Normalization of Relations with Cuba is Long Overdue

President Obama is (finally) taking steps to normalize diplomatic relations with Cuba. Why is this a big deal? We have normal diplomatic relations with our World War II enemies Germany and Japan. We have normal diplomatic relations with our Cold War enemies Russia and China.

The problem, of course, is that we have a community of Cuban expatriates in southern Florida who bitterly oppose this move. But frankly, those who oppose it most vehemently, those who actually lost their land or businesses in the Cuban Revolution, are mostly over 70 years old. Their children and grandchildren, and other younger Cuban-Americans do not feel the same way. Most of them would like to be able to exchange visits with their relatives in Cuba.

I worked as a translator at Fort McCoy, WI when some of the Cubans who participated in the Mariel Boatlift were there during the summer of 1980. Because the United States did not have normal diplomatic relations with Cuba, they were considered political refugees. Had they been from any other country in Latin America or the Caribbean, they would have been considered economic migrants, and returned to their country of origin. Not to mention that Fidel Castro would not have been able to send along folks from Cuba’s prisons and mental hospitals.

Our lack of diplomatic relations with Cuba allowed Castro to “play us” in 1980. It made no sense then and it makes even less sense now! What makes sense now is for the United States to position itself to be able to influence the political direction Cuba takes in the post-Castro era. For that we need to have normal political relations with Cuba. That’s the big deal!

Tech Support

Back in the 1990s, when AOL (America Online) was still a significant ISP (Internet Service Provider), I took a job doing phone tech. support for a company I’ll call TelCo in Madison WI. We were sworn to secrecy about who we were providing support for, so hopefully enough time has passed that they won’t come after me.

I didn’t work there very long, in fact I did their two week training and then lasted about two more weeks before I quit ahead of being fired. I don’t remember much about the training, except that the point of emphasis was to get off the phone with a client as quickly as possible. Calls of less than a minute were good; calls of over five minutes were unacceptable. I later learned that if a call went over five minutes your supervisor would come to your desk and glare at you with as angry a look as they could muster, until you hung up, and then chew you out. Fortunately my supervisor Julie was actually a decent person, so it never came to shouting or actual verbal abuse.

My problem with doing tech. support the TelCo way was that I really was interested in solving the client’s problem, whatever it was, and had enough knowledge of personal computer (PC) hardware and software (from previous jobs) to have a shot at fixing many problems presented by the clients. Of course there are those folks who are hopeless as PC users. A story I’ve heard, which is probably more urban legend than truth, is about a user who called tech. support to say the monitor on his desktop PC had gone dark. The techie asks him to check that the monitor is both plugged in to an outlet and connected to his computer. The client responds that he can’t because it is too dark under his desk. The techie then asks if he can turn on a light or use a flashlight to check the cables, and the client responds, “ I could go look for a flashlight, but the power is off here so it’s hard to find your way around!”

I never had a client that clueless, and, frankly, most folks I talked to had legitimate problems – though most had nothing to do with the AOL software. The problem that got me “fired” is a case in point.

JoAnn called to say that her PC was “stuck” at a Microsoft Word error message screen. First names only was another TelCo rule; I’m Dan, by the way. She had turned off and restarted the PC several times and it always booted normally but went right back to the error screen.

Quite coincidentally, due to personal experience, I knew exactly what the problem was and how to fix it (but not in under a minute or even 5 minutes).

An engineer designing IBM desktop PCs had come up with a new feature the company called the Resume feature. When enabled in the BIOS of a PC, this feature allows the user to turn off the computer’s power switch at any time, then turn it back on later and return right back to where they were, with all the applications and documents that had been open, open again to exactly the same application screen and line in any open documents.

Sounds wonderful doesn’t it? The computer stores a record of exactly what applications and documents are open automatically, so you can be doing your budget in an Excel spreadsheet in one window, while working on the next great American novel in another window, and when you’re done for the day you just turn off the power switch, secure in the knowledge that when you flip the switch of that PC tomorrow morning, everything will be right where you left it.

Obviously, this is the scenario the IBM engineer envisioned, and convinced his colleagues to buy in to. Great right? What could possibly go wrong?

Let me tell you. If any one of your open applications or even Windows itself should encounter a fatal error condition, your PC is stuck right there, forever, unless and until you turn off the Resume feature in its BIOS.

So, I talked JoAnn, a competent PC user who didn’t know what a BIOS was, through the fix. You turn off the machine, then turn it back on and immediately hold down the F8 key (sometimes it is F3, but hers was F8). Eventually, you will be taken to a screen labeled B-I-O-S. Using your keypad to navigate (make sure the NUM-LOCK light is on) through the different BIOS screens, find the Resume feature, select it and turn it off! Then navigate to the screen that lets you save your BIOS settings, do the save and exit.

After that the PC booted to the Windows desktop, JoAnn thanked me, and I hung up.

My supervisor, Julie, had showed up at my desk when I was in the middle of explaining what a BIOS was and why JoAnn needed to go there to fix her PC. It took a couple tries with F8 to get into the BIOS, and more time figuring out how to navigate in her BIOS, and changing the Resume setting also took some back and forth. So by the time I hung up, Julie had been standing over me scowling for about 10 minutes.

To her credit, she did not bother to chew me out. She just said, “You’re going to want to resign before next week so you won’t have being fired on your record.” I thanked Julie, finished the night and quit the next day.

Congressional Republicans Militantly Threaten To Do Nothing!

Can you poison a well that is dry? Congressional Republicans accuse President Obama of "poisoning the well" because he has (finally) decided to do something unilaterally about the nation's immigration mess.

What are these angry folks going to do about it? It sounds like they plan to do what they have been mostly doing since Obama was first elected, and certainly all they have done since his re-election 2 years ago, obstruct anything Mr. Obama tries to do and, other than that, do a whole lot of nothing!

Since they don't like what the President is doing to try to clean up the immigration mess, why don't they try passing some legislation for a change? I find it hard to believe that the American public will continue to re-elect them to keep doing nothing and blaming the President for it! They don't have Congressional Democrats to blame anymore, since Republicans control both houses.

Here's hoping that I'm wrong, and Congressional Republicans have a big portfolio of legislation ready to introduce as soon as the new session begins. But I'm not holding my breath.

Crossword

Mom was a farm wife. When they coined the term ‘hard working’, she was who they had in mind. But the last couple years of her life she spent mostly in an easy chair in front of the T.V. Congestive heart failure robbed her of the strength to walk.

The daily crossword puzzle in the newspaper was always a favorite activity. Not even her failing heart could keep her from it. The last time I saw Mom, before she passed, she was sitting in her chair, seemingly half asleep, ignoring the T.V. Unexpectedly, she sprung into action, grabbing a pen from a nearby table and folded newspaper from somewhere in the easy chair. She wrote a word on the puzzle and returned pen and paper to their places just as quickly! That’s the way with crossword puzzles, you have to write that word when it pops into your head!

John Doe probe of Walker recall proves only one thing!

What the John Doe probe of the 2011-2012 recall elections proves about Walker and his team is that they explicitly coordinated with so-called independent interest groups (501c4 groups), especially Wisconsin Club for Growth, to arrange large donations from right-wing individuals and groups. Such donations would have been illegal at the time if made directly to the Walker campaign.

But, the truth is, we have no meaningful campaign finance laws any more. Existing laws are so easy to circumvent it’s a joke. So, in all probability, Walker and his aids cannot be convicted of any wrongdoing. And the only thing Republican operatives have to say about it is, “So what, the Democrats are doing the same thing.”

So the $700,000 from Gogebic Taconite was not a bribe, just a shrewd business investment. And the fact that the company later won approval from the Legislature and Walker to streamline regulations for a massive iron ore mine in northern Wisconsin, is mere coincidence?

Get used to it. We are no longer a democracy; we are a plutocracy, which means “pay to play” is now the norm. The John Doe probe proves only that neither Wisconsin nor the United States have any campaign finance laws worthy of the name.

My Political Philosophy

Recently I read somewhere that it is important to know what you favor in terms of solutions to political problems, not just what you are against. Otherwise you are not a political critic, just a complainer.

In recent years I find that I'm mostly expressing opposition to political events I don't like, such as the U.S. Supreme Court's Citizens United ruling or the passage of Governor Walker's Act 10. So I decided to spend some time thinking about what I am for (in favor of) in the political arena, my political philosophy.

To give myself some guidance, I purchased a copy of "Chomsky on Anarchism", a series of essays and interviews by Noam Chomsky. Note that I would never label myself an Anarchist or advocate of Anarchism due to the very negative reaction the word (either form) elicits in the United States. But Chomsky is comfortable with both Anarchism and the closely related term Libertarian Socialism, as describing his political perspective. I find both his vision and his goals for human society to be quite compatible with my own.

My core political beliefs start with a Winston Churchill quote: "Democracy is the worst form of government, except for all those other forms that have been tried from time to time." Some take this as a cynical, even bitter, statement. I interpret it as just the hard-headed truth. When the people decide a question with their votes, they don't always get it right, but that is certainly preferable to some dictator deciding.

The one major problem with democracy is that the majority may decide to persecute a minority group, such as when the majority in certain states of the U.S. made it near impossible for minority African-Americans to vote. As a democratic republic, which recognizes certain rights as applicable to all citizens, even when they are in the minority, the national government eventually stepped in to enforce voting rights for all adult citizens. So my preferred form of government is a democratic republic which protects the rights of all citizens, not just those of the majority.

The United States is a democratic republic, at least when it comes to voting rights. But that is far from the complete story. The State of the Union Address to the Congress, January 6, 1941, delivered by President Franklin Roosevelt described "four freedoms" which he considered as essential to obtain for all people in all the nations of the world in order to ensure lasting peace. The four freedoms are (1) freedom of speech and expression, (2) freedom of religion, (3) freedom from want, and (4) freedom from fear.

The first 2 of these are covered by the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, though recent Supreme Court rulings have transformed "freedom of speech" into a license for rich people and corporations (legally created people) to dominate political expression with their money.

"Freedom from want", which Roosevelt further defined as a healthy peacetime life, may have been a bit of a stretch. After all, I want many things I will most likely never have!

Seriously, "freedom from want" can be seen as justifying programs such as Social Security, Medicare, Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC) and National Health Insurance. One might restate it, much more modestly, as the freedom to pursue a reasonably healthy and potentially productive life without starving to death or dying for lack of access to treatment of diseases and conditions curable by the current state of medicine.

Even this very basic level of "freedom from want" - to the extent that it may currently exist - is threatened, even in a wealthy democracy like the United States, by those on the political right who seek to dismantle what they refer to as the "welfare state".

"Freedom from fear", which Roosevelt further defined as a world-wide reduction of armaments to such a point and in such a thorough fashion that no nation will be in a position to commit an act of physical aggression against any neighbor — anywhere in the world, is certainly a long way from being achieved. Maybe the pure version of this freedom was forever doomed with the advent of nuclear weapons!

I guess "freedom from fear" is what some have used to justify our huge and powerful armed forces. But our idea of defense is somebody else's act of physical aggression. So the closest we ever got to "freedom from fear" was mutual assured destruction (back in the cold war years)! Today, the world seems infinitely more dangerous and less predictable.

But I'm not without hope. Democratic, libertarian socialism flowers like a cactus in the desert. I see co-ops of many kinds, farmers' markets and community sponsored agriculture (CSA) farms as examples of people organizing themselves in positive ways at the community level. I buy my food at a co-op, do my banking at a co-op (aka. credit union), and get my health care through a co-op.

Civil disobedience was rampant in the protests against Act 10. Some folks were mistreated by authorities, but nobody was killed. Read your labor history, many have been killed trying to assert and defend their democratic rights over time!

Democracy continues to be the only form of government that gives us any hope of eventually becoming a kinder and gentler world. We learn from great leaders in the politics of social justice including Ghandi, King and Mandela.

The struggle continues and will continue for many more generations. The times they are a-changin', always!

Plutocracy Now!

de-moc´ra-cy : noun, 1) government by the people. 2) political and social equality in general; belief in this.

plu-toc´ra-cy : noun, 1) government by the rich. 2) the influential rich.

Citizens United versus Federal Election Commission, January 21, 2010

The Supreme Court ruled that the First Amendment prohibits the government from restricting political independent expenditures by corporations, associations, or labor unions.

McCutcheon versus Federal Election Commission, April 3, 2014

The Supreme Court struck down limits in federal law on the overall campaign contributions the biggest individual donors may make to candidates, political parties and political action committees.

The United States transition from democracy to plutocracy is nearly complete. Rich people and corporations can spend as much money as they want to purchase the government that they want.

The only thing left is to find a way to quietly stop all the "little people" from voting. Currently too much money is spent getting them to vote against their own interests. This is inefficient, and since they can't afford to get their ideas heard in today's expensive media market anyway, it is silly to allow them to vote.

Remembering Mom

My mother passed away December 29th. For the last couple years of her life she was almost exclusively confined to her chair, a wheel chair, and her bed. But that is not how I choose to remember her.

I will remember her as the hardest working person I’ve ever known, and one of the most disciplined. She was a farm wife, which means she was a full partner with my father in the operation of the family farm - sharing fully in all the work, but receiving little of the recognition (such as it was). She drove tractor in the fields. She washed and sanitized the milking machines, bulk tank and other milk house equipment. She could feed and milk the cows if she needed to, but Dad usually did that.

In the non-farm realm, she did just about everything. She gave birth to and raised 10 children. Included with that were cooking, cleaning, raising a large garden (from which she annually canned and froze an impressive amount of produce), baking bread and cakes, sewing (both mending and making clothes), decorating (including flowers inside and out).

Some tasks that fell to Mom would fall in the "farm-related" category, such as going to town (often a couple towns down the road) in search of replacement parts for whatever machine was currently broken down - inevitably at the time it was most needed. Another farm-related task was keeping down the population of pigeons by shooting them when they perched on the roofs of the barns or silos. Mom was a crack shot with her 22 caliber rifle. The legend that she once killed 2 pigeons with a single shot is true - I witnessed it!

Another legendary story about Mom is that shortly after she married Dad, he had her go out to the field with him to try to kill some woodchucks. He had her drive the tractor while he used the 22 rifle to shoot at the woodchucks. Within a short time of having her around he figured out that she was better with the rifle than he was, so they switched roles, and had better luck killing woodchucks!

To say my Mom sewed is a huge understatement. She mended old clothes and made new clothes using patterns which she purchased and customized. She accumulated boxes and boxes of patterns! The new clothes were primarily for her daughters and herself. She made new matching dresses for the first day of school in the fall, for each of her daughters going to school that year. I've seen the "first day of school" pictures, starting with just one daughter and continuing up to five daughters, all in a row and wearing identical dresses (her first 5 children were all female). Of course, as they grew she also taught her daughters to sew! All seven daughters and one son eventually became proficient.

Later on she became a prolific quilter, making at least one quilt for each child and grandchild. She showed off her products at quilt shows and county fairs, winning more than her share of awards over the years. Her quilts and those she made together with the other members of her Homemakers club were frequently auctioned off for charitable causes.

In addition to sewing she also knitted, crocheted, embroidered, etc. When her children were in primary and secondary school she kitted them all mittens for Christmas, every year! There were also knitted hats and sweaters. While in college, I remember being on a plane and the flight attendant complimenting me on my sweater - which Mom had made for me.

Mom was well known among her children's primary school teachers for her fruit cakes. I realize that in the many years since, holiday fruit cakes have not just fallen out of favor, but become a standard laugh line - as in: "There is really only a single fruit cake that continues to be regifted year after year". However, back then, a well-made fruit cake was highly valued (really!), and my Mom's were legendary.

Mom was a 4-H leader, and for a time ran her own 4-H club, the Lucky Clovers. We used to meet at the Town Hall.

Did I mention that Mom was the Town Clerk for the rural township in which our farm was located? She inherited the job from my Dad's mom, and served for almost 50 years, eventually passing the job on to one of her daughters. She remained involved, unofficially, in township government until her death. What I most remember is that, during the Christmas season she would work late into the night calculating the Town's tax roll - since the tax bills needed to go out in time to give folks the opportunity to pay them (or pay half) in the current tax year if they chose to. I also remember her early calculators. They were heavy enough to give you a hernia!

Mom was a legendary baker. We had home-made bread and biscuits all the time when I was growing up. From her mother-in-law she learned to make Bohemian traditional breads including Houska and Kolache (which we called Kolachas and Kukan). Her pies were incredible. My personal favorite was blueberry, but she made pies of all  kinds from rhubarb to banana cream to pumpkin, with a flaky crust few restaurants can match!

Also, Mom was chief organizer and communicator in our family. She shopped for our birthday and Christmas gifts. Later, as we scattered around the state, the country and beyond, she sent letters and birthday cards to us. She had an incredible knack for getting those birthday cards to each of us on time regardless of where we might be - including such destinations as El Salvador, Central America; Arecibo, Puerto Rico; and Paris, France.

Are you impressed yet? Mom was not a great person or a famous one. She falls into that much less recognized category of good, hard-working people. Dad used to say, "Nobody will ever do for you what your mother already has." In my case he was even more right than he knew.

Bye Mom, I already miss you a bunch. I hope you are getting a good rest and having a beer with Dad.

We are what we pretend to be.

I just read an opinion piece about former President George W. Bush. The author's point was that whatever else he was, Bush was and is a genuinely nice and caring person in his personal life.

I have no doubt that is true, and at least partly explains the popular notion that most Americans would rather have a beer with him than with Al Gore, his one-time opponent for the Presidency.

What it made me think of, however, is the quote (which also embodies the story's moral) from Kurt Vonnegut's novel "Mother Night": "We are what we pretend to be, so we must be careful about what we pretend to be."

President Bush was self-righteous to the point of arrogance in his public life. Even if he was only pretending, that, not his demeanor in his personal life will be his legacy.

Here are a couple more Vonnegut quotes relevant to the legacy of the second President Bush.

"There are plenty of good reasons for fighting, but no good reason ever to hate without reservation, to imagine that God Almighty Himself hates with you, too."

"Left or right, Christian or Muslim, those convinced they're doing violence in service of a higher power and against an irretrievably inhuman enemy are the most dangerous creatures of all."

Vonnegut served in World War 2 and was a POW in Germany (That's where the title for "Slaughterhouse Five" comes from.), so there is some experience behind his quotes!

I find the "we are what we pretend to be" quote especially humbling. Have I been arrogant, self-righteous or dismissive of the opinions of others in my professional life? I expect that I have been, and more often than I'd care to admit.

But then I'm probably attributing more importance to my actions than they deserve.

Forgiveness is the only real hope any of us has. "So it goes."

Headline: State Employee Pay - higher raises for fewer workers

It seems state supervisors under the Walker administration have doled out raises averaging 6.52 percent to 2,757 workers, or roughly 1 out of 14 workers "eligible", a total of $8.2 million.

It sounds like a lot of money until you remember that Walker's dismantling of public employee unions, and subsequent unilateral modifications to health insurance and retirement plan deductions, resulted in a 5-10 percent cut in take-home pay for all state workers, less than 2 years ago. So a very few of them got a part of their money back!

The future headline I'm expecting is: 90% of state employee raises go to political appointees and family members of Walker cronies!

Remember, you heard it here first.

Citizens United Blues

Following the current Supreme Court election here in Wisconsin is just sad. Ed Fallone is a good candidate who deserves the monetary support to mount a competitive campaign, but he is not getting it.

Justice Pat Roggensack has so much corporate money behind her that those with relatively deep pockets who oppose her just see it as hopeless. Of course unions have a lot less money to spend thanks to Governor Scott Walker's divide-and-conquer strategy of destroying most public employee unions while threatening private sector unions that oppose him.

This could have been an interesting election with public financing, but thanks to the US Supreme Court's Citizens United ruling, the challenger Ed Fallone is being hopelessly outspent, and the smart money is avoiding him like the plague.

I've got the Citizen's United blues, little else can be done until we fix that!

Anonymous Money

I am (free?) speech without responsibility

I can fling mud and rotten eggs from behind an impenetrable wall

I destroy one candidate's integrity without placing blame on another

I guarantee the candidate favoring moneyed interests always wins,

Because (s)he will always have more anonymous money

I am the bane of democracy and the darling of the privileged

Who needs a coup d'etat when there is anonymous money?

Remembering Senator Russ Feingold

I just got done reading Russ Feingold’s book, “While America Sleeps”. It is a worthwhile read, its main point being that we in the US need to pay more attention to what is going on in the world, and encourage our government to do so as well, so we don’t continue getting blind-sided by events like 911.

The book brought back memories of how great it was to have a Senator who held listening sessions in every county of the state every year, and had office staff dedicated to helping citizens with any issues they had with the federal government.

I know of a case where a person who did everything by the book had their application for US citizenship “lost” by the INS. They only got the matter straightened out with a lot of help from Feingold’s Milwaukee office. Don’t go expecting that kind of help from Senator Ron Johnson!

Has Ron Johnson held even one listening session or town meeting? Not counting campaign events with Walker or Romney, has he been back to visit our fair state since he bought the senate seat?

We now have 2 multi-millionaire Senators who bought their way into Congress with their own money. And it appears that retiring Senator Herb Kohl will just be replaced by a multi-millionaire of the other party.

Senator Feingold, I miss you for your mainstream (non-millionaire) Wisconsin values. We didn’t deserve you, and I don’t know if we’ll ever be able to overcome the huge financial advantages of the millionaire candidates and their millionaire and corporate donors to elect another like you.

2012 Prognostications

Friday, January 13, 2012. Ahhh…- perfect day to write about the New Year! With 2011 we left behind old rumors and gather some supporters to help us make it in 2012. How about that?

What are the three things we worry most about? For most people those things are:

Health. Money and Love.

Health – 2012 will bring a mixed bag for most of us. We should take better care of our overall health. When making plans about improving our health habits, we tend to ignore our mental health. This year, we should take better care of our mental health. We need to learn to be kinder with ourselves and accept not only our strengths, but also our flaws. Lets try to develop a healthier relationship with our bodies by paying special attention to our minds.

Money - In 2012 just like any other year, we need it to pay for our daily bread, but just keep in mind that money is a tool and not everything revolves around it. In 2012 we should be careful on how we make and spend money. Try to find a balance between money and everything else – otherwise you will have a very miserable existence. A miserable existence is not a life, just an existence.

I predict that if you work diligently and take time to maintain a balanced life, you will achieve your goal of abundance in 2012.

Love – What will 2012 bring…well…as the old song said – “Love, life's sweetest reward.” That is my prediction…you reap what you sow. And if you didn't plant, well then…start today. Better times are in the forecast, leave behind the turbulent waters and chart ahead with confidence. Hey Don Dino…Happy 35^th your hotness! I know. I need new glasses!

Why not phased-in retirement?

I struggle to articulate the reasons that this is a good idea, because a part of my brain keeps telling me that just the statement, "Why not phased-in retirement?" should be all I need to say for the light to go on in the brains of others!

After all, in the tribal past of all humans, isn't this what was done? What does the term tribal elder really imply? Surely, our ancestors didn't send their older members out to hunt and to war rather than their younger and stronger fellows. But they made full use of their experience by listening to their ideas.

When I was in my mid-twenties, full of energy and ideas, I remember filling out endless job applications and mailing in tons of resumes, trying to get a decent job. The employers all wanted more experience (often with software that was already out-of-date or soon would be).

Now, in my fifties and wanting to slow down, I have seemingly unlimited opportunities to put in more hours, and earn more money, by taking on additional tasks at my current job, or doing some consulting on the side.

An acquaintance - with a career worth of valuable experience - has health issues that prevent her from working fulltime, but would very much like to work a reduced schedule - maybe 40-60 percent of fulltime. Nobody offers part-time jobs these days, unless (1) the hours are those nobody else will work, or (2) the pay is less than what you would get at a fast food joint, or (3) the job description is a mile long and the "flexibility" is all on the employer's side (to make you work as many hours as they wish without guaranteeing you any minimum).

Currently the economic recovery is being hindered by a combination of baby boomers, who can't afford to retire, hanging onto their jobs, and folks in their mid-twenties who can't find that career-starting job.

Imagine sixty-something-year-old workers mentoring twenty-something-year-olds; passing on that (much talked about) organizational knowledge, which managers mostly remember after it has walked out the door.

Imagine allowing older workers with health issues to work abbreviated schedules, thus letting businesses
continue taking advantage of their hard-earned expertise after their bodies can no longer endure forty-plus hours per week in the cubicle jungle.

So, why not phased-in retirement?

Remembering Ken Coffeen

I guess I've never felt quite worthy to be your friend - I still don't. But I will miss having you in this world profoundly. You have been a good and gentle soul I could look to for guidance and attempt to model my life after. I have aspired to approach life in a positive yet philosophical way - the way you did. I will continue to do so.

Ken Coffeen was truly a wise elder of the human tribe - Madison, Wisconsin branch. He touched many lives and will be missed. Lo vamos a hechar de menos - that's the simple truth.

Ken worked as a civil engineer for most of his life, including a couple years in Ecuador, designing and leading the construction of a sanitary sewer system for a then small town. Ken was one of the first group of young Americans to answer President Kennedy's call to join the Peace Corps. 30+ years later he returned to Ecuador and received rare treatment as a valued elder who had helped lay the foundation for a now much larger and thriving town.

Here in Wisconsin, Ken was one of those who stood on the docks in quiet support of native Americans as they asserted their treaty right to spear fish. This he and many other brave and gentle folks did at a time when those native Americans were being subjected to vicious racist verbal attacks which threatened to become physical attacks.

This is just one of many stories about Ken's social activism which you would only hear if you were willing to take the time to listen as he spoke quietly. He was never a person to self-aggrandize or impose his stories upon others. But he told good stories!

Here in Madison, Ken volunteered often as part of the local returned Peace Corps volunteers group. He was the sort of person who is so reliable that others take them for granted. "Ken will be there." or "Ken is taking care of it." Ken has other business to attend to now, and we will miss him.

Since the death of my father, I have not felt the loss of anyone this strongly. As with Dad, there are things left unspoken that I wish I had said to Ken. I guess a big part of all grief is really self-pity. I already miss you a lot, Ken, and would like to be able to tell you so.

Ken spoke out against those things which need to be spoken against, such as war, and he spoke out in favor of those things we all ought to, such as social justice and peace. His quietly passionate voice will be missed.

Deer Caught in the Act!

It had to happen eventually. Here is visual proof that our local suburban deer does in fact eat from the bird feeder. She brought along a couple of trainees today!

This is the same mature doe that has been eating from our backyard feeder for a few years now. She is obviously trying to teach her two fawns from last spring how to live well in the suburbs by taking advantage of existing food sources.

After this photo was taken one of the little ones came right up to our deck and looked in the window. Possibly hoping for an invitation to dinner?

The Garlic Guy is Gone, Farmers' Market Loses Another Old-Timer

He made much more of a splash, both figuratively and literally, in death than he did in life. Until I saw his obituary in the Sunday paper, I did not make the connection between the person who died on his ice boat on Lake Monona and the long-time vendor of braided strings of garlic at the Madison Farmers' Market.

William "Tad" Gedko was both the guy at the Farmers' Market, whose name I never knew, but from whom I yearly bought a long string of garlic heads to hang in the kitchen; and the avid sailor and ice boater who apparently died of a heart attack before his ice boat went through thin ice leaving his body far from shore on the only partially frozen Lake Monona. A much-publicized rescue attempt ensued, causing Tad to finally get his fifteen minutes of fame, a bit too late for him to enjoy it.

Thanks for all the great garlic Tad, sorry I won't be seeing you on the west side of the square, selling it, any more.

No more Big Cheesies?

Another main-stay of downtown Madison has passed from the scene. Miles Allen, owner/operator of Myles' Teddie Wedgers at the corner of State Street and the Square died of cancer on Friday. He was 64 years old and preparing to retire, according to reports.

My addiction to teddie wedgers is well know within my family. It is an addiction I have passed down to the next generation. Please, please let there be a Myles Junior to carry on!

I apologize to my one follower and any other random readers for turning this blog into an obituary column, but I guess I've reached that age at which my friends and acquaintances are dropping like flies!

Poor Miles! Another case of a man who works hard his whole life and dies in his early to mid 60's before collecting a penny of Social Security. How can the Social Security Trust Fund be going broke when so many men die of heart attacks, cancer and the like in their early to mid 60's without collecting a dime?

Hippies?

Mary Travers, of Peter, Paul and Mary, died September 16th (of leukemia). When they announced her passing on Yahoo, they ran this photo.



Yes, that is Bob Dylan and Stevie Wonder performing with Peter, Paul and Mary! The photo is from a concert in the 1980's.

I have been a Peter, Paul and Mary fan for as long as I can remember, so I decided to download the photo and put it on my computer desktop for a few days. That's when I discovered that the name of the JPEG file containing it was hippies.jpg . I was shocked!

I believe that all five of these folks predate the hippie movement. Stevie Wonder got his first national exposure in the "beach party" movies of the early '60's. Peter, Paul and Mary were folk singers; I'm not sure their early hits were even considered Rock-and-Roll at the time. And Bob Dylan certainly got his start in folk music before crossing over to Rock. He notably caused a stir the first time he put down his acoustic guitar and picked up an electric one.

So, where do they get off calling these people hippies? What do you think?

Warning: H1N1 can sneak up on you!

I just lost a friend to complications of H1N1 flu. He was a great guy, a musician, a good friend to all who knew him. But he also drank too much and didn't take very good care of himself. I guess because he had always been a big, strong guy whose body was able to endure the abuse.

Well he got the flu and a high fever. He rested and did the right things for a couple days and when he started to feel a bit better he went back to hydrating himself with beer rather than juice and toughing it out. That's when it got him, H1N1.

He thought it was done with him and it wasn't. He died of severe dehydration and possibly a secondary infection.

So, heed this warning. Don't mess with H1N1, follow the advice of the health care professionals. Get plenty of rest and hydrate yourself well, with juice not beer!

Goodby Che!

Che was my dog and constant companion for nearly 12 years. He was mostly black lab, though he had just enough spaniel in his background to be a pointer. He was also a gun dog to the point that we had to worry about him walking right out in front of the target when practicing with rifles.

But Che never became a hunting dog since I'm a suburb dweller and have done no hunting since I left the farm to go to college. We got him as a puppy from a coworker who had more puppies than homes for them. He was selected on the basis of being the friendliest (and chunkiest) of his litter.

We named him Azabache, after a dog who is a family legend because he gave his life to save my father-in-law from a poisonous snake. Then we shortened it to Che because you just can't go around calling a dog by a 3-syllable name for 12 years.

Che was the stubbornest, most headstrong animal I've ever been around. He was very strong physically, with a broad chest and muscular build - weighing about 100 pounds in his prime. We had to get a harness instead of a collar for walking him since he would pull against the leash to the point he might have strangled himself.

He was also the most loving and lovable pet any of us had ever known. He was so attached to his human pack that as a puppy he would punish us for leaving him alone by destroying things. Eventually we figured out that leaving a radio on would trick him into thinking he was not alone. His favorite station was always WPR News and Classical Music. Even in the last couple years, when his arthritis made it painful for him to get around, he always greeted each member of the pack with puppy-like enthusiasm upon our return.

Che was an ideal watch dog. He took his job of protecting family and property very seriously, patrolling the house at night and barking with a deep base tone bark at any perceived threat. I'm sure anyone hearing his bark, or seeing his apparently angry look through a window was appropriately intimidated. Little did they know that the only real danger they were in was that of being licked and slobbered to death by this big friendly guy!

Eventually, Che's arthritis got so bad that we had to have him put down. But not without a fight. I kept him going, probably an extra year, by giving him aspirin and glucosamine every day (The same treatment I take!). So, I miss you Che. We were best buddies and I don't ever expect to find another like you.

New puppy and a fox den in the neighborhood

I have finally added a photo to this blog. I suspect nobody cares very much what I look like, but we have a new puppy in the house and he is just incredibly cute, as you can see.

We got the puppy through a local Humane Society, so nobody knows for sure, but our best guess is that he is half German Shepard and half Chou. He is an incredibly quick and playful guy, full of spit and vinegar as you would expect a puppy to be.

But, what leads into the second part of my story is the fact that his primary color is a reddish brown (that looks more reddish than brown in bright sunlight!) and he has a face that looks very much like a fox. So, our family joke is that he is just an extra fuzzy, extra chunky fox that somehow was mistaken for a dog, captured and dropped off at the Humane Society.

I've previously written here about seeing a fox in my back yard, and since the arrival of the puppy, my dog walker (a family member) has been reporting that he frequently sees a fox while walking the puppy and that the fox seems fascinated by the puppy to the point that it will follow along at a distance observing the puppy.

Yesterday I was walking the puppy myself when my companion said, "Look at the cats, somebody must have dumped a litter of kittens!" At first glance I decided the animals in question were too big to be domestic cats. After a second look I realized they were young foxes!

The three fox cubs were standing on a mound of dirt which I soon realized was their den. Apparently their fascination with my puppy had overcome their natural wariness. They stared at him until the next house blocked their view.

I would not have expected foxes to have a den in a relatively open spot in the midst of a suburban subdivision, but they do! This does help explain why I have not seen nearly as many rabbits and chipmunks in my back yard as I normally do this time of year.

Where's Obama?

Where's Obama? This is what a youngster said to first lady Michele Obama on the T.V. news cast. It was just so cute to see an obviously unrehearsed moment like that. A cute kid obviously just a bit disappointed that the president hadn't come along with his wife to visit his class.

I'm still getting used to having a president and first family who seem like real people, instead of just rich people trying (at times) to act like real people. President Obama actually said, "I screwed up." In eight years we never heard a similar admission from George W. Bush.

And how about those House Republicans? While three Senate Republicans managed to get several billion dollars of changes to the stimulus package in exchange for their votes, the entire Republican contingent in the House did the "Just say no" thing. Here in Wisconsin, I guess, we are used to having the Republicans be nothing more than obstructionists, but still!

There is a line in Dante's Inferno that I can't quite quote right, but it is something to the effect that the hottest circles of Hell are reserved for those folks who in time of great crisis did not do anything! Throw the bums out, I say. When the country is going to Hell in a hand basket, it is better to do something than to do nothing. I hope other voters remember this, I will!

I'm old enough to also remember "do something" Republicans in Wisconsin, such as Governor Warren Knowles and State Senator Walter John Chilsen. Though I often disagreed with him, Governor Tommy Thompson was also a doer. Who needs these folks who just know how to say no to everybody else's ideas, but have none of their own!

Plant and Animal Life Update

It's been a great summer for the trees, bushes and flowering plants in my yard. There has been rain to excess, but I live on a hill so no flooding, just paradise for the plant life. I've gotten at least two normal years growth out of the arborvitae I planted a couple years ago to provide a windbreak and back yard privacy.

Of course the woods behind my house are so thick with mosquitoes that you are at risk of being eaten alive if you go in there. But conditions appear to be ideal for the birds, squirrels, rabbits and chipmunks that populate my back yard.

At least it was ideal until the fox showed up. I had seen a fox in the back yard almost a year ago, but since I was the only one to see it, other family members were skeptical. This summer, two of them have also seen our "pet fox" so now they believe. And our fox has proven to be a worthy predator, reducing the population of prey animals in the yard, and making the survivors a bit more cautious.

Our pet deer has also been back to eat from the backyard bird feeder, and according to reports (I did not personally witness this), she brought a friend on one occasion. I guess that concludes my suburban animal and plant life update for now. More later.

So long Jim, I'll miss you!

Jim Salzman, one of the long-time vendors, and in many ways an icon of the Dane County Farmers Market, died Friday, November 30th. He was down in Clearwater, FL selling Christmas trees when a heart attack felled him.

For many, many years I've been parking in the McCormick ramp when I go to the Farmers market on Saturdays, so I approach from the east, walking past the YWCA building. Generally my first indication that things are in full swing is the sight of Jim in his usual spot at the northeast corner of the square, selling vegetables.

I occasionally bought vegetables from Jim, but not often enough to be one of his regulars. In recent years he went through some hard times, including bankruptcy I'm told, but nothing stopped him from showing up for the Farmers Market every Saturday - until now.

Jim Salzman is immortalized in a huge color photo that hangs in a conference room at the state Department of Agriculture, Trade and Consumer Protection. At least it used to when I worked there. The photo is of a much younger Jim, bare chested and bronzed, wearing tiny shorts and hawking his wares. That's how I'll remember him - icon of one of Madison's finest traditions, the Farmers Market on the Capitol Square.

Throw the bums out!

As long as we have the right to vote in this country, that should be our first priority. What is the biggest difference between a democratic form of government and any other? The fact that we can vote our leaders out of office and try some new ones!

So vote this November, and if you are having trouble deciding who to vote for, vote to throw the bums out, and give somebody else a shot at the job!

My cat gallops

I have a black cat named Orion who normally moves about silently on the soft pads of his feet. But occasionally he will run accross the wood floor deliberately using his claws to make a noise like a horse galloping. He usually ends his gallop by jumping onto a throw rug, causing it to slide into a wall or door.

I also have a deer that visits my back yard late at night to eat from my bird feeders. I would not believe it either had I not seen the evidence. These are cylindrical feeders, one clear plastic and the other metal, with small holes and perches for the birds. The deer manages to clean out both feeders on each visit, without knocking them down or damaging them in any way.

I have never actually witnessed this, but unless some other entity has figured out how to walk on deer feet, leaving no other tracks in the snow, the deed is being done by one very clever deer!

I grew up on a dairy farm and we once had a cow that would open a door in the side of a barn, hold the door open with her body while any other cows that wanted to walked into the barn and then would walk into the barn herself. I did witness this happening. We had to drill a hole and put a bolt through the latch of the door to stop her.

The point of this post, I guess, is that we humans have a tendency to believe that we possess far superior intelligence to that of other animal species. As with any arrogance, this leads us to underestimate the intelligence of other animals. What do you think?

Immigration, what a mess.

Today I'm disgusted with the whole immigration mess we have in this country. Due to various free trade agreements, goods can travel back and forth accross our borders unimpeded. Not so people.

Powerful companies want to be able to hire illegal immigrants at low wages instead of having to improve wages or working conditions to attract US workers. They like the fact that these folks are here illegally so they can't complain to our legal system when they are mistreated, and they are less likely to be able to move on to a better job.

There is a whole industry that exists for the sole purpose of making money by smuggling people accross the US/Mexico border. Arguably, poor working people in both countries (and all other countries illegal immigrants come from) are the victims of this industry.

So, should the US just build their own Berlin Wall and be done with it? Would that be better than the current situation in which both immigrant and domestic workers are the victims and the ones making a tidy profit are the smugglers and the companies hiring illegals?

What's it all about?