Surrendering Super-Power Status...

The End of Gasoline? A New Beginning…


How to get the economy moving again. Imagine! A future in which no one owns a car and cars are only seen in museums....
People will recount tales when gasoline used to cost only $10.00 a gallon...or about the cost of five bars—candy bars becoming the standard of measurement in a new economy. Stories recount when there were people who literally used to think nothing of driving 100 miles in a day. With the obsolescence of cars, cities will undergo a rebirth. More people will spend less time commuting. Schools will improve in the inner cities giving those considered on the lowest rungs of the economic ladder an opportunity to partake of promised equality.

With more and more people gravitating to the cities, roads will fall into disuse, bridges will start to collapse from a lack of maintenance, apartments will gain in popularity. Homes, especially those not near major transportation hubs, will go down in value making them affordable to the Middle Class.

. The horse will make a come back. Hay will be scattered all over the ground. Farmers will have a new crop. Horse manure will be found to be a natural fuel that can be burned on modified gas engines. New cars will be built and designed that eliminate 90% of all the unnecessary weight. Detroit will be back in business. Entire new industries will be born around recycled products. People will not need to travel to malls. The US will start manufacturing again.

People will also use mass transportation fueled by horse manure. Used methane will be recycled preventing heat build up in the atmosphere. The Greenland Ice Cap will get better. Oceans will cool. And tropical diseases will stop moving north. Maintenance crews will find work repairing the roads and the bridges. The economy will improve. Start-up funds will be given to those promising new technology for getting from one place to another. Business will be good. There will be less disease since no conventional fuels will be available for burning. The Middle East will go down hill in a hurry. Eventually, in the course of maybe ten or twenty years, no one will remember where Saudi Arabia is. With the Middle East becoming increasingly irrelevant, there will be no funding for terrorism so we've eliminated a major cause of threats and challenge to our country which is increasingly becoming a separate and distinct market that exists just to feed and cloth its own people..

Because nobody is traveling anywhere, there are more immigration officials to guard the borders and no one comes into the country who does not have our best interests at heart. With less time spent commuting people will spend more time talking to each other.

With government out of despoiling nature in order to get a few more grams of gasoline, there is much less anger expressed at government positions. Tree huggers begin to talk to lumberjacks and find some common ground. Those who were of polarized views are starting to find that they can understand each other's point of view. With no terrorism, there is little need to underwrite an expanded military. The Homeland Security department and forty other departments go out of business. There is no great shedding of tears. Families go out for bike rides more often and get to know each other better. People find that there is less smog, more sunny days. People go out on picnics more often. Another 1,000 applications for Spam are discovered...all because we cut out gasoline. Maybe not such a bad scenario after all.

Les Aaron

The Foxes Are Investigating the Foxes

With All of Their Professed Values and Patriotism, Why Has This Government Failed To Have a Serious Investigation of the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina?

Any good American, especially one claiming that their values are better than yours, would demand to get to the truth no matter who gets in the way. Any good American patriot would demand to know why innocent people had to die or suffer from a situation that we as a country knew about and should have been prepared for. Yet, here is a government that has the authority and reason to conduct an immediate and intensive investigation into the causes and the failures connected with Hurricane Katrina; and yet this government insists on conducting their own investigation which
Increasingly seems like a sham.

Why not throw the investigation open? Why not enlist the best and the brightest to take part to eliminate any kind of suspicions about the government’s motives and failings?

Herbert's editorial "Blood on their Hands" explains why this government has dragged its heels on the follow up. . There is a pending cover-up that involves the foxes investigating the foxes. Where have we seen this before?

It doesn’t take too much contemplation to connect this embarrassment with the government’s failure to move forward with a serious investigation into what happened on 9-11. After one year, the government under pressure appointed Henry Kissenger to investigate 9-11 which is something like giving the back of your hand to honesty and integrity in government.

Doesn’t this raise more questions than it answers?

Wouldn't someone whose hands are clean demand an immediate investigation if for no other reason than to clear up any misunderstanding?. But in the case of 9-11, there are many reasons that they would want to hold investigators at bay. From the reason why the Arabs were gathered from all over the country and shipped out without even a casual investigation smacks of suspicious behavior especially in light of the fact that 17 out of 19 of the hijackers carried Saudi passports. Why did nothing come of that? Why didn't the media and the public simply demand that this government be held accountable for what it did and what it did not do? Why did nothing come of the fact that everything that happened the previous year spelled out an attack on the US from attempted hijackings in southeast Asia to the specific warnings that Bush received? A specific threat assessment stood on his desk just before he left for his vacation. And he did nothing. . Why did nobody raise the issue of the fact that those perpetrators of the first attack on the WTC carried plans of the WTC along with text documents that have still not been made public? Where was NORAD that had trained just the year before on the idea of two such hijackings aimed oddly at the WTC and the Pentagon? Why are there so many questions still unanswered surrounding the issue of 911 and our failure to be prepared or act to protect New York's citizenry?. The answer seems simple: There was more to lose than gain had they moved taken an investigation seriously.

Just look at what happened by comparison at Pearl Harbor.. They went from start to finish on Pearl Harbor by comparison before 9-11's probe could get launched. In one year, Peal Harbor was investigated and summary findings presented to the American people! And why then was the president so reluctant to go before the board and explain exactly what he knew and when he knew it?
Condy Rice's remarks alone seem to play fast and loose with the truth and I think more people have been left hanging after the investigation than before despite the fact that Tom Keene is an honest man who could not be bullied as Bush discovered.
When we think about Katrina, we cannot help think about how we need an independent commission to get at the truth. Bush must feel that what comes out will be worse than not conducting the investigation at all.. What he does not realize however is that Katrina has helped shape the perception of a government in disarray. And once the people put it all together and see that we could not even help one of our cities facing a long-standing threat will help them to understand that we do not know what we are doing in Iraq either. If this perception gets rooted, good bye Mr. Bush.

Yesterday, when general Casey was asked whether we would be able to start sending troops home soon, he reneged on his earlier words, saying that most insurrections last for a period of nine years. What does that infer? It means that we can look forward to seven more years of exposure for our still unprotected young men and women with no real solution in sight. Will the country sit still for the rising numbers of dead? What will happen when the president goes to congress asking for another 87 billion dollars when we can't even seem to get New Orleans up and running?

With Frist, Delay being investigated for possible corruption in two of our highest officials; and the leader of FEMA shown to be largely incompetent, with the VP's Chief of Staff being revealed as the leaker of secret information for what we can only surmise is political reasons, and Bush failing in the polls, it seems clear that this administration has more to explain than it is capable of.
It is now incumbent on the Dems to stand up and be counted and demand an independent investigation into the reasons why we were so badly prepared for what happened in the Gulf despite all of the warnings...

It just may be that we are watching a government that doesn't seem to know right from wrong self-destructing in front of our faces. .

Les Aaron

Honesty And Integrity Take A Pass...

Boy, what a wonderful government we have. Last week, a friend of Bush's and a key official in the government purchasing office was incriminated for misdeeds.. Next, Mike Brown is relieved from his job for his inability to run his department and his failure to help people abandoned in the wake of the storm; then in the biggest breach of honesty and integrity, he is rehired under the table to serve as a consultant for the same agency. Bill Frist, Senate Majority Leader, is now under investigation for insider knowledge and trading. No, he tells us, he didn't know a thing about his family's company doing poorly in the next financial report. It just came to him through his most recent seance. And now, the Republican's House Majority Leader, Tom Delay is being charged with criminal conspiracy. Tom Delay has mastered the art of telling the big lie with a straight face. And claims that he is innocent. Of course, it is the democrats who set him up! This all happened in under three weeks. And these are the guys who are running government.

Remember Newt Gingrich with his Contract with America where he took a position against the Democrats for being corrupt. Well, Mr. Gingrich, never motivated by setting a good example worked a deal with Murdoch who got to grab up more media opportunities in exchange for a big advance on the book. And this all happened in the public eye; and nobody mentioned that his tactics didn't exactly set an example for honesty and integrity. . And you know what it dealt with? Restoring honesty and integrity to government. Gingrich promoted term limits and restraints. So, look what happened. With term limits, the incoming Republicans realized that they would have to steal faster and that's precisely what they did. Now, they only four years to do the stealing they normally could have done in eight years...
And I am not even going to mention the kickbacks, the pork that allows the Republican representative from Alaska to build a bridge for nearly 500 million dollars to connect four people to the mainland. Give me a break! Now, we are going to help the Iraqis with a health plan when we don't even have one ourselves. Meanwhile all of our jobs go overseas thanks to the collusion between this government and the private sector. And let us not forget the extreme right wing making a bundle on bombs and ammo to keep the war going as our special interest government doles out noncompetitive contracts to companies like Haliburton or Brown and Root, a subdivision, while at the same time, these Cheney connected companies cash in on the money they made under the table for setting up Iran's nuclear capability.
Nor is the president or his family immune; nor the officials from Reagan's administration who conspired to work deal after deal with their Arab buddies through the "let's pretend" objective business interests of the Carlyle Group where dad racks it in. Last but not least should we forget Mrs. Bush's gratuitous remarks about how lucky those evacuated are to be sharing in Houston hospitality. Yeah, give me a break. How could this be going on with any pretense of legality is beyond imagination. Every single prosecutor in America; every single Democrat should resign for their failure to stand up and be counted and by saying nothing to allow these kind of abuses to go on endlessly. Right now, America is the last place that we can look for honest government.

Is that Gail Norton Drilling In Your Back Yard?

Spotted Gail Norton walking down the block.
She has a particular indiosyncracy of stopping every few blocks and looking down.
What is she doing, we wondered.No, it isn't an aberration; it's part of her newly defined job. Gail Norton is now under mandate to drill in every conceivable spot where there may be a few litres of anything resembling fuel. It seems that nobody bothered to mention to her that as an Interior Secretary, her responsibility is to the land. But from the jobs she held prior to being made Interior Secretary, she never cared much for the land--exploiting it every chance she got.
If Gail Norton has her way, in her amazing ineptitude like all of her peers in the Bush White House, you will see oil wells everywhere. Last year alone, more than 200 oil contracts were signed that allow the government to drill precisely where it wants; irregardless of whether the wells and the drilling disturb important species or the people who own nearby. We expect the government to whiz by those numbers in the coming years. The moritoriums are off on development of possible oil reserves off shore. So, don't expect to go bathing without seeing them all over your beach despoiling not only your views but just about everything else!...

And this undisciplined development is already going on in some states that happened to vote red.

Many of the ranchers who previously voted for Bush are literally incensed by this violation of the land and they are saying so out loud.

However, this administration is using the flood as an opportunity to push their wildcatting agenda. It seems to be all that these oil zealots know. God forbid the thought of developing options entered their growth-deprived minds.

Meanwhile, even the NYTimes, the paper of record that has made a habit of sitting on the sidelines, which is worse than not knowing the truth, is finally owning up to the fact that there is something to global warming and doing nothing is no solution at all. The disembodied gurus of the Times even point the finger topside, which is an indication of which way the wind is blowing politically. With the Times coming out of the closet, it's clear that we are nearing the final chapter of this aborted administration that can't think it's way out of a paper bag.

The Times mentioned that if the condition persists and water levels rise as the scheme dictates when there is continuing melting of the Greenland ice flow, the entire plan to rebuild New Orleans and Texas or even fixing the problems of Florida may be moot since they would all be either under water or newly formed islands...

What would Jebb say? "Thanks for the help, bro?"

And that's only the half of it, if global warming is allowed to persist, you can pretty well look forward to another ice age.
And remember what happened to species at that time.

I don't think I am giving away a big secret to suggest that liberals better start stocking up on blankets and down jackets and woolen hats at least enough for 10,000 years.

And while you're at it, it wouldn't be a bad idea to have something to read.

But it may not be all downhill. After a few decades of below 40 below temperatures, Hell may start to look pretty good!


Les Aaron

New Czar to Take Charge of Disaster In New Orleans

New Czar being screened now...

Sorry, thanks to censorship, I am prohibited from using names that I make fun of....so have to resort to this measure....

He who reigns by divine rule was talking today about the possibility of having an "interface," someone who could take charge of the present mess and kind of remove him from the picture. One man mentioned was Henry K of Nixon's day who could slip in there and before anyone noticed all of the President's opposition would start disappearing. Others might take note of a growing number of young men in brown shirts speaking softly in foreign accents. Henry if he gets ambitious might even extend his talent to eliminating the alligators and water moccasins in the bayous next store with selective bombing that he would never admit to. Another possibility is our illustrious VP, who said to those who questioned him at his press conference "f**k you all." "With the fishing so lousy, don't expect me to show up. " As soon as his legs begin to heal, he will be burrowing into his earthen hide-away til Halliburton declares its next dividend or the election whichever comes first.
Another name mentioned is our retired former Secretary of State, the good general, but he is reportedly still coughing up pubic hairs from his ass-kissing position and could not tolerate the strain on his system. According to a statement issued by the four star general, "you can catch this city boy maybe once with sweet talk but never again, honky."

A more realistic candidate for this czar is crazy Rummy except that some think he may resort to Shock and Awe in order to re-establish order. He is rumored to have said, "if you got them, you might as well use them..."--a serious change in policy that offered us some protection against a first strike mentality that is gone now. There is also considerable argument for the same kind of planning that we have seen in evidence in Iraq in order to return the NO area to normalcy and to prevent the potential clash between power groups in the area.--except nobody is quite sure who the power groups are since everyone seems totally without power. The CIA is trying to resolve this one as George Tenent goes on the record as saying "This is one you can't pin on me..."

. As we've seen, Rummy would begin with securing the oil processing stations in and around New Orleans and up through the Texas border. As part of the bigger picture, more than likely, he could start a new kind of torture program that would be a model for the country...and perhaps lock up the Mayor for suggesting that the Federal government was inept for its failure to respond promptly to the needs of the people. It would be right up Rummy's alley according to old friend, Henry who never sleeps well when Rummy's on the prowl.

Les Aaron
hubmaster
http://lesaaron.blogspot.com

What Goes Around Comes Around

According to CNN Jack Cafferty the Bush team is under the gun in Time's latest issue., Time magazine, typically conservative and in the past committed to the presidency of Bush, reports on the cronyism that has been a hallmark of this government since its inception. My own forays into the records have demonstrated that this government has a history of putting people who are 100% mismatched for their jobs into high Cabinet appointments beginning with the FDA and moving forward into the Department of the Interior. I have shouted this to every magazine and newspaper for five years and no one would listen! I also stated that If you are not hack by the time you were appointed by Bush &Co, you would be guaranteed to become one if you stay on... It is consistent with the image of a White House that cannot tolerate a strong department head or underlings that don't play the kiss up game. Now, at last, about five years after I commented about this remarkable inept Cabinet ( Christy Whitman was an exception; although she screwed up New Jersey when she was governor she at least had a modicum of common sense and integrity. OF course, Bush would never respond to her or any of her memos and eventually unceremoniously dumped her for being too forthcoming. ) And of course, we all know whatPowell became after kowtowing to the Cheerleader of record. The FDA was no exception filling its vacancies with people from the industries they were supposed to monitor and so on including putting a pro-industry hack to monitor the Interior Department. In every way, an escalating crew of mediocrities that have no equal in any government before-- whether Republican or Democrat. To think that Time magazine whose subscriptions I have routinely cancelled, is picking up the standard reflects that even these toadies know when to escape a sinking ship. Signs of the time....Now, maybe the Washington Post or the paper of record, the NY Times' editorial board will say something... But for me that was the hand-writing on the wall and a watershed of a government that is finished. Kaput! Only they don't know it yet! When the bills come due from NO and Congress has to go ask for more money to fight the war in Iraq, guess what's going to happen? Stay tuned, folks, it can only get better from here on out!

Downstate News is to publish this editorial this week. It reflects a larger concern about how throwing money at a problem is oftentimes the wrong solution. It was written when the government's response to Katrina reflected an inherent disconnect and it was clear that there was no plan in place not only for distribution and evacuation but to get NO up and running and back in business. Since then, things have not improved and the potential burden created of pulling numbers out of the air is likely to see us indebted virtually forever to places that either support terrorism (Saudi Arabia) or are in danger of taking us over (China). If neither the Democrats or Republicans are capable of rational thinking, it becomes contingent upon us to change the system....

Les Aaron


New Vision Needed.

The president has talked about “fixing the problem” and making New Orleans whole again. And we have heard endlessly about the government’s failure to respond to the needs of the people; its failure to mobilize resources and the disorganization and sense of disconnect that seem to flow from the White House to FEMA, but in all of that we’ve heard few remedies about how America should respond to the challenge of rebuilding New Orleans; nor have we heard the kind of break-through thinking needed to meet the myriad challenges we face head on
.
But it is not the purpose of this editorial to condemn the past but instead to move on in order to find ways to turn a route into an opportunity to demonstrate American ingenuity to the world, to show to all of the world how Americans can rally to any cause, how we can put our best foot forward to develop practical yet far-sighted solutions to man’s needs that will serve as models to the rest of us who inhabit this planet.


It is discouraging that we as the richest nation in the world have not mobilized the forces, focused the thinking of the ‘best and the brightest’ and moved forward with dispatch. But we have not. Part of the reason has to be a lack of leadership or vision. The government’s solution has been to throw money at problems and bring in the same kind of contractors who have failed us in Iraq and expect miracles. It doesn’t work that way!

No, we must go beyond the conventional Chinese menu approach to problem definition and resolution. In point of fact, there is a real opportunity here to think outside the box, to initiate a large scale crusade to develop solutions that might apply to all of mankind in various fields of endeavor; not simply more of the same which would put us back to square one should New Orleans be challenged by another storm which in all likelihood, is an inevitability given the present circumstances.

What is needed is a whole new way of thinking about all of the needs that have not been met during this event –from new solutions to protecting wet-lands and low-lying areas to the problems of housing, distribution, evacuating large bodies of people, energy, food and water, communications and the rest..

What we need are grand-scale views that see the entirety of the challenge; that recognize that we have an opportunity to bring together all of the pieces into an organic framework or system that allows us to see the contribution of each element to the whole. We need to get beyond fixing one thing and watching the rest of the interdependent elements go down the drain. For example, we cannot fix a house and forget that that house needs to have access to a dependable energy source and water. If you fix one without the other, you have not solved the problem. And once we begin to understand the enormity of the problem and the inter-relatedness of the various functions and activities that describe the problem, we can begin to focus on the solution.

As part of this process, we should mobilize the nation’s talents to begin at the beginning. Is the concept of the levee as presently envisioned equal to the task? Do the walls that retain the lake waters of the best design? Or even more fundamentally, is New Orleans a viable concept? Does the answer consist of moving the city to a new location, to higher ground? These and other serious questions should be asked now. And we should start off with the great debate inviting others more experienced at these problems, like the Dutch and the Italians to sit in with us in order to solutions, both engineering and otherwise, that are appropriate to the challenge. In an age of communication, we have failed to use communications to embrace the larger need and that is a failure that demands to be addressed now.

As part of viewing the problems of New Orleans as part of a larger need that includes consideration of global warming and rising tides, we need to consider all possibilities before we put one dime into rebuilding.. What I am suggesting is a series of solutions that are just as viable and real for the rest of the world as they are for New Orleans. Herein lies an opportunity to be a problem-solver and a model for the world, and in the process demonstrate what can be done with the proper cooperation and the right talents being applied to the problem.

There is a concomitant need to go beyond the pedestrian level of thinking so much in evidence in this country and move onto a world stage where discussion and disagreement and argument are not only encouraged but are viewed as a way to tap into a world-wide body of expertise in order to arrive at solutions on a scale equal to the challenge..

America must get over the hubristic view that only we can solve every problem; the world is too small for that kind of thinking.

What then would be our next step once we have resolved the issues of protection for low lying areas? The logical place to begin seems to be the “home,” and the community. If we start there, we can begin to ask ourselves how do we make a difference? How do we make an area like New Orleans safer against any kind of real or perceived threat? And how do we take the lesson we have learned to expand upon it to serve a broader mission, to help not only the people in misery in New Orleans, but similar low lying areas around the world? These are only a few of the questions and challenges that have not been fully addressed. The solutions should not be developed within a vacuum either; throwing money at a problem is no solution; neither is not figuring out how to pay the price so that basic services will not be sacrificed..

One of my friends and colleagues, Gary Cook, moderator for Progressive Political, one of the foremost Internet databases for intelligent discussion of problems facing America and the world, put forth an idea that may constitute an excellent starting point for bringing some true innovative thought to the challenge.. It was his break-through approach to the concept of housing that would not only work under flood conditions, it would serve as the starting point for finding appropriate solutions leading to safety and self-sufficiency in the fundamental areas needed for survival.. It would focus thinking on the problems of providing water, energy, communications and it would provide intelligent thinking to the needs of warehousing, distribution and evacuation. Marshall’s solution would not only allow the inhabitant of this new conceptual approach to housing to feel independent but safer; at the same time, it would allow people to feel unified in staving off the effects of natural calamities or even a terrorist threat.

The concept that Gary embraces at first blush seems inordinately simple but that simplicity per se is deceptive in that elegant solutions tend to be simple and uncomplicated; yet, within it is the germ of a solution to the myriad challenges of survival amidst natural upheaval or terrorist threat.

The concept proposed by Gary forces the planner to think about the home in a totally different way as more or less a fulcrum or the pivotal point for many other activities connected to “living” that have been virtually ignored in the conventional solutions that fail to integrate the interconnectivity of various interdependent elements essential for survival of not only the community but the area as well. The idea, although radical to what we now think of as "home," does something that no prior plan does: It serves to connect what we know and understand about survival at the most elemental level to those activities needed to sustain it: energy, communications, distribution, food. And if we are starting from a zero base line, we have the option of rejecting what doesn’t fit and rejecting all of the baggage and preconceived ideas that have shaped conventional approaches in the past.

In the second part of this series, we shall strive to illustrate an approach that evolves from a common need that can be inductively applied across the board. It is a view that can be best described as holistic in that it tends to view the whole as a totality, the sum of its parts with every part interdependent to the success of the entire enterprise. . it is our attempt to describe a different way of working and a different way of seeing things that hopefully will become part of a platform for innovation and thinking that will transcend petty differences and become a model for world cooperation.

Les Aaron

A New Vision Needed: Part II

Part Two:.

As we discussed in the first part of this series, the view we have adapted in this enterprise tends to view all the challenges not piecemeal but as part of the entire problem of serving the diverse needs of the individual necessary for not only survival but a quality of life. Among such defined needs are protection, access to energy resources, two way communications, interconnectedness with the community, basic services such as food and water and other objective needs some of which are yet to be configured into the overall matrix. In effect, we are suggesting a new paradigm that says we don’t have to accept something if we don’t think it works or works well enough; or that we are necessarily mandated to accept systems, technology or process just because it was done that way before. In the end it is a zero sum game that provides optimum latitude to solve the problem rather than the appearance of the problem ,

The unifying element becomes the need for a new conceptual approach that not only provides a context for living but takes into account the challenges that living infers in the natural world. Once we make that quantum leap, we can mentally transcend conventional notions of wood and stone housing that has failed so miserably in facing up to the unpredictable forces of wind, rain and flooding.. As part of this transformation in thinking, we are no longer limited to the choices of materials; nor are we confined to a limited number of designs; instead, we can apply more innovative thinking that begins with the needs of the individual to not only survive but enjoy a quality of life. The beginning iteration of the home assumes a shape roughly akin to a type of windmill designed to better survive high force winds and the application of new materials, such as high strength, light-weight metals, that would not be defeated by water or wind. Gary also perceives that the structure would benefit from incorporating its own electricity generators powered by large wind fans.

Gary’s concept, once accepted, allows one free reign to expand on the basic brilliance inherent in the original idea.. . In my extrapolation, I tend to see Gary’s open conception as a stepping stone for broadly enhanced visions. In a personal iteration, the windmill concept becomes larger and more expansive serving to unite a community by joining it with three other windmill designs to form a very stable integrated community, connected and inter-dependent with a capacity for “sharing” in order to stave off the potential large scale effects of a Nature that is largely unpredictable or the possibility of a terrorist threat..

The four windmill iteration, which I refer to as a hub, may be joined to other “hubs” through a networked system that would allow for a city to be formed that would offer many inherent safeguards against rain, wind or even terrorist threats in much the same way as a child’s Tinkertoy game might be expanded and enhanced by adding parts; in the process, the expansion of the hub system adds rigidity and strength to the overall system, providing enhanced stability and resiliency against most anticipated threats or challenges..

. In my own particular conception, additional strength is gained from an integrated skeletal structure that allows the “upper” windmill design to be extended vertically through a series of five concrete legs that not only provide a base but a platform to enhance stability through greater load distribution. As envisioned, each of the “hubs” would be integrated through a series of elevated walkways which serves as connective tissue to keep residents connected in a viable way.

The living portion of the individual hubs would begin above 25 feet, above the high water marks set by previous floods. Under the proposed scheme, the walkways would be powered internally in a way that allows them to be elevated to various levels in the event of rising tides; a clear central tubular core in each of the hub units would also allow a method for staying interconnected in a very real sense. Inside the core would be both stairs and elevators that could be stopped at various levels to either load or unload passengers. The core would be sealed against water damage; to reach the lower levels under normal conditions would involve changing from the central core to other elevators….In the event of a disastrous flood, the lower level elevators could be shut off without affecting the central core and the central elevator system. Walkways would provide an exit to lower levels.

In my conception, each of the windmill designs would be mega-structures capable of containing a small community of anywhere from 100-500 families.. To envision the concept, imagine a variety of circular shapes, similar to cakes each representing a floor or level of the structure stacked on top of each other to form a giant structure.. Each of those cakes, then would be sliced into “wedges” or apartment sized areas joined through the central core. Ancillary stairwells would provide additional means of reaching each floor.

The central core which would allow a means for members of the community to congregate in “apartments” left vacant for that purpose; accessibility to the core would also provide a means of egress to flotation devices and inflatable boats sequestered at various levels for easy egress should that become necessary. Other means of evacuation would involve the placement of protected helicopter pads at various levels of the mega-structure.

To meet the demands for water that would begin early in any disaster scenario, each of the structures would also contain reservoirs that would catch rain fall and a small desalinization plant that would provide adequate water supplies.

Power could be linked between grids so that various units comprising the various ‘hubs’ could share reserves.

In this design, every so many levels would also allow facilities for storage purposes exclusively; thereby allowing for the storage of emergency supplies, such as food, medication, health care needs, that could be gathered in advance for any such contingency.

In other words, the hubs would be virtually self-sufficient under the worst of circumstances allowing the inhabitants to survive until aid might be forthcoming.

As configured, each of the mega structures forming the units of the hub would contain satellite communications thereby making it possible to stay in touch through any kind of hypothetical threat, whether weather related or terrorist.

An integrated level allocated to classes would allow children to continue to get their education even if it was impossible for them to travel to a formal school. News and educational materials would be piped in via a satellite system so that there would always be a connection between the community and each of the hubs and the government outside. People would never feel isolated in a hub design.

Temporary aid stations would be located at convenient locations in and around the hub locations should the need become necessary.

Although the design and construction of such units might some prohibitive because of the innovations and features they contain, one must be remined that mass manufacturing techniques could be employed in building the interior unit apartments. And that each hub design would contain upwards of 500 families. By repeating the model over and over again, the community and the state would benefit from the economics of scale and the low failure rates.

These are simply a few ideas showing the promise of going beyond the conventional thinking of years’ past and finding new ways to not only provide housing but a means of survival that will stand up to most threats.

In addition, the government must explore other ideas and venues that will provide much needed housing for all of those below the poverty level. The failures of our government to respond to the demands of the needy is not comprehensible in view of the fact that is now capable of manufacturing permanent shelters like automobiles at high rates and low prices. The promise of such shelters was demonstrated in Canada’s Man and His World many years ago; yet, we have failed to follow through on the promise of manufactured housing. We also need to rethink how to store and distribute aid packages; we need to think about alternative energy sources; and we need to think about intangibles like distribution and storage and, mostly, under such conditions of stress, we need to think about a plan that lays out all contingencies in clearly identified steps that will eliminate the kind of death and disaster we recently experienced with Katrina.

There is much work to be done. The question: Whether the government will recognize these needs as more than prosaic. And whether they can rise to the occasion and deal with the challenges from a visionary perspective.

Time will tell.

Les Aaron

Visit the SuperBlog: The Armchair Curmudgeon: http://lesaaron.blogspot.com

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Bring Back the Guilds...

Bring Back the Guilds…


On NPR today, the subject of retirement for the ‘baby boomer’ generation came up and the consensus was that there would be a high percentage of job openings that would not be filled.


To make matters worse, it was also realized by some in human resources and management, that there would be a wealth of talent that will no longer be available to draw upon once this generation retires.

Really? And this is a surprise? Let’s cut back to the late 80’s and early 90’s,
At that time, it seemed as if every possible merger or acquisition possibility was exhausted, with it being unreported that many American jobs were lost through foreign acquisition and take-over.

We didn’t hear about the owners complaining about lost talent and expertise then.
At that time, business was about one thing: Increasing profits. Only, recently did we learn that these gurus may have only half-reported the truth. As we’ve since learned, much of those purported “profits” actually found their way into Golden Parachutes and other benefits for top executives.

In the corporate trimming that went on in the 80’s, we heard a lot about “corporate downsizing,” the euphemism of the day. After all, if you were going to drop much of your management team, it was nice to put a smiley face on it.

Here’s the straight facts: At the time, I didn’t know any senior executive who was not encouraged or threatened to take early retirement. One might posit the question: What happened to that reservoir of knowledge that was eclipsed? Mainly, it was lost in the rush to computers and Internet technology husbanded by twenty-five year olds who thought they knew everything.

At the time, there was all too much faith in process rather than the intimate knowledge of how things worked. And it backfired! The twenty five year olds discovered that maybe they didn’t know as much as they thought. . That was especially evident during the short-lived Internet boom where bright eyed Stanford graduates and their ilk discovered that through their ignorance of business practices and their lack of specific business expertise, they were turning off senior level buyers and other executives. No, computer expertise was hardly enough to keep the economy growing; and when that reality showed up, those same companies found themselves in a spiral.

Nonetheless, an entire generation of management had evanesced in a flash. In the course of a very short time frame, the geeks had taken over. .

So, what happened?

A lot of companies failed because they didn’t have access to the wealth of expertise that resided in those folks sent out to pasture before their time foundered.. That’s the whole wicked truth. And it makes one amazingly cynical to think that the industry is going wholesale through the process of seeking redemption. Maybe they should have thought about that before they merged or “outsourced” (another damn euphemism) all of their good jobs overseas.

No, folks, the Greening of America concept that starting this whole thing off wasn’t quite honest and I suspect it was financed by a lot of wealthy business owners who really just wanted an excuse to send the jobs overseas so that they could fatten their own wallets.

For those, however, leaving the field who really want to leave a legacy they might start thinking about something old that could be something new and very relevant to other workers who before had no one standing in their corner. In other words, we may be on the cusp of an opportunity to bring people back into the equation.

What I am hinting at is the resurrection of the amazingly successful Feudal Guilds that brought the professionals together with tyros allowing them to pass their talents down to those who were best qualified to take their places.

The concept might very well lend itself to technology and manufacturing as well as crafts giving a shot in the arm to Americans who would be eager to get back to work in quality jobs.

At the very least, such an arrangement would give labor the edge again over
Management and provide the kind of balance between management and the worker that we have not seen for generations… It is something for the Unions to think about if they ever hope to make a comeback and it would be salubrious for American enterprise and constitute perhaps a new beginning…. Overall, it might just be the win-win labor has needed for the last twenty years…

And the need for a new beginning—along with new thinking—are very much the order of the day in a country that has seen all of its quality jobs disappearing overseas on the pretense that it is good for America.

Wouldn’t it be interesting to see an old concept revitalized to fit the needs and challenges of today, a concept that could restore good jobs to America and help us to shine again in international markets. Made in America. It has such a nice lilt.

Les Aaron

Why Don't We Get It?

We Never Seem to Learn…


When I first came back from Asia, I found myself in a blue funk and I wasn't sure why. Sure, I was glad to be home after three years plus serving our nation. But the return was without bells and whistles. For the return, we were herded aboard troop ships, stacked up in beds six feet high, fed three crummy meals a day and shunted off at Oakland after twenty three days for an unceremonious debriefing and eventual discharge. I had disabilities but I was so happy to be home I didn’t claim them. But that happiness didn’t last long. When I got out and mixed it up with regular folks, I discovered something that was truly disturbing. Most people didn't know what was happening, more importantly, didn't care.

I asked myself what was I doing overseas if nobody cared about what was going on? Admittedly, this was a very early time and there was very little publicity when the Advisers went in beginning in 1960. Things didn’t start with a big kick-off and lots of fan-fare; in fact, most Americans didn’t even know that by 1960 there were thousands of Advisers in this far-away land and others poised to go. And most people in those days were more concerned with their own problems than any problems in some far off Asian land.

It was my first real insights as to how Americans think. For the most part, I discovered that most Americans thought the world revolved around themselves;. that if it didn't happen in America, it couldn't really be all that important. That frame of mind has not changed much in more than forty years. We still feel that America is where it’s happening. You can see it in our truncated news coverage. And you can see it when you discuss foreign affairs with others…. What Americans fail to realize is that with the exception of a few who are dependent on America, most people from around the world couldn't care less about what happens in America. Not only do they have their own concerns, but America’s super-power status was wearing thin and people saw how we treated our friends. .

In those days, the big threat was communism. We were told that if we weren't careful communism would take over the rest of the world and we would be left isolated. We couldn't afford to let that happen. Then somebody coined the idea of "falling dominoes" and backing away from a commitment to our Asian allies no longer seemed possible or even feasible
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We should have learned at that time that if the French with all of their modern equipment couldn't fend off the North Vietnamese, then our chances would be rather slim, too.

Eisenhower tried to warn us of what might happen if the military industrial complex got too strong. But the hawks were overpowering and there was simply too much profit to be gained through a war. I hate to sound cynical but our recent wars have convinced me that the economic benefits of war seem to flow to those who congregate at the threshold of power.

On rethinking Iraq, It's amazing to me that an entire new generation, unschooled in what happened before, seemed to be amenable to being sucked into another war that all of the elements of Vietnam and no easy way out!.... Of course, the cast of characters had changed but not much. There were still some of the loonies around like Rummy who even scared Kissenger, quite a sinister mastermind himself, and of course, Cheney, who was Rummy's room-mate back in Princeton. Baker is there, too, mostly behind the scenes now content to carve the big deals for himself and Fortunate Son's dad, who never saw a deal with Arabs that he didn't like. (Make no mistake about it: The limb doesn't fall far from the tree; only in this case it fell to the ground short a few important genes.)

Anyway, in a strange way life goes on. And we keep making the same mistakes over and over again for the benefit of a few. Only, those mistakes involves the lives, hopes and ambitions of young, honest people with their whole lives in front of them.

Vietnam was a dumb war that could have been avoided in my judgment. Why should the French have maintained their colony in Indo China? What gave them the right? And why the dickens did we rush out to support them? Would they have come to our aid?

When your purpose is not clear, when your motives are not for what is right but what is expedient, you are bound to hold a losing hand. . Were not the people of Vietnam entitled to freedom as much as we were? These contradictions bounced around in my mind for many years afterwards..

But it was clear to me that if our leaders had read the columns of Walter Lippmann syndicated in the Stars and Stripes they may have thought differently about going in. Walter laid it out like a Greek tragedy. And he had done his homework perhaps all too well! And all we had to do was read it to see what we are in for. But Americans in power seem to draw hubris from their own inflated egos combined with a lack of understanding of the real world that ultimately winds up with our youth's bodies broken and bleeding on foreign battlefields.

Now we seem to be very much in a position that is reminiscent of the Tet offensive, with all of the government saying that things are going well while our eyes show us pictures of the Viet Cong marching to the outskirts of Saigon. Something was as wrong with that picture as it is wrong with the picture we are being forced to look at today. Somebody is not being honest with us or themselves. Again, we have to go back and examine motives. What were our motives? What was our proof?

Of course, we had no basis for going in to Iraq and staying there is just compounding the problem. It’s like admitting to making a mistake by marrying somebody you don’t love and attempt to correct the problem by deciding to stick it out for the sake of the kids. Well, to me that begins to sound like a mistake followed by another mistake. I hate to seem maudlin but it would seem that after all of this time we should have learned something. And maybe that is not to place our trust in those who are only interested in exploiting our patriotism for their own ends. In the end, America like the Mafia, has dumbed down and the rest of us are being forced to live with it. Will the whole damn thing blow up in our faces? It could when the population realizes that our government has failed on every count to provide protection for us, its citizenry, and that is the basis for the relationship that ties us to our society in the first place. When we wake up to discover that the Compact that binds us to society and society to us no longer works, we may think differently.

Les Aaron

A Fresh Look

The New Yorker’s View of the World


Want to hear about the wildest leap of self-delusion?

Until about two weeks ago, I believed that America’s problems were the world’s problems; that whatever happened to America--either good or bad—resonated and reverberated throughout the world; that either the world’s population was happy or sad dependent on what was happening here.

What a solipsistic view coming especially from one who should have known better. The truth was that aside from the policy makers and others directly affected, few knew or even cared whether we were happy or sad or whether it even mattered on the global scale of things.

For any American, no matter how sophisticated they may think they are, it is always a shock to learn that the world does not live or breathe America; that for the most part, our antics are our own unless they make headlines for one reason or another.

Knowing that, I should have been less moved to learn that over my stay in British Columbia that life goes on whether we’re viewed as an active participant or not. It’s not that the Canadians I met were partisan or not., it’s just that they have their own particular concerns and those are near and ours are far away.

Maybe such views are due to the growing complexity of the world without the two great players enmeshed in threat and counter-threat or maybe it’s simple because Canadians have their own issues that simply push us off the front burner. I don’t know but tend to chalk it up to a coming of age in the north=land in a way that is more pronounced now than I had seen it in past visits.

As one who is a citizen of the U.S. but also the grand-child of Canadian pioneers who date back to Hudson Bay, I have always found it wise and instructive to try to keep a finger on the pulse of perceptions among our northern allies for their balanced and objective perspective. Nontheless, with typical American hubris, we have also taken some of our best allies advice and good will for granted. Regrettably, being taken for granted tends to leave a lasting impression and tends to color our relationship in subtle ways..

In the past, Canadians had kept alive the perception that events in Canada to a great degree are shaped by the ebb and flow of what happens to its neighbor to the south. And this is not to suggest that our interdependence has changed, it’s just that the Canadians seem presently preoccupied or distracted by their own government and its vagaries.

Beyond that, it just seems that life in BC is one of the best kept secrets on the continent. To put that notion to the test, a recent survey of Canadians published in the Canadian papers confirmed that Canadians overall tend to be a pretty happy people. And that the people in BC are perhaps happiest of all when measured against other Canadians..

For anyone new to this area, the combination of tolerant climate and beauteous vistas would only reinforce such findings. On a recent foray into remote Pendar Island, where vacationing business people from Toronto and Vancouver live side by side with local writers, artisans and craftspeople in secluded splendor, it is hard not to be lulled into forgetting what’s going on around the world when distracted by the wake of the ferry from Victoria or the engines warming up for the 8:00 seaplane to Vancouver or the pull of the salmon on your 80 lb test lines. It seems hard to think of the problems that beset the world when you have a good merlot in your hand and your toasting to another beautiful sunset. And perhaps that’s the reason that our friends to the north test so well on the happiness scale. And in that there may be a lesson for the rest of us; that being a Superpower is not all it’s cracked up to be. And that we’d sleep a lot better at night, if we decided to remove ourselves as policeman for the world. It may be hopelessly naïve to think of such things, but at the very least we should try to stand back and gain some objectivity by taking in the thinking of our friends around the globe. It may just put things into a new perspective.


Les Aaron

The End of the Social Compact

What our government is not admitting to: The Compact is Broken.

This is not something minor that can be swept under the rug.
It is the issue that will define our relationship to our government for years to come.
It is spelled out in Bentham, Rousseau, and by all of the social philosophers who have defined our relationship either wholly or in part to our society.

For the first time since the Magna Carta and the Rights of Man, the western world must confront the fact that the Compact is broken and may never be mended in the same way again. Not only is it broken, but it has been broken by the country professing the most progressive of values, America. And that is the crux of all of the problems we, as Americans, face now and in the years to come.

What is complicated here is that although the physical manifestation of what has happened is real, the incalculable damage has been to our psyches. The understanding that there is an exchange that takes place to make the concept of society work that involves both parties, society, per se, and the individual who come together for joint interests and a common cause. .It is an indelible provision of the social contract that the society provides protection. This notion lays at the very core of our society and constitutes the fabric of what makes a society workable..

Consider that from the very beginning, the average man gave up certain of his perceived “inalienable” rights for the protection afforded by the feudal ruler. This understanding has allowed for the perpetuation of society over the last twenty thousand years. It lies at the very heart of our philosophical underpinning of what a society is and how it functions. And it has stayed fundamentally the same despite the fact that society has evolved into newer, more progressive forms that fundamentally serve the same purpose.
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If you cancel the perceived role of the society which is protection for its citizens or negate that responsibility, you remove one of the very constructs that binds man to accept the ruling of that society.

Today, the role of the society is an issue yet untouched by the media and government, because of and by itself it is very incendiary, yet should that perceived role be tampered with or sullied, the relationship that remains becomes charged with unpredictable implications. If the society is either unwilling or incapable of extending the mantle of protection to its citizenry, it is a society that no longer functions in the traditional or philosophical sense. Yet, this is the very situation we find ourselves in. On two occasions over the last five years, we have found that our government, besides its assurances otherwise, has been unable to provide we, the citizenry, with the most elemental form of security.

This brings into question what is our enduring obligation to such a government.
If the citizen cannot find protection within the society he has agreed to join voluntarily, then one might ask what is the basis for the relationship? Or is there a basis for a relationship? Without both sides giving to the social compact, that that compact becomes frayed and the relationship becomes one-sided and, in a sense, no relationship at all... In the absence of that perceived security, individual rights gain ascendancy and chaos may be the end result.

For surely, without the gains and assurances of freedom as guaranteed under a free society, the citizen no longer has a responsibility to abide by that society’s dictates and may choose to abrogate them if it is no longer in the citizen’s best interests .

In recognition of this failing, it becomes appropriate for the individual to assume responsibility for his own safety thereby abridging his contract either written or otherwise that had defined his or her prior obligation.

There is, however, an inherent flaw in that argument. Free-will, as exemplified by the ego, as Freud refers to it, if not constrained by the super-ego can manifest itself in the hegemony of the individual which is antithesis of the concept of a workable society.. Citizenry without the benefit of society’s version of the super-ego can easily degenerate into entropy and resulting chaos.

Is there an alternative?

Yes, if the society seizes the opportunity and is willing to make those adjustments deemed necessary to guarantee the level of protection and security promised and inferred as inimical to the social contract hope may not be lost. Should those guarantees be recognized, it may reverse those forces that impel towards dissolution of that contract. We are at that stage now. Will our government in good will, with the confidence of its citizens, make amends and heal the breach? If not, the citizen will recognize that his or her own protection is in his own hands and act accordingly. The end result will be a kind of entropy and the end of society as we know it.

There is still another option: That the people seize a government that does not recognize the full responsibility that is implicit in government and change it through the action of the majority; thereby, restoring the notion and guarantees of a functioning society. The continuation of society is in man’s best interests and the tenuousness of our relationship seems hardly understood.


Les Aaron

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Bold New Thinking Needed

It is time to rise to the challenge.

Les Aaron

We hear figures for reconstruction being bandied about. And the numbers seem not only stratospheric but not entirely believable. It is as if they were simply pulled out of the atmosphere in an attempt to assuage the heavy sense of guilt for our failure to respond instantly to the needs of a beleaguered people or a spurious effort to put a positive spin on a government seen as inept and trapped in its own bubble of indifference.

If any solutions are being advanced, it seems almost redolent of the thinking of the past.

The solution it seems is to rebuild New Orleans but in the process everybody avoids specifics like the plague. Overall, it is hard to discern any kind of credible plan and when something tangible is put forward it always seems like a repeat of the mistakes of the past.

This begs the question where are the bold new ideas? Where is the vision? In view of the fact that many of the homes we are seeing on TV are so water damaged that the only possible solution is clearing the area, what has been viewed as a challenge should really be viewed as an opportunity.

Surely, if those charged with the reconstruction are talking about clearing areas, then it must also be acknowledged that much of the task that lies before us involves starting over. And while starting over should cause our leaders to push forward with imaginative new approaches, to date it has become a synonym for a repeat of all of the mistakes that have led to the predictable events of the last few weeks.

On closer examination, it has become crystal clear that the problems we are facing may not go away under this government’s vision that until now seems so bogged down with finger-pointing and photo ops.

If were to rebuild the same way as before, it is highly likely that another storm just as pernicious as this one will produce an equivalent disaster; therefore, the challenge that faces us is how do we not only rebuild New Orleans but how do we prevent Nature from taking its toll on our handiwork? .

In view of the variables, is it not then logical at this point in time to explore new possibilities and new solutions that may do better than simply repeating the mistakes of the past? Should we not use this opportunity to start over to do things like explore new building materials, examine new building forms and perhaps even new ways to design communities that consider the realities of an unpredictable Mother Nature and the full range of human needs and emotions?

From as near as we can tell, there is no evidence that despite all of our talent and training, anyone is doing this; yet without bold new thinking we may be opening ourselves to a repetition of fresh disappointments that will continue to challenge not only the New Orleans community but also the State and the Federal governments.

Perhaps that might all change if we can perceive this as an opportunity –an opportunity to not only heal the wounds of the past but to prevent a reoccurrence over the near term and to apply bold new thinking that cuts across the board to consider not only the needs of Americans but a world faced with rising tides and changing environmental patterns.

What it is apparent we need is not simply a sugar pill but a Crusade to advance a whole new way of thinking to the challenges of the past and to establish cross links to various industries and think tanks that can mutually benefit from cross pollinating and spur the growth of new thinking applied across the board to a host of new challenges. This natural event could be used as the catalyst to create the environment for sweeping new ways to think about challenges.

It could shape the climate for our next great revolution in ideas and thinking that will encourage regional and national planners to try new things; it may lead to the marriage between segments of industry and the kind of blossoming ideation that allows new thinking to enter traditional but somehow atrophied industries and technology segments that have not moved forward in a generation; that have not benefited from an influx of capital or a commitment to new ideas.

The opportunities present in taking the mega view may offer solutions to problems that not only affect us here but perhaps throughout the world. In addition, the challenges afforded by New Orleans should also awaken us to the opportunities to consider alternative fuels, new communications methods, ways to network and distribute materials, supply and survival techniques that we obviously have only barely if at all examined or discussed in forums both public and private around the country.

Why are we not examining and discussing how to turn poverty around? Why are we not exploring how new businesses and industries could benefit from the special advantages and talents evidenced in a city like New Orleans? Why are we not considering bellwether projects that may fit in with the demands of a changing environment and what is needed to service that environment?.

Why are we not thinking about using the many talents that we already know exist within New Orleans to spur on new businesses and opportunities?. Why don’t we turn New Orleans current disadvantages into advantages? . Why don’t we simply establish the structures for a national program to apply native talents and energies towards solutions for this troubled land? And why aren’t we already hard at work at doing these things?

In fact, until now, we have only seen coverage of the challenges, we have talked about the challenges but we have not offered any solutions and that, by itself, despite all of the talk about throwing money at the problem does not offer hope. Why in a country that is known for bold and innovative solutions have we proven so reticent, so slow to adapt the kind of thinking needed to move New Orleans forward as a bright shining star that is being reborn? Why have we not mobilized the American initiative, the very thing that has made us famous, and tasked the ‘best and the brightest’ to find solutions. To me, that is unfathomable.

Every college in the land should be funded to address the challenge as part of a national initiative. Every think tank committed to bold new ideas should be working towards making New Orleans a special set piece that stands for how America faces up to its challenges. Right now, that is not happening. Nor have we lit up the sky or set the bar higher for our best and brightest.


Why a national crusade? Because the challenges exist. But there is another reason. With Katrina, the challenge is not over. We may need to explore cutting-edge technology and thinking to explore solutions to not yet experienced challenges that will enable us to survive attacks on our energy grid, to our distribution networks, to our communications capabilities, to water power and transportation. We need to consider each and every one of these as both discrete challenges and in an inter-related way so that we will not be found wanting again. We have been forewarned and in a way, what has happened should have opened our eyes to the broad spectrum of needs that we have barely begun to understand or explore. If nothing else, we should be tapping into our vast resources of creative thinkers, many of whom who are languishing for work in a country where most of our work is done outside to return maximum profit. Perhaps that, too, should be rethought if we are to continue as a Super-power in more than name only. What we need is talent and boldness of vision that can be focused like lasers on this problem. We need fresh talents and expertise to not only help the country heal but at the same time, find ways to make us safer in the context of a world where there are those who will stop at nothing to try to tear us down.

This is the challenge we face and from what we’ve seen, nothing has been done to rectify these challenges despite all of the talk, the agencies falling over each other, the hundreds of thousands of people in alphabet agencies and the expenditures over years of hundreds of billions of dollars.

Over all, we should be ashamed that in the wake of this disaster, we are receiving donations from third world powers like Afghanistan and in comparing scorecards for rendering needed services to the desperate and needy, we rank far behind countries with endemic poverty issues and no technology base like Thailand.

It is clear that America after two hundred years has wound down and needs to be re-invented.

Les Aaron

A Solution That Even Rove Would Appreciate

I've got a great solution that will solve everyone's problems. The president won't have to squirm and try to look presidential which he is doing a botch job at and we won't have to worry about paying the bills.

Here's the deal.


Since we have shown that we couldn't care less about the people of New Orleans and we already hate France for questionning our judgement re going into Iraq, we could kill two birds with one stone.

Why don't we just reverse the Louisiana purchase?.

We all know that the news coming from that part of the country is not going to get better in a hurry. And where possible, we'd like to spare the president for any more photo ops and stage acting. It is undoubtedly a real strain on a person trying to look as if the plight of a bunch of Democrats and non-voters really amount to a hill of beans. And this happening after that pesky Cindy made his vacation miserable. and forced him to cut it short. Certainly the demands of those tours and those attempts at guitar playing in the midst of disaster were justifiable reasons for not doing anything for nearly five days and leaving the whole affair up to an organization that is nothing more than a joke. Just imagine how the terrorists are going to take our cowboy tactics after this. Will they ever face us with a straight face again.
If you think about it we could probably get off the hook by paying them back twice the original asking price and still come out ahead of what it would cost to repair the sea wall that was damaged. That way, the whole damn place becomes somebody else's responsibility and GWB comes out looking like a good businessman before the Mid-terms....

What's more, we'd get the French and all those "Third World" foreigners out of our face who are trying to volunteer and make America look bad.

As part of the deal, we might even agree to serving French fries in the White House again...

And they would be obligated to say only nice things about us. Just yesterday the French Canadian government was nice enough to call George a "schmuck."

What do you think? Does that sound like a plan?

Les Aaron

Putting Things Into Perspective...

Putting things into Perspective:
Les Aaron

Contrasting The Response to the Tsunami to what happened in New Orleans.

When the Tsunami hit, there was no advance warning. No newspapers or TV to blare the news that a dangerous tidal wave was headed to the shores of Thailand.

Thailand, a third world country, characterized by great poverty, poor communications and undeveloped infrastructure was virtually stripped bare by an event for which there was no warning. The Tsunami was not anticipated nor planned for. There were no simulations or models or exercises to deal with such an unexpected event.. .As it happened, the tidal surge may have been twenty to twenty feet or higher that swept inland wiping out everything in its path. Thousands upon thousands disappeared; others were drowned and their remains scattered far and wide.

However, although a third world nation with few reserves, within hours relief was on its way. People helped people. Volunteers proved numerous. Water and food were dispensed within hours. Organization began almost immediately. And those who were injured received medical attention the same day. This was all without outside help. And no sophisticated communications system..

On the second day, the country showed its ability to deal with the disaster. Aid was administered equitably. An organization designed to handle the plight of the stricken was in place; posters and photos of the missing were posted; and the bodies of those drowned by the tsunami were being removed to prevent disease from spreading.

Contrast this to what happened in New Orleans.

According to the president of the neighboring Parrish, FEMA turned away three flatbed trucks offered by Wal-mart loaded with water from entering New Orleans. Local communications were uprooted by FEMA staff members and a supply of gasoline was not allowed to enter the city that needed it most.

In the interim, fifty countries around the world offered to send help. And FEMA and the government failed to respond to their offer, causing people around the world to shake their heads in amazement. And expressions like the Superpower with feet of clay started to emerge along with other remarks that tended to cast America’s ability to do anything right in question.

Sadly, as pointed out in the Toronto Star and other media around the world, State and local officials focused on maintaining order instead of getting to those most in need of help. Clearly, the priorities were not in the right place. There were insufficient emergency vehicles to evacuate the hospitals; no deliveries of food and water to the embattled survivors clinging to life.

The scrambling to blame others and circumstances was widespread in Washington today. While Michael Chertoff said that supplies had been prepositioned, It took five days for food and water to begin to get to the Super Dome which was the gathering place recommended by City and State officials in the event of such a staggering emergency. This was the result of simulations and models conducted by FEMA officials and other state and local officials in advance of the disaster.. More than twenty thousand people converged on this location within forty eight hours. Within days, The sanitary conditions became intolerable. And people who required medication and treatment were being ignored; in the meantime, police wandered the streets ignoring the pleas of the people focusing instead on the "looters"--many of whom had few options for locating food and water. .

It took six days before Michael Brown, the Head of FEMA, realized that fifteen thousand people were holed up at the Convention Center without food or drink. More than 2,000 people were still there as of yesterday!...When asked by Ted Koppel why things took so long, Michael looked like a deer in the headlights and start hemming and hawing until the cameras moved off him.

Michael Chertoff, the head of Homeland Defense, a job given Secretary level status, said that he as well as Bush were surprised that the levees did not hold.

Surprised that the levees didn’t hold. Excuse me, where were these people? Report after report including a full series of articles in the Times Picayune described precisely what would take place in the event a category Five hurricane hit New Orleans.

The man in charge of planning for emergency procedures for New Orleans had completely modeled the scenario and demanded repeatedly that the budget requested be approved to prevent such a disaster three years before.

Despite the urgency of his pleas, the request fell on deaf ears when George Bush redirected the funds to Homeland Security for protection against the probability of a “terrorist attack.” This is despite the fact that the former head of FEMA listed the challenges facing New Orleans as being the third highest priority in America. And their pleas were ignored.

Mary Landrieu the Democratic Senator from Louisiana had petitioned Congress to approve her bill for protection of the Levee system for more than three years; yet she had little success.

Engineers have explained in books and white papers that the entire city was at risk as long as the Federal Government had neglected the health of the wetlands and the neighboring islands that protected New Orleans from such an event. According to the studies, the health of the port area and the safety of the City depended to a great extent on the alluvial flows from the upper Mississippi to build the wetlands and provide barrier protection, keeping the wetlands nourished and healthy. The natural flow of these normal sedimentary deposits had been interrupted by the decision of the Corps of Engineers to extend the Levee system upriver, the normal source of the alluvial flows.

The cost of correcting this problem which had been generated in the first place by the Corps of Engineers was deemed to be in the 14 billion dollar range. The Bush government failed to act.

When a board of experts convened this morning on Meet the Press said that it makes no sense to rebuild New Orleans until the natural flow of alluvial deposits to the wetland perimeter and neighboring islands is restored, the moderator asked whether anyone thought the problem would be the money. No one thought it might be a problem since money was found to rebuild every citizen after a disaster but at the same time none of the guests spoke for government. . Another of the guests mentioned that it is not unlike the problems faced by Florida which received a seven billion dollar allocation to correct the problems of the Everglades to restore the natural flow of this body of water.

If money turns out to have been the problem all along, people will be within their rights to question why we have hundreds of billions of dollars for Iraq and cannot find fourteen billion dollars to restore one of America’s most cherished cities.

One guest correctly pointed the finger directly at the GWBush administration for its refusal to deal with global warming as contributing to future problems with major coastal cities that will suffer from rising water levels expected to rise 12 to 50 inches over the next fifty years. This would result in major cities like Miami and New York facing similar challenges to New Orleans. He added wisely, that until we find alternative fuels that do not add to global temperatures, the problems facing our largest coastal cities is real and cannot be ignored.

In the meantime, the questions and investigations have really not yet begun. And the worst of it is not over. Mary Landrieu pointed out that there will be gruesome surprises in store for the clean up crews when they find many more dead than they might have expected, people driven up to their attics by rising water levels, either asphyxiated or dead due to the lack of food and water with no place to go.

The original estimated cost to repair the levees was under 100 million dollars; today, not including the loss suffered by hundreds of thousands of people, the cost to rebuild New Orleans and the outlying areas affected by hurricane Katrina has topped 100 Billion dollars!

One might ask how we would fare facing an emergency that we did not anticipate? And why a third world nation with no preparation and poor communications was able to handle the needs of those stricken by one of the worst natural disasters in history while it took us nearly a week to respond to an event that everyone said was coming?

Les Aaron
The Armchair Curmudgeon
http://lesaaron.blogspot.com

Will Kissenger Be Asked To Lead This Investigation Too?

Judging from how long it took them to agree to investigate the root causes of 911, expect it will take another year to conduct an investigation of what went wrong in New Orleans, which will give them sufficient time to bury the evidence--ie. destroying the wetlands that protected the city, devastating the budget used to protect the city against a storm system like Katrina and the other failures that include on the seventh day of the storm, Brown of FEMA looking like a deer caught in the headlights when told about the folks trapped at the Convention center, etc. etc.. Somehow, we know how it will end. It will have been caused by bin Laden working in concert with Bill Clinton; it always does.

Remember when the Buck Stopped Here was more than a slogan; when a president didn't lie to his constituency; when a president facing some imminent crisis would prefer to share the burden with the people???

This government should provide free therapy for Americans who are so shocked by these events, that they can't believe we're living in a world that can put people on the moon, mount wars thousands of miles away, create clones that look exactly like their parents, build satellite systems that can telegraph messages back to earth from out in space, but cannot protect the people of its own city after knowing for years that that city faced a major threat.

America in 2005: Let's all visit the burial sites of the Founding Fathers and have a national prayer session.

Les Aaron

The Real Price of Katrina...

...You know what we lost with Katrina?

The ability to be taken seriously as a world power.

What kind of world power would not know what to do in a disaster that was expected?
What kind of superpower would do nothing to help its stranded citizens for three days?
What kind of superpower would turn away people from being rescued?
What kind of superpower would not have evacuated the helpless and the bed-ridden?
What kind of a superpower would tell all of its citizens to go one place and then not prepare food and shelter for them?
What kind of superpower would allow the oil companies to exploit the situation?
What kind of superpower would be so poorly prepared to address the needs of people who are being denied food and water and shelter?
Can we ever be taken seriously again as a Superpower if we can't even get our own house in order after we were forewarned and new what was going to happen in a category five storm?
What kind of superpower would allow the violent to take over the streets?
What kind of superpower takes five days to evacuate those in need and send them to a place that turns them away?
What kind of a superpower cuts the budget to repair a pending disaster and then talks about bull-dozing a city that has a rich meaning and tradition for its inhabitants?
What kind of a chief of a superpower treats a disaster like it was something to blow off?
What kind of a CEO would go home and go to sleep and not worry about his people
who have no food, no water, no shelter?
What is wrong with America?
I am ashamed to admit of being an American in America of 2005.

Les Aaron

The Good News is The Government Saved 40 million dollars on not repairing the dike; the bad news:it's going to cost 100 billion dollars to rebuild

While I feel overwhelming compassion for these poor folks who are stranded, who've lost members of their family, had their homes destroyed, and are now flooded with nowhere to turn, I have to ask why the City of New Orleans, the State and the Federal government have been so slow to respond.

Did they not realize that when you inhabit a place immediately next to the water and that place is between ten and eighteen feet below the level of the sea next store that that's not a great place to be. And with all of the best planning, you could be asking for it.

Shouldn't there have been an emergency plan for all contingencies involving the sea spelling out possible rescue alternatives and options?

To me, that seems like living on a cliff in California and then being totally surprised when an earthquake hits. I mean in virtually every environmental and global warming script I've read, it says that the current level of fresh water melt due to global warming caused by burning of fossil fuels will raise the level of ocean water by anywhere from twenty to fifty inches over the next fifty years. That means places like Florida which average a maximum of about twelve inches above sea level are at risk. New Orleans is 10 to 18 feet. Therefore, shouldn't there have been a damn good plan in place.

It seems to me that if that's the best we can do to handle a natural disaster that is inevitable, how are we ever going to prepare and fend off a terrorist attack. If someone wants to know why thinking people's level of confidence in this government is zilch, this should tell them why!....

I'm sorry, but this is a disaster that was coming down the pike; not to believe that it was going to happen at some time or place, was just a question of fooling one's self.

That's my take on our preparedness as a city--which is painfully instructive--and as a nation. . We pour hundreds of billions into weapons and preparedness and where has it gotten us???

Have we as a people stopped thinking? Have our leaders been chosen for their lack of brains? What the Hell is going on here...

The lesson here is clear: Want to save yourself, don't expect the government to even think about a plan: Figure it out yourself and prepare a plan to escape from a government disaster that it will not anticipate or plan for.

Les Aaron

The Truth Comes Out

A few things conspired to make the New Orleans disaster worse than it had to be. I was watching the chief coordinator of planning for New Orleans this evening and he had conducted simulations three years ago projecting the damage of a category 5 hurricane.
And he called it right; only a few things happened to prevent him from getting the protection he needed for the City. Bush virtually doomed two of the projects to failure when he cut them badly. One was to reinforce the dikes; the other was to strengthen their ability to pump out water should the dikes be breached. Although New Orleans was viewed as the third greatest potential threat to the US, the Chief Planner said that the money was taken out of these projects to be used for Homeland Security. The other thing was ongoing: It was the destruction of the marshlands and islands that surround New Orleans and acted as somewhat of a buffer. When the corps of engineers started extending the dikes all the way up the river, it prevented the alluvial deposits that had originally shaped the whole Delta area from traveling downstream to replenish the nutrients needed by the wetlands resulting in their eventual demise. This could have been prevented but then again it involved money that the government didn't want to provide. After all, they had squeezed by two times before without spending any money on fixing the problem, maybe they could squeeze by again. Great thinking for the greatest superpower in the land now made to look like a third world nation.
Therefore, it was clear that the blame lay not with New Orleans, the city or its planners, but with the Federal Government that was not particularly predisposed to helping out a city that was mostly democratic when it voted.

Les Aaron

The Powder Keg

The Powder Keg....


What no one has said is that New Orleans right now is a powder keg so is much of the Gulf Coast after being ignored by the Federal government and FEMA for so long.

And it would not take much for this to blow up!

Many don't mince words and blame the president for dereliction of duty.
Viewing the disaster area from 5,000 feet and making some bland speeches about not buying gasoline is not exactly designed to warm anyone's hearts especially in view of the sacrifices being made, the loss of property and loved ones...and the fact that this government has demonstrated a kind of cavalier attitude that pretty much suggests
that you are on your own.

Well, the effect is starting to become cumulative. The people, and rightly so, are beginning to ask where is the National Guard? Where is the help they've been promised? Why has it taken so long to get food and water in? Why have the hospitals been left to fend on their own?

Questions abound.

Many people are beginning to wonder whether this benign neglect has racist overtones. (I think it's political: Don't most cities vote Democratic; therefore, who cares?)
And this does not auger well for future peace.
Nor does the escalating gas prices that are being forced on consumers all over the country.
Did Bush claim it a national emergency and tell any gas wholesalers and retail operations that raising prices right now is against the law and capitalizing on this disaster is equally against the law. No! This unfeeling cretin did not do that; and that was the easiest thing he could have done.

If any of you remember the Newark riots, remember it didn't take much.
There are armed men in New Orleans. They are hot and angry; they are not to be fooled with. And there are National Guard forces there who are not really trained for these circumstances. Might we see an accident like Kent State where somebody fires and it turns intro a disaster that would spread like wildfire all across the country? Remember the power of TV; this resembles just such a scenario before the guns went off....

It might. All I'm saying is that with the people fired up about Iraq and our failures there and our inability to handle this crisis and gasoline that costs more than milk, we could easily see an explosion and this president thrown out of office along with all of his minions.
Or it could turn out to be the largest oppression of the people ever witnessed with thousands dead.

I hope I am wrong; but the hard feelings are piling up. And even the conservatives are showing their hatred for our incompetent Chief of Staff.

Les Aaron
Home of the Super Blog: http://lesaaron.blogspot.com