During the recently concluded Presidential campaigns, I was asked several times my opinion of the two candidates.
With my Republican history, most questioners likely knew which way I "leaned" already, but I may have surprised some by responding: "Frankly, Obama SCARES me!"
He did during the campaign, in spite of the lack of "vetting" by the mainstream news media. I don't know what most voters do, but one thing I do is actually to listen when candidates speak.
I know. I know. What a concept!!
It is sometimes surprising just how much candidates reveal of their views and personal guiding values when they make speeches. Even more revelations usually slip out during one-on-one interviews.
Perhaps others did too, but early on, I perceived that Barak Hussein Obama is at least a socialist -- perhaps even a communist.
Witness only two events, though there are numerous others.
In his conversation with "Joe, The Plumber", Obama expressed his desire to "redistribute wealth" - a scary socialistic idea. Actually the very words come from Karl Marx himself. Taking the hard-earned income of those who work to support themselves and their families, or even to build some weath of their own, and arbitrarily re-distrubute it to others who've not earned it, is communistic socialism . . . actually . . . the epitome of their economic views.
The other happened this week, less than one full week since the election. Obama, in a very "underreported" event, apparently directly contacted the Russian Prime Minister, Putin. We don't know the entire conversation, of course, and may never be privy to all of it, but the part reported today is really scary to me, and IMO SHOULD scare the pants off every security conscious American.
Obama promised the Russian leader that he would not deploy the defensive missile shield in eastern Europe, planned and negotiated by President George Bush. The placement of missiles in eastern Europe is designed to protect former member nations of the Soviet Union, as well as NATO nations from potential attacks from rogue nations - including Russia - though Russia has been left unstated.
Putin has opposed this anti-missile deployment as an "agression" against the Russians, which it clearly is not!
Even if we give him the benefit of the doubt, Obama is misguided in making this promise, for more than one reason.
Foremost is that those nations will now be unprotected from Russian agression, practically inviting Putin to roll his tanks back into Georgia, and the other nations who left the Soviet Union, killing thousands of innocents. Russia has been looking with greedy eyes on those oil-rich countries ever since they lost control of them when the Iron Curtain came down on their final act.
Almost as important is the fact that Obama has begun performing "presidential acts" before he actually is in office.
This is an affront to the Office of President, and unprecedented in my memory. Often, incoming Presidents-elect express their views or things that they plan to do when they've actually assumed office, but never do I recall their taking action as though they were already President.
This is the height of arrogance and ill manners. It borders on treason, undermining years of careful planning and delicate negotiations by President Bush and his foreign ministers.
Sadly, innocent people will pay the price. Perhaps even for generations to come.
Monday, November 10, 2008
Monday, July 7, 2008
...passing of a friend; passing of an era...
During my formative years, Murphy Martin had a major influence on me. I looked up to him as I might have to an older brother. Murphy was a distant cousin. We both were born in Groveton, a small, relatively insignificant saw-mill town in east Texas.
For a few years, my daddy (Alton Thompson) sang in a couple of gospel quartets on the local radio stations in Lufkin. If the buildings still stand, you're likely to find my "nose-print" permanently embedded in the multi-panel studio sound-proof glass. Much of that "nose-time" was watching Murphy Martin at the controls of radio station KTRE in Lufkin -- learning, soaking up every nuance, every motion, every word.
A while later, in junior high school, my friend Larry Bills somehow finagled a weekly radio program, oriented toward our school mates, and invited me to be his assistant host. Larry moved on, and I kept the program going in various guises through most of my junior year. When I began to "solo", Murphy Martin was the one who took me into the Control Room, sat me in the "Air Chair" and taught me how to operate all the mysterious controls and spin records. Gave me some pointers on reading the news.
I did not realize at the time what profound effects this kind, simple instruction would have on the rest of my life.
Fast forward to about 10 years later. Murphy is assigned by WFAA-TV in Dallas, to covering the Billy Sol Estes scandals during the Lyndon Johnson administration. I was then in the news department of WFTV, Channel 9 in Orlando. Before long, Murphy had been moved by ABC to New York, where he became the iconic "anchor" of their prime-time evening news. "Murphy Martin and The News" became one of the highest rated network news shows of the mid-sixties era.
During his stint, he arranged for me to meet Tom O'Brien, at the time, News Director of ABC Radio News, and a friend of Murphy's.
O'Brien subsequently invited me to New York, where he offered me my "dream job", Science Editor / Reporter for ABC radio.
For a number of reasons, I never took the job, but both started and reached the pinnacle of my profession through the care and tutelage of Murphy Martin.
And now.... he is gone. If there is such a position in the life to come, he's reporting on current events from his "Front Row Seat".
Farewell, old friend. See you again!! That's my time. Thank you so much for yours.
Monday, June 23, 2008
. . . my brother was an only child . . .
"My brother was an only child."
Mon, 01/21/2008 - 02:05
My brother WAS an only child!
You may not know it, but I was born at a very young age. Wasn't even a year old, as a matter of fact. But, that didn't discourage my parents. They kept me anyway.
Alton Thompson and Annie Swor grew up in Trinity County, Texas, in the first half of the 20th century and like many others of their time, were victims of The Great Depression. Alton was born and grew up in Sylvester, just outside the logging town of Groveton. Annie was born and grew up just a few miles away in Apple Springs. Good thing it was a ride on horseback of a reasonable distance, or I may never have seen the light of day.
Dad's parents were Cleona Fidelia (Mochman) Thompson Harrott. Very German in her early years, but greatly Americanized and "Texanized" by the time I knew her. I never knew my grandfather, Herbert Thompson. He died during the year of the great flu epidemic, in 1917. He had "Bright's Disease", so I've never known which claimed him - the flu or the disease. He left my grandmother and four relatively young children, Butler, Madge, Alton, and Wilhelmina to operate a farm and feed and clothe themselves . . . alone. I don't recall their relative ages . . . I'll try to find and post that later, but Alton was 4 and the younger Wilhelmina was only 2 when he died.
A few years later, Grandma married Joseph Harrott, her brother-in-law. Jodie, he liked to be called, was a brother of ______ Harrott, husband of her sister, Ocie. So, Grandma and Jodie are who I remember as my paternal grandparents. Perhaps later, I'll have time for a few stories about them.
Mother's parents were Richard Henry Wright Swor and Mary Elizabeth (Smith) Swor. Farmers.
Richard - all his children AND grandchildren called him "Papa" - had migrated from Swortown, near Paris, TN, when his parents moved to Texas.
Mary Elizabeth - we called her "Grandma", but her friends called her "Lizzie" - had been orphaned when she was quite small. She had been adopted by a couple named "Smith" in the southern Georgia town of Cairo. When she was 7, the family migrated from Georgia to East Texas by covered wagon.
I don't recall much about mother and daddy courting. I guess I was much too young to have noticed. :) But, I do recall them telling about daddy riding his horse from Sylvester to Apple Springs to see her. They liked to go to dances, and from what their friends have told me, they were very good at the Texas 2-Step. No question about whether or not they enjoyed it. They really did.
In 1935, they had a son, Jerry Alton, who never lived more than possibly a moment or two. Apparently his was a very difficult delivery in which the doctor needed to use forceps to assist in birthing him. Forceps can be very hard on a new-born's delicate little body. In the delivery, tragically, his neck was broken, along with mother's heart. Jerry Alton is buried in the Old Sumpter Cemetery, just outside Groveton, TX, where he was born.
Three years later, on May 5, 1938, their next son was born, also in Groveton. That was I.
In 1941, my first sister, Elizabeth Ann joined me. Then in the icy winter of 1944, Charles Henry became a part of our growing family. In 1946 and 1948, both on March 13, Martha Lynn and Melba Jane made our famly complete.
About my brother being an only child? I just borrowed that from Mark Twain to get your attention.
Mon, 01/21/2008 - 02:05
My brother WAS an only child!
You may not know it, but I was born at a very young age. Wasn't even a year old, as a matter of fact. But, that didn't discourage my parents. They kept me anyway.
Alton Thompson and Annie Swor grew up in Trinity County, Texas, in the first half of the 20th century and like many others of their time, were victims of The Great Depression. Alton was born and grew up in Sylvester, just outside the logging town of Groveton. Annie was born and grew up just a few miles away in Apple Springs. Good thing it was a ride on horseback of a reasonable distance, or I may never have seen the light of day.
Dad's parents were Cleona Fidelia (Mochman) Thompson Harrott. Very German in her early years, but greatly Americanized and "Texanized" by the time I knew her. I never knew my grandfather, Herbert Thompson. He died during the year of the great flu epidemic, in 1917. He had "Bright's Disease", so I've never known which claimed him - the flu or the disease. He left my grandmother and four relatively young children, Butler, Madge, Alton, and Wilhelmina to operate a farm and feed and clothe themselves . . . alone. I don't recall their relative ages . . . I'll try to find and post that later, but Alton was 4 and the younger Wilhelmina was only 2 when he died.
A few years later, Grandma married Joseph Harrott, her brother-in-law. Jodie, he liked to be called, was a brother of ______ Harrott, husband of her sister, Ocie. So, Grandma and Jodie are who I remember as my paternal grandparents. Perhaps later, I'll have time for a few stories about them.
Mother's parents were Richard Henry Wright Swor and Mary Elizabeth (Smith) Swor. Farmers.
Richard - all his children AND grandchildren called him "Papa" - had migrated from Swortown, near Paris, TN, when his parents moved to Texas.
Mary Elizabeth - we called her "Grandma", but her friends called her "Lizzie" - had been orphaned when she was quite small. She had been adopted by a couple named "Smith" in the southern Georgia town of Cairo. When she was 7, the family migrated from Georgia to East Texas by covered wagon.
I don't recall much about mother and daddy courting. I guess I was much too young to have noticed. :) But, I do recall them telling about daddy riding his horse from Sylvester to Apple Springs to see her. They liked to go to dances, and from what their friends have told me, they were very good at the Texas 2-Step. No question about whether or not they enjoyed it. They really did.
In 1935, they had a son, Jerry Alton, who never lived more than possibly a moment or two. Apparently his was a very difficult delivery in which the doctor needed to use forceps to assist in birthing him. Forceps can be very hard on a new-born's delicate little body. In the delivery, tragically, his neck was broken, along with mother's heart. Jerry Alton is buried in the Old Sumpter Cemetery, just outside Groveton, TX, where he was born.
Three years later, on May 5, 1938, their next son was born, also in Groveton. That was I.
In 1941, my first sister, Elizabeth Ann joined me. Then in the icy winter of 1944, Charles Henry became a part of our growing family. In 1946 and 1948, both on March 13, Martha Lynn and Melba Jane made our famly complete.
About my brother being an only child? I just borrowed that from Mark Twain to get your attention.
Wednesday, June 18, 2008
. . . death to the infidel . . . !
Below are selected excerpts from Brigitte Gabriel's speech delivered at the Intelligence Summit in Washington DC. I thought you should and would want to know this.
At 10 years old, I learned the meaning of the word 'infidel.' I had a crash course in survival. Not in the Girl Scouts, but in a bomb shelter where I lived for seven years in pitch darkness, freezing cold, drinking stale water and eating grass to live. At the age of 13, I dressed in my burial clothes going to bed at night, waiting to be slaughtered.
By the age of 20, I had buried most of my friends -- killed by Muslims. We were not Americans living in New York, or Britons in London. We were Arab Christians living in Lebanon. As a victim of Islamic terror, I was amazed when I saw Americans waking up on September 12, 2001, and asking themselves, 'Why do they hate us?' The psychoanalyst experts were coming up with all sort of excuses as to what did we do to offend the Muslim World. But if America and the West were paying attention to the Middle East they would not have had to ask the question. Simply put, they hate us because we are defined in their eyes by one simple word: 'infidels.'
Under the banner of Islam 'la, ilaha illa Allah, muhammad rasoulu Allah,' (None is god except Allah; Muhammad is the Messenger of Allah) they murdered Jewish children in Israel , massacred Christians in Lebanon, killed Copts in Egypt, Assyrians in Syria, Hindus in India, and expelled almost 900,000 Jews from Muslim lands. We Middle Eastern infidels paid the price then. Now infidels worldwide are paying the price for indifference and shortsightedness. Tolerating evil is a crime. Appeasing murderers doesn't buy protection. It earns one disrespect and loathing in the enemy's eyes. Yet apathy is the weapon by which the West is committing suicide. Political correctness forms the shackles around our ankles, by which Islamists are leading us to our demise.
America and the West are doomed to failure in this war unless they stand up and identify the real enemy: Islam. You hear about Wahabbi and Salafi Islam as the only extreme form of Islam. All the other Muslims, supposedly, are wonderful moderates. Closer to the truth are the pictures of the irrational eruption of violence in reaction to the cartoons of Mohammed printed by a Danish newspaper. From burning embassies, to calls to butcher those who mock Islam, to warnings that the West be prepared for another holocaust, those pictures have given us a glimpse into the real face of the enemy. News pictures and video of these events represent a canvas of hate decorated by different nationalities who share one common ideology of hate, bigotry and intolerance derived from one source: authentic Islam. An Islam that is awakening from centuries of slumber to re-ignite its wrath against the infidel and dominate the world. An Islam which has declared 'Intifada' on the West.
America and the West can no longer afford to lay in their lazy state of overweight ignorance. The consequences of this mental disease are starting to attack the body, and if they don't take the necessary steps now to control it, death will be knocking soon. If you want to understand the nature of the enemy we face, visualize a tapestry of snakes. They slither and they hiss, and they would eat each other alive, but they will unite in a hideous mass to achieve their common goal of imposing Islam on the world. This is the ugly face of the enemy we are fighting. We are fighting a powerful ideology that is capable of altering basic human instincts. An ideology that can turn a mother into a launching pad of death.
A perfect example is a recently elected Hamas official in the Palestinian Territories who raves in heavenly joy about sending her three sons to death and offering the ones who are still alive for the cause. It is an ideology that is capable of offering highly educated individuals such as doctors and lawyers far more joy in attaining death than any respect and stature life in society is ever capable of giving them. The United States has been a prime target for radical Islamic hatred and terror. Every Friday, mosques in the Middle East ring with shrill prayers and monotonous chants calling death, destruction and damnation down on America and its people.
The radical Islamist deeds have been as vile as their words. Since the Iran hostage crisis, more than three thousand Americans have died in a terror campaign almost unprecedented in its calculated cruelty along with thousands of other citizens worldwide. Even the Nazis did not turn their own children into human bombs, and then rejoice at their deaths as well the deaths of their victims. This intentional, indiscriminate and wholesale murder of innocent American citizens is justified and glorified in the name of Islam.
America cannot effectively defend itself in this war unless and until the American people understand the nature of the enemy that we face. Even after 9/11 there are those who say that we must engage our terrorist enemies, that we must address their grievances. Their grievance is our freedom of religion. Their grievance is our freedom of speech. Their grievance is our democratic process where the rule of law comes from the voices of many, not that of just one prophet. It is the respect we instill in our children towards all religions. It is the equality we grant each other as human beings sharing a planet and striving to make the world a better place for all humanity. Their grievance is the kindness and respect a man shows a woman, the justice we practice as equals under the law, and the mercy we grant our enemy.
Their grievance cannot be answered by an apology for who or what we are. Our mediocre attitude of not confronting Islamic forces of bigotry and hatred wherever they raised their ugly head in the last 30 years, has empowered and strengthened our enemy to launch a full scale attack on the very freedoms we cherish in their effort to impose their values and way of life on our civilization. If we don't wake up and challenge our Muslim community to take action against the terrorists within it, if we don't believe in ourselves as Americans and in the standards we should hold every patriotic American to, we are going to pay a price for our delusion.
For the sake of our children and our country, we must wake up and take action. In the face of a torrent of hateful invective and terrorist murder, America's learning curve since the Iran hostage crisis is so shallow that it is almost flat. The longer we lay supine, the more difficult it will be to stand erect.
Brigitte Gabriel is an expert on the Middle East conflict and lectures nationally and internationally on the subject. She's the former news anchor of World News for Middle East television and the founder of AmericanCongressforTruth.com. More bio info at:
http://www.intelligencesummit.org/speakers/BrigitteGabriel.php
Complete article is at http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=1 9016 http://www.snopes.com/politics/soapbox/gabreil.asp
(You can also find her on U-Tube)
Friday, June 13, 2008
. . . the day the Constitution died . . .
I am appalled at Thursday's decision, handed down by the US Supreme Court.
Never, in my wildest imagination, would I ever have even guessed that even our most liberal Justices could rule the way they did about the circumstances and RIGHTS of battlefield "detainees" held in an isolated military compound at Guantanamo Naval Base in Cuba.
Voting for today's ruling were the liberal Justices: Justice Anthony Kennedy, who wrote the majority opinion and was joined by Justices John Paul Stevens, Stephen Breyer, David Souter and Ruth Bader Ginsburg.
Dissenting were the more conservative four: Chief Justice John Roberts, Antonin Scalia, Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito.
You can be assured that if elected, Senator Barak Obama will appoint even more liberal justices (if they can be found) than Kennedy, Stevens, Breyer, Souter, and Ginsburg.
However, a President John McCain has already promised more like Roberts, Alito, Thomas, and Scalia.
Spread the word among your friends and acquaintances.
In effect, this ruling gives men captured on the battlefield, trying desperately to kill our military men and women in any horrible way they can devise . . . not only our enemies, but not citizens of this country . . . the same rights granted only to citizens of the USA by our Constitution and laws.
You can read the full text here: http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/scripts/getcase.pl?court=US&vol=000&invol=06-1195
Writing the dissenting point of view, in part, Justice Scalia said:
"America is at war with radical Islamists. The enemy began by killing Americans and American allies abroad: 241 at the Marine barracks in Lebanon, 19 at the Khobar Towers in Dhahran, 224 at our embassies in Dar es Salaam and Nairobi, and 17 on the USS Cole in Yemen. See National Commission on Terrorist Attacks upon the United States, The 9/11 Commission Report, pp. 60-61, 70, 190 (2004). On September 11, 2001, the enemy brought the battle to American soil, killing 2,749 at the Twin Towers in New York City, 184 at the Pentagon in Washington, D. C., and 40 in Pennsylvania. See id., at 552, n. 9. It has threatened further attacks against our homeland; one need only walk about buttressed and barricaded Washington, or board a plane anywhere in the country, to know that the threat is a serious one. Our Armed Forces are now in the field against the enemy, in Afghanistan and Iraq. Last week, 13 of our countrymen in arms were killed.
"The game of bait-and-switch that today's opinion plays upon the Nation's Commander in Chief will make the war harder on us. It will almost certainly cause more Americans to be killed."
Justice Scalia concluded with the ominous warning . . . " The Nation will live to regret what the Court has done today. I dissent."
With great sadness . . . I agree! :(
Never, in my wildest imagination, would I ever have even guessed that even our most liberal Justices could rule the way they did about the circumstances and RIGHTS of battlefield "detainees" held in an isolated military compound at Guantanamo Naval Base in Cuba.
Voting for today's ruling were the liberal Justices: Justice Anthony Kennedy, who wrote the majority opinion and was joined by Justices John Paul Stevens, Stephen Breyer, David Souter and Ruth Bader Ginsburg.
Dissenting were the more conservative four: Chief Justice John Roberts, Antonin Scalia, Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito.
You can be assured that if elected, Senator Barak Obama will appoint even more liberal justices (if they can be found) than Kennedy, Stevens, Breyer, Souter, and Ginsburg.
However, a President John McCain has already promised more like Roberts, Alito, Thomas, and Scalia.
Spread the word among your friends and acquaintances.
In effect, this ruling gives men captured on the battlefield, trying desperately to kill our military men and women in any horrible way they can devise . . . not only our enemies, but not citizens of this country . . . the same rights granted only to citizens of the USA by our Constitution and laws.
You can read the full text here: http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/scripts/getcase.pl?court=US&vol=000&invol=06-1195
Writing the dissenting point of view, in part, Justice Scalia said:
"America is at war with radical Islamists. The enemy began by killing Americans and American allies abroad: 241 at the Marine barracks in Lebanon, 19 at the Khobar Towers in Dhahran, 224 at our embassies in Dar es Salaam and Nairobi, and 17 on the USS Cole in Yemen. See National Commission on Terrorist Attacks upon the United States, The 9/11 Commission Report, pp. 60-61, 70, 190 (2004). On September 11, 2001, the enemy brought the battle to American soil, killing 2,749 at the Twin Towers in New York City, 184 at the Pentagon in Washington, D. C., and 40 in Pennsylvania. See id., at 552, n. 9. It has threatened further attacks against our homeland; one need only walk about buttressed and barricaded Washington, or board a plane anywhere in the country, to know that the threat is a serious one. Our Armed Forces are now in the field against the enemy, in Afghanistan and Iraq. Last week, 13 of our countrymen in arms were killed.
"The game of bait-and-switch that today's opinion plays upon the Nation's Commander in Chief will make the war harder on us. It will almost certainly cause more Americans to be killed."
Justice Scalia concluded with the ominous warning . . . " The Nation will live to regret what the Court has done today. I dissent."
With great sadness . . . I agree! :(
. . . about oil prices . . .
You can do something about oil prices now . . . !!
I don't know whether the commentators and pundits have been reading our blog lately or not, but suddenly they've begun talking about market speculators being responsible for the unconscionable run-up of world oil prices.
Those who speculate only for the potential profit are responsible. Check our suggestion we posted a few days ago about limiting the oil markets only to those with the potential of taking delivery of what they purchase options for.
Yes, I know it will take more than your Congressperson passing laws re-regulating and setting new rules for oil futures trading . . . it will take some international diplomatic negotiations to stop the practice in other countries, as well.
But, Congress is a start. If they will, they can initiate change. Now is the time. Contact your Congressional Representative now, and make the suggestion, or simply refer them to our blog for information. Be sure to put your own thoughts in your own words in your email to your Representative. Here's a link to a site that will link you to him or her.
https://forms.house.gov/wyr/welcome.shtml
Please, do it now, while its fresh in your mind . . . unless, of course, you really enjoy paying $4.00+ at the gas pump!
I don't know whether the commentators and pundits have been reading our blog lately or not, but suddenly they've begun talking about market speculators being responsible for the unconscionable run-up of world oil prices.
Those who speculate only for the potential profit are responsible. Check our suggestion we posted a few days ago about limiting the oil markets only to those with the potential of taking delivery of what they purchase options for.
Yes, I know it will take more than your Congressperson passing laws re-regulating and setting new rules for oil futures trading . . . it will take some international diplomatic negotiations to stop the practice in other countries, as well.
But, Congress is a start. If they will, they can initiate change. Now is the time. Contact your Congressional Representative now, and make the suggestion, or simply refer them to our blog for information. Be sure to put your own thoughts in your own words in your email to your Representative. Here's a link to a site that will link you to him or her.
https://forms.house.gov/wyr/welcome.shtml
Please, do it now, while its fresh in your mind . . . unless, of course, you really enjoy paying $4.00+ at the gas pump!
Thursday, June 5, 2008
. . . a brief response to "K's" comment on oil . . .
Thank you, K, for bringing this up. I'm not familiar with "B5 oil", and would like you to post some more information about it here.
I didn't get into it, but I'm also a proponent of exploring for more domestic oil reservoirs and for developing what we already know about, including ANWR. Perhaps we should open up that discussion soon here, too.
I didn't get into it, but I'm also a proponent of exploring for more domestic oil reservoirs and for developing what we already know about, including ANWR. Perhaps we should open up that discussion soon here, too.
Wednesday, June 4, 2008
. . . I've solved the oil "crisis"
Who'd'a thunk that if you read here long enough, we'll likely come up with the solution to every problem . . . we have one for oil and gasoline . . . just keep reading .....
The current oil prices continue creeping upward. Someone compared it to placing a frog into a "pond-temperature" pan of water, placing it on the stove, then putting heat under the pan.
Poor frog is fat, dumb, and happily swimming around in the pan and does not notice that the temperature is slowly increasing. Before the poor frog realizes his predicament and reacts properly, his "goose is cooked"! (I just wondered: Do frogs even have geese?) : )
Kinda what happened with the world oil market . . . gradual increases . . . ever so slowly . . . causing a few cents increase in the price we were paying at the pump for gasoline. Then, suddenly, like the frog in the pan, we discover the water's really gettin' hot!!
Suddenly, it costs $100 to fill the tank in the big gas-guzzling SUV, and the price is still rising!!
You know it's gotten really serious when General Motors announces the closing of their plants which manufacture the SUV, and hint that the Hummer brand might be for sale.(http://www.autoweek.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080603/FREE/57736413/1023/contact)
Having given this more than 15 minutes thought, I have solved the "oil crisis" problem. (Congress, you paying attention yet?)
The price per barrel of oil has been steadily increasing in the Commodities Market. The free market!!
That means that, if I have even an inexpensive account somewhere, I can buy options - for only a few cents on the dollar - to purchase whole tankers of oil at a time.
Now the trick is, I don't actually have a place to park that tanker of oil yet, so I purchase a future contract, to be delivered - let's say - in December 2008. While that actually wouldn't give me enough time to build a large enough port for parking the tanker, it also wouldn't be enough time to build a pipeline to a refinery to process my tanker of oil into gasoline, oil, diesel, kerosene, etc., either.
So, I really have no intention of taking delivery of 100,000 Dead Weight Tons of oil.
All I really want (and in fact, I'm betting on it!) is for the price of oil to move up only a few cents per barrel before I have to take delivery. Between now and December, upward price movement of such a few cents for each barrel of oil in that 100,000 tons means perhaps several 10s of thousands of dollars in profit for me.
Not only that, I did not have to build nor own a port, a pipeline, refinery, nor service station. All I owned was for a few weeks I had the right to purchase a tanker of oil at the price at which we had contracted.
That's how I would make my profit: by speculating that the price of oil would go up during the time I owned the option, and that I could sell my option - at a profit - to some other speculator, or to an oil company with the capacity to process it.
The solution: Require that anyone trading in the oil futures market have the capacity of taking delivery of everything for which the speculator has purchased options.
That would keep only the oil "pipeline" people (pun was intended!) people in the market and keep the pure speculators out. At some point quite soon after such a regulation, the price of oil would reach some equilibrium controlled only by supply and demand.
It is cruel and obscene what speculators have done to the price of oil, which has had trickle-down (or perhaps "trickle-up") effects on almost everything else which we purchase. It will take something drastic to turn this around. I think only Congress can do it. Then, the State Department would need to negotiate with other countries to pass similar laws.
If you also believe this idea would work, please contact your Congressman (or Congresswoman) and US Senator and ask them to do it . . . and soon!!
The current oil prices continue creeping upward. Someone compared it to placing a frog into a "pond-temperature" pan of water, placing it on the stove, then putting heat under the pan.
Poor frog is fat, dumb, and happily swimming around in the pan and does not notice that the temperature is slowly increasing. Before the poor frog realizes his predicament and reacts properly, his "goose is cooked"! (I just wondered: Do frogs even have geese?) : )
Kinda what happened with the world oil market . . . gradual increases . . . ever so slowly . . . causing a few cents increase in the price we were paying at the pump for gasoline. Then, suddenly, like the frog in the pan, we discover the water's really gettin' hot!!
Suddenly, it costs $100 to fill the tank in the big gas-guzzling SUV, and the price is still rising!!
You know it's gotten really serious when General Motors announces the closing of their plants which manufacture the SUV, and hint that the Hummer brand might be for sale.(http://www.autoweek.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080603/FREE/57736413/1023/contact)
Having given this more than 15 minutes thought, I have solved the "oil crisis" problem. (Congress, you paying attention yet?)
The price per barrel of oil has been steadily increasing in the Commodities Market. The free market!!
That means that, if I have even an inexpensive account somewhere, I can buy options - for only a few cents on the dollar - to purchase whole tankers of oil at a time.
Now the trick is, I don't actually have a place to park that tanker of oil yet, so I purchase a future contract, to be delivered - let's say - in December 2008. While that actually wouldn't give me enough time to build a large enough port for parking the tanker, it also wouldn't be enough time to build a pipeline to a refinery to process my tanker of oil into gasoline, oil, diesel, kerosene, etc., either.
So, I really have no intention of taking delivery of 100,000 Dead Weight Tons of oil.
All I really want (and in fact, I'm betting on it!) is for the price of oil to move up only a few cents per barrel before I have to take delivery. Between now and December, upward price movement of such a few cents for each barrel of oil in that 100,000 tons means perhaps several 10s of thousands of dollars in profit for me.
Not only that, I did not have to build nor own a port, a pipeline, refinery, nor service station. All I owned was for a few weeks I had the right to purchase a tanker of oil at the price at which we had contracted.
That's how I would make my profit: by speculating that the price of oil would go up during the time I owned the option, and that I could sell my option - at a profit - to some other speculator, or to an oil company with the capacity to process it.
The solution: Require that anyone trading in the oil futures market have the capacity of taking delivery of everything for which the speculator has purchased options.
That would keep only the oil "pipeline" people (pun was intended!) people in the market and keep the pure speculators out. At some point quite soon after such a regulation, the price of oil would reach some equilibrium controlled only by supply and demand.
It is cruel and obscene what speculators have done to the price of oil, which has had trickle-down (or perhaps "trickle-up") effects on almost everything else which we purchase. It will take something drastic to turn this around. I think only Congress can do it. Then, the State Department would need to negotiate with other countries to pass similar laws.
If you also believe this idea would work, please contact your Congressman (or Congresswoman) and US Senator and ask them to do it . . . and soon!!
Tuesday, June 3, 2008
". . . 'til the fat lady sings!"
"It ain't over, 'til the fat lady sings," or, as Yogi Berra is credited with saying, "It ain't over 'til its over!"
The long hot summer of the Democrats's discontent stretched over two long hot summers and an equally llooonngg winter. Now, seems as if Barak Obama has made history by becoming the first black to carry the banner toward the US Presidency for one of the two major political parties instead of Hillary Clinton becoming the first woman to be nominated by either party.
Who'd'a thunk it?
Was it only a year ago that Obama "didn't have a chance", and the former First Lady, Hillary Clinton, had "a lock on the nomination" and was moving toward her own coronation as the Democrat standard-bearer on the evening of "Super Tuesday". And, how ironic that this time in 2007, John McCain, also, "did not have a chance."
Needless to say, Clinton's "Super Tuesday Strategy" failed.
Now, it will be Obama, challenging John McCain to be next White House resident. Here, now, on this date, according to many of the "legitimate" polls, it appears to be a toss-up. But, as the old expression, "there's many a slip twixt cup and lip" pictures, many things can happen before the November decision.
Things change.
Often more quickly than we are ready for changes.
This time next summer, either John McCain or Barak Obama will be settling in to his role as President of the USA. Leading our country just slightly toward right-center, or toward the extreme left, toward Socialism.
The long hot summer of the Democrats's discontent stretched over two long hot summers and an equally llooonngg winter. Now, seems as if Barak Obama has made history by becoming the first black to carry the banner toward the US Presidency for one of the two major political parties instead of Hillary Clinton becoming the first woman to be nominated by either party.
Who'd'a thunk it?
Was it only a year ago that Obama "didn't have a chance", and the former First Lady, Hillary Clinton, had "a lock on the nomination" and was moving toward her own coronation as the Democrat standard-bearer on the evening of "Super Tuesday". And, how ironic that this time in 2007, John McCain, also, "did not have a chance."
Needless to say, Clinton's "Super Tuesday Strategy" failed.
Now, it will be Obama, challenging John McCain to be next White House resident. Here, now, on this date, according to many of the "legitimate" polls, it appears to be a toss-up. But, as the old expression, "there's many a slip twixt cup and lip" pictures, many things can happen before the November decision.
Things change.
Often more quickly than we are ready for changes.
This time next summer, either John McCain or Barak Obama will be settling in to his role as President of the USA. Leading our country just slightly toward right-center, or toward the extreme left, toward Socialism.
Sunday, June 1, 2008
"Hello world!"
Those simple words, computer-generated onto an attached printer, in one fell swoop, both heralded and ushered in a revolution in computing.
On a noisy printer in Bell Labs, two young men had labored for days -- and NIGHTS, if my own experience taught me anything -- to create and write a computer program that, at once, would fit into the limited computing space of their early Digital Equipment Corp. PDP-7 (DEC PDP-7) and predict movement of stars and planets. Testing the draft-version of their new programming concept, the two young men had it print out only the words: Hello World!
They didn't have the big, heavy, IBM 360 mainframe, so prevalent in big business in those days. Their department's tiny budget allowed only for the "mini"-computer. "Mini" did not mean "small"!
"Mini" meant only "not huge"!
A mini-computer lived in a frame, which typically stretched from floor to ceiling - roughly 7 feet - and really thrived in an air-conditioned, climate-controlled room.
If their DEC computer had a hard disk drive, it would have been housed in a washing-machine-sized cabinet, and held several stacked metal platters. A typical one of that era might have held 8 megabytes on 8 platters, stood a little over waist-high, and been operated from a keyboard - printer terminal. Instructions were typewritten on the keyboard and the computed results printed out on the same machine. Video Display Terminals were uncommon.
But, in this environment, an elegant, simple, powerful programming language was born. They called it UNIX.
For all posterity, their names are recorded in the annals of computing history: Ken Thompson, and Dennis Ritchie.
more information . . . http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unix
On a noisy printer in Bell Labs, two young men had labored for days -- and NIGHTS, if my own experience taught me anything -- to create and write a computer program that, at once, would fit into the limited computing space of their early Digital Equipment Corp. PDP-7 (DEC PDP-7) and predict movement of stars and planets. Testing the draft-version of their new programming concept, the two young men had it print out only the words: Hello World!
They didn't have the big, heavy, IBM 360 mainframe, so prevalent in big business in those days. Their department's tiny budget allowed only for the "mini"-computer. "Mini" did not mean "small"!
"Mini" meant only "not huge"!
A mini-computer lived in a frame, which typically stretched from floor to ceiling - roughly 7 feet - and really thrived in an air-conditioned, climate-controlled room.
If their DEC computer had a hard disk drive, it would have been housed in a washing-machine-sized cabinet, and held several stacked metal platters. A typical one of that era might have held 8 megabytes on 8 platters, stood a little over waist-high, and been operated from a keyboard - printer terminal. Instructions were typewritten on the keyboard and the computed results printed out on the same machine. Video Display Terminals were uncommon.
But, in this environment, an elegant, simple, powerful programming language was born. They called it UNIX.
For all posterity, their names are recorded in the annals of computing history: Ken Thompson, and Dennis Ritchie.
more information . . . http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unix
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