Requirements

A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly.

Mexico's Troubles

I met with some attorneys from Mexico yesterday and last night in my normal course of business. They flew up from Mexico City to meet me. While our discussions had nothing to do with the current national health concerns in that country, the flu is on everyone's mind. According to one very influential attorney (not a wild-eye'd crazy or conspiracy theorist by any means), the word in Mexico city is that over 5,000 people have died from the flu. Those numbers do NOT jibe with the word coming over the wire services. He said, "the people are poor, they can't afford medicine and they just die. If they don't go to the hospital, they're not counted."

People are trying to take precautions but most of those involve staying home, away from work and away from public places, further weakening an economy that was on its knees. Just about everything in Mexico City is closed and a horrible situation down there with the drug cartels is enhanced with fears of an epidemic ripping through the Mexico City slums. 

As an aside, in separate incidents, seven police officers were murdered by the drug cartels in Tijuana yesterday alone and another ten were wounded by gunfire. The cartels attacked several small police stations in the city and killed or wounded all the officers who happened to be inside. The death toll from organized crime murders is over 2,000 so far this year with a guess that the yearly number will top 8,000 by 2010. I don't have a precise number but there have been about 100 police officers murdered by organized crime/cartels in Mexico so far this year.

UPDATE: 

• The first US Death from swine flu was reported today.
  
• Researchers believe they located the first case of swine flu in the city of LaGloria, in Veracruz. And the first victim (a child) survived the illness.
• Every public business in Mexico is closed until May 6th. To their credit, the Mexican government is clearly taking serious measures to deal with the crisis.

Death Valley - Ballarat

The Ballarat Trading Post, part of Old Death Valley that has been here since the days of the Gold Rush. The old cowboy runs the place, and it's part of the vanishing Old West. Ballarat is a long way from anywhere and there's nothing but the trading post that consists of a main room and a bedroom where the cowboy sleeps.
The Barker Ranch (above) was made famous as the hide out for the Charles Manson Family/cult in the 1960's. The ranch is the same now as it was when Manson lived there. Nobody has lived there since and it's one of many abandoned places in Death Valley. It's about a day's walk - maybe two - from Ballarat. The Mansons kidnapped two girls who escaped down the mountain to Ballarat and notified authorities.  Days after we left, somebody found another human skeleton not far from the house. After the cult killed people they kidnapped, they buried them in the hills in unmarked graves.

The Scorpion negotiating a mountain road.

My daughter, E-L, who likes to go off-road and to explore. She also likes to drive the rig on rough roads and is a good companion on these trips.

Tea Kettle Junction

Overlooking Death Valley from Chloride Cliffs. (CROSHAWK - not his real name - left and LL right) We both served in the Navy with SEAL Delivery Vehicle Team One, but at different times. My son-in-law, Braden took the photo (above). CROSHAWK came out to visit from where he is stationed on the East Coast for a visit and a romp in the dirt. 
There are a large number of odd things in Death Valley. This is a crossroads where people began leaving tea kettles. I don't know when the practice began, but when you go (and it's in the middle of nowhere), you are obliged to add to the collection.
There's nothing but old mining roads for hundreds of miles. Death Valley is a very big place.

Piracy in the Gulf of Guinea & Niger Delta

The Gulf of Guinea

The burgeoning profit that can be made by hoisting the "black flag" and becoming a pirate has been slowly migrating to the west coast of Africa and the Gulf of Guinea/Niger Delta.

The UK has taken proactive steps to train the Nigerian Navy in small boat tactics and combat operations in an effort to head off pirates in that area, but it's been less successful than it hoped to be in forming a maritime security training center. 

Some of the pirates operate against commercial oil interests as a branch of the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND), a militant organization currently engaged in an "oil war". Others are merely criminals intent on making money through piracy. An April 15th  article by David Lewis (Reuters) provides an overview. (CLICK HERE) to read it.

The USS Nashville (LPD-13) - underway as part of the Africa Partnership Station -  is currently conducting training exercises off the Nigerian Coast to enable the Nigerians to deal more effectively with their maritime security problems. I do not wish to offend the captain or crew of the Nashville, but the problem is more than brief training sessions with the Nigerians can provide.  Nigerian pirates captured an oil vessel off the coast of Cameroon ten days ago. Where was the Nashville and what could her captain or the captains of other warships from other nations have done if they were in the immediate vicinity?

The clear solution is to unchain international warships by providing them rules of engagement which provide for swift and severe reactions to pirate incidents rather than binding them with bureaucratic red tape. Pirates engage in piracy because they are successful. Eliminate the fruits of success and they'll find something else to occupy their time.

Don't Tread On Me!

What's in a flag?

They are symbols and they make powerful statements.

For some obscure reason the US Department of Homeland Security identified these flags as those used by domestic terrorists and that people who display them must somehow be mistrusted. (Cite: MIAC report dated 20 FEB 09 - Modern Militia Movement)

The striped flag with the snake on it (below and right) is the US Navy's Jack - the flag currently flown on the jackstaff of all US Naval vessels. Does the position of the US Department of 

Homeland Security also call into question the loyalty of the US Navy in general? As a retired officer of that service, I find that whole line of thought to be odious. -- And quite frankly, absurd. The positions taken early by the Obama Administration has led to President Barack Obama's popularity with firearms manufacturers as "salesman of the year" since there has been a literal run on firearms and ammunition since he took office. The Obama Administration should consider pondering WHY people would feel insecure in their homes and in their lives to the extent that this would happen, rather than declaring that the earliest American symbols against tyranny somehow equate to "domestic terrorism".

Stolen from the WoFat Blog

This article appeared in the Daily Telegraph, Sydney, AUS and also appeared on WoFat's blog yesterday. He scooped me but I had to include it here for all of you:

A SEX-CRAZED housewife banned from making too much noise during sex after 25 complaints to police, has been arrested for breaching the order - just two days after it was imposed.

Caroline Cartwright was served the anti-social behaviour order in the UK last Friday after magistrates found he guilty of breaking an initial noise abatement order.

But by Sunday, the 47-year old had already breached the terms of her Asbo (restraining order) and was arrested by police officers.

Caroline remains defiant and, despite a second arrest yesterday and the threat of prison, she vowed to carry on with her love life.

"I'm not going to stop," she said. "I've been making the same noises since the Asbo was imposed, and this morning we were making noises for three hours.

"I can't stop making noise during sex, it's unnatural not to make any noises, and I don't think that I'm particularly loud."

--All I can add as your faithful blogger is YOU GO, GIRL!