No pictures this time, just some reminiscing.
This week I attended a convention in San Diego, where many years ago I lived and worked until the economy of the time (1992) and some other personal issues led me to move to the Bay Area. While I have been here I have encountered friends and former co-workers that I have not seen or heard from in almost 20 years. Not only that, but I also saw a college friend of mine who I have not seen or talked to since we both graduated 20 years ago.
It amazed me that some of the people that I seen here have hardly changed in appearance since the last time I saw them, while others have changed so much that I barely recognized them. I am also not sure where I fit in their eyes in this regard. They all recognized me, but only after I introduced myself to them. All that is except for one friend, who told me that she recognized me because of my smile. I was very happy to hear that, until she then pointed out that I had "filled out" since I had last saw her. But believe it or not I took it as a compliment, at least that is how I think she meant it, that is after she said that I was too skinny in college. It is the nicest way that I have ever been told that I have gained weight in my life.
Now while my time in San Diego is almost done since I leave tomorrow, my trip down memory lane has one more mile to go, as I will be travelling to my hometown to see another friend who I have not seen in 20 years or so but nevertheless is my longest standing friend, as I have known her for over 40 years. I have no idea what to expect or how that will go, but again I have that same sense of nervous anticipation as I did before I met my other friends.
It is funny how nervous I got before meeting my old friends and co-workers, and how nervous I am now before meeting with the oldest friend. All sorts of thoughts have run through my head the last few days: Will I see them? Will they recognize me? Will I be able to recognize them? Is this the beginning of re-establishing contact, or will they and I again not talk to each other for another 20 years? It is strange and tense and yet at the same time so much fun when they do recognize me and we touch base and reminisce about days gone by. It is also worth remembering that I still have something in common with each of them, even though our lives have gone in much different directions since then.
There are still a few friends out there that I have not seen in many, many years. I hope that the day will come when I will be able to reconnect with them and I hope that they too will be able to recognize me.
Friday, September 25, 2009
Friday, September 11, 2009
A 9/11 Essay Revisited
The one or two of you who remember the blog that preceded this one (no, not the American Idol one) might remember this post that I made to that blog on September 11, 2006. I think with a relatively new blog, and possibly one or two new readers, that it is worth posting it again on this anniversary.
A 9/11 Essay - How 9/11 Changed My Life
I don't know anyone who died on September 11, 2001. I don't know anyone who knew anyone who died on that day. I don't know anyone who was in either New York or Pennsylvania that morning. I did know one person who worked at the Pentagon, but thankfully she was not in the building at the time the plane hit there. So some of you might think I'm being pretentious by saying that the events of that day changed my life beyond just the general effects that we all felt that day and beyond, but it is true.
It was the Monday after September 11. Throughout the previous week there were of course a number of conversations at my workplace about what happened. However, I found the discussions to be very disturbing. The talks centered around the collapsed buildings, the closed stock market, the grounded planes, the cancelled football and baseball games, things like that. I didn't hear any conversation about the event itself, almost as if it were an afterthought. I couldn't believe what I was hearing, or more importantly, what I wasn't hearing. Thousands of people had just died and all I heard were people complaining about how their stocks weren't being traded. Over the weekend I decided to write an open letter to the company. In that letter I attempted to remind people that, as I wrote, "We are people first and engineers second, not the other way around." I tried to point out what I thought was a myopic attitude that some of my co-workers were apparently taking and the anger that I felt about that and that even if they didn't know anyone directly involved in the attacks they should still give a damn.
I sent it out that Monday morning. The reaction was strong. Some personally thanked me for sending out the letter, as they felt the same way that I did. Others criticized me, claiming that I was telling them how they should feel. Still others, including most importantly my bosses, thought it was an attack on the company, since I pointed out that the only acknowledgement of the events from the company was an e-mail from the IT manager asking people to curtail their Internet use. I tried to explain that my message was not meant to be an attack on the company but rather on specific people within the company that I had chosen not to name. Nevertheless, the view about me and the letter remained and would affect me in an even bigger way a few months later.
Around that time I was engaged in discussion with my bosses about opening a branch office in Oakland, where I was planning on moving. As the months went by I was growing increasingly frustrated by the slow progress that the company management was making in coming to a decision on whether to open the office. I learned later that one of the reasons why it was taking so long was because of the letter. I was now seen as a loose cannon for having publicly criticized the company, and even though I had been with the company for 9-1/2 years at this point there were some at the management level who questioned whether or not I could be trusted. The questioning of my loyalty to the company, and the delay in the decision to open the Oakland office that resulted from it, was the main reason why I decided to leave the company 4 months later.
I think it is too simplistic to say that the letter all by itself led to my departure from the company that I spend almost 10 years of my life. There were certainly other issues that were involved that had nothing to do with the 9/11 letter. However, it certainly played an important role.
The letter changed me in another way too. It reminded me that there are important things that are going on outside my office window, and that I too should not be so focused on my work that I ignore them. That is what led me to become more involved in volunteer work, and why I spent my 40th birthday helping people in Indonesia rebuild their homes after the earthquake and tsunami. One can never say for sure, but it is possible that were it not for the events of 9/11 I would still be at my old company and never gotten involved in anything outside of it.
I don't regret writing what I did. It was something that I felt had to be said, job be damned. And every September 11 since then, I pull out that letter and read it again, just to remind myself that I am a person first and an engineer second, and not the other way around.
And at the risk of potentially revealing my identity to a couple of former co-workers, here is the letter that I wrote and sent out to my company on September 17, 2001, which was not part of the post back on 9/11/06:
I've noticed something in the last week that, to me, is very upsetting. While the rest of the country set aside their daily routines to pause and mourn the events of last Tuesday, there was hardly any recognition of the event here in the office. It was just business as usual, or so it seemed. I'm sure that everybody here was aware of what happened (judging by the apparent high use of the Internet), but the only conversations that I heard were about either the collapse of the World Trade Center buildings, the disruption of air travel, the cancellation of sporting events, or the closing of the stock market. I didn't hear anybody talk about the human tragedy or suggest something to do to help, and this disturbs me. Has anyone here donated blood or money? Did anyone here go to a memorial service? Did anyone here participate in the moment of silence on Friday? Was anyone even aware of it?
We tend to be myopic, focused on the task at hand. Meeting schedules, making budgets, keeping clients happy, and completing our tasks. These are the things that preoccupy our time and our thoughts. If something is not thrown in front of us we tend to put it aside and neglect it in favor of other things that we consider more important. While this high level of concentration may make us better engineers, it also makes us lousy people. Thousands of people died due to a random, senseless act of violence, and yet we go on with our jobs as if nothing happened. Thousands more may die defending our country against those who committed these acts, and all we can think about is how it affects our stock options or our future projects. Am I the only one who thinks that this is wrong? I sure hope not.
Not only should the events of last Tuesday show us how important our work is, but it should also show how unimportant it really is. How much of our work really affects the world at large? Not much, when you really think about it. The rescue workers currently digging through the wreckage of the World Trade Center are engaged in work that is far more important than what we are doing. So are the FBI investigators and possibly soon our armed forces. That's not to say that we should disregard our work as useless rubbage, but we should recognize that it's not the most important thing in the world, and that there are some very important things going on outside the walls of this office that we should be aware of and should care about.
So now we may be going to war. Some of you may not be concerned about this. You may think that because neither you nor your family is eligible for the draft, or because you are not a US citizen, or because you’re an engineer and not a soldier that it doesn't really matter to you whether we go to war or not. After all, if it doesn't affect you directly why should you care? We should care, not because it could affect our jobs but because it will affects our lives and the lives of everyone around us. I'd bet that the main reason you work here is because of the economic opportunity that this country, this city, and this office provides you that you can't get anywhere else. There's nothing wrong with pursuing economic opportunity, but you should remember that this opportunity comes with a price. A price that the workers and rescue crews in the World Trade Center and the Pentagon paid. A price that the passengers on the hijacked planes paid. A price that members of the Army, Navy, Air Force, and Marines may soon have to pay. A price that could be, and hopefully won't be, paid by someone you know. The people who died last Tuesday did so for everyone who is taking advantage of the economic opportunities and social freedoms that this country has to offer, regardless of their age, profession, or nationality. Think about that the next time you dismiss what has happened, and what may happen, as something that doesn't matter to you.
I'm not accusing anyone of being uncaring, and I hope that I’m not insulting anyone or putting my job on the line for saying this, but it worrisome to me that many people here appear to be acting as if nothing happened when in fact something has. Please remember that we are human beings first and engineers second, not the other way around.
I still try to remember...
Saturday, September 5, 2009
Where in the Hell are This Kid's Parents?
A few weeks ago a 17 year old high school dropout returned to campus armed with 8 pipe bombs, a machete, and a chain saw. His intent was to set off the bombs and then when the students and teachers began running in panic from the bombs he was going to hack them with the machete and the saw. He managed to set off two of the bombs but didn't injure anybody because two teachers tackled him before he could start the chain saw.
The kid had dropped out of school the previous year and from notes the police found later they believe he had a grudge against one of the teachers there, who he apparently felt was responsible for his dropping out. He planned to use the chain saw and the machete instead of guns because he wanted to be more distinctive than the Columbine kids and others who have shot up schools. The kid is now in jail and is being charged as an adult for attempted murder and other charges.
I wonder, where in the hell are this kid's parents?
It was reported that the kid's parents divorced several years ago. He was living with his mom and sister in an apartment near the school. According to police the mother knew nothing about this plot. The boy's father lived in another town about 30 minutes away and when contacted by the press had no comment. The press was able to get a hold of the boy's grandmother back in New Jersey, and she told them that the kid was a bright boy who had never gotten into any kind of trouble before. Grandma also told the press that she spoke with her son, the boy's father, just the week before and they were talking about the boy going to college.
I suppose the grandma can be excused because she lives on the other side of the country, but there is no such excuse to the parents. They had to have known that he had dropped out of school, something that "bright" boys don't typically do. Why did he drop out? Was he depressed? Why didn't they notice that something was wrong? Why did they miss this one big hint? These are questions that the parents have yet to answer.
Even more amazing is that this kid bought chemicals over the Internet to make the pipe bombs, and some of those chemicals can only be bought by someone over the age of 18. So he had to have used one of his parents' credit cards to buy them, and so one of them had to have known and been OK with these purchases. There were reports that the mother did know about the chemical purchases (though no word if it was her credit card that was used) but thought they were toy rockets. WTF? You have a kid that dropped out of school and was buying explosives that kids his age were not allowed to buy and you were not at least a little bit suspicious about the toy rocket story?
And oh BTW, where the hell did he get the chain saw and the machete? The kid lived in an apartment and apartment dwellers don't usually have a need for landscaping power tools. I never heard what kind of dwelling the dad lives in, but if these tools were his then I wonder why he didn't notice that they were gone. Then again, if this guy really did think his dropout son was still going to college perhaps it is not that big of a surprise.
This to me illustrates one of the biggest social problems out there, parents who are not parents to their children. If even one of this kid's parents were paying attention to what their son was up to then this incident could have been prevented without the heroic efforts of two teachers and the dependence on chance that the chain saw would not start. Have you noticed that you almost never hear from the parents of kids who commit acts like this? I don't ever remember hearing from the parents of the boys who shot up Columbine, and I think there was only a short apology from the family of the guy who shot up Virginia Tech. I can accept that they are too embarrassed to say anything to the public, but quite honestly they should be embarrassed for the shoddy parenting job that they did. Hell, shoddy may be too kind of a word. I know parenting is hard, but how much attention would it have taken for these parents to stop their kids from shooting up or blowing up schools? Certainly not more than what any caring parent is capable of giving.
It's funny that the social conservatives are all bent out of shape by gay marriage because of the potential "harm" such relationships would have on children and on society. Well, which do you think is a greater harm to society, a kid that decides to be a homosexual or a kid that decides to shoot up his school? I'll take the gay kid any day of the week.
Now if you want an example of a single parent who was able to be a parent, I offer up to you on Shirley Partridge.
Not only was she a single mom with 5 kids, but these kids were also in a rock band together. A sure recipe for disaster you'd think, but not only did Shirley keep her kids on the straight and narrow she actually joined their band and performed with them. And when she needed a father figure to step in she did not hesitate to call in Mr. Kincaid to help, especially with that hell raiser Danny. If a single mom with 5 kids in a rock band can raise them without the kids turning into psychopaths then why can't others?
Yes, there was that drug thing that Danny did, but that was years after the show was cancelled.
The kid had dropped out of school the previous year and from notes the police found later they believe he had a grudge against one of the teachers there, who he apparently felt was responsible for his dropping out. He planned to use the chain saw and the machete instead of guns because he wanted to be more distinctive than the Columbine kids and others who have shot up schools. The kid is now in jail and is being charged as an adult for attempted murder and other charges.
I wonder, where in the hell are this kid's parents?
It was reported that the kid's parents divorced several years ago. He was living with his mom and sister in an apartment near the school. According to police the mother knew nothing about this plot. The boy's father lived in another town about 30 minutes away and when contacted by the press had no comment. The press was able to get a hold of the boy's grandmother back in New Jersey, and she told them that the kid was a bright boy who had never gotten into any kind of trouble before. Grandma also told the press that she spoke with her son, the boy's father, just the week before and they were talking about the boy going to college.
I suppose the grandma can be excused because she lives on the other side of the country, but there is no such excuse to the parents. They had to have known that he had dropped out of school, something that "bright" boys don't typically do. Why did he drop out? Was he depressed? Why didn't they notice that something was wrong? Why did they miss this one big hint? These are questions that the parents have yet to answer.
Even more amazing is that this kid bought chemicals over the Internet to make the pipe bombs, and some of those chemicals can only be bought by someone over the age of 18. So he had to have used one of his parents' credit cards to buy them, and so one of them had to have known and been OK with these purchases. There were reports that the mother did know about the chemical purchases (though no word if it was her credit card that was used) but thought they were toy rockets. WTF? You have a kid that dropped out of school and was buying explosives that kids his age were not allowed to buy and you were not at least a little bit suspicious about the toy rocket story?
And oh BTW, where the hell did he get the chain saw and the machete? The kid lived in an apartment and apartment dwellers don't usually have a need for landscaping power tools. I never heard what kind of dwelling the dad lives in, but if these tools were his then I wonder why he didn't notice that they were gone. Then again, if this guy really did think his dropout son was still going to college perhaps it is not that big of a surprise.
This to me illustrates one of the biggest social problems out there, parents who are not parents to their children. If even one of this kid's parents were paying attention to what their son was up to then this incident could have been prevented without the heroic efforts of two teachers and the dependence on chance that the chain saw would not start. Have you noticed that you almost never hear from the parents of kids who commit acts like this? I don't ever remember hearing from the parents of the boys who shot up Columbine, and I think there was only a short apology from the family of the guy who shot up Virginia Tech. I can accept that they are too embarrassed to say anything to the public, but quite honestly they should be embarrassed for the shoddy parenting job that they did. Hell, shoddy may be too kind of a word. I know parenting is hard, but how much attention would it have taken for these parents to stop their kids from shooting up or blowing up schools? Certainly not more than what any caring parent is capable of giving.
It's funny that the social conservatives are all bent out of shape by gay marriage because of the potential "harm" such relationships would have on children and on society. Well, which do you think is a greater harm to society, a kid that decides to be a homosexual or a kid that decides to shoot up his school? I'll take the gay kid any day of the week.
Now if you want an example of a single parent who was able to be a parent, I offer up to you on Shirley Partridge.
Not only was she a single mom with 5 kids, but these kids were also in a rock band together. A sure recipe for disaster you'd think, but not only did Shirley keep her kids on the straight and narrow she actually joined their band and performed with them. And when she needed a father figure to step in she did not hesitate to call in Mr. Kincaid to help, especially with that hell raiser Danny. If a single mom with 5 kids in a rock band can raise them without the kids turning into psychopaths then why can't others?
Yes, there was that drug thing that Danny did, but that was years after the show was cancelled.
Thursday, September 3, 2009
The Price of One's Supper
Did you know that this Labor Day there will be a national potluck/eat-in organized by Slow Food USA? Apparently folks are supposed to bring potluck lunches to 250 events across the country where there will be speeches and petitions calling for healthier food in the nation’s public schools.
While I take no issue with improving the food in schools, I do take issue with the political correctness and arrogance of the entire “slow food” movement. I wrote back in March that the school lunch program in Berkeley that is being held up as a national model was projecting a $250,000 deficit this year and that the champion of the program, Alice Waters, was not planning on contributing any more money to the program because she wants the parents of the school kids to foot the bill. The Berkeley school board had been subsidizing the program and had considered cutting that subsidy to save money, but at the last minute decided to continue the program for one more year hoping that they can convince enough parents to pay into it, and at the same time raise the prices to help make up the debt. "I wish more of our families would make a commitment to (eating the hot lunches)," said district Superintendent William Huyett during the school board meeting. "We're asking for 25 cents more and we know it's hard times, but what we feed our children is important."
And what are they feeding the children of Berkeley? Whole chickens, hormone and antibiotic free hamburgers and hot dogs, California-grown organic rice and beans, fruit from local farmers, whole grain bread, and so on. In other words, politically correct food. Food that is not produced by a large agri-business corporation. Food that you often see at those slow food festivals that Slow Food USA, Slow Food Nation, and other organizations like them put on.
One such festival was recently held here in beautiful Oakland. The organizers of this festival, Eat Real, wanted to stage a more affordable slow food festival than the $60 a plate haughty events that Slow Food Nation holds in San Francisco and other places. Admission was free and the food prices were around $5 a plate. Sounds great, right? Well, here is a partial list of vendors who participated at Eat Real: barbecue, wood-fired pizza (utilizing local ingredients), crème brulee, Southern soul food, Mexican food, microbrewed beer, and ice cream. Now, if the goal is to have people, especially kids, eat healthier food then I for one wonder about the choice of vendors. I happen to know the barbecue vendors personally and while their tri-tip and pulled pork sandwiches are absolutely delicious it is not exactly healthy. I swear I can sometimes feel my arteries hardening while I am enjoying their meat. While it is debatable how much of the food served at Eat Real was in fact healthy (not just the BBQ, everything), there was one thing we can all be sure of, none was produced or sponsored by large food corporations.
I think that is the real target of these slow fooders, evil fast food corporations like McDonald’s and KFC and evil agri-business like Archer Daniels Midland, and like the social conservatives that want to ban rap music, Playboy, and Internet soft porn sites, they are using children as a totem to convince everybody else to do what they want. There is this push for lunch programs like in Berkeley, an incessant cry to remove soda machines from school campuses, and the occasional local bill calling for a ban on fast food restaurants, as if these alone are making kids fat, lazy, and stupid. How about the video games? Or the schools that have cut PE? Or most importantly the parents who are not supervising their children’s eating and playing habits? These people seem to think that the cure for all of our social ills, including escalating health care costs and failing kids, is to put Burger King, Coca-Cola, and their brethren out of business and force everyone to eat whole grain bread and free range chicken.
Look, I am not trying to argue that people won’t get sick and die if they eat Taco Bell every day. I’m trying to argue that this is supposed to be a free country and we should have the right to choose if we want to eat whole grain bread or a Chalupa Supreme, and we should identify arrogant do-gooders like Slow Food Nation as the politically correct police that they really are. If you want to eat organic tofu that’s fine with me, as long as you don’t get in my grill and tell me how stupid I am for not doing the same.
Continuing my theme of tying in 70’s TV personalities with the subject of my rants, I’d like to close with a brief shout-out to culinary student Jack Tripper. While Jack was a master of the culinary arts and given how skinny he was probably ate a healthy diet, you never heard him lecture Janet, Chrissy, Cindy, Terri, Larry, the Ropers, or even Mr. Farley about the food that they ate. No, Jack was a live and let live kind of guy, which was all the rage back in 1978 but seems to have all but disappeared from our society now.
While I take no issue with improving the food in schools, I do take issue with the political correctness and arrogance of the entire “slow food” movement. I wrote back in March that the school lunch program in Berkeley that is being held up as a national model was projecting a $250,000 deficit this year and that the champion of the program, Alice Waters, was not planning on contributing any more money to the program because she wants the parents of the school kids to foot the bill. The Berkeley school board had been subsidizing the program and had considered cutting that subsidy to save money, but at the last minute decided to continue the program for one more year hoping that they can convince enough parents to pay into it, and at the same time raise the prices to help make up the debt. "I wish more of our families would make a commitment to (eating the hot lunches)," said district Superintendent William Huyett during the school board meeting. "We're asking for 25 cents more and we know it's hard times, but what we feed our children is important."
And what are they feeding the children of Berkeley? Whole chickens, hormone and antibiotic free hamburgers and hot dogs, California-grown organic rice and beans, fruit from local farmers, whole grain bread, and so on. In other words, politically correct food. Food that is not produced by a large agri-business corporation. Food that you often see at those slow food festivals that Slow Food USA, Slow Food Nation, and other organizations like them put on.
One such festival was recently held here in beautiful Oakland. The organizers of this festival, Eat Real, wanted to stage a more affordable slow food festival than the $60 a plate haughty events that Slow Food Nation holds in San Francisco and other places. Admission was free and the food prices were around $5 a plate. Sounds great, right? Well, here is a partial list of vendors who participated at Eat Real: barbecue, wood-fired pizza (utilizing local ingredients), crème brulee, Southern soul food, Mexican food, microbrewed beer, and ice cream. Now, if the goal is to have people, especially kids, eat healthier food then I for one wonder about the choice of vendors. I happen to know the barbecue vendors personally and while their tri-tip and pulled pork sandwiches are absolutely delicious it is not exactly healthy. I swear I can sometimes feel my arteries hardening while I am enjoying their meat. While it is debatable how much of the food served at Eat Real was in fact healthy (not just the BBQ, everything), there was one thing we can all be sure of, none was produced or sponsored by large food corporations.
I think that is the real target of these slow fooders, evil fast food corporations like McDonald’s and KFC and evil agri-business like Archer Daniels Midland, and like the social conservatives that want to ban rap music, Playboy, and Internet soft porn sites, they are using children as a totem to convince everybody else to do what they want. There is this push for lunch programs like in Berkeley, an incessant cry to remove soda machines from school campuses, and the occasional local bill calling for a ban on fast food restaurants, as if these alone are making kids fat, lazy, and stupid. How about the video games? Or the schools that have cut PE? Or most importantly the parents who are not supervising their children’s eating and playing habits? These people seem to think that the cure for all of our social ills, including escalating health care costs and failing kids, is to put Burger King, Coca-Cola, and their brethren out of business and force everyone to eat whole grain bread and free range chicken.
Look, I am not trying to argue that people won’t get sick and die if they eat Taco Bell every day. I’m trying to argue that this is supposed to be a free country and we should have the right to choose if we want to eat whole grain bread or a Chalupa Supreme, and we should identify arrogant do-gooders like Slow Food Nation as the politically correct police that they really are. If you want to eat organic tofu that’s fine with me, as long as you don’t get in my grill and tell me how stupid I am for not doing the same.
Continuing my theme of tying in 70’s TV personalities with the subject of my rants, I’d like to close with a brief shout-out to culinary student Jack Tripper. While Jack was a master of the culinary arts and given how skinny he was probably ate a healthy diet, you never heard him lecture Janet, Chrissy, Cindy, Terri, Larry, the Ropers, or even Mr. Farley about the food that they ate. No, Jack was a live and let live kind of guy, which was all the rage back in 1978 but seems to have all but disappeared from our society now.
Now this is what I need, a female version of this guy who can cook dinner for me in less than 22 minutes (including commercials of course) and do so with a smile on his face and without a lecture.
My goodness, 2 posts in 2 days. As you may have guessed I have been saving up...
Wednesday, September 2, 2009
To Protect and To Serve
It's been a bad week for the cops in my area. Heck it's been a bad year really, but these week the blue s*** really hit the fan.
First we discovered that a convicted sex offender had been hiding a kidnapped girl in his backyard for 18 years until the police finally discovered the girl and the two daughters that the kidnapper had fathered. What is bothersome here is that the local law enforcement authorities, including the police, the sheriff, and the feds all knew about this guy. He was subject to frequent visits from parole officers and not once, not once, did any of them bother to check out the backyard. People reported seeing this guy with daughters that he was not supposed to have and yet no one bothered to check on that. The dude's next door neighbor even called the police a couple of years ago saying that there were kids living in the backyard, but the officer who responded to the call didn't search the backyard at all. He now claims that he needed a warrant to do the search, but don't you think he could have gotten one considering the man whose home he was searching was a registered sex offender? The cop also claimed that he didn't know the guy was a registered sex offender even though anybody, yes even you, could have found this out with a couple of mouse clicks here. Even more bizarre, a few months after the kidnapping the guy was caught growing marijuana and did time because it was a parole violation, but again nobody bothered to search the backyard even though he was caught growing weed.
The sheriff has issued an apology and claims "full responsibility" for what happened. What exactly does "full responsibility" mean though? He hasn't resigned, he hasn't fired any deputies, he hasn't taken a pay cut, he hasn't donated anything to the victims, he hasn't done anything except say that he was sorry. It is so easy to claim "full responsibility" when it does not mean anything. You have multiple lives who are ruined forever in part because of the incompetence of this guy and the people who he is responsible for, and yet he thinks, or perhaps hopes, that he can claim "full responsibility" and bring his involvement to closure. Quite honestly it should not work that way.
And then there is the case of a missing 5 year old boy here in my home town. The boy disappeared about two weeks ago from the back of a shoe store where his foster father left him while he went inside to visit the foster mother. The cops claim that they could not find any evidence that the boy was ever at the shoe store but found a text message from the father saying that he was so frustrated with the boy that he was going to live the kid at a train station. So what do these Barney Fife's do? Arrest both foster parents for murder and pressure them to rat on each other. Of course the DA has no evidence to support these arrests so both parents had to be set free, and now the cops have two angry and uncooperative parents on their hands who have hired an attorney who loves the TV news cameras and really loves high profile police misconduct lawsuits, not to mention a community that already distrusts the police and is still ticked off about the guy who got shot by a cop at a train station back on New Years. That's one hell of a risk to take when they have nothing to charge either of them with. Did they really think they would get that lucky? Now we may never know what happened to this boy.
Normally I would give the police the benefit of the doubt but neither of these incidents deserve that kind of leniency, and the cops are certainly not doing themselves any favors or inspiring any confidence among the citizenry that these folks are sworn to defend.
Now that my ranting is done I can briefly talk about a cop who always inspired confidence, T. J. Hooker. Variety says that T.J. is coming to the silver screen but it doesn't say whether or not the guy who played him, William Shatner, will be back in the saddle playing the part that allowed Shat to avoid being typecast as a starship captain with a dramatic flair.
Now see, this is what we need, more men in blue with a heart of gold and the ability to slide across a car hood without one hair out of place.
His mere look just exudes trust and confidence. You know if T.J. were on the case both kidnapped kids would have been found within an hour, or 52 minutes if you count the commercials.
First we discovered that a convicted sex offender had been hiding a kidnapped girl in his backyard for 18 years until the police finally discovered the girl and the two daughters that the kidnapper had fathered. What is bothersome here is that the local law enforcement authorities, including the police, the sheriff, and the feds all knew about this guy. He was subject to frequent visits from parole officers and not once, not once, did any of them bother to check out the backyard. People reported seeing this guy with daughters that he was not supposed to have and yet no one bothered to check on that. The dude's next door neighbor even called the police a couple of years ago saying that there were kids living in the backyard, but the officer who responded to the call didn't search the backyard at all. He now claims that he needed a warrant to do the search, but don't you think he could have gotten one considering the man whose home he was searching was a registered sex offender? The cop also claimed that he didn't know the guy was a registered sex offender even though anybody, yes even you, could have found this out with a couple of mouse clicks here. Even more bizarre, a few months after the kidnapping the guy was caught growing marijuana and did time because it was a parole violation, but again nobody bothered to search the backyard even though he was caught growing weed.
The sheriff has issued an apology and claims "full responsibility" for what happened. What exactly does "full responsibility" mean though? He hasn't resigned, he hasn't fired any deputies, he hasn't taken a pay cut, he hasn't donated anything to the victims, he hasn't done anything except say that he was sorry. It is so easy to claim "full responsibility" when it does not mean anything. You have multiple lives who are ruined forever in part because of the incompetence of this guy and the people who he is responsible for, and yet he thinks, or perhaps hopes, that he can claim "full responsibility" and bring his involvement to closure. Quite honestly it should not work that way.
And then there is the case of a missing 5 year old boy here in my home town. The boy disappeared about two weeks ago from the back of a shoe store where his foster father left him while he went inside to visit the foster mother. The cops claim that they could not find any evidence that the boy was ever at the shoe store but found a text message from the father saying that he was so frustrated with the boy that he was going to live the kid at a train station. So what do these Barney Fife's do? Arrest both foster parents for murder and pressure them to rat on each other. Of course the DA has no evidence to support these arrests so both parents had to be set free, and now the cops have two angry and uncooperative parents on their hands who have hired an attorney who loves the TV news cameras and really loves high profile police misconduct lawsuits, not to mention a community that already distrusts the police and is still ticked off about the guy who got shot by a cop at a train station back on New Years. That's one hell of a risk to take when they have nothing to charge either of them with. Did they really think they would get that lucky? Now we may never know what happened to this boy.
Normally I would give the police the benefit of the doubt but neither of these incidents deserve that kind of leniency, and the cops are certainly not doing themselves any favors or inspiring any confidence among the citizenry that these folks are sworn to defend.
Now that my ranting is done I can briefly talk about a cop who always inspired confidence, T. J. Hooker. Variety says that T.J. is coming to the silver screen but it doesn't say whether or not the guy who played him, William Shatner, will be back in the saddle playing the part that allowed Shat to avoid being typecast as a starship captain with a dramatic flair.
Now see, this is what we need, more men in blue with a heart of gold and the ability to slide across a car hood without one hair out of place.
His mere look just exudes trust and confidence. You know if T.J. were on the case both kidnapped kids would have been found within an hour, or 52 minutes if you count the commercials.
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