The Bureau of Indian Affairs

Image by wwboy from Pixabay

This is: A weekly column consisting of letters to my perspicacious progeny. I write letters to my grandkids and my great-grandkids — the Stickies — to advise them and haunt them after they've become grups and/or I'm deleted.

Warning: This column is rated SSC — Sexy Seasoned Citizens — A Perusal by kids, callowyutes, or grups may result in a debilitating intersectional triggering. Viewing with a tablet or a monitor is highly recommended for maximum enjoyment.  

About 

Glossary 

Erratically Appearing Hallucinatory Guest Star: Dana — A gentlereader

"I am aware that as presenting myself as the advocate of the Indians and their rights, I shall stand very much alone." -Sam Houston 

"There are not enough Indians in the world to defeat the Seventh Calvery." 

                                                                            - George Armstrong Custer

Dear (eventual) Grandstickies and Great-Grandstickies (and Gentlereaders),

Fortunately for black people, The Fedrl Gummit doesn't include a Bureau of African-American Affairs. Unfortunately for Native Americans, there is such a thing as the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA). 

In fact, having been set up in 1824, it's almost 200 years old.  

By the time the Pilgrims arrived off the coast of present-day Massachusets most of the previous occupants of the area had conveniently died. 

“Within these late years, there hath, by God’s visitation, reigned a wonderful plague, the utter destruction, devastation, and depopulation of that whole territory, so as there is not left any that do claim or challenge any kind of interest therein." -King James the first  

Yes, that King James.

The Pilgrims, not having access to GPS, or even AAA TripTiks, arrived in Cape Cod Bay after more than two months at sea. They were more than 200 miles north of their intended destination, Hudson Bay. 

They were a day late (several days actually) and a dollar short. 

[A dollar short?]

I'm speaking metaphorically, Dana, cool writers do that. Literally speaking, they were running out of food and their timing was terrible. It was early November and they parked the Mayflower in what is now the Northeastern region of the U.S.A. 

Winters there were/are even worse than those here in Northeast Ohio (aka Canada's Deep South).

[Shudder!]

They were supposed to have landed in the Big Apple (actually it was the little apple back then) having heard good things from the Dutch. Having once spent a winter in the NYC area I can verify that winters there are much milder than New England winters, or even Northeast Ohio winters. 

[Shudder!]

They nearly didn't make it; they almost became a historical rounding error. However, they discovered that by breaking into Native American homes and graves there was food to be had.  

By the time November rolled around again they had (temporarily) befriended some of their new neighbors and had, um, recycled cleared farmland and empty native villages left behind by the locals who had been dying off in droves from European diseases for over a hundred years.

In short order, the Europeans set out to save their souls while stealing their country. The rest is history. The fact that the majority of the natives would die from disease and didn't have to actually be killed sped the process up considerably. 

(Very) long (and complicated) story short — two centuries of theft, exploitation, and attempts at forced assimilation by The Fedrl Gummit. The Bureau of Indian Affairs is about to celebrate its 200th birthday. 

If one defines the Deep State as I do, as a group of mostly faceless, unelected bureaucrats that write and enforce most of the Rules&Regs of The Fedrl Gummit, we should be preparing to celebrate(?) the Deep State's birthday.  

Now, I'm a firm believer in what I call the That was Then, This is Now philosophy of history. That is to say, while the sins of the past should be acknowledged, lessons learned, and where realistic, compensation paid in some form or fashion, what can actually be done to actually solve a given problem so we can all move forward together?           

While I freely admit to knowing virtually nothing about the plight of modern Native Americans living on reservations googlin' the phrase why are Indian reservations so poor? immediately pulled up a nine-year-old article from Forbes (.com) titled, Why Are Indian Reservations So Poor, A Look At The Bottom 1%.

Another very long story short: 

"The vast majority of land on reservations is held communally...This leads to what economists call the tragedy of the commons: If everyone owns the land, no one does. So the result is substandard housing and the barren, rundown look that comes from a lack of investment, overuse and environmental degradation. "

It's the exact same reason most inner-city housing projects are a disaster. Property rights change everything. The article explains why, in detail, if you're interested. 

For our purposes, suffice it to say that if the provisions of the Dawes Act, passed in 1887, had been implemented and all Indian land privatized we could've solved this problem a couple of centuries ago. 

But what happens when Fedrl regulators, special interests, and self-serving, local Native American officials wind up on the same team? 

Ya get a 200-year-old agency of The Fedrl Gummit that's been working on the same problems for 200 years.

"Any Indian who didn’t win clear title to land by 1934 was left with a fractional share of the reservation’s land held in trust. With every generation, each share was divided among more family members and today hundreds of people may have a partial claim to one share of trust land."

Wednesday, April 30, 2121

HHS Task Force Releases Report

 

Washington (AP) — Dr. Anthony Steven Fauci III, Secretary of the United States Department of Health and Human Services, has announced that the Report of the Joint Task Force appointed to study and recommend reforms to the American healthcare system is now in the hands of President Kardashian and will be released to the public shortly. 

Dr. Fauci, asked if a final determination as to whether face masks work and under what circumstances had been made (as specifically requested by President Kardashian) responded, "Well, that depends..." 

Poppa loves you,
Have an OK day

Comment, share this column, or access older columns below. If you find my work pleasing you should buy me some cheap coffee with PayPal or plastic.    

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Racialism

Image by M Vaughn from Pixabay

This is: A weekly column consisting of letters to my perspicacious progeny. I write letters to my grandkids and my great-grandkids — the Stickies — to advise them and haunt them after they've become grups and/or I'm deleted.

Warning: This column is rated SSC — Sexy Seasoned Citizens — A Perusal by kids, callowyutes, or grups may result in a debilitating intersectional triggering. Viewing with a tablet or a monitor is highly recommended for maximum enjoyment.  

About 

Glossary 

Erratically Appearing Hallucinatory Guest Star: Dana — A Gentlerreader

"The word racism is like ketchup. It can be put on practically anything - and demanding evidence makes you a racist." -Thomas Sowell 

Dear (eventual) Grandstickies and Great-Grandstickies (and Gentlereaders),

Racialism is an interesting word. 

[And what, pray tell, is racialism?]

Well, Dana, that depends on who you ask, which is what makes it interesting. If one goes a-googlin' the very first page of returned links may connect to sources that contradict each other. 

Also, two different kids entering the word on the exact same make and model of their school-issued Chromebooks are unlikely to be offered the same set of links to choose from. 

[Wait-wait-wait. Who you callin' kids? Is a 20-year-old college student a kid? Is a...]  

98.7% of all H. sapiens under the age of 30 or so, student or not. It's not an insult, it's a fact. It's a fact that, fortunately, will be recognized and remedied by 94.3% of all H. sapiens by the time they're 30, at the latest.

As for the remaining 4.4%... well, we must all do what we can to minimize their impact on our lives, hopefully without having to resort to violence.

Luckily for me, although I was a card-carrying member of the 4.4% until I was 32 years old, I managed to survive till April of 1985 with relatively little damage to myself and others, whereupon my head popped out of my ass. 

I've been paying restitution ever since but I'm cautiously optimistic that by the time I'm deleted the bill will be marked paid in full.     

Regardless, my point is that the Goog, by design, customizes search results based on what it knows about you, what it thinks you might want to see, and what it thinks you should see.

Given that the Goog is more likely to start making donations to Republicrats than revealing how the secret army of Algorithmites goes about deciding what information you'll be offered, constant caution is called for if you're actually seeking truth and not mere confirmation of your biases. 

And entering a word like racialism, which means whatever the user wants it to mean, is especially problematic.

[Great (yawn) But what the fu... what the heck does it mean?]

Well personally, I define it as the tendency of certain people to insert the subject of race into every possible situation. What used to be called playing the race card has gone mainstream. 

A fundamental tenet of the Church of the Woke is that Pasty Patriarchs, and even the melanin-challenged women they hold in bondage, are, by definition, all Neoracists all the time.

[What's a Neo... Never mind, let's move on. That doesn't make any logical sense; it's impossible to prove all white people are racists.]

Proof? Proof and logic are merely weapons that the oppressor class uses to control the oppressed. 

This is why you white people just don't understand what's going on. You think that just because proof and logic, fundamental to that Enlightenment thing that's produced a society that our ancestors couldn't even imagine, will show us the way forward. 

[I'm a literary hallucination, not a white person. You're the white person.]     

Not anymore, I've awokened. I've decided to stop resisting the fact I self-identify as an African-American lesbian woman named Coco who could pass for Hale Berry's twin sister. 

[Whatever gets ya through the night, Coco. But what's that got to do with turning your back on the "Enlightenment thing?"] 

To be a Wokie is to reject logic and proof and embrace a revelation. New religions are based on a revelation of some sort that enables their adherents to reject everything that came before and start over. The revelation provides a firm foundation to stand on that can't be questioned. 

"There is no God but Allah, and Muhammad is his messenger." -The Shahada

All Caucasians, and all the "Western" traditional notions of morality, ethics, lifestyle etc., are racist by definition. Therefore, when any given white person says they're not racist it proves that they are. -Me

We Wokies believe that life on Earth is merely the story of the strong oppressing and exploiting the weak and the marginalized. For the last several hundred years this has been all about Caucasians versus everyone else.

St. Karl thought it was all about economics, the evil rich vs. everyone else. When more modern thinkers were trying to figure out how it was the Russian revolution so quickly morphed into hell on Earth and not the predicted utopia they concluded two things.    

White people had managed to take control not only by economically exploiting everyone else they perpetuated a cultural fraud that was hidden by the fact that anyone anywhere that applied the life lessons so-called "Western Civilization" had spent several thousand years learning (the hard way) could prosper and thrive. 

This is why it's been so tough, till recently, to wake people up. 

But now that there's enough money sloshing around in developed countries to free us from traditional restraints such as self-restraint, the belief in/need for a higher power, the nuclear family, patriotism, ya just can't have it allism, etceterism — a new version of the devil has been created, "constructed" if you will.  

Everything that's wrong with the world is due to white privilege and power. 

This trope enables everyone that's piling up the dough — multinational firms that have turned their backs on the blue-collar types that built and maintain the world, Hollywood, universities, most of the media, certain black superstar athletes — to thrive and prosper as long as they say the right things and pay off the right grifters. 

That's racialism, and that's why I'm now officially a black lesbian, I could really use the money.

Poppa loves you,
Have an OK day

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Cranky don't tweet.       

     

        

  

OK, Boomer

Don't trust anyone over 30. OK, Boomer?

Image by Rudy Anderson from Pixabay

This is: A weekly column consisting of letters to my perspicacious progeny. I write letters to my grandkids and my great-grandkids — the Stickies — to advise them and haunt them after they've become grups and/or I'm deleted.

Warning: This column is rated SSC — Sexy Seasoned Citizens — A Perusal by kids, callowyutes, or grups may result in a debilitating intersectional triggering. Viewing with a tablet or a monitor is highly recommended for maximum enjoyment.  

About 

Glossary 

Erratically Appearing Hallucinatory Guest Star: Dana — A Gentlerreader

"At fifty you realize that you are no longer a kid. I ignored forty. It was like I was almost at middle age. Maybe it's the baby boomer thing."  -John Travolta

Dear (eventual) Grandstickies and Great-Grandstickies (and Gentlereaders),

The phrase OK, Boomer, according to Wikipedia, "...is a catchphrase and meme often used by teenagers and young adults to dismiss or mock attitudes typically associated with people born in the two decades following World War II, ...it has increasingly been used to refer to pre-millennial people in general, regardless of when they were actually born."

[You had to look it up? OK, Boomer. The implicit, eye-rolling sarcasm was over your head, Mr. Obvious? ]

No, Dana, I was already well aware of the significance of this snarky, smug dollop of ageism.

I wish to compare and contrast the meme in question to a meme that was popular among Boomers when Boomers were callowyutes, and memes were not yet called memes. 

[Huh?]

Patience. 

I looked it up merely because I wondered if my fellow English speakers were inserting a comma betwixt OK and Boomer which I think is grammatically correct. (My grammatical abilities are not what I wish they were.) 

Also, I tend to favor color, melody, and rhythm over technically correct and I've found that using commas to "set off nouns of direct address" often looks discordant, Dana, so I was...

[Huh?]

Never mind, it's not you, it's me.  

In the sixties, the meme don't trust anyone over thirty was quite popular. I love irony for some reason and...

[It's because you were a cynical old bastard the day you were born!]

That's not true. I was a cognitively dissonant combination of idealism and cynicism for quite a while. Reality has gradually boiled off most of the idealism but it occasionally rears its nieve head when I'm least expecting it. I think it has something to do with having a kid, and grandkids.  

As I was saying, I love irony and there's a double dose to be found in comparing these two memes. There's the obvious one, Boomers who sneered at their parents being sneered at by their progeny. 

And then there's the less obvious one. 

Don't trust anyone over thirty is credited to one of the founders of the Free Speech Movement, Jack Weinberg, a movement that stemmed from an incident on the campus of the University of California, Berkeley in the fall of 1964. 

Fast forward to the present era and the epidemic of college students shouting down, and often shutting down, the free speech of the unwoke — including students at UC Berkeley.

Nowadays, no shortage of uncollegial collegiate callowyutes favor restricting free speech if they or one of the high priests of Neojacobinism rule that a given utterance is hate speech since they conflate alleged hate speech with violence.

[Wait-wait-wait. Should Neojacobinism be capitalized?]

Well... Jacobinism is, and from what I can tell the word is usually rendered as Neo-Jacobinism. However, I prefer rendering as one word, as in neoconservative or neoliberalism. 

[OK, Boomer but...]

Anyways, even silence is violence if one is not promptly and properly parroting the party line. Somewhere, George Orwell (and some otherwhere, Chairman Mao) are smiling.

[You know, not everyone likes alliteration as much as you do.]  

OK, boomer is illustrative of another current phenomenon — the effortless kneejerk reply by uninformed or inarticulate social media mavens with fractured attention spans — one of several reasons why Cranky don't tweet. 

For example, suppose I was a Tweeter and posted something like, "I'll wager that the majority of Wokies, particularly younger ones, don't even know what a Jacobite is and why canceling someone is the modern equivalent of sentencing them to death by guillotine without having to get blood on their coke white kicks." 

[What are...] 

Unblemished sneakers.

[OK Boomer]

No meaningful response is required, not even a link to someone else's meaningful response is required. 

[OK Boomer] 

Touche', Tweety.  

[Hey, wait a second. You've been known to take a shot or three at your fellow boomers.] 

True, I've devoted entire paragraphs, and then some, to my contention that unless a given Boomer is as sharp, productive, and relevant as Einshtein at his best it's time to leave the stage — if one can afford to — and mentor a grup or a callowyute if ya' can find one that'll pay attention.

Hint: you may have to do so surreptitiously. 

Otherwise, get a new job, or get a hobby, or volunteer to be a volunteer that _______.

[Einshtein?] 

Yes, that's how it's pronounced you Neandertal. 

[OK, Boomer.]  

On a related note

I don't know if Dr. Anthony Faucci is as sharp, productive, and relevant as Einshtein at his best. He has many fans, but also many detractors. I do have a problem with the fact he can dance the Walkback as adroitly as any given politician. That's not an ability that inspires trust and confidence in a scientist in my semi-humble opinion.

Regardless, he's 80-yeas-old and was paid $432,312 in 2020. This makes him the highest-paid employee of the 4,000,000 or so people that work for The Fedrl Gummit. 

And yes, that's more than we pay our commander-in-chief. 

I can't help but wonder if there's a younger person somewhere out there, a medical genius, that could and would change the world if given the chance.        

Poppa loves you,

Have an OK day

Comment, share this column, or access older columns below. If you find my work pleasing you should buy me some cheap coffee with PayPal or plastic.    

Feel free to comment/like/follow/cancel/troll me on Cranky's Facebook page.

Cranky don't tweet.

  

Voting

Image by chayka1270 from Pixabay

This is: A weekly column consisting of letters to my perspicacious progeny. I write letters to my grandkids and my great-grandkids — the Stickies — to advise them and haunt them after they've become grups and/or I'm deleted.

Warning: This column is rated SSC — Sexy Seasoned Citizens — A Perusal by kids, callowyutes, or grups may result in a debilitating intersectional triggering. Viewing with a tablet or a monitor is highly recommended for maximum enjoyment.  

About 

Glossary 

Erratically Appearing Hallucinatory Guest Star: Dana — A Gentlerreader

"In my lifetime, we've gone from Eisenhower to George W. Bush. We've gone from John F. Kennedy to Al Gore. If this is evolution, I believe that in twelve years, we'll be voting for plants." -Lewis Black  

Dear (eventual) Grandstickies and Great-Grandstickies (and Gentlereaders),

The Donald has declared repeatedly, and continues to declare frequently, I wuz robbed! 

If he's deleted before getting a chance at a rematch with Uncle Joe this cry for justice will probably be chiseled into the marble of the biggest, best, and most beautiful mausoleum in all of New York City, maybe the whole country.

It'll be America's answer to the Taj Mahal and be part of a complex that includes a casino (Taj 2) and the Trump Memorial Skating Rink and Shopping Mall!

It'll...

[Hey-hey-hey! Glance up, please. The title of this missive is Voting.]       

Indeed it is. Thanks, Dana. 

Our story so far:

The Donald says he wuz robbed. But he'd say that even if he lost by a decisive margin instead of a narrow one. It's what he does. 

The powers that be in various Depublican states dramatically expanded vote by mail and kept tweaking rules as they went, sowing confusion and litigation.

The Republicrats have responded by introducing new voting laws in several states, Georgia for example, and the purple press is covering the story as though it's as important and traumatic as the impending divorce of Kim and Kanye.

[And social media mavens are going nuts. Did you know she's allegedly worth a billion bucks?]

Most states require people to prove they have the right to vote, when they vote, by producing some form of identification. 

The recently passed law in Georgia requires a given Citizen of the Republic to produce a drivers license (expired is OK) or a (free) state-issued ID — or a Social Security number, or a copy of a current utility bill, or a bank statement, or a government check, or a paycheck. 

[Shudder... Racism!]

The Ds answer to the Rs is an 800-page bill that requires the states, among many many other things, to enable voter registration via an automated telephone system...

"Please press one if you're a Depublican, two if you're Republicrat, three if you're an independent, and four if none of the preceding options apply. 

Beep. 

"I'm sorry, I didn't get that. Please press one if you're a Depublican..." 

And, specifies that envelopes used to return mail-in ballots must be "self-sealing." 

[To protect the salivicly challenged?]    

And, a grace period. Mail-in votes that arrive up to ten days after an election must be counted. 

[You made all that up!]

No, I didn't

I've been hinting around about starting a movement called neo-neoconservatism, but have yet to mention any details. Upon reflection, the very thought of trying to start, or worse yet lead, a political movement makes me want to hide under my bed.

Despite the fact I'm still stinging from my resounding defeat in the last election —America apparently doesn't want a king — going forward I'll continue to preface my ideas for untangling the nation's political and cultural problems with the phrase if I were king.

To be honest, being a benevolent monarch is the only political job that I'd bother to dust off my resume for. That said: 

If I were king, I'd declare the weekend and Monday prior to the federal elections that occur every two years (on Tuesdays) to be a national four-day weekend/holiday. Fireworks are suggested, but not mandatory.  

Most importantly, the vast majority of the Citizens of the Republic will be required to vote in person if they want to participate. I'm sure that Uncle Joe, the president that's trying so hard to reunite our nation's fractious factions, will agree.

Traditionally, most Americans somehow managed to all vote on the same day. In the modern era, the results were usually known by the next morning and everyone got on with their lives.

But compare and contrast the election of 1960 to the election of 2000. 

In 1960 Tricky Dick, many now believe, actually won the race against Kennedy. But Tricky Dick — a firm believer that all's fair in love, war, and politics (which became abundantly clear by 1974) — conceded rather than put the nation through what the Algore didn't hesitate to put the nation through in 2000. 

I propose an All American four-day weekend. Plenty of time to get to the polls and plenty of time to get the transportationally challenged to the polls. 

[Transportationally challenged?]  

Voting parties and picanics! Parades! Voting sales  — "Everything in the store 10% off all four days!" — Football! Members of gummit and schoolteachers unions get another paid holiday to honor their service to a grateful nation!

Normal people can resume their lives on Wednesday. Lawyers can file fresh lawsuits. Politicians can start raising money for the next election.

[Pic-a-nics?] 

Google the name, Yogi Bear.

Anti-racism statement

I unequivocally condemn the blatant racism that's been on display since the controversy over Georgia's new election law has seized the attention of the nation and the world. 

To assert that black people won't be able to prove their identities via one of the multiple options listed in the new law is appalling. I can't believe that in this day and age there are openly racist white people that still think that black people aren't as smart as they are, and that our president is one of them. 

I'm thinking about moving to another country.

Poppa loves you,
Have an OK day

Comment, share this column, or access older columns below. If you find my work pleasing you should buy me some cheap coffee with PayPal or plastic.    

Feel free to comment/like/follow/cancel/troll me on Cranky's Facebook page.

Cranky don't tweet.    

     

  

      

 

Spring

A Mr. Cranky's neighborhood episode

Image by Bessi from Pixabay

This is: A weekly column consisting of letters to my perspicacious progeny. I write letters to my grandkids and my great-grandkids — the Stickies — to advise them and haunt them after they've become grups and/or I'm deleted.

Warning: This column is rated SSC — Sexy Seasoned Citizens — A Perusal by kids, callowyutes, or grups may result in a debilitating intersectional triggering. Viewing with a tablet or a monitor is highly recommended for maximum enjoyment.  

About 

Glossary

Erratically Appearing Hallucinatory Guest Star: Dana — A Gentlerreader

"The first day of spring is one thing, and the first spring day is another. The difference between them is sometimes as great as a month." -Henry Van Dyke

Dear (eventual) Grandstickies and Great-Grandstickies (and Gentlereaders)

It must be Spring. 

In the course of a single recent day, I encountered the three wise men for the first time in a while, Picasso man wheeled his way down the sidewalk in front of my house as I was looking out the window, and my favorite Morman — the 80-year old that lives next door — was in his backyard prepping his Can-Am Spyder for fresh adventures.

Consilience or cosmic coinkydink?  

"Get your motor runnin'

Head out on the highway..."

If not for the fact he's much more likely to be seen on the back of one of his two-riding lawn mowers than his motorcycle when the weather's nice I'd get him a leather jacket with Missionaries on Motorcycles written on the back.

While walking around my very quiet and very old neighborhood, I refer to the age of most of the houses and many of my neighbors, I've been trying out a new greeting when I encounter a fellow Citizen of the Republic of a certain age. 

"Good morning and/or evening (I never walk in the afternoon), looks like we've survived another Northern Ohio winter and the plague!"

Some version of "Well, so far anyway" is the reply I almost always receive unless it's one of the very few people I encounter regularly and who don't regard me as a potential threat. The demeanor of most, often as not, clearly expresses that they're prepared to sic their dog on me if I should do or say something that confirms their suspicions.  

When I cross paths with younger adults I limit myself to good morning and/or evening. They usually toss one back at me but often look surprised. 

Why's that geezer talking to me? I wish I had brought the dog.       

Teens almost always look startled and uncomfortable and mumble a half-hearted reply or none at all. If there's more than one there's often giggling and speaking in hushed tones as they walk away trying to make sense of what just happened.

The elusive, unaccompanied younger kid(s) also is likely to look startled and uncomfortable and also mumble a half-hearted reply or none at all. Their demeanor displays a fight or flight response as their eyes dart around in search of the best escape route. 

There's a reason the expression Northern hospitality is not a thing. 

[Maybe it's just you?]      

Entirely possible, Dana. I may have the soul of an artist but it's trapped behind/inside the face/body of a non-speaking extra in an old school gangster movie.

Assuming he's lived long enough to have grey hair and has no visible scars.

We have new streetlights, or rather, new streetlight bulbs on some of the streets of Hooterville. The old bulbs were encased in a sort of shroud/cover that diminished the harshness of the light a bit. The shrouds/covers didn't do much to reduce the light pollution in our little Ohio "city" but they helped.

The new bulbs are just sort of there. No cover, quite bright, and high-tech looking. Hopefully, there's a phase two pending in which the shrouds/covers will return.  

Not that (almost) any location in Northeast Ohio is good for stargazing despite the fact there's no shortage of ruralness in the region southwest of the thriving megalopolis of Cleveland.

Lake Erie not only produces lake-effect snow once it freezes over in the winter it generates a lot of cloud cover a lot of the time.

And now, since multimedia entertainment is considered cool and cutting edge, I'm a cynical old crank, and it's my column, here's a video version of an old Randy Newman song, Burn On, about the time the Cuyahoga River caught on fire in Cleveland. 

"Cleveland, city of light, city of magic."

The good news is that both Lake Eire and the Cuyahoga River are in much better shape than when the song was written. The bad news is that most of the factories and steel mills (and thousands of jobs) that caused the problem are now polluting China.

[Is ruralness a real word?]

Absabalutely, Dana. 

[Wait-wait-wait. You said almost any location. Where...]

Observatory Park. Described by Google Maps as a "green space for hiking and stargazing." I've never been there but now that I know about it I might pay a visit... after the plague is under control.  

I'm embarrassed to admit that even though I've been temporarily living in Ohio for 35 years I only recently became aware of its existence. Observatory Park I mean, not the Buckeye state. 

A quick bit o' googlin' revealed that it's one of only 8, or 10, or 27 parks recognized by the International Dark-Sky Association in the US. (I love living in the Information Age.)

Anyways, it's located in a rural part of Geauga County (between me and Cleveland) that has minimal light pollution, and the folks that run the park work with local officials to keep it that way. Unfortunately, it's as subject to cloud cover as the rest of this region so clear nights are catch-as-catch-can.

Maybe I could get a room... 

Poppa loves you,
Have an OK day

Comment, share this column, or access older columns below. If my work pleases you you can buy me some cheap coffee with PayPal or plastic.    

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Cranky don't tweet.     

 

  

The National Guard vs The Plague

Photo by Clay Banks on Unsplash

This is: A weekly column consisting of letters to my perspicacious progeny. I write letters to my grandkids and my great-grandkids — the Stickies — to advise them and haunt them after they've become grups and/or I'm deleted.

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Erratically Appearing Hallucinatory Guest Star: Dana — A Gentlerreader

"I’ll get vaccinated when politicians make it easier to get an appointment than front row Springsteen tickets." -Peter Van Buren

Dear (eventual) Grandstickies and Great-Grandstickies (and Gentlereaders),

I've been wondering why the National Guard presence isn't so ubiquitous in every state of the union that posted conspiracy theories have bogged down the internet. 

[Why would you expect...]

Vaccinations, Dana, Covid vaccinations. I'm not talking about troops behind barbed wire-topped fencing like the ones still in Washington. The last of those battle-scarred troops will hopefully be going home by the end of May as promised. 

[Battle-scarred? Are you making fun of said soldiers?]

Oh hell no. I thank God for the fact there are about 2.2 million active and reserve volunteers serving their country.

If you count armed paramilitary forces Emperor Xi has a million more minions serving in his military than we do, as does the Pooteen, voluntarily or otherwise. North Korea's Dear Leader has 7,769,000 hungry minions at his disposal according to Wikipedia.

I'm making fun of the fact that 26,000 troops were deployed to protect the center of the Swamp in January as compared to virtually none to protect the country from mostly peaceful protestors last summer.

[Which has exactly what to do with Covid vaccinations? ] 

I'm glad you asked.

I've been trying to get vaccinated for awhile now. I recently scored an appointment for my first jab on April the eighth. My home state, Ohio, has been threatening to open Regional Mass Vaccination Clinics for several weeks but the last time I checked only two were open. 

In the meantime, getting vaccinated is a catch as catch can game. One clicks around hoping to snag an appointment at one of the many authorized sites but the vaccines are being doled out in dribs and drabs. 

I get it. The stuff can only be manufactured and distributed so fast. But why didn't The Fedr'l Gummit's highly successful Operation Warp Speed, which produced vaccines in record time, include a distribution plan given how long they had to put one together?

[So why do you think the National Guard should be the master jabbers?]

The Interstate Highway System and the military's logistical expertise. 

[Well, that explains that then.]

Quick point, I think the shots should be administered by local, qualified volunteers under the supervision of a Doc or three in light of some... interesting experiences I've had at a local outlet of a national drugstore chain where I no longer get my prescriptions filled. 

[Whatever, but...]

The building of the Interstate Highway System that we take for granted was begun in 1956, three years after I was born and three years after Eisenhower began his first term. 

(Note to my younger readers: America used to be able to get all sorts of amazing things done but around the time we landed men persons on the moon things started going south.)   

In fact, its full name is the Dwight D. Eisenhower National System of Interstate and Defense Highways. 

Note the word defense. 

The Interstate Highway System includes the STRAHNET, the Strategic Highway Network, which according to Wikipedia is: The entire network of highways which are important to the United States’ strategic defense policy and which provide defense access, continuity, and emergency capabilities for defense purposes.

Note the phrase emergency capabilities.   

Emergency capabilities... Like a pandemic, for instance?

As to logistics expertise, despite its flaws (which stem primarily from the officers at the very top of the food chain, but that's another column), the military of the United States knows how to get stuff from point A to point B. 

So why wasn't Brigadier General Amos T. Halftrack tasked with securing the cooperation of large, more unused than used facilities— from small concert halls to ginormous, domed stadiums that are in every state of the union — to serve as distribution centers/mass vaccination sites?

The Guard could also have been tasked with building pop-up sites wherever needed, or commandeering the secret FEMA concentration camps... 

[Why haven't you been canceled yet? And hasn't the Guard been involved...]

In a limited way, yes, but America could've made some much-needed positive history. The country, if only briefly, could've experienced the buzz that comes from everybody — well, most bodies — being on the same team and working towards the same goal.

The country that put persons on the moon should be making the rest of the world look bad.  

On a related note...

According to NPR.org, in the US (in which roughly 15% of us have been fully vaccinated) "...the White House announced it is working through the technicalities to loan 2.5 million doses to Mexico and 1.5 million doses to Canada from its stockpile of 7 million doses."

[Like, seriously dude?]

Keep in mind that the Fedr'l Gummit funded the development of the vaccines and guaranteed they will buy the vaccines developed by Big Pharma to get vaccines ASAP — fortunately for us. 

This means that the Feds can, by law, since there's taxpayer money involved, force the drug companies to hand over the technology to manufacturers in poor countries, which is how you end a global pandemic before ever new versions of the bug come looking for fresh meat.

The Donald and Uncle Joe apparently didn't/don't think this is necessary. 

Poppa loves you,

Have an OK day

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