Here we are at the end of year that has proven tumultuous for myself as well as for a lot of other people, if you take into account the play that was on the world stage. As for what's gone on in that side of things; I've commented on it enough over the course of the past year, and will instead in this posting take a look back at what happened for me, and where it looks like I'm going.
One year ago today I was still employed by that private spaceflight firm in North Las Vegas. The future for the enterprise looked promising as that it had been less than two weeks earlier that we were going to expand. Sixteen new hires were reporting for work on the 4th of January, that first Monday back from Christmas vacation. This was mainly to staff up a newly created department that our Test team was going to help out. I had re-established a friendship with the Propulsion Manager who was one of the first friends I had made down here in Arizona in early 1999. As much as I hated living in Las Vegas, there was something to look forward to, even if at that time I was planning on finding work in Arizona so that I could return home.
Well, things turned out differently. Fourteen or fifteen out of those sixteen were laid off one hour after reporting for work. The owner decided not to expand the Propulsion department, and the buzz going around was that things were going to get worse. The next day at 4:30, forty of us were rounded up and laid off since "not enough money was coming into the company", which no one bought since the owner was financing it out of money he made from another business. Ron and I later on went out to the Fiesta Station to talk about this over iced tea at the food court that they had. We were not happy about it, but the upshot that he was going home to his wife in Florida and I was going home to Sheila. There was the matter of setting up unemployment from the State of Nevada, which both of us qualified for the full benefit since we had worked there for one year.
Before I even had a chance to digest all of this, I received a call from a medical device firm here in Tucson who needed a test engineer. The phone interview went well and I was brought in for one afternoon. I felt I had done well, and one of the managers, as she was walking me out, told me "by the way, don't wear that suit on your first day here. We wear jeans." That told me that her panel vote was going to be in favor of making an offer, and that must have been the way the rest of them felt as that I got the phone call the very next day.
That meant for one last trip up to Nevada to get my things, which was at that time the nicest problem that I could have, and Sheila and I drove up for that last one. The apartment was emptied out, and we stayed that last night at Fiesta Station, after which the next morning we had the final walk-through by the apartment management. Not one nickel was withheld from my security deposit. It was given back to them in the same state that it had been given to me. It was then the drive home, and the frantic process of getting an Arizona license plate back on my truck.
The work at the medical device firm went well. I didn't think about what I had gotten myself into and if I was in over my head or not. I dove right into it, took over a project in its infancy, and went from there. Things fell into place as I discovered some innovations as I was developing my process for how I was going to help get this one over the goal line. When it came time to test, we were ahead of schedule. Yes, I padded the test time somewhat, but by 20% so that we had margin in case of equipment failure or issues, which did arise.
After that I was done, and I started my sabbatical, thinking that I would be back early next year when they had another round of upgrades. I was told in a phone call that budgets have been frozen, and that they weren't bringing in contractors next year. This forced me to look more seriously. I mean, I was looking just in case, but I amped that up some after that phone call.
Well, I can now report that I accepted an offer of employment earlier this month. This is a test position very similar to what I was doing with medical devices, but this time around it's with radio transmitters running the spectrum from HF (high frequency) to satellite uplinks. It's a great job for a ham radio licensee with a degree in electrical engineering, and it's going to pay me well too. The past few weeks have been spent filling out paperwork to get this set up. A background check has been started on me. It's unclear if it will take a few weeks or a few months.
In that event, the nature of the offer does allow me to pursue contract work while I'm waiting. I don't know if that will happen. Through some other sources, there is reliable information that this should be done by the end of next month. And at that time I'll be ready. I've already got some ideas on how to streamline things.
On the personal front, I have been extremely grateful these past few weeks to have been home.....meaning that I'm extremely grateful that I'm not waking up in an apartment in North Las Vegas......that I'm instead waking up in my own bed, next to Sheila. I've told some friends recently and I'll tell you this here........I will never again take being or living at home for granted. My exile lasted over a year. Of all the blessings that the good Lord has allowed me to enjoy, the blessing of home, family and marriage is the one that I've been appreciating the most lately.
Saturday, December 31, 2016
Sunday, December 11, 2016
Electronic Kitbuilding and Experimentation
Years ago when I was living in California I was active in a ham radio club. We met monthly, and after the club business was taken care of there was a guest speaker. (I was a guest speaker one month, but that's not what this entry will be about). One guest speaker was a YL, ham radio slang for "young lady", and most ham radio operations who are OMs (OM means "old man", regardless of your age) will tell you that the hobby needs more YLs. (XYL is "ex-young lady", which means "wife").
Well that speaker was technically an XYL, but we'll regard her as a YL in this post. Her talk was on QRP, which means "low power (operation)", and about how she built her own transmitters and experimented with QRP, and her experiences with using it.
QRP is one of those niche interests, among several, that can be found in ham radio. A longtime friend of mine was into it, and me, for all those years I was active I would run with an input power of 100 watts, which is definitely not QRP. I remember talking to one ham who was only using one watt of power, and his signal was surprisingly good. It wasn't pegging my meter or anything like that, but I had 100% copy of him on the 40 meter band. He was in the L.A. area and I was in San Jose, and he was hearing me as good as I was hearing him.
Anyway, what the YL said was that some hams didn't want to waste their time talking to her. A lot of hams are into DX, that is, "distance", which means that you want to hams who are very far away, and yes, working DX is quite the thrill. But the seed that she planted in my mind then, was to get into experimenting with electronics, and a few days after her talk I was at one of the surplus electronic parts stores in Silicon Valley (All-Tronics? Haltek?) getting integrated circuits to experiment with on a breadboard. I also realized that I would need a power supply, so I visited a Radio Shack, bought a book on how to build power supplies, and I spent a week or so in the garage building one of my own.
I'm going to backtrack a little bit here as that I wasn't new to building things. I built my first radio in 1974, a very simple crystal set that could only receive one station. I built a second one later on that year, as part of a class in high school. It was finished in January 1975, and to my amazement it worked, and using the instructions I was able to align the IF (intermediate frequency) cans to where it worked fine. I still have it, it's in the garage, and probably what I ought to do sometime is build another one that's similar to it.
But let's get back to the later years. I built that power supply, and used it for experimenting with some simple computer circuits, and that went on until some life changing events that visited me during the last few months of 1998. The power supply moved with me to Arizona in early 1999, and it is still with me as that I figured that it would be useful in some future endeavor. Earlier this evening, I went out to the garage to look at it, after finding a notebook that I started to document my projects and experiments.
So why is this now happening?
I've been thinking a lot about getting back into shortwave listening these past few weeks, and I'm also thinking of resuming my ham radio hobby. Right now the house is a little on the crowded side, but eventually one of the stepdaughters is going to move out, and that will give me a chance to reclaim one of the bedrooms as my "radio room". Until then, I might be able to operate out of the master bedroom, which although is a little cramped, I think I can set up a table and get one of my transceivers back into commission.
And, I'm now thinking, maybe it's time I build a QRP transmitter, and see what I can do with it.
I've been spending the past few days visiting websites about transmitter design. Eventually I would like to homebrew my own transmitter, but existing QRP kits can be had for $40 or so, and I'm thinking that I should purchase one of these kits and have some fun with it. Of course, my intention is to build one of my own, and to see what I can do with that.
Next month, I might be in San Jose again, and if that happens I plan on visiting my favorite surplus stores with a list of parts to look for. In the meantime, I'll be combing thru some boxes of parts that I already have, to see if I can jury rig a small transmitter, just for the fun of it.
Well that speaker was technically an XYL, but we'll regard her as a YL in this post. Her talk was on QRP, which means "low power (operation)", and about how she built her own transmitters and experimented with QRP, and her experiences with using it.
QRP is one of those niche interests, among several, that can be found in ham radio. A longtime friend of mine was into it, and me, for all those years I was active I would run with an input power of 100 watts, which is definitely not QRP. I remember talking to one ham who was only using one watt of power, and his signal was surprisingly good. It wasn't pegging my meter or anything like that, but I had 100% copy of him on the 40 meter band. He was in the L.A. area and I was in San Jose, and he was hearing me as good as I was hearing him.
Anyway, what the YL said was that some hams didn't want to waste their time talking to her. A lot of hams are into DX, that is, "distance", which means that you want to hams who are very far away, and yes, working DX is quite the thrill. But the seed that she planted in my mind then, was to get into experimenting with electronics, and a few days after her talk I was at one of the surplus electronic parts stores in Silicon Valley (All-Tronics? Haltek?) getting integrated circuits to experiment with on a breadboard. I also realized that I would need a power supply, so I visited a Radio Shack, bought a book on how to build power supplies, and I spent a week or so in the garage building one of my own.
I'm going to backtrack a little bit here as that I wasn't new to building things. I built my first radio in 1974, a very simple crystal set that could only receive one station. I built a second one later on that year, as part of a class in high school. It was finished in January 1975, and to my amazement it worked, and using the instructions I was able to align the IF (intermediate frequency) cans to where it worked fine. I still have it, it's in the garage, and probably what I ought to do sometime is build another one that's similar to it.
But let's get back to the later years. I built that power supply, and used it for experimenting with some simple computer circuits, and that went on until some life changing events that visited me during the last few months of 1998. The power supply moved with me to Arizona in early 1999, and it is still with me as that I figured that it would be useful in some future endeavor. Earlier this evening, I went out to the garage to look at it, after finding a notebook that I started to document my projects and experiments.
So why is this now happening?
I've been thinking a lot about getting back into shortwave listening these past few weeks, and I'm also thinking of resuming my ham radio hobby. Right now the house is a little on the crowded side, but eventually one of the stepdaughters is going to move out, and that will give me a chance to reclaim one of the bedrooms as my "radio room". Until then, I might be able to operate out of the master bedroom, which although is a little cramped, I think I can set up a table and get one of my transceivers back into commission.
And, I'm now thinking, maybe it's time I build a QRP transmitter, and see what I can do with it.
I've been spending the past few days visiting websites about transmitter design. Eventually I would like to homebrew my own transmitter, but existing QRP kits can be had for $40 or so, and I'm thinking that I should purchase one of these kits and have some fun with it. Of course, my intention is to build one of my own, and to see what I can do with that.
Next month, I might be in San Jose again, and if that happens I plan on visiting my favorite surplus stores with a list of parts to look for. In the meantime, I'll be combing thru some boxes of parts that I already have, to see if I can jury rig a small transmitter, just for the fun of it.
Wednesday, November 30, 2016
Cowboy Coffee
On one of the forums I frequent, I found this recipe that someone posted. The post is quoted in its entirety below the *s. I'll have to give it a try sometime.
I drink a couple of cups a week... usually black. But when camping we just throw the grounds in the water, boil and settle the grounds with cold water. It's horrible. Here's the recipe!
Cowboy coffee isn't known for tasting good, because many people make it using this recipe. If you want to taste truly awful coffee, just follow these steps:
* * * * * * *
I drink a couple of cups a week... usually black. But when camping we just throw the grounds in the water, boil and settle the grounds with cold water. It's horrible. Here's the recipe!
Cowboy coffee isn't known for tasting good, because many people make it using this recipe. If you want to taste truly awful coffee, just follow these steps:
- Disregard the coffee-to-water ratio guidelines, because the coffee won’t be good enough for the ratio to matter. Just add some grounds to a pot and fill it with water.
- Place the pot on the fire and bring the water to boil. When done correctly, the grounds will float to the top, so most of them aren’t being brewed, and the pot will boil over.
- After burning your hand while trying to adjust the pot so that it doesn’t boil over again, let the “coffee” sit for a few more minutes.
- Remove the pot from the fire, and sprinkle a handful of cold water into it. Not only will the cold water help the grounds settle on the bottom, but it will also give the appearance that you know what you’re doing. Perhaps you’ll recover some of the dignity you lost in Step 3.
- Serve the coffee. There are two strategies for this step. You might pour your cup first, so you have as few grounds as possible in your mug. Alternatively, you can save yours till last, hoping that the coffee will be gone by the time you get to your cup.
Tuesday, November 22, 2016
KMOX Radio, St. Louis
That one night back in high school where I discovered that I could tune in distant radio stations at night will forever remain special to me. I was able to get all sorts of stations. WCFL in Chicago. CBM in Montreal. WWWE in Cleveland. WWVA in Wheeling. WJR Detroit. And more were to follow that night.
The prize catch of them all was KMOX St. Louis. That was the most distant signal I got that night, and certainly the westernmost. I remembered that station from a road trip when I was not even a teenager, as that the family favorite baseball team was the St. Louis Cardinals, and their games were carried on KMOX. On one trip we stopped to take in a Cardinals game. This was back in the era of Lou Brock and Bob Gibson. Curt Flood and Orlando Cepeda. Nelson Briles and Steve Carlton. They were America's team in their day.
We had to resume the trip, so after catching the last half of the first game (it was a double header) and the first half of the second game, it was back on the road. We listened to the game on KMOX as we continued on to Kansas.
I hadn't heard KMOX since then, until that one night. KMOX was the standout catch, and I hadn't heard KMOX since then..........until last night.
I've been spending some nights tuning in those distant stations. The radioscape here, of course, is different. I've been getting stations in Texas, Oklahoma, Colorado, Utah, and other places. Stations from Mexico have been tuned in and identified (my Spanish has gotten quite rusty over the years but it has been a help). But the one station I had been most wanting to get, KMOX, just wasn't coming in. I have checked on those nights set aside for listening, checking 1120 kHz, but nothing. Oh, there is a station in Utah on that frequency that I can get almost every night, but I would null them out to see if KMOX was there.
Last night wasn't set aside for radio listening. Several nights are spent laying upstairs in bed with Sheila. She's watching her favorite shows and I'm working on some favorite novels. Lots of time we talk. I enjoy being with her and I very much enjoy being married to her.
Anyway, it was time to check the garage, and I thought, I'm going to go out there and turn on the radio to see if KMOX is there. It was almost the top of the hour, when station IDs take place, and I didn't want to miss out if they were there.
This time, there was a signal on 1120. Utah had been nulled out and the signal that I had was weak to fair, but copyable. I thought I had heard a mention of KMOX but I wasn't sure. There were some local commercials, some local weather, and I'm thinking, that might be the type of weather one would expect in St Louis this time of year.
I continued listening, and then got a definite ID. It was them! I was hearing KMOX for the first time since high school! I then came back inside, and making use of a distance calculator, I learned that they were some 20 miles further away than KOMO out of Seattle, which I got a week or so ago. KMOX held in steady, but I couldn't stay long as that I was tired and bedtime was fast approaching.
Long distance radio listening, called DXing within the hobby circles, is one hobby that I've indulged in off and on over the years. Winter is the "season" for AM broadcast band DXing, and I've been doing plenty of it during this sabbatical. Logging KMOX here has been a goal since I've resumed this, and I figured sooner or later I would get them. KMOX has been heard in Europe and in South Africa. I knew they would be heard here sooner or later.
Now if I can only get a positive log on WWL from New Orleans.
The prize catch of them all was KMOX St. Louis. That was the most distant signal I got that night, and certainly the westernmost. I remembered that station from a road trip when I was not even a teenager, as that the family favorite baseball team was the St. Louis Cardinals, and their games were carried on KMOX. On one trip we stopped to take in a Cardinals game. This was back in the era of Lou Brock and Bob Gibson. Curt Flood and Orlando Cepeda. Nelson Briles and Steve Carlton. They were America's team in their day.
We had to resume the trip, so after catching the last half of the first game (it was a double header) and the first half of the second game, it was back on the road. We listened to the game on KMOX as we continued on to Kansas.
I hadn't heard KMOX since then, until that one night. KMOX was the standout catch, and I hadn't heard KMOX since then..........until last night.
I've been spending some nights tuning in those distant stations. The radioscape here, of course, is different. I've been getting stations in Texas, Oklahoma, Colorado, Utah, and other places. Stations from Mexico have been tuned in and identified (my Spanish has gotten quite rusty over the years but it has been a help). But the one station I had been most wanting to get, KMOX, just wasn't coming in. I have checked on those nights set aside for listening, checking 1120 kHz, but nothing. Oh, there is a station in Utah on that frequency that I can get almost every night, but I would null them out to see if KMOX was there.
Last night wasn't set aside for radio listening. Several nights are spent laying upstairs in bed with Sheila. She's watching her favorite shows and I'm working on some favorite novels. Lots of time we talk. I enjoy being with her and I very much enjoy being married to her.
Anyway, it was time to check the garage, and I thought, I'm going to go out there and turn on the radio to see if KMOX is there. It was almost the top of the hour, when station IDs take place, and I didn't want to miss out if they were there.
This time, there was a signal on 1120. Utah had been nulled out and the signal that I had was weak to fair, but copyable. I thought I had heard a mention of KMOX but I wasn't sure. There were some local commercials, some local weather, and I'm thinking, that might be the type of weather one would expect in St Louis this time of year.
I continued listening, and then got a definite ID. It was them! I was hearing KMOX for the first time since high school! I then came back inside, and making use of a distance calculator, I learned that they were some 20 miles further away than KOMO out of Seattle, which I got a week or so ago. KMOX held in steady, but I couldn't stay long as that I was tired and bedtime was fast approaching.
Long distance radio listening, called DXing within the hobby circles, is one hobby that I've indulged in off and on over the years. Winter is the "season" for AM broadcast band DXing, and I've been doing plenty of it during this sabbatical. Logging KMOX here has been a goal since I've resumed this, and I figured sooner or later I would get them. KMOX has been heard in Europe and in South Africa. I knew they would be heard here sooner or later.
Now if I can only get a positive log on WWL from New Orleans.
Friday, November 11, 2016
So Why Did The Donald Win?
The most interesting election in my lifetime is now behind us, and we're watching a transition get under way. There has been lots of interesting speculation on talk radio, the newspapers, internet forums, and the foreign press. Some folks are looking at at what went wrong, while others are trying to figure out what went right. Why did Trump win? I've touched on it in my previous entry, but I want to expound on this further. Here are the reasons why, in no particular order.
(1) Hillary Clinton wasn't exactly likeable. Ever since she became prominent in 1992, half the country has hated her. Books I've read on 1980s Arkansas politics strongly suggest she wasn't exactly well liked there either. When the rest of the nation knew about her, there was a lot of chatter about her being Co-President. I remember a conversation with a taxi driver in Rome that took place in 1995, who made a snide remark about "Presidente Hillary". So, even the Europeans could see right through her.
(2) Serial betrayal of their base by the Republican Establishment. For years we heard their message that if we would just give them a chance, we would get a lot of great results. They promised us conservative judges. We got David Souter on the Supreme Court, and a Harriet Miers nomination. They promised us a secure border. They tried to join forces with the Democrats and force "amnesty" down our throats instead. They said they would defend the Constitution, and instead we got the Senate Majority leader Trent Lott saying that talk radio ran the country and that something needed to be done about that. It got well past the point to where they could be trusted, much less given credibility. All members of the Republican Establishment wanted President Obama to "succeed", and many of them voted for Hillary.
(3) Widespread hate for Organized Media and a repudiation of their way of thinking. Rush Limbaugh calls them the "drive-bys"; I call them "Organized Media" and have for years as that it connotates a sinister purpose like the term "Organized Crime" does. Organized Media talks down to us. They act like they are visionary, that they know what's best for us, that we're just a bunch of stupid uneducated dumptrucks who need our freedoms taken away since we don't know how to properly use them.
They are in meltdown over this election. They are also in denial. You have Van Jones telling CNN that this was a "whitelash", which is a cheap shot and an attempt to suggest that there was a racial component involved in supporting Trump. He has to know that this is a cheap shot, but he runs with it; CNN lets him run with it, and they arrogantly think that we're too stupid to figure all of this out.
I despise Organized Media, they are the ones misusing their freedoms. In spite of that statement, I honestly want them to continue going down this road in the hopes that more of the masses will wake up to what they're doing.
(4) Trump connected to the people. No, he didn't connect to that part of the country that voted for Hillary, but he connected to that part of the country that counted. I wasn't on board his train at the start. I voted for someone else in the primary. I wasn't sure he was for real. He is still technically an unknown quantity to me, but I found that preferable to a known evil, and that's why I voted for him.
Now I want him to make America great again.
(5) The country has been heading on the wrong direction, and you'd have to be stoned on marijuana to not be aware of this. Really, are millions of more Americans on food stamps going in the right direction? Home ownership at a 51 year low an improvement? Well, that would be seen as an improvement by those who think that the State should own all property and distribute it as they see fit, but in my mind that view can only be seriously entertained by those who think they are entitled to assets that they were too lazy to earn.
(6) Multinational trade agreements are much more of an issue than Organized Media and the fatass politicians realize. Now personally, I think a free trade agreement between the United States and Canada makes a lot of sense. Standard of living of the two nations is practically on par. NAFTA? There is no doubt that Mexico is still a developing country, and if she would make proper use of her resources and rid herself of institutionalized corruption, she would be a great asset to a trade pact.
Mexico's not there yet.
(7) This was a repudiation of the Obama agenda. Trump won the primary because his supporters knew that Jeb wouldn't fix it, and Rubio wasn't going to stop. Jeb was proud of the similarity of stances that he had to Hillary, and Rubio was fixated on shoving "amnesty" down our throats. We didn't want more of the same! We wanted it to end!
(8) Big Hollywood actors threatening to leave the country. We heard this in 2000, and they didn't leave. We heard it again in 2004, and we gave them another reason to leave. We were hearing it again this time around.
Well what the hell were we supposed to do? Give in to these Hollywood millionaires and beg them to stay? Do they really think that the rest of us are just as stupid as their fans who fawn all over them?
This time, will you just shut the firetruck up and make good on your promise? Leave, and don't come back!
If I think about it long enough, I could come up with some more reasons, but I think I will instead observe our sorry-ass Organized Media wring their hands and moan about how the rest of us (that is, the real world) just doesn't get it.
(1) Hillary Clinton wasn't exactly likeable. Ever since she became prominent in 1992, half the country has hated her. Books I've read on 1980s Arkansas politics strongly suggest she wasn't exactly well liked there either. When the rest of the nation knew about her, there was a lot of chatter about her being Co-President. I remember a conversation with a taxi driver in Rome that took place in 1995, who made a snide remark about "Presidente Hillary". So, even the Europeans could see right through her.
(2) Serial betrayal of their base by the Republican Establishment. For years we heard their message that if we would just give them a chance, we would get a lot of great results. They promised us conservative judges. We got David Souter on the Supreme Court, and a Harriet Miers nomination. They promised us a secure border. They tried to join forces with the Democrats and force "amnesty" down our throats instead. They said they would defend the Constitution, and instead we got the Senate Majority leader Trent Lott saying that talk radio ran the country and that something needed to be done about that. It got well past the point to where they could be trusted, much less given credibility. All members of the Republican Establishment wanted President Obama to "succeed", and many of them voted for Hillary.
(3) Widespread hate for Organized Media and a repudiation of their way of thinking. Rush Limbaugh calls them the "drive-bys"; I call them "Organized Media" and have for years as that it connotates a sinister purpose like the term "Organized Crime" does. Organized Media talks down to us. They act like they are visionary, that they know what's best for us, that we're just a bunch of stupid uneducated dumptrucks who need our freedoms taken away since we don't know how to properly use them.
They are in meltdown over this election. They are also in denial. You have Van Jones telling CNN that this was a "whitelash", which is a cheap shot and an attempt to suggest that there was a racial component involved in supporting Trump. He has to know that this is a cheap shot, but he runs with it; CNN lets him run with it, and they arrogantly think that we're too stupid to figure all of this out.
I despise Organized Media, they are the ones misusing their freedoms. In spite of that statement, I honestly want them to continue going down this road in the hopes that more of the masses will wake up to what they're doing.
(4) Trump connected to the people. No, he didn't connect to that part of the country that voted for Hillary, but he connected to that part of the country that counted. I wasn't on board his train at the start. I voted for someone else in the primary. I wasn't sure he was for real. He is still technically an unknown quantity to me, but I found that preferable to a known evil, and that's why I voted for him.
Now I want him to make America great again.
(5) The country has been heading on the wrong direction, and you'd have to be stoned on marijuana to not be aware of this. Really, are millions of more Americans on food stamps going in the right direction? Home ownership at a 51 year low an improvement? Well, that would be seen as an improvement by those who think that the State should own all property and distribute it as they see fit, but in my mind that view can only be seriously entertained by those who think they are entitled to assets that they were too lazy to earn.
(6) Multinational trade agreements are much more of an issue than Organized Media and the fatass politicians realize. Now personally, I think a free trade agreement between the United States and Canada makes a lot of sense. Standard of living of the two nations is practically on par. NAFTA? There is no doubt that Mexico is still a developing country, and if she would make proper use of her resources and rid herself of institutionalized corruption, she would be a great asset to a trade pact.
Mexico's not there yet.
(7) This was a repudiation of the Obama agenda. Trump won the primary because his supporters knew that Jeb wouldn't fix it, and Rubio wasn't going to stop. Jeb was proud of the similarity of stances that he had to Hillary, and Rubio was fixated on shoving "amnesty" down our throats. We didn't want more of the same! We wanted it to end!
(8) Big Hollywood actors threatening to leave the country. We heard this in 2000, and they didn't leave. We heard it again in 2004, and we gave them another reason to leave. We were hearing it again this time around.
Well what the hell were we supposed to do? Give in to these Hollywood millionaires and beg them to stay? Do they really think that the rest of us are just as stupid as their fans who fawn all over them?
This time, will you just shut the firetruck up and make good on your promise? Leave, and don't come back!
If I think about it long enough, I could come up with some more reasons, but I think I will instead observe our sorry-ass Organized Media wring their hands and moan about how the rest of us (that is, the real world) just doesn't get it.
Wednesday, November 9, 2016
The Donald Wins It!
I didn't think it was really going to happen. Organized Media went all out for Hillary, as did the welfare class, the Silicon Valley titans, and even some members of the Republican Establishment. I honestly thought that there would be some vote-rigging in five states. My home state, as I write this, hasn't yet been called.
My gut feel in this, is that this is more of a rebellion against the Establishment than it is support for Trump. Well, there are also a lot of people out there who don't like Hillary. Some in her own party either stayed home and voted for others, while others voted for Trump more in order to keep her out of the White House.
Not being able to return to the White House isn't, in my mind, going to bother Bubba any. There's no shortage of babes out there who would try to be that one who gets to satisfy him. Personally I have thought for a long time that he was more qualified to be an assistant manager at Burger King than he was President, but Ross Perot didn't think so and was able to siphon votes away from Bush 41.
So, what's next?
Expect a lot of university protests and riots in California.
Do not expect court filings from the Hillary camp.
Her political career is over.
My gut feel in this, is that this is more of a rebellion against the Establishment than it is support for Trump. Well, there are also a lot of people out there who don't like Hillary. Some in her own party either stayed home and voted for others, while others voted for Trump more in order to keep her out of the White House.
Not being able to return to the White House isn't, in my mind, going to bother Bubba any. There's no shortage of babes out there who would try to be that one who gets to satisfy him. Personally I have thought for a long time that he was more qualified to be an assistant manager at Burger King than he was President, but Ross Perot didn't think so and was able to siphon votes away from Bush 41.
So, what's next?
Expect a lot of university protests and riots in California.
Do not expect court filings from the Hillary camp.
Her political career is over.
Monday, November 7, 2016
As Predicted......Hillary Will Skate
I figured I was going to be proven right in my last posting about there not being an indictment brought against Hillary "What Difference Does it Make" Clinton. I didn't think it would happen this soon. The announcement yesterday by FBI Director Comey effectively squashes any chance of criminal charges. It spares President Obama any repercussions of having to pardon Hillary on his last day in office, which he may do anyway just to be on the safe side, but the upshot here is that Hillary will walk.
It is unfortunate that there are going to be other repercussions from this. I've read where the FBI has had a lot of agents resign over this, and more are sure to follow. When you put your heart and soul into investigating something and then have your work consigned to the trashcan, that has to be demoralizing. Yes, I've had that happen to me as an engineer due to program cancellations and stretchouts. You get to where you want to work on something else.
Anyway, the big day is tomorrow. I will offer no predictions on that one. My gut is telling me that The Donald has the momentum, but if Hillary has the machines rigged in five key states, it's in the bag for her, and knowing that she will never fear indictment for anything criminal that she does, she may be encouraged to implement the fix. That is, if the fix really exists, and I have no way of knowing if it does or not.
One other scenario may play out.
If The Donald wins the electoral votes that he needs, is it really in the bag for him? What are the chances that his electors are more beholden to the Republican Establishment than they are to the will of the electorate? What's going to stop them from voting for Hillary? I bring this up as a possibility as that I have no way of knowing if any of them are "Never Trumpers". There is already one Hillary elector in Washington state who's declared that he is not going to vote for Hillary.
Maybe another question is, are there other Hillary electors who won't vote for her?
That's extremely unlikely in my opinion, but it may only take a small handful to throw the election to the House.
It is unfortunate that there are going to be other repercussions from this. I've read where the FBI has had a lot of agents resign over this, and more are sure to follow. When you put your heart and soul into investigating something and then have your work consigned to the trashcan, that has to be demoralizing. Yes, I've had that happen to me as an engineer due to program cancellations and stretchouts. You get to where you want to work on something else.
Anyway, the big day is tomorrow. I will offer no predictions on that one. My gut is telling me that The Donald has the momentum, but if Hillary has the machines rigged in five key states, it's in the bag for her, and knowing that she will never fear indictment for anything criminal that she does, she may be encouraged to implement the fix. That is, if the fix really exists, and I have no way of knowing if it does or not.
One other scenario may play out.
If The Donald wins the electoral votes that he needs, is it really in the bag for him? What are the chances that his electors are more beholden to the Republican Establishment than they are to the will of the electorate? What's going to stop them from voting for Hillary? I bring this up as a possibility as that I have no way of knowing if any of them are "Never Trumpers". There is already one Hillary elector in Washington state who's declared that he is not going to vote for Hillary.
Maybe another question is, are there other Hillary electors who won't vote for her?
That's extremely unlikely in my opinion, but it may only take a small handful to throw the election to the House.
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