American and International Info Resources

Environmentalism has taken on a power of its own over the past few decades. Gone are the days when industrial complexes can dump chemicals and waste byproducts across the landscape with impunity. Nearly every nation on Earth now has environmental laws on the books and many countries and communities have begun tasking their police forces with dedicated enforcement of environmental law. These new “green police” are standing between social irresponsibility and the future of our ecosystem.

But how do you become a “green cop”? Is there a Green Police academy you enroll in? Are there environmental law enforcement certifications you pass examinations to earn? The truth is a bit simpler than that, actually. Some Green Police are actually park rangers and other state or national-level ecosystem protection officers.

But in large jurisdictions there may now be dedicated environmental units. One person was curious enough to ask how does one join the Green Police. A helpful answer suggests that environmental police are drawn from the rank and file of the New York City police. According to Yahoo! Answers, Green Police refers to “New York City’s Department of Environmental Conservation (which) has a team of twenty officers, nicknamed the “Green Police.”

That’s just a shot in the dark. Maybe there really is a green police academy somewhere. If not, then maybe Steve Guttenberg has a new movie waiting in the wings. Imagine a whole series of “Green Police Academy” movies where he teaches new generations of law officers how to protect the environment (without destroying it).

As I imagine you know, giving your time as a volunteer allows you to make your community stronger as well as helping those in need. Yet, finding the freedom for this kind of event can be a bit time consumung, and before you know it you don’t have as long at your disposal to actually do some good. And don’t you think that with your colleagues working alongside you, you’d all enjoy yourselves more while volunteering?

This is a call, then, for companies to take a cue from far-sighted firms like Connecticut’s Adaptive Marketing LLC. As well as financial benefits programs like Leisure Exclusives (MVQ*LSUREXCLUSIVE) made for the benefit of consumers, Adaptive Marketing organizes local volunteer activity so that its employees have more time to reach out to the local community.

Initiatives like these were always rare, minor activities — but this has come to be seen as the minimum of effort. As an example, Adaptive Marketing has offered employees the opportunity to help with anything from shoe recycling efforts to tree replanting events. Applying the principles of central organization individual initiatives developed into events, with specific times, dates, and locations posted in advance to make time management easy for those signing up. It’s important to let volunteers support activities that fit their outlook. Employees of Adaptive Marketing can select from many volunteer programs. You’ll find there’s so much to be done, after all; taking part in the entertainment and education of young adults, lending a hand to environmental activities, or supporting local theater to list just a few that have already been tried. The result is that Adaptive Marketing volunteers are presented with the opportunity to explore useful avenues in volunteer work and love getting involved.

Usually a company-supported volunteer project — getting involved with a local school or assisting at a homeless shelter — is done either as a one-off event or on a regular schedule to accomplish a bigger goal. Staffers may well say they don’t have the free time, though one would be surprised if they seriously cannot free up the hours to lend a hand with one instalment of a long-term project.

It has always been a fairly common practice for businesses to assist the community which they serve. The good worksefforts of the staff at businesses like Adaptive Marketing create valuable good feeling around their home base. Helping around your home town leaves you feeling like a better person — which is just the sort of feeling to motivate members of staff both in their volunteer work and back behind their desks, too.

President Bush’s portentous phrase intoned this summer past may turn out to be an iconic pain in the *** as it becomes increasingly clear what the potential time-scales, costs and difficulties of withdrawal for America and its allies could be. The difficulties are political, military, economic,
logistic and diplomatic. Politically, they must leave behind a government with support from all the major factions in the country. Militarily, they must leave behind military and policing forces capable of dealing effectively with the threat of native rogue militia and imported Islamic terrorists.

Economically, they must leave behind a country whose infrastructure has been restored as
efficiently and effectively as it was destroyed.
Logistically, they have the ongoing headache of refreshing troop strength and maintaining military
supplies lines in the face of ongoing insurgency while gradually peeling back from the frontline to
allow Iraqi forces to take their place yet still ‘hand hold’ where necessary and respond effectively
to serious incidents. Finally, diplomatically, they have the burden of convincing the rest of the
world they are doing the right thing and keeping allies on board in face of very direct threats to the
lives of their citizens.

The apparent lack of a detailed withdrawal plan over and above the phrase quoted above is
worrying for Americans, worrying for their allies, worrying for the Iraqis and probably worrying the
Bush administration as well. The recent swell in pro-withdrawal support and reports of poor troop
morale do not augur well for an administration which wants to end on a high note. More
concerning is the seeming lack of contingency planning. What if it is not possible to stand down?
What of Iran? What if Saturday’s vote on the constitution proves to be an exercise in non-
participation or even rejection by the Sunni, raising the possibility of civil war?

Equally confusing is the British response. Prime Minister Tony Blair told the Iraqi President British
troops will stay “as long as he wants them” and Britain will not be intimidated by Iran. While
Foreign Secretary Jack Straw argued against setting a date for withdrawal yet stated that he
hoped the troops’ task would be completed “within a very limited number of years”. He also ruled
out as “inconceivable” military action against Iran. Also, while it is unlikely that Britain would
withdraw unilaterally, the same cannot be said for other allies who can, have and probably will do
so again.

One suspects all parties of playing a game of ’suck it and see’ and, in particular, that Bush and
Blair are hoping for a soft center.

Finally, above everything, Vietnam, that grim ghost of America’s Christmas Past, reaches out to
choke the life out of any meaningful internal political dialogue or foreign diplomatic effort -
especially since Vietnam saw precisely the kind of long drawn out struggle being predicted by the
pessimists followed by an equal and embarrassingly swift, politically destructive withdrawal.

The conclusion is not yet.

While I’m conservative on many issues, when it comes to healthcare I’m a little more moderate. I have a social conscience and believe better healthcare coverage is needed for the thirty to forty million Americans who are without healthcare in this country. I take a middle of the road approach to healthcare. I disagree with both the Democrats and Republicans when it comes to healthcare.

On one side of the issue are the Republicans who are against the type of comprehensive healthcare found in Canada. The Republicans argue that having a comprehensive healthcare system like Canada would cost too much and raise taxes through the roof. They also argue that a comprehensive healthcare system is hard to administer and would be inefficient.

On the other side of the issue are the Democrats who argue that it should be a right to have healthcare and that a caring society takes care of its citizens. They argue that it’s horrible to have so many Americans who don’t have insurance coverage. They also argue that children are the innocent victims in the current healthcare climate.

The Republicans are correct when they say that a comprehensive healthcare system is expensive and would greatly increase taxes. That’s why I disagree with a comprehensive system but I’ll discuss this later. The Republicans fail to realize that no child or adult is refused healthcare in Canada. Canadians are also allowed to get preventative care. The preventative care for health issues like early liver disease are treated immediately and people don’t have to wait until they’re near death to recieve emergency care. A condition that is left untreated could turn into a serious problem later.

I agree with the Democrats that a caring society should take care of its citizens. Children and adults without healthcare should be taken care of. I know too well the feeling of being laid off and being without healthcare. Yes we have COBRA available to us but it can cost anywhere from 500 to 1000 dollars per month. Who can afford that. In Minnesota where I live, if a person goes a certain period without healthcare insurance they become uninsurable. This is nonsense. Something must be done.

I advocate for an expanded healthcare system. The Government should provide basic insurance for those people who don’t have medical insurance. The majority of Americans have healthcare and I believe that corporate America would continue to provide healthcare insurance for their employees if the Government were to provide basic healthcare to people who don’t have medical insurance. The reason is that companies would want to attract talented employees. They would use their benefits to lure employees to their companies.

The federal government needs needs to provide coverage for those Americans who are laid off and are without insurance. It’s an unfair system when a person who is laid off (at no fault of their own) is left without healthcare coverage for themselves or their children. This is a heartless system. Why should the innocent children suffer? Expanding healthcare to these people is fair and just. The cost of expanding the system wouldn’t be nearly as expensive as a comprehensive system and America can afford this coverage.

Another solution to making the healthcare system better is to create legislation to prevent frivolous lawsuits. Something needs to be done to limit the amount of lawsuits and the crazy monetary awards that are being paid out to settle these claims. While doctors and healthcare providers should be held accountable for their mistakes, the monetary awards are burdening the system. The monetary awards are excessive and needless. If there was legislation to curtail the current trend of suing healthcare providers and receiving excessive monetary awards, healthcare would be more affordable and our rates wouldn’t continue to increase as much. I worked in the healthcare field and the amount of frivolous lawsuits and excessive monetary settlements are mind boggling. I also believe that people who bring about frivolous lawsuits should have to pay for all the legal costs of the people they’re suing and be made to pay punitive damages.

If the federal government were to create an expanded helthcare system and reduce the frivolous lawsuits and excessive settlements, the healthcare system would be better, more fair and would take care of those people who don’t have healthcare.

UPDATE ( June 9th, 2005 ruling by Supreme Court of Canada): “The Supreme Court on Thursday struck down a Quebec law banning private medical insurance in a decision that represents an acute blow to the publicly financed national health care system” (NYT.com, June 10th). In its ruling, The Supreme Court of Canada remarked that waiting lists for health services have become so long that they violated Quebec’s Charter of human Rights (NYT.com).

The court also mentioned that there is evidence that patients die or have died as a result of waiting for services (NYT.com)
Many Canadians argue that patients may wait for long periods of time to receive services but that life threatening health problems are taken care of. The court’s comments seem to contradict that type of argument.
It is expected that their will be lawsuits against other provinces which ban private billing of health services.

According to the New York Times article, Canada is the only industrialized nation that “outlaws privately financed purchases of core medical services” (NYT.com).

Anthony B. is the founder and owner of ItsTheRightWay.com a news, political and sports commentary website.

Anthony has over 7 years of experience as a business professional

It has always seemed that there’s been a conflict between reformers and revolutionaries. The former relatively being described as those who want to patch up and repair the parts of the current system that cause so much misery. The latter relatively being described as those who want to completely overturn the social system in favor of a different system, one much more applicable to the wants and desires of human society. The chief aim of both has been thus: to change the current order of society insomuch that the lives of people (and animals, perhaps) are considerably improved. Both the reformer and the revolutionary are motivated by the same cause; they are plants to the same fertilizer. Their aim is to improve the lot of mankind — to change those faults which have become inherent parts of life.

One of the most common assaults made against the reformer by the revolutionary is this: by reforming the system, by making small changes, my patching up small parts of the system, we are doing nothing but making the system more livable, making the people more tolerant of the status quo. For example, during the French Revolution, the efforts of all reformers (if there were any) were completely ineffective. Nothing was patched up. Nothing was changed. The commonplace misery of the greater 95% of the population, caused by the social relationships, was enough to motivate the mass of people to revolt and overthrow their government. It was their misery, their pain, the suffering they had endured, that made them in to revolutionaries. Reformers, the revolutionary intellectual argues, prevent that misery from existing, and thus, they prevent revolutionary tendencies from taking place. For example, reformers in the United States have created a Minimum Wage law, have sustained fair working conditions in manufacturing plants, have created unemployment payments, have erected numerous public works programs — all things that have alleviated the miseries of the working class in the United States. If none of these things had been put in to place, if none of these reforms were given acceptance by the government, then the working class would be pretty pissed off — they would become revolutionaries from the 16 to 20 hour working days, the repression of the will of the workers, the massive amounts of poverty and unemployment, etc., etc.. If the conditions in the United States were worsened, then working proletariat would be so moved as to revolt against the class system, and they would create a genuinely Libertarian Communist social order.

At least, that is the argument presented by those people wearing the title “Revolutionary.” I think an example or two is sufficient to prove them wrong. Consider again, the French Revolution. The misery and poverty of the working class instigated them to overthrowing the ruling class. However, what was the result? Did they erect this genuniely Libertarian, Anarcho-Communist-Syndicalist social order? Did they create a society free of censorship, free of repression, free of sexism, free of racism, free of exploitive social relationships? No, they did not. What was enacted was the Jacobin philosophy, that of a Federated Republican government. That is to say, what they created upon the eve of revolution, was a system of government that the reformers had been aiming to create. If we took away the hard-earned rights that labor has earned in the United States (minimum wage, overtime pay, etc.), if we took all of those away, and a revolution were to take place because fo that, I think it’s pretty obvious what kind of government the revolutionaries would set up. They would create a government that wasn’t much different than the previous one, the primary differences being a fair minimum wage law, overtime pay, non-hazardous work conditions, etc., etc..

I think the essential message here is that revolution alone does convince people of the arguments of Anarchism, Socialism, Communism, etc., etc.. That is to say, the arguments of those who want to radically reorganize society so that human misery and want nearly disappear completely. That does not mean that revolution itself is a completely useless tool, without any relation to the class struggles that take place everyday in modern society. In fact, what use is revolutionary activity? Does it have any valuable, useful aspects to it? I suppose I am of the opinion, “No Peace Without Justice.” I cannot see justice, in a people laying down, to make it easier for their oppressors to steal their labor and destroy their culture. Not only is such an idea devoid of justice, but it is equally devoid of sense and common reasoning. Let’s take some examples… The French Resistance to the Nazi invasion of France; did these underground revolutionaries (”terrorists”) help to better serve their purpose? Were they wrong for secretly building bombs to be used in destroying fortifications of the Third Reich? I don’t think of any person would disagree to this argument, excepting maybe Gandhi.

Consider a more modern argument. Consider American and European revolutionaries today, “urban guerillas,” etc., etc.. It was an Anarchist who shot President McKinley on his inauguration day, because of McKinley’s invasion Cuba and other islands in the area. It was the Anarchist Alexander Berkman who assasinated Frick, a Capitalist whose idea of “humaneness” was working in dangerous conditions for low and unfair pay. But then again, the way governments and corporations respond to such industrial sabotage and warfare, is usually with a repression of civil liberties. It does not make the enemy more sympathetic to the cause of these radicals. At least, not necessarily. There is a good chance that the activities of bombing McDonald’s and burning down Starbucks will catch the public eye, and make it a social issue. The tactic of bambing Starbucks, for example, might only have a monetary damage on a corporation that uses foreign slave labor for coffee beans, maybe $20,000 or $30,000. From the stand point of the urban guerilla, that is the point of the activity. But, this bombing puts corporate practices of Starbucks in to the spotlight of society. People will be forced to look at it and deal with it as an issue. A single bombing might very well have a greater spread of ideas and beliefs than a ten thousand printed and distributed pamphlets. Essentially, these urban guerillas would be satisfying the philosophy of Martin Luther King: by making an issue of the matter, people must recognize it and deal with it. King accomplished his goal by marching in the streets, being ripped to shreds by attack dogs of the police, beating beaten by cops in riot gear.

So, the first purpose of urban guerillas is economic damage. For preventing the corporate entity from gaining profits, that means the entire social structure breaks down. That means that no money will be funnelled to Vietnamese sweatshops so that children work 12 hours a day. That means no bribes are going to be made to the shifty governments of third world countrties. In an international Capitalist society where money is power, by inflicting economic damage on these creatures of doomsday, we are eliminating their power, their strength. That is to say, we are hindering their ability to exploit the citizens and workers of all countries. And, beyond that, to act as a current and standing threat to the corporations, to stand as the defender of internationally understood rights of the people. Corporate entities will be much more hesitant to engage in activities that bring with them a constant barrage of bombings, property defacement, etc., etc..

The second purpose, and perhaps the often unintended purpose, of revolutionary activity is to bring the issue to the spotlight, to make society look at these guerillas and understand their reasons. Sure, the great deal of conservative, right-wingers will argue that these men are deviants of the social order, an unintended consequence, probably spawned by mental illness and the inability to adaptate to society’s wants. The same was said of Martin Luther King, of the Communists and the Socialists and the Anarchists, of all people who wanted to improve society and make the lives of all much easier. In fact, sometimes this second purpose is the primary purpose. There are many Animal Liberation Front/A.L.F. cells (known as “terrorist organizations” to the government) which break in to testing laboratories with video cameras. Many of them obtain video tapes from the testing facility. These tapes are then mailed to the major news media outlets, and they are often played on national television; the public then is made aware of the cruelty that is inherent in animal testing and experimentation. Lewis Heine, the photographer of the early 1900’s, was capable of sneaking in to many factories and manufacturing plants, disguised as an official of the census bureau; upon gaining access, he would photograph the children laboring in machines, many of them physically deformed by the environment that they were working in. It was these photos that greatly aided the elimination of child labor from the United States and all European countries. (I’m quite curious as to why the government hasn’t ever labelled this man as a terrorist, despite the fact that his tactics are nearly identical to those of the A.L.F..) It was through the use of these tactics that the goals of these revolutionaries were accomplished, by forcing the public to acknowledge the issue.

So, then, in conclusion, what is the greatest way to advance the political ideology that you hold dear? What way is most effective in advancing Animal Liberation, in destroying the Corporate State, in establishing an Anarcho-Syndicalist Federation? Is it reform, that is to say, the peaceful and lawful changing of opinions, through pamphleteering, distribution of propaganda, etc., etc.? Or, is it revolution, that is to say, breaking the law as a means and method to accomplishing your goal? In the past, both tactics have managed to gain ground, to accomplish their goals. Harriet Tubman, Frederick Douglass, Martin Luther King, John Brown, every person who served in the revolutionary forces to accomplish and sustain the civil rights of all people — the term terrorist that is applied to A.L.F. and Anarcho-Syndicalist cells equally applies to these people. In some of the cases, their tactics were succesful in making the enemy weaker, so that the deathblow would be much more succinct and easy. The reformers, of which we can count Henry Stephens Salt, Percy Bysshe Shelley, Robert Green Ingersoll, among so many countless other names, were successful in some efforts and unsuccessful in others. To which road should we take? It is clear that I have taken the road of the reformer, to convince the minds of men and women of alternative theories of social order, that a collective effort can be willed into existence, to change our living conditions. Whether a person decides to take the road I have, or the road of the revolutionary, I do not think anything should be held against a person for their decision, unless it is clear that their actions simply inhibit the achieving of our goals.

http://www.punkerslut.com

For Life,

Punkerslut (or Andy Carloff) has been writing essays and poetry on social issues which have caught his attention for several years. His website http://www.punkerslut.com provides a complete list of all of these writings. His life experience includes homelessness, squating in New Orleans and LA, dropping out of high school, getting expelled from college for “subversive activities,” and a myriad of other revolutionary actions.

Prison guards and corrections professionals are hard at work insuring that suicides do not take place. They have special attire, suits, straps, rubber rooms and event blankets, which cannot be tied in knots. Those who are believed to be a risk of suicide are checked on every 15 minutes. But it is nearly impossible to completely prevent suicide.
The Suicide Prevention Resource Center (SPRC) supports suicide prevention with some science, skills and practice. If you want to learn more about this, here is the link.

http://www.sprc.org/aboutsprc/index.asp

If convicted of child molestation Michael Jackson is a potential risk; most suicides in jail occur in the first 24 hours. I propose that we use a special system for positive bio-feed back for at risk individuals. I propose; Whispering Windows For Prison Rehabilitation. The windows of the cell or mirror will whisper positive comments to the inmate.

Talking glass, which was featured recently in the famous Tom Cruise Movie “Minority Report” where advertising would spring to life and communicate with the actor; is not new science. In fact it has been around since the 1940’s and some believe that the ghost of Lincoln, which was discussed in the biographies of Richard Nixon as being in the White House when looking at his picture on the wall was Whispering Windows Technology. In other words unfortunately ghosts do not exist in the white house at all. These technologies where called “Terfonal Devices” and were developed by scientists at the University of Iowa and were primarily used to enhance sonar capabilities. Today you can buy a small personal device for your mirror at home to tell you that you look great or use the mirror as a speaker for your favorite music.

The talking glass advertisements to day use “magnetostriction,” that of course being a real fancy name for a hockey puck size transducer unit made of Terfonal-D alloy which is a blend of various rare alloys, which is attached to the flat surface via a small inconspicuous wire. This rapid shape changing attached transducer is then hooked up to an amplifier. This allows the glass to vibrate at up to 20,000 times per second producing sound.

What is interesting is that marketers of retail stores have found ways to hook this to counter tops, tales, windows, mannequins, shelves and even walls. The company which produces this is Entrema Products in Ames, IA;

http://www.etrema-usa.com

This is hardly a new science but it could be used for many other purposes as well. For instance we could hook this up to a heads up display unit and miniaturize it. It could be used for Heads Up Displays in attack helicopters, Racing, Private Jet Aircraft. It could be used to read your airspeed on landing in a corporate jet. It could be used on the space shuttle to read out altitude, speed, heat, angles on re-entry. It could be used on Docking Maneuvers of spacecraft boarding the ISS. It could be used for pilots landing on aircraft carriers. It could be incorporated into night vision systems, combat Army tanks, gun sites. We could use it for satellite controller ground stations. It would work for UAV tele-robotics. It would well in Virtual Reality Environments, Augmented Reality, or even video games where you turned your windows into elements of a 360-degree sound system. The possibilities are endless and the life saving possibilities for prison and faster rehabilitation without relapse from repeat offenders should be considered for the benefit of our civilization. Think about it.

“Lance Winslow” - Online Think Tank forum board. If you have innovative thoughts and unique perspectives, come think with Lance; www.WorldThinkTank.net/wttbbs/

The National Response Plan (NRP) established in December 2004 under the guidance of Secretary of Homeland Security Tom Ridge was designed, “To establish a comprehensive, national, all-hazards approach to domestic incident management across a spectrum of activities including prevention, preparedness, response, and recovery.” (NRP, 2) If one assesses the federal government’s response based on the NRP a clearer and more accurate picture of the efforts to deal with the Hurricane Katrina incident can be painted. The effectiveness of the NRP in accomplishing the four aforementioned goals of prevention, preparedness, response and recovery in the wake of hurricane Katrina as well as the federal government’s adherence to the NRP will be discussed herein.

Prevention & Preparedness-

Will Bunch made several negative assertions in his Philadelphia Daily News column Attytood on August 30, 2005 in an article entitled “When the Levee Breaks.” Bunch, along with many others nationwide, seems to feel that the federal government could have prevented the effects of a category five hurricane from being so disastrous; the federal government could have imposed their power over nature. He and others called for a shoring up of the levees around Lake Pontchartrain and named the federal government as the party responsible for doing so, not the local or state governments. Bunch and others claim that the Bush administration cut spending on the SELA project that was designed to help improve flood control in the Southeast Louisiana area, redirecting funds to homeland security and the war in Iraq. It is important to note that not one successful terrorist attack on the United States has taken place since the inception of the Department of Homeland Security which to me indicates that there has been some money well spent on this endeavor. With regard to the war in Iraq, there was overwhelming support from both the Senate and the House of Representatives on October 11, 2002 when the vote was made to authorize a use of force, in fact both senators Breaux and Landrieu of Louisiana voted in favor of the resolution to authorize the use of force. One must also consider the fact that funding to the SELA project was only cut starting in 2003, just two years short of the intended stop date of project funding. What this means is that after eight years of funding the SELA project the levees were still in such bad shape that they did not withstand the force of Hurricane Katrina. What this also means is that critics like Bunch feel that just two more years of federal support for the SELA project would have been enough to prevent the effects of a category five hurricane, even though the levees were reportedly sinking at a rate of four feet annually in some of the worst spots along the line. Lastly, this means that the state and local governments of Louisiana refused to pick up just two years of expenses funding the SELA project at the risk of offending their constituents with higher taxes. Why did the local and state governments not assume the responsibility of shoring up the levees if it was known how serious the situation was in advance as critics say the federal government knew?

There are two more things that should be considered when discussing prevention and preparedness with regard to the Hurricane Katrina incident. CNN, one of the biggest critics so far of the federal government’s response to the Hurricane Katrina Incident, reported on August 29, 2005 that, “About 70 percent of New Orleans is below sea level, and is protected from the Mississippi River by a series of levees.” The article went on to state that, “Forecasters predicted the storm surge could reach 28 feet; the highest levees around New Orleans are 18 feet high.” Considering these reports one must conclude that the levees protecting New Orleans would have had to be raised at least ten (10) feet in all areas (more in some areas) to withstand the surge of the storm. This strikes me as a very unachievable project to attempt within two years, especially with the reported rate of settlement (sinking rate) by members of the Army Corps of Engineers in the year prior to the incident.

One should also consider that on Sunday, August 28, New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin declared a state of emergency and ordered a mandatory evacuation of the city. Those that chose to stay behind did so knowing the risk. In the Center for Disease Control’s list of Key Facts About Hurricane Readiness they say, “Because of the destructive power of a hurricane, you should never ignore an evacuation order. Authorities will be most likely to direct you to leave if you are in a low-lying area, or within the greatest potential path of the storm.” Remembering that 70 percent of New Orleans is below sea level and heeding the warnings of the mayor and other government agencies would have led most wise people to follow evacuation orders and leave the city and surrounding areas. The people who stayed are now criticizing the federal government for a slow response to the disaster in a way that indicates ignorance of the fact that they [the residents that stayed] themselves were very slow to respond to the orders for evacuation. With approximately twenty-four (24) hours notice given to residents to evacuate it is difficult to sympathize with those that did not listen to the orders unless there was a physical or mental impairment that prevented them from complying.

Response-

Hurricane Katrina could very easily fall into three different incident annexes when attempting to classify the incident. The hurricane could be classified as a catastrophic incident due to the destruction that was caused by the incident. The amount of displaced people, structural damage and environmental and commercial impacts could certainly lead one to the conclusion that this was a catastrophic incident. The hurricane could also fall under the category of Food and Agricultural Incident as it was a, “major disaster, or other emergency involving the Nation’s agriculture and food systems.” (NRP, 2) Larry Neumeister of the Associated Press reported Hurricane Katrina’s damage to agriculture in the Gulf states as having topped three billion dollars as of September 14. The last incident annex that hurricane Katrina could fall under is the Oil and Hazardous Materials Incident Annex due to the fact that it is a “nationally significant oil and hazardous materials pollution incident.” (NRP, 2) There are different support plans and operational procedures associated with each incident index. The difficulty in classifying Katrina could have led to some confusion when attempting to apply a plan that had only been fully in place for ten (10) months prior to such a catastrophic incident. The application of varying incident plans could cause the insufficient or inappropriate allocation of resources as well as problems within the chain of command. It was very important for the federal government to evaluate the incident thoroughly before managing it ineffectively. Unfortunately this can, and in fact did, take time. As most members of the first responder community are aware, it does not do much good to rush into an incident and cause undue harm or damage to responders and resources when there are already so many people suffering from the incident; it does not help to send responders in (national guard, fire department, police, FEMA, etc.) if the incident will cause the loss of their lives too. The federal government made a calculated judgment when responding to Hurricane Katrina, which was necessary to preserve the safety of responders.

Recovery-

C-130’s are in the air, troops, experts, volunteers and NGO’s are on the ground and the recovery effort is on its way. Critics still claim that the process is taking too long but one must think back to what was stated earlier about response. The health and welfare of responders must be taken into account when implementing recovery efforts. Responders are being sent in with the task of saving lives and property, not with the task of ending their own life. This is, and will be, a slow process while dangers still exist and the situation evolves. The stability of structures, pathogen hazards and environmental hazards, as well as the fact that we are still in hurricane season and could possibly face more meteorological problems before the recovery process is concluded all must be considered. Removing national guardsmen from their families and places of employment, mobilizing volunteers and NGO’s and allocating billions of dollars in financial aid is a process that should not happen overnight. Approximately two thirds of the people polled recently in a variety of different polls feel that response and relief efforts have been too slow. I would venture a guess that at least two thirds of the population of the U.S. have never seen or heard of the NRP and have no experience with working in emergency situations. I would also venture a guess that more than ninety-nine (99) percent of the U.S. population has never experienced the effects of anything greater than a category three hurricane, especially since only three category five hurricanes have made landfall in the U.S. since the hurricane rating system was developed. All of the Monday morning quarterbacks that are criticizing the efforts should try and focus on the positives and recognize that efforts to improve conditions are being made after an incident that is unimaginable to the majority of us.

Conclusion-

The burden of responsibilities for efforts in preventing and preparing for Hurricane Katrina should have been the burden of local and state governments in Louisiana and other affected areas. The federal government did recognize that there was a problem with the levees prior to Hurricane Katrina and made efforts to improve the levees and assist the local and state governments with funding. Any monies that were diverted from the SELA assistance plan were done so immediately before the planned conclusion of the SELA plan and in most cases were diverted for programs and endeavors necessary for the betterment and security of the United States as a whole. The response and recovery efforts in the Hurricane Katrina incident have been slow but very calculated. The slow, calculated efforts are necessary for the preservation of responder safety and welfare. Individuals must be held accountable for their own safety and cannot expect the federal government to make all decisions for them. If a person is told to evacuate and chooses to stay, then they must be willing to accept the conditions that lay ahead of them and are not in a position to complain about response time. The federal government is fulfilling its responsibilities in accordance with the predetermined guidelines established in the NRP and should be applauded for its efforts thus far.

Ryan Murphy
yannnik@aol.com

Mr. Murphy is a teacher of U.S. History and Government on Long Island. He is a member of the United States Capitol and Supreme Court Historical Societies, as well as a member of the National Council for the Social Studies and the American Historical Association. He was a participant at the State Department’s Foreign Policy Teacher’s Forum in 2005.

Mr. Murphy is also a firefighter on Long Island and a past-Chairman of Fire Prevention, recognized by Suffolk County Fire Educators Association as an outstanding Fire and Life Safety Educator. He has also recived numerous FEMA certifications during his tenure in the fire service.

The second amendment to the U.S. Constitution guarantees every American the right to bear arms. Has any law ever been so ambiguous? What are arms? What does it mean to bear them? At least with the first amendment we know exactly where we stand: Freedom of speech. It couldn’t be any clearer. But, the right to bear arms leaves the second amendment open to different interpretations. We need gun permits to carry a concealed weapon. Do we need knife permits? No. Yet both can, and often do, cause death. We can own a gun, or a rifle, or a sub-machine gun, or a machete, and dozens of other tools to kill, even our own bare hands. So, gun control is a debate in our country that makes no sense unless you broaden the ban or acceptance to include all instruments of death.

According to Population Stats, www.xist.com, America has the highest crime rate in the world. Everyday 30 people in the United States are murdered by a gunshot. That means 11,000 people. However, there are more than 25,000 murders each year in the United States. In other industrialized countries, Germany has 381 each year, France 255, Great Britain 68, Australia 65, and Japan 39. Based on population to make it a fair assessment, it turns out to be guns in America murder 1 out of 25,916 people every year. Compared to Canada where the amount is 1 out of 190,387, and 1 out of 864,546 in Great Britain, and only 1 out of 3,254,508 in Japan, America is the killing field of the world.

Gun expert Robert J. Spitzer, political science professor at SUNY Cortland and author of the book The Politics of Gun Control points to America’s ‘mixed ethnicity.’ “Our diverse cultural background, composed of many different ethnic, religious, social, and other groups leads to inter-group rivalries, suspicion, hatred, fear, and sometimes violence,’ Professor Spitzer said. “Most other Western nations, by comparison, are more homogeneous than the U.S.”

Which brings us back to the thesis that America does not need a gun control law; it needs a crime control law.

The number one concern in America today is safety: Safety from terrorists, safety from drugs and violent drug dealers, safety from gangs, and safety from those whose evil ways affect our lives and our children’s lives everyday. However, we have no safety of which to speak. Our police departments are as overwhelmed by the size of the enemy as are our troops in Iraq. Without safety, we are prisoners of our own society. Safety and security are more important than any other issue, for, without it, we cease to live. We merely exist. We must first feel safe, and be safe, before we can think about curing our other ills. With 14,000 of the homicides each year being committed without guns (11,000 with), we must look at the bigger picture.

We must build more maximum-security prisons. Enough so that everyone convicted of first-degree homicide, or of a felony three times, is sent there for the rest of their life, without any chance of parole. (There is no reason to spend millions of dollars on each death row prisoner’s appeals that last ten years or longer when it has been proven not to be a deterrent and when housing them is substantially much less expensive.)

Within a federal partnership with select American manufacturing companies, these companies for the work they would be required to do would pay these prisoners minimum wage. The product they create would then be infused into mainstream American commerce. In return for these jobs, the prisoners would pay the government for their room and board, and any security, medical, and utility fees. If the prisoner has any dependents, their paycheck would reflect that deduction. Cut off from society, these prisons would be a society of their own. Away from us forever.

Crime control, rather than a gun control, is a stricter and more effective deterrent than the failed alternatives. It would not just deter murder with guns, it would deter murder with any type of weapon, as well as rape, aggravated assault - ALL felonies. It would reduce crime and get these criminals off America’s streets once and for all, saving the American taxpayer substantially in law enforcement: Money that will instead be used to build and staff these new prisons. Our safety is what we have to take care of - what we must take care of - before we do anything else. We owe it to our children.

We teach our children to have pride in America. We teach our children safety first. We teach our children about good and evil, right versus wrong. What must our children be thinking when they see murder after murder on the news, and walking the streets with the fear of a drive by shooting, or of being abducted? We are raising a society born of fear and mistrust. This is why we need a stricter crime bill. This is why we must - we have no other choice - take back our country from these criminals.

Yes, Americans should be able to have handguns in their home for protection, as long as it is responsibly locked up and away from children. Yes, Americans should be able to have rifles to hunt for food. However, these are still weapons of destruction and they must be registered with personal background checks. There is absolutely no need or reason for any person, other than law enforcement and the military to have assault weapons that are aimed to violently kill masses of people. We must compromise through common sense. We must understand and follow the true intent of our forefathers when they penned the second amendment to the Constitution.

All it takes is the determination, the moral strength of our elected representatives, to enact tougher laws, so we can finally take back our country and make it a safe haven once again for every American man, woman, and child.

Bruce Schwartz is a lifelong political activist. THE TWENTY-FIRST CENTURY, his novel on politics today, discusses this subject as well as others that affect every American. It is on sale oon the Web at http://www.thetwentyfirstcentury.com and at http://www.amazon.com. All of the author’s royalties is being donated to the Alzheimer’s Association.

Cancer of the mesothelium is a rare cancer of the tissues that line the person’s inside organs. Almost two thousand brand new cases are diagnosed every year in the whole United States. From these, around75 percent of cases affect the sac that protects the lungs, referred to as the pleura. Also known as pleural mesothelioma. In about 10 to twenty percent of cases, mesothelioma could concern the tissue that encloses abdominal organs, called the peritoneal membrane, resulting in what is then acknowledged as peritoneal mesothelioma.

Being exposed to asbestos is absolutely the primary influencing factor for this rare sickness. Following asbestos exposure, the time period to development of the mesothelioma disease may be 20 to 40 years. Due to occupational introduction, cancer of the mesothelium is around three times more likely in males, than in women. Because the mass of occurrences moves upward with age, there are almost ten times more instances in the males more than age 64 than in the males in their thirties.

Developing Mesothelioma is a serious cancer, which, at the current time, has a very bad rate of overall endurance. On the other hand, if it is recognized quickly, regimens are then obtainable that will significantly extend the patient’s life. All new approaches continue to be and are being developed by the way of clinical trials.

I’ve written on the importance of listening to George Bush carefully in the past and have been attacked for doubting his “veracity”, “truthfulness”, and “his way of speaking”.

O.K.

Let’s try an experiment. Yesterday, February 21, 2005, he had this to say about the port deal with the United Arab Emirates:

“I can understand why some in Congress have raised questions about whether or not our country will be less secure as a result of this transaction. But they need to know that our government has looked at this issue and looked at it carefully… Again, I repeat, it’s - if there is any question as to whether or not this country would be less safe as a result of the transaction, it wouldn’t go forward.”

Reading that should make clear why he referred to his 2004 “victory” as a “mandate” and his reference to millions of protesters against the Iraq war as “some people” and “focus groups”.

First, he refers to “some in Congress”. “Some”?

Question, is he: 1) blissfully unaware of the Congressional (and State) reactions; 2) delusional; or is he 3) intentionally “misleading” that portion of the public that doesn’t follow the news but for the times when he speaks (a surprisingly large group for a people supposedly in love with independence).

Second, he refers to the “some” as “raising questions”. The line formed to squash this deal on both sides of the aisle is puzzlingly unnerving even to those whose deepest desire is to see bipartisanship return to Washington.

Third, when he says, “… they need to know that our government has looked at this issue and looked at it carefully.”

Really?

How, pray tell, would he know that at the time of making that statement. According to today’s press reports, he didn’t know about it until he heard it from the press. To further cast doubt on “our government” looking at this carefully consider the following response by Scott McClellan:

“He became aware of it over the last several days,” McClellan said. Asked if Bush did not know about it until it was a done deal, McClellan said, “That’s correct.”

So what part of the “government” is George Bush talking about?

He does say, “our government” and, the last time I checked, we still had 3 branches although two have been trimmed to the point of being nubs that may never sprout leaves or bear fruit again.

We know that Congress wasn’t informed and that his spokespeople claim he didn’t know about it until after the “filter” of the press informed him. Maybe Justices Scalia, Thomas, Roberts, and Alito were informed.

To his credit, he did clarify his statement:

“The more people learn about the transaction that has been scrutinized and approved by my government, the more they’ll be comforted…”

As Marty Kaplan points out on the Huffington Post, “The founding documents of our nation talk about the government, our government, a government, any government. If my,is used, it’s said on behalf of the citizens, not their rulers. “

P.S. the Katrina Review made by the Administration came out. It calls for direct military control in the event of a “natural disaster”. Homeland security adviser, Frances Fragos Townsend, when asked if this would violate the Posse Comitatus law and would it require new legislation responded that George Bush had been advised by his (presumably) legal staff that he already had the power to do what was recommended in the report.

So, in conclusion, FISA doesn’t apply to this White House, those pesky quaint Geneva Conventions (or just basic prohibitions against torture) didn’t, and don’t, apply to this White House, the recently overwhelmingly passed anti- torture legislation doesn’t apply to this White House, informing Congress that we’re giving the contracts for running our thus- far- still- unsecured ports to a foreign government with a questionable recent history of transferring money to terrorist groups and being the conduit for nuclear information and/or material to countries in the “axis of evil” doesn’t apply to this White House, and the general rule on submitting to a police interview after shooting a guy in the face don’t apply to this White House, etc.

It must be nice to have one of ‘em “my guvmunt” things.