you never found a woman much more devoted to Christianity than Queen Victoria in the Protestant churches. The British army in India picked up smoking ganja (pot) from the Sepoy troops and found it to be very good for treating the nausea that came along with certain camp diseases and they found that it caused very few problems with morale. In fact today medical marijuana is used to treat the tremors of palsies and ease back pain, relieve pressure in the eyes of a glaucoma patient, help with depression and a list of other things. The plant has quite a few active compounds in it. The THC or tetrahydracanabinol and some thing called CBD or canabidiol and other active components found in different levels in different strains of the two types of cannabis used for medicinal purposes have very different effects depending on the levels of the different components in the pot. It's been used for relieving maladies from anxiety attacks to alleviating the nausea and restoring the appetite of cancer patients. Meth and crack and LSD and heroin and the other drugs in that schedule do not do that and they kill. Pot doesn't. Pot seed is used in many uses from bio fuels to beer. Yeah I've seen it, I drank some in Canada.
Besides the cannabis sativa and the cannabis indica, the intoxicating strains, there is cannabis ruderalis. One of its strains is Hemp. Any old sailor knows what hemp is. The Bosun's locker of the older ships were filled with it since some of the best rope or line to a sailor was made of hemp. It is one of the strongest fibers we can grow. It can be used for rope or for shirts and pants or for whatever your mind can dream up where a vegetable fibre is needed. And of course it can be used for bio fuel. We used to grow it. The War Dept. experimented with it in WWII because of the Japanese invasion of the major latex producing nations of the world. They found it had all sorts of promise then they banned it. Along the way they banned the sativas and the indicas. Now they are working on Poppies who knows what is next? Let's just legalize it then we don't have to fight a non-enemy and waste our resources on a quixotic task of trying to eliminate a very useful plant.
I don't know whether to sing the praises of Cannabis or to simply acquiesce to the fact that it just won't go away. I guess I'll do both. You know another state legalized it. I think it won't be long before the whole of the United states will be turning toward Wash. D.C. with their thumbs to their noses and pipes in their collective fists. The only entity that will keep it illegal will be the Federal Government.
Won't that be interesting? The 50 states saying yes and the federal government trying to say no. Can you imagine another Obamaesqe character in the white house pissing and moaning about Arizona wanting to enforce federal and state law about illegal immigration but accepting their thumbing their noses at Cannabis law?
Where this will all go I am not sure but I am sure that so long as it sticks with cannabis there's no real problem. What?, you say, are you crazy endorsing the use of cannabis? No really I'm not. Before I straightened out and became a Catholic and started to something very like abiding by the law, I used to get stoned. Of course I did. I've been a biker of sorts for a long time. And one thing you can count on Scooter trash to do is exactly what they please. So I smoked and sold and grew. Yes officer that was over 7 years ago. More like 20 something. But the point is that if you grow up with a certain behaviour you either see the danger in it or see it as harmless. Or both. I personally see Cannabis as pretty harmless. It is no corrupter of youth beyond what the other dangers that beckon to the youth of this country are. And for heavens sake drop that line about it being a gateway drug. Gateway where? If a teen picks up a beer and drinks beer off and on for a while before he lights up a joint then the gateway drug was beer. But if he smokes cigarettes first then the gateway drug was cigarettes but if he is like the guys I did my last half year with in high school and has a ring in his back pocket from a snuff can. Well the gateway drug was Copenhagen or Skoal or Grizzly. You can blame all sorts of things on all sorts of things but if the person is going to take harder drugs then they will do it with or without Pot. I was into much more potent stuff a year before I smoked my first joint. When I had quit the other stuff and straightened out a bit I still smoked a bit. I quit that out of necessity. The people who were the type that I got in trouble with were the ones who sold or knew where to get pot. I had a promise to not get into trouble to keep so I had to switch playthings and playmates.
But think about it. If you have never smoked pot what do you think it does to people? Are you one of those who believes in the "Marijuana Madness" image of pot smokers? Do you really think that a person can be a real nice guy one minute and light up a joint and become a pot smoking sex fiend the next? No it doesn't do that. If you are a nice person before you light up you are a nice person after. It's sort of like having a few drinks. Except the police will tell you that except in extreme cases they would rather deal with a pot smoker than a drunk. It's been my experience that a pot smoker is much less likely to get violent than a drunk. That is if they are not violent to begin with. Marijuana use in the normal range just doesn't cause anybody to do something they aren't going to do in the first place. Sure the weed does lower inhibitions but like I said it isn't going to cause a Catholic Virgin to strip naked and "do it" if they don't seriously want to "do it" already. In fact what one can expect is a euphoria of sorts maybe a a bit of giggling if they smoke enough they will become uncoordinated and maybe confused. But you have to be pretty stoned or smoking some serious chronic weed for that. And no matter how much you use you will not overdose. I have been about as high on weed as you can get in the past and took a whole 12+ hours to come down and still did not overdose. A pot high usually lasts an hour to three hours unless you keep smoking. I got a terrible case of dry mouth but my life was never in danger. No one else was ever in danger either. And I never got addicted. In those days I could smoke. If I did that now I would have to have my albuterol inhaler handy.
Of course no one with any sense of responsibility would advocate that children of any age should use it unless advised by a physician. But it is safer even in the long term than Alcohol and diabetics can use it if they can get by the munchies, the propensity of pot to make you eat anything you can get your paws on. I remember a green variety the sellers said was from Mexico that we could get in the early 70's. It would make you feel very good, happy and contented and chatty and giggly and then as soon as we could find our way out of those bean bag chairs, bar the door Nellie. We were a holy terror for Moon Pies and Cherry Smashes and Dr Pepper. Point is that we smoked quite a bit of pot and had allot of fun and did no one any harm and never once endangered our lives because of the pot. We did stupid stuff but hey, we were crazy. We were gonna act dopey with or without the pot.
I like to watch that border wars series. I think the American people need to understand what kind of folks are causing the mayhem in that border war and what they are capable of. Used to be that we would saddle up and ride down to Ciudad Juarez and go partying. Sure it could be tricky then but if you didn't step out of line too bad there was just about nothing you could do that $50.00 couldn't buy you out of. The locals usually didn't cause you any mayhem because you were their source of income. A dollar would keep them running for a couple of days and running well. They could eat high on the hog literally for five bucks a day. But now if you go down there you run the very real risk of getting caught up in a Sinaloa / Zeta firefight. I've even heard of American women getting kidnapped and sold off down there. A large part of the money that funds these crazies who line the road to Monterrey with heads and decapitated corpses is from pot. Of course billions is consumed by our DEA and Border Patrol in stopping Pot, a stupid plant, from crossing the border. Even the local sheriffs and the forest rangers have a dickens of a time trying to stop the growing of pot. in the meantime there are Meth labs and crack labs going great guns using dangerous chemicals needing to be busted and they can barely get to them.If they didn't have the pot to contend with I think they could be freed up for the more dangerous stuff.
Did you know that pot is classed on a level with LSD? Since when did pot get dangerous enough to be placed on level with LSD oh yeah and Heroin? You have got to be kidding me you say. No I'm not. Sure there are anti-pot zealots out there that will announce their ignorance to the world and proclaim that pot is as dangerous as Heroin and as mind bending as LSD. I tell you that based on personal experience, no it is not even almost dangerous. But the Law will beat themselves silly trying to eradicate it. They will also proclaim the dangers of smoking pot and nearly wet themselves to haul in a hundred pounds from the smugglers. It looks like quite a bit on Tv but while they are busting the hundred pounds a half a ton is crossing elsewhere and is north bound. Then there is the home gardener who will install a set of grow lights and keep a few plants in the basement or the garage. Not the folks who rent a whole house for the purpose of growing a thousand plants but the old hippie who keeps a couple of plants in self defense. He never buys or smokes it in public but he nevertheless has at any one time a pound of prime bud. You cannot stop him unless you plan on ignoring the constitution and start searching the whole neighborhood one house at a time. The fact is America despite that silly war on plants you are surrounded by weed. Someone down the block is growing a plant or two. You can't stop it.
But why would you want to stop it? Okay smoking anything except BBQ is not good for your health. That is sure. But the use of cannabis is not dependent on smoking. There is a method called vaporizing. The pot is heated to just below the smoking temperature and it vaporizes. No kidding. there is also the tincture. You put a bunch of chopped buds into alcohol and let soak covered. Then strain and the alcohol has the active ingredients in it. You can either let it stay in the alcohol or add oil and let stand uncovered. The alcohol will evaporate off and viola Hash oil. Or you can use hash or hash oil or tincture in cooking. What's hash? Well it's like distilled pot. The part of the pot that intoxicates is a set of cannabanoids contained in resinous hairs called trichomes on the buds of the plant. If you cut the buds off and let them dry for a while then there are several methods that you can use to break those little nearly microscopic trichomes off. They will stick to each other and if you press them together into a shape you will get the traditional brick like appearance of Hashish. The hashish or hash can be smoked or eaten. Fat likes it. You can put it into margarine or butter when you are baking and make some powerful brownies or candy or whatever.
These alternative methods are popular amongst the modern medical users of cannabis. And if you are thinking that the idea of pot as a medicine is just a pile of "bovine scat", think again. Victorian doctors in the famously restrained country of Britain tested and saw that it did have valid medical uses. Queen Victoria used it to relieve female cramps and to help with her depression after the King died. I'll guarantee that you never found a woman much more devoted to Christianity than Queen Victoria in the Protestant churches. The British army in India picked up smoking ganja (pot) from the Sepoy troops and found it to be very good for treating the nausea that came along with certain camp diseases and they found that it caused very few problems with morale. In fact today medical marijuana is used to treat the tremors of palsies and ease back pain, relieve pressure in the eyes of a glaucoma patient, help with depression and a list of other things. The plant has quite a few active compounds in it. The THC or tetrahydracanabinol and some thing called CBD or canabidiol and other active components found in different levels in different strains of the two types of cannabis used for medicinal purposes have very different effects depending on the levels of the different components in the pot. It's been used for relieving maladies from anxiety attacks to alleviating the nausea and restoring the appetite of cancer patients. Meth and crack and LSD and heroin and the other drugs in that schedule do not do that and they kill. Pot doesn't. Pot seed is used in many uses from bio fuels to beer. Yeah I've seen it, I drank some in Canada.
Besides the cannabis sativa and the cannabis indica, the intoxicating strains, there is cannabis ruderalis. One of its strains is Hemp. Any old sailor knows what hemp is. The Bosun's locker of the older ships were filled with it since some of the best rope or line to a sailor was made of hemp. It is one of the strongest fibers we can grow. It can be used for rope or for shirts and pants or for whatever your mind can dream up where a vegetable fibre is needed. And of course it can be used for bio fuel. We used to grow it. The War Dept. experimented with it in WWII because of the Japanese invasion of the major latex producing nations of the world. They found it had all sorts of promise then they banned it. Along the way they banned the sativas and the indicas. Now they are working on Poppies who knows what is next? Let's just legalize it then we don't have to fight a non-enemy and waste our resources on a quixotic task of trying to eliminate a very useful plant.
Sunday, September 23, 2012
Farewell to white stigma.
I'm sitting here thinking do I dare or do I not. I still have enough brainwashing to hold back saying what I feel I need to say. My whole race has been pressured to stay silent for so long that have lived this whole 57 years a virtual mute along with every right leaning white male in America. Why. Because we have been taught not to speak up to keep our mouths shut about what we see or else bear the stigma of being called a racist.
We have watched the movies and the news reports declaring what horrible crimes we have perpetrated on women and everyone who is not pure European heritage.
From the theft of the Americas from their aboriginal inhabitants to the enslavement of millions of Africans into servitude in the new world to the exploitation of orientals in the menial tasks associated with the building of this nation that I love. Along with the shoving aside of immigrants from every prosperous undertaking available here. Well I will not take the time to debate it though if I did I would destroy the whole premise of the oppressive European.
I just have to say that the purpose of those who have raised their fists into the sky and shout their anti white propaganda is obvious. The have pushed their propaganda of suspicion and hate into the minds of Americans to the point that their dealings with each other have been permeated with a distrust so thick that at many times I have felt the need to appease and assuage and calm and comfort and kneel before and kotow to any and all members of another race or the opposite sex to keep from being called a RACIST. Well the anger in me for having to live 57 years as a suspected racist /sexist just because I am a European American Male is done with. I've had it with all of you Gender feminist dyke wannabes and you poor put upon blacks and Hispanics and orientals and Indians and everybody who is not of European descent. Too bad if you feel an offense every time you deal with a white man I can't and I will not help you any more I will no longer bow to you and put my lips to your posterior. I can't abide your United Negro Colleges and your Black Entertainment TV. I hope your National Association for the Advancement of Coloured People, and Jesse Jackson's "Monochrome" coalition blows up and burns to ashes. I'm tired. If you who are not white males cannot accept us as is then Bugger Off. You stand in front of us with your hats on upside down and backwards and your pants down to your knees jabbering in some verbal slop impossible even for your mind to understand behaving like some sort of a demented clown constantly grabbing with one hand at your genetals and you want us to show you the respect reserved for an individual of high intelligence and a high level of accomplishment. In fact I am supposed to not only allow you to sit in the empty seat available in the bus of life but now I have to give you my seat even when you didn't earn it just because you are a different colour than me? No! No! I will not any more. I will tell you this once and only once. My family never owned you or your sister nor any of your family as slaves. We owe you nothing so don't come looking. It is your behaviour not my prejudice which has caused me to watch you out of the corner of my eye when you are around. My experience tells me to do so, not some obscure tale about slavery. What I have seen and what has been done to me tells me not to trust people no matter the colour that are dressed and act a certain way. And if you dress and act like thugs I will treat you like thugs. Let me tell you a story.
I was following Hwy 17 south in the spring of '06 headed to South Carolina. Somewhere in Winston Salem I lost the highway and landed in the dark side of town. Well I stopped and whipped out my map and began to plot a course out of there. I noticed that quite a few of the hoods denizens had taken an interest in me but weren't quite sure what they had parked there. I was sitting on an 80 cu in vtwin piled with gear wearing a three piece patch. Obviously they had had experience with biker clubs because all I had to do was undo my vest and smile and they kept their distance. Not wanting to call the never ending wrath of what might be an outlaw club down on their hood. I got done with what I needed to do and moved on without incident. Their life experience told them to be wary of bikers wearing patches. My life experiences (not the KKK) tells me to be wary of certain folks.
too.
But from now on I really don't care what anyone thinks I was born White I am White and I will from this day on be proud of being White. Anyone who can't abide by a white person being happy to be white, Bugger Off. I have put up with all of the "Black power", and La raza, and ADL and NAACP and SPLC and Black liberation and Aztlan liberation and AIM and every other anti white organization there is. I bear you no ill will if you are not like me but don't be surprised if I suddenly shout White Pride World Wide. Why shouldn't I seek the survival of my people and a future for our children. The actions of those who think their race makes them entitled have forced me to it with their policies of exclusion. And don't tell me I'm the only one who feels this way. I'm just one of the few who has the guts to write it.
We have watched the movies and the news reports declaring what horrible crimes we have perpetrated on women and everyone who is not pure European heritage.
From the theft of the Americas from their aboriginal inhabitants to the enslavement of millions of Africans into servitude in the new world to the exploitation of orientals in the menial tasks associated with the building of this nation that I love. Along with the shoving aside of immigrants from every prosperous undertaking available here. Well I will not take the time to debate it though if I did I would destroy the whole premise of the oppressive European.
I just have to say that the purpose of those who have raised their fists into the sky and shout their anti white propaganda is obvious. The have pushed their propaganda of suspicion and hate into the minds of Americans to the point that their dealings with each other have been permeated with a distrust so thick that at many times I have felt the need to appease and assuage and calm and comfort and kneel before and kotow to any and all members of another race or the opposite sex to keep from being called a RACIST. Well the anger in me for having to live 57 years as a suspected racist /sexist just because I am a European American Male is done with. I've had it with all of you Gender feminist dyke wannabes and you poor put upon blacks and Hispanics and orientals and Indians and everybody who is not of European descent. Too bad if you feel an offense every time you deal with a white man I can't and I will not help you any more I will no longer bow to you and put my lips to your posterior. I can't abide your United Negro Colleges and your Black Entertainment TV. I hope your National Association for the Advancement of Coloured People, and Jesse Jackson's "Monochrome" coalition blows up and burns to ashes. I'm tired. If you who are not white males cannot accept us as is then Bugger Off. You stand in front of us with your hats on upside down and backwards and your pants down to your knees jabbering in some verbal slop impossible even for your mind to understand behaving like some sort of a demented clown constantly grabbing with one hand at your genetals and you want us to show you the respect reserved for an individual of high intelligence and a high level of accomplishment. In fact I am supposed to not only allow you to sit in the empty seat available in the bus of life but now I have to give you my seat even when you didn't earn it just because you are a different colour than me? No! No! I will not any more. I will tell you this once and only once. My family never owned you or your sister nor any of your family as slaves. We owe you nothing so don't come looking. It is your behaviour not my prejudice which has caused me to watch you out of the corner of my eye when you are around. My experience tells me to do so, not some obscure tale about slavery. What I have seen and what has been done to me tells me not to trust people no matter the colour that are dressed and act a certain way. And if you dress and act like thugs I will treat you like thugs. Let me tell you a story.
I was following Hwy 17 south in the spring of '06 headed to South Carolina. Somewhere in Winston Salem I lost the highway and landed in the dark side of town. Well I stopped and whipped out my map and began to plot a course out of there. I noticed that quite a few of the hoods denizens had taken an interest in me but weren't quite sure what they had parked there. I was sitting on an 80 cu in vtwin piled with gear wearing a three piece patch. Obviously they had had experience with biker clubs because all I had to do was undo my vest and smile and they kept their distance. Not wanting to call the never ending wrath of what might be an outlaw club down on their hood. I got done with what I needed to do and moved on without incident. Their life experience told them to be wary of bikers wearing patches. My life experiences (not the KKK) tells me to be wary of certain folks.
too.
But from now on I really don't care what anyone thinks I was born White I am White and I will from this day on be proud of being White. Anyone who can't abide by a white person being happy to be white, Bugger Off. I have put up with all of the "Black power", and La raza, and ADL and NAACP and SPLC and Black liberation and Aztlan liberation and AIM and every other anti white organization there is. I bear you no ill will if you are not like me but don't be surprised if I suddenly shout White Pride World Wide. Why shouldn't I seek the survival of my people and a future for our children. The actions of those who think their race makes them entitled have forced me to it with their policies of exclusion. And don't tell me I'm the only one who feels this way. I'm just one of the few who has the guts to write it.
Monday, August 27, 2012
The big shocker right now on the movie scene is D'nesh Dsouza's 2016 Obama's America.Making at last call three times the money it was supposed to be making and at the Hollywood 14 theatre where Dolly and I went to see it they had to move it over from the small theatre to a bigger one because of over flowing attendance. As A documentary I expected to walk into something akin to the Clinton Chronicles. A hazy accusation of everything from murder to drug running based on foggy associations and unsubstantiated accusations from characters I wouldn't have believed if they told me that the sky was blue yesterday. It was nothing like that. D'nesh a university president and easily one of the most intelligent men in America today, takes you though an exploration of the difference between a dark man from Indian stock and a dark man from Kenyan stock and how they can wind up on different ends of the political spectrum. Especially how Obama can behave in such a manner as to baffle most of America and defy every label we try to hang on him unless we know his philosophical secret.
Most of us Obama watchers have been shaking our heads till we've become dizzy over what this fellow Barak Obama Aka Barry Soetoro. Maybe son of Barak who has many other maybe sons all over Africa and step son of Lolo Soetoro. Maybe Barak is Kenyan maybe he is Indonesian and he might be just what he says he is, Hawaiian. He was reported to have started off as Islamic and certainly acts like it at the drop of a hat, but he says he is Christian. A label he can hide behind ever since the heresiarchs took over and splintered Christendom into clumps of religion that carry such different beliefs that many are mutually exclusive and have caused Protestants to accept such seriously bizarre variants so as to not be able to judge and decide what is and what is not christian. He has been hiding behind Black Liberation Theology with his pastor Rev. Wright, who is maybe kooky but still only a serious believer in this Marxist anti-colonial extract of neo-christian philosophy. A virus of the philosophical world that has been breeding and populating the Black community labeled as Christian and basically hiding in plain sight. Most White folks have no idea what this is and so when we observe a convert behaving pretty much in perfect concert with its tenets we are baffled. We come up with all sorts of explanations for his behaviour. This is the basis of the movie Dsouza explains Obama's otherwise bizarre behaviour as nothing short of a very dangerous strain of this religiophilosophical virus that breeds hatred of the western nations and the strangest urge to blow apart the economy of the U.S. and Europe and form the worlds victim colonized nations together and somehow raise them from their malaise by the destruction of the colonial nations. I know we the U.S. have never been a real colonial nation in that we have historically, even with our conquered enemies, stayed in control just long enough to see the nation we occupy rise up strong enough to take it's place among the developed nations, strong, economically vital and free. But to the liberationists we are some kind of evil facilitator of the old colonialism that we broke free of.
This somewhat abbreviated explanation is exactly what is offered by Mr. Dsouza for Barak's obviously anti-American and pro-Arab, pro-south American pro anybody but us behaviour. This is why he sent the bust of Winston Churchill the man who broke the back of the Mau Mau's in Kenya back to England with an Ipod of his speeches as though Queen Elizabeth would find any wisdom there that she needed. A move that has baffled many. This would also explain his bowing to the king of Arabia and his mistaken open mic conversation about telling Putin that in this next term he would have more flexibility since he would not be able to be reelected. Suddenly the whole refusal to allow drilling to expand in the Gulf under European or American flags but sending our tax dollars to fund Brazoil makes sense. The whole comparison of how Obama could be raised and mentored by his Mother and Frank Marshall Davis both Communists from Kansas and behave as an anti colonialist Marxist while Dsouza could come to America from India and wind up as a Conservative Commentator and university President now makes sense.
I advise this movie as time better spent than time spent watching Batman reconstituted. At least for those who wish to see their country survive the clutches of this Marxist liberationist. For the rest of y'all. Well People who know don't understand what they are voting for shouldn't vote.
Sunday, February 26, 2012
Court reporters and DAR.
The following is a letter provided to the Topeka Bar Assn. newsletter about the advantages of court reporters over DAR. Read it.
The Court Reporter-Guardian Of The Record
There has been much discussion in the Third Judicial District about using Digital Audio Recording (DAR) for various types of hearings. One of our misdemeanor criminal courts is already experimenting with the use of DAR technology. As an official court reporter I have seen several very important reasons why DAR should not be used in criminal proceedings.
First let me explain to you exactly what a court reporter is and what they do. A court reporter is simply a silent, impartial witness who records what is said in court, who then safeguards that record and when requested provides an accurate printed account of that record within a specific amount of time. Some can provide a real-time record that is displayed immediately on monitors in the courtroom. I provided This service during the Koch family trial here in Topeka Federal Court. You may have also seen real-time during the O.J. Simpson murder trial on TV.
A prospective court reporter, after training must pass examinations to certify their accuracy, speed, spelling, grammar and punctuation. After certification they are allowed to affix their seal to a transcript certifying that the transcript was prepared by a Certified Court Reporter thus assuring the accuracy of that document. The court reporter is able to certify the accuracy because they saw and heard what was transpiring in the courtroom. When the speaker spoke too fast or was inaudible the court reporter was able to intervene and slow them down or ask them to speak louder so that their statement will be heard and properly recorded. Law requires the court reporter to guard that record and provide a transcript in a timely manner when requested. Any attorney that cannot obtain an accurate transcript from a reporter in a reasonable amount of time has legal recourse from the State Supreme Court who will issue a “show cause“ to the court reporter in question in order to ascertain the cause of the delay. Likewise the court reporter faces disciplinary and legal action if a transcript is not provided.
The DAR records audio and only audio it cannot differentiate between words. It cannot use visual input or prior knowledge of the case at hand to add to its understanding of what is being said. It will record unintelligible sounds and any background noise that masks testimony. When a DAR is supplied to a transcriptionist to be transcribed many times a complete and accurate transcript cannot be made. Even the skilled firm that the court uses returns transcripts with “inaudible” in many important places. Unlike the record taken by a Certified Court Reporter no one is responsible for the maintenance and accuracy of the DAR. If the transcript of a DAR is not useable for an attorney they have no legal recourse. In several instances already there simply was no DAR taken. Either the judge forgot to turn it on or it simply was lost. If I were an attorney I would be upset if a key portion of the proceedings in a criminal case was “inaudible” or “unintelligible” or simply nonexistent because someone didn’t turn on the recorder or lost the record. Especially since there is no legal recourse.
As a student court reporter I was taught to be “seen and not heard”, probably the reason I haven’t spoken before. The thing is that if you see me in the courtroom you know an accurate record is being taken it will be protected and a transcript will be available. If you don’t see a court reporter, who knows?
If the record is important to you request a court reporter or you don’t know what you will get.
On the administrative level the Certified Court Reporter is seen as an unnecessary expense. The DAR is attractive as an inexpensive replacement.
What price, Justice?
Dorothy J. Sheeley-Seel CSR, RPR, FCRR
Managing Reporter, Third Judicial District
The Court Reporter-Guardian Of The Record
There has been much discussion in the Third Judicial District about using Digital Audio Recording (DAR) for various types of hearings. One of our misdemeanor criminal courts is already experimenting with the use of DAR technology. As an official court reporter I have seen several very important reasons why DAR should not be used in criminal proceedings.
First let me explain to you exactly what a court reporter is and what they do. A court reporter is simply a silent, impartial witness who records what is said in court, who then safeguards that record and when requested provides an accurate printed account of that record within a specific amount of time. Some can provide a real-time record that is displayed immediately on monitors in the courtroom. I provided This service during the Koch family trial here in Topeka Federal Court. You may have also seen real-time during the O.J. Simpson murder trial on TV.
A prospective court reporter, after training must pass examinations to certify their accuracy, speed, spelling, grammar and punctuation. After certification they are allowed to affix their seal to a transcript certifying that the transcript was prepared by a Certified Court Reporter thus assuring the accuracy of that document. The court reporter is able to certify the accuracy because they saw and heard what was transpiring in the courtroom. When the speaker spoke too fast or was inaudible the court reporter was able to intervene and slow them down or ask them to speak louder so that their statement will be heard and properly recorded. Law requires the court reporter to guard that record and provide a transcript in a timely manner when requested. Any attorney that cannot obtain an accurate transcript from a reporter in a reasonable amount of time has legal recourse from the State Supreme Court who will issue a “show cause“ to the court reporter in question in order to ascertain the cause of the delay. Likewise the court reporter faces disciplinary and legal action if a transcript is not provided.
The DAR records audio and only audio it cannot differentiate between words. It cannot use visual input or prior knowledge of the case at hand to add to its understanding of what is being said. It will record unintelligible sounds and any background noise that masks testimony. When a DAR is supplied to a transcriptionist to be transcribed many times a complete and accurate transcript cannot be made. Even the skilled firm that the court uses returns transcripts with “inaudible” in many important places. Unlike the record taken by a Certified Court Reporter no one is responsible for the maintenance and accuracy of the DAR. If the transcript of a DAR is not useable for an attorney they have no legal recourse. In several instances already there simply was no DAR taken. Either the judge forgot to turn it on or it simply was lost. If I were an attorney I would be upset if a key portion of the proceedings in a criminal case was “inaudible” or “unintelligible” or simply nonexistent because someone didn’t turn on the recorder or lost the record. Especially since there is no legal recourse.
As a student court reporter I was taught to be “seen and not heard”, probably the reason I haven’t spoken before. The thing is that if you see me in the courtroom you know an accurate record is being taken it will be protected and a transcript will be available. If you don’t see a court reporter, who knows?
If the record is important to you request a court reporter or you don’t know what you will get.
On the administrative level the Certified Court Reporter is seen as an unnecessary expense. The DAR is attractive as an inexpensive replacement.
What price, Justice?
Dorothy J. Sheeley-Seel CSR, RPR, FCRR
Managing Reporter, Third Judicial District
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