Sunday, 2/28/10, Public Square

Saturday, 2/27/10, Public Square

THIS IS A PICTURE OF AN ORCA.

Also known as a Killer Whale, actually they are not Whales but the largest member of the Porpoise family.

This picture is kept in a tank so small that it can not even turn around, this picture is a very social animal.

In the wild it lives in family pods and interacts with the family members with vocal calls and are very intelligent.

Their nic-name “Killer Whales” was given to them by the human whalers as often a harpooned Whale would be attacked and killed by pods of Orcas.

There has been no recorded incidence of an Orcas ever eating a human being. They only attack boats when being trapped or harassed and this to drive the boat away. They have been hunted some times by fishermen when it was suspected that their presents was causing poor fishing.

Just from seeing this picture you should feel that these animals should be protected and freed from the small pools they are being kept in!

*****

NOW, if you wanted to get all Native American the Orca is my animal spirit.

The recent news is tragic, there is a growing call for both the Orca the caused the death of its trainer to either be released or killed.

And that this same Orca was involved in two other deaths, the first was a home-less man who had after hours climbed into the tank. The cause of death was Hypothermia otherwise saying he got so cold his body shut down which would have happened whether there was an Orca in the tank or not.

The second was that of a trainer who had slipped and fell in then drowned.

This time around, you have a twenty two foot long and twelve ton animal in a small pool.

That when the trainer’s ponytail fell into the Orca’s face it reacted by grabbing the hair and retreating pull the trainer in. The effect was like a marble in a tin can and sadly the trainer was injured and drowned.

Should the Orca be killed?

No, despite the name Orca are not aggressive toward human by nature .

They are under stress in captivity, they are never kept in a pool big enough and these are an animal that swims the Oceans large and free expanses. They are highly social animals often living in pods that can count up to thirty members.

The males dorsal fin can tower six feet and one of the side effects of captivity is that their fin sags and folds over because there is not enough depth to hold it up and the cartilage can not support the fin.

this is only one of the effects of captivity upon the Orca along with the mental and physical effects.

In general they receive the up-most of care medical and mental.

But to kill this animal in response to the death and blame this animal is to blame a maltreated dog for biting.

Those that work with such animals are well aware of the possible danger and knows it can happen.

For the most part working with these animals does not result in serious injury or death.

Release is not possible, this animal has been in captivity for so long it is not a realistic thought that it could adapt to going back to the wild. It has became so use to human contact there is no natural fear left in it.

It even looks to humans for its food and more then likely would also in the wild look to humans for food rather then hunting.

with all the downfalls of keeping such animals in captivity of what good comes from it?

Simply, we human beings are self centered in our thought processes.

Thinks are not real less we can actually see them for ourselves.

Up thread I related the tale as if it is the picture that is suffering the plight that the actual Orca does in captivity. The two dimensional, nonliving image of an animal that you may have never seen or heard of before. Expressing concern and thought about that image and suggesting you too should have such concerns and thoughts.

That is often how we perceive and think about animals we never see in real life.

It is hard to have concern and thoughts of something that to us is not more real then a two dimensional image.

Before it closed in Dallas I had a dream come true, I got to see an Orca in real life.

Every year it was something I looked forward to going to see the Sea lions at the Independence Kansas zoo.

Forget the rides, I loved going to World of fun to see the Dolphins.

Any chance for a Kansas boy to see real live sea animals!

Sadly once I got older the reality hit home, the Sea Lions do not live long in captivity.

And were often replace because of the number of death.

But my point, actually seeing the live animals made us more aware that they are actual creatures out there.

If my son is in Washington long enough for me to finally have the money to visit.

I will go to the Puget sound in the hopes of seeing wild Orcas.

These animals in captivity allows us to make the plight of their species real to us.

Cruelly this also often means those in captivity are nothing more than a sacrifice to allow for us to care about the fate of all their relatives we do not see. In a sense saving them by the ill effects of captivity.

We often do not care until we are shown that there is something that is worth us caring about.

My Father’s Apparent CVA…

Well, it has not been a good year for me, or for those I love.   I think my father has had a stroke.  He seems frozen in a time where what he believes to be true, is no longer true.  As an example to the foregoing, my mother’s older brother was my father’s best friend in high school.  He had difficulty believing my mother and me when today (02/25/10) we told him this relative died over ten years ago.  He had difficulty believing us when he brought him up to date on the fate of several relatives.

I am grateful that he his not mean or angry like many people get when told such things by their families.  My dad seems to have a recognition that he is not doing real well right now.  It is odd, and I am not sure why I thought so, but I always believed my father would be around to take care of my mother, not the other way around.  Statistically, the foregoing would seem unlikely – but, I thought it would be true, none the less…

iggydonnelly

Friday, 2/26/10, Public Square

Thursday, 2/25/10, Public Square

Wednesday, 2/24/10, Public Square

The Decline: The Geography of a Recession

by LaToya Egwuekwe

According to the U.S. Department of Labor’s Bureau of Labor Statistics, there are nearly 30 million people currently unemployed — that’s including those involuntarily working part time and those who want a job, but have given up on trying to find one. In the face of the worst economic upheaval since the Great Depression, millions of Americans are hurting. “The Decline: The Geography of a Recession,” as created by labor writer LaToya Egwuekwe, serves as a vivid representation of just how much. Watch the deteriorating transformation of the U.S. economy from January 2007 — approximately one year before the start of the recession — to the most recent unemployment data available.

Opposing health care reform plans

The GOP Health Care Reform Bill

The President’s Proposal for Health Care Reform

So these are the two proposals that have been posted online for your perusal.  The Health Care Summit scheduled for this Thursday (two days hence) begins with these ideas.

Where will health care reform end up?  Will the American people benefit?

Tuesday, 2/23/10, Public Square

The Darkness

I guess…I guess I could have been one of those that contributed to the end of America. If I had known how it was going to end, though, I would have been one of the first to start fighting! But I didn’t see that by remaining silent, by clinging to my misguided belief that the government would not, could not, turn against the people of this nation, I was helping them do just that.

“They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.”

Now, of course, Benjamin Franklin’s words are a haunting warning. But by the time we realized that, it was too late.

Our leader has asked me to write down what happened, in the hope that someone in the future will find it and learn the truth. As I look out into the darkness of two o’clock in the morning, I can see the shapes of the APCs and tanks in the distance, rolling towards our hiding place. After chasing us with fighters and bombers for most of the day, they were finally able to pin us down in this valley. What we thought would be a place of safety from the air strikes has instead left our troops cornered in a dead end.

“Dead-end.” My God, never have two words sounded so final, so deadly.

I am wasting time getting philosophical. Just write the facts, John, I tell myself!

I shift my weight to the other side of my buttocks, and take another glance toward the east. There is no light except the moon; by its soft glow, I can see the approaching armor and troops of the Joint Task Force. It gives me a renewed urgency to finish this journal. I turn back to the notebook in my lap, and start writing again:

“In hindsight, I can now see when it started, or rather, how it started. What seemed like totally unrelated occurrences, then, can now be seen quite clearly as parts of a larger plan. Most were in the name of ‘safety,’ while others were such small acts they didn’t seem to matter one way or another. But taken all together, they did what no invading army could ever have done—disarm the American people, take away their means to put up an effective defense, and enable certain factions of the government to control them.

“I’m sure anyone who may someday read this will have been told we were rebels, traitors to the American way of life—assuming any mention whatsoever of our fight hasn’t either been erased or forbidden by then. So I guess I should tell you of the circumstances that led us to take up arms against our own government. I’m not going to list the causes in order of occurrence; the sequence is not nearly as important as the effects, and to try to recall all of the dates would take too long. Time is running out; I hear the sound of the approaching armor on the wind.”

The Oath Keepers – Some Scary Stuff…

This Mother Jones article is must reading.  Warning:  it contains some very scary information.  How many of the next Timothy McVeighs are there out there?

Credit Card Act of 2009

Credit card holders, listen up: Today, 2/22/10, new federal regulations take effect, changing the relationship between you and your card issuer.

The changes are part of the Credit Card Act of 2009, signed into law last May. Congress approved the legislation to end what consumer groups have called unfair and deceptive business practices. But critics say the heavier regulations will make credit cards more costly for everyone.

Here are some of the key provisions:

Monday, 2/22/10, Public Square

The consequences

President Obama left his signature domestic policy in the hands of Congress, and now he is facing the consequences.  From the outset of his presidency, Obama invited Congress to devise the details of health care reform legislation — an apparent bid to avoid what happened when President Clinton tried to overhaul health care 17 years ago.

Leaving it to Congress put an unusually glaring spotlight on how Capitol Hill does business. The spectacle of Congress’ horse-trading, secrecy and gridlock has fueled today’s virulent anti-Washington mood. The public’s reaction was all the greater because Obama had campaigned on a promise to change the way Washington did business, and because health care reform engendered such personal high hopes and anxiety.