Obama and Clinton 2008 ?

Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama appeared together in Unity, New Hampshire today in and effort to mend fences and to display that there is unity in the Party. It was a very polished and well coordinated appearance with all the right imagery and words being spoken. There was a somewhat self-depreciating Hillary and a gracious Barack standing together and working the mostly bussed in crowd. To the cynic it may have all appeared to be just a little too rehearsed and contrived but I believe that we may have just witnessed a new turn in this election.

Obama is still looking for a running mate and today may have very well have been a dress rehearsal for Clinton. They looked good together. The crowd liked them together. They said the right things together. Barack looked and sounded presidential. Hillary spoke glowingly of his strengths and she attacked McCain. She looked and sounded like a running mate. 

Several weeks ago I would have said that Obama would be crazy to have her as a running mate but after today I'm not so sure of that. Obama needs the 18 million people that supported Clinton to vote for him. Right now he only has 6 out 10 of her supporters in his camp. He needs her access to old Democratic money as much as she needs his help paying off her debts. Lets face it Bill Clinton is a great campaigner. The Clinton's can bring in lots of voters that may otherwise stay home in November. Yes, Bill Clinton comes with some baggage but we already know about it and for the most part never cared that much about it. We did vote him in twice. I also believe that Bill will not get in the way after the election either. He could continue to be the elder statesman of the party and a general goodwill ambassador, a role he is already playing.

What will Barack Obama do? I don't know but if today was a rehearsal for Hillary she aced it.  

Diabetes and Me

I was watching the news this evening and one of the topics was the prevalence of diabetes in the USA. There are now 25 million Americans that already have it or are at risk. I too have diabetes. I was diagnosed in 2000 and started taking oral medication. I worked at doing the right things but believe me it is not easy. I blamed my job and the difficult hours. I blamed the fact that I was working mostly nights and my wife was on days. I blamed everything under the sun for what was happening to me. It didn't help and in 2006 I started taking insulin.
I was depressed and felt like a total failure. My doctor told me that it was not a failure and that for some people the medications and carbohydrate counting just didn't help. He told me that in some ways it was freeing. It meant that I could eat that cake and ice cream every now and then without the damage that it would do to my blood sugars. He told me that if I was good and worked hard I would not have the large swings in blood sugar that I had been experiencing.
It was still several months before I started to feel better about myself and start to understand how the insulin worked with my body. I'm still not as compliant as I could be but I have brought down my A1C from 8.8 to 7.2. I know, not good but better and I have been at 6.8 on my A1c once so I can do it again and get it even lower. Now that I'm retired from my 911 job I have more time to walk and plan meals. Hell, I may even really try to lose some weight.

Walking the Dogs

I was walking the dogs last Saturday at Ann Morrison Park. Tee Tucker and Harriet love it because of all the smells and the river. Tucker was the first one in the river and she had a great time splashing and running. Tucker is the only dog I have ever seen that really can't swim. She dog paddles for all she is worth but when she can no longer feel her feet on the bottom she gets scared. She then starts to sink and all you can see is her nose sticking out of the water. 

Harriet is a good swimmer but she is a real chicken. Every little thing scares her. So she is very tentative at first. But once she is going she gets braver and braver. She will actually get up on the bank and jump in, something that Tee Tucker will not do. Since the river is so fast moving and deep towards the center I don't let them off their leashes. I have two 24 foot reel type leashes and they are always on them. Unlike other dog owners I don't let my dogs free-range nor do I believe that everybody loves my dogs just because I do. 

I have taken them to the fenced dog park and have let them off their leashes there but I would never do it any place else. I know that people let their dogs off leash on the trails in the foothills but I believe that is a recipe for disaster. The chances of a two dogs fighting or scaring a person or child that is scared of dogs anyway is just too great. Even if the person likes dogs not everybody wants to be jumped on or licked either. You may know how your dog will react to another dog but do you know what the other person's dog will do, of course you don't so why would you take the risk with an animal you claim to care for. 

Fireworks

The dogs and I were watching the news at noon today when there was a series of loud bangs from fireworks somewhere in the neighborhood. Tee Tucker went crazy. She was bouncing around and barking wildly in all directions at once. Harriet curled up into a small ball and laid beside me and shivered so hard you could have mixed paint. The reports from the fireworks were over in less than 5 minutes but it took the dogs over a half hour to calm down.
I'm not sure just what the attraction is with setting off fireworks that just make noise. I understand and enjoy the large aerial displays that happen at New Years, the 4th of July and at some sporting events. I just don't see the allure of the noise makers that are sold as "Safe and Sane" for the 4th of July from stands all through the area and of course the bottle rockets, sky rockets, roman candles and the M80's M90's and M100's . They start fires and cause no end of trouble in the neighborhood for the residents and the police. They have also made the last two Independence Days a pure hell for my two dogs.
I know that all the fireworks sold here are to be of the "Safe and Sane" variety and that if you buy the other kind in Canyon County you sign a paper saying that you will not set them off in areas that are prohibited. Well guess what, that doesn't work, never has never will. The police almost always take the calls of illegal fireworks as area information and then go look for more fulfilling police work. The fire departments don't have enough personnel to stop it all and frankly they don't try any harder than the police.
The only way this will end is for the rest of us to put a stop to it. We need to educate people about the damage that is done by all fireworks. We need to make the politicians change the laws to stop the sale of illegal fireworks anywhere in the state. We need to make the possession of them illegal. We need to demand that the police act on the calls they get and not just blow them off. We need to find other ways to celebrate the 4th other than with thousands of small explosions for days on end. We need more parades, more discussion of the history and a community sponsored aerial display rather than the village idiots playing with bottle rockets.

Gas Prices and What To Do

Gas is now $4.07 a gallon for regular at most of the Chevron stations in Boise. Not as high as in some areas but a record for Boise. I retired at the start of this month and had hoped to do some traveling. In fact I had wanted to get a travel trailer and do some serious touring. Not sure that will happen now. Oh, I will travel but the trips will be shorter and very targeted. I will not be getting a trailer anytime soon either. I know that the prices are not set by the individual stations but it is hard to rage against a corporation that you can't talk to. Talking to the politicians doesn't help. They are all about protecting the big corporations. No, all we can do it tighten our belts and hope we can get by.
I know that is just a little pessimistic. So we should let Congress know that we want the big oil companies to use this windfall money to find a solution for this energy problem. Better batteries for electric cars. More wind and solar power. Hydrogen engines and hydrogen refueling stations. More fuel efficient cars not just smaller cars. Public transportation for all cities not just the largest metropolitan areas. More trains both for freight and passenger service. We need more ride sharing and flexible working hours. More working at home instead of traveling to an office.
There are also some less obvious things we can do. How about growing a vegetable garden. Reading a book rather than watching TV. Turning off and even unplugging appliances and other electronic equipment in your home. Replacing light bulbs with more efficient ones. Recycling. How about just walking and using the stairs. Riding a bicycle to work even one day a week. Using a scooter instead of your car. Yes, lets tighten our belts and do something to make a difference and for once have our voices heard and felt by both the big corporations and the government.

What Now

So Obama has won the nomination for the Democratic Party, now what. I have been watching the coverage on the CNN and MSNBC and the pundits are having a field day or a feeding frenzy. They are wildly speculating and ruminating on just about everything. It doesn't matter that Obama has not even had time to think about what's next or that most of them have never even meet Hilliary Clinton. They all either know what they are think or they know just what they need to do next. Is it just me or is the media the real driving force in politics in America.
It was 4 years ago that the media declared that Hilliary was the Democratic front runner, even though she had yet to say she was running. Then when Obama appeared on the scene they immediately started speculating on whether or not he would run, again even though he had said he was not running because he had no real experience. No matter where Obama went they were there asking if he had decided to run. Remember Rudy Giuliani, that's right the media made him the front runner at least 18 months before the first voting even happened.
When did the media stop reporting the news and start making or shaping the news. I believe that there needs to be more reporters and less pundits and analysts. There should be more "News Hour's" and fewer "Hardball's". More debates and fewer interviews. Lets have an election and not a media event.

Retired

Last night was my last night at work. In fact I only stayed 4 hours and then went home. My co-workers gave me a really nice party and an unexpected but very nice gift. Several of the firemen came down and Rob and Carter were there too. It was just nice. The last call I took was a straightforward "I just don't feel well" call. I sure wish I could remember what the very first call I took was.
There are lots of things that I will not miss about being an emergency call taker. Callers that have no idea where they are but you had better hurry. Neighbors complaining about neighbors. Mothers that hold their screaming children while talking to 911. Cell phones, if your a 911 operator you know what I mean. I will miss the people. I have worked with some really great people over the years both in the room and in the field. I will miss each and everyone of them.
I knew it was time to hang it up several months ago as I started to more and more lose my sense of humor and perspective about the job. So I knew I was fast approaching my "Monty Python" moment. And so "Now for something completely different".

A Little More Politics

The Democratic primary season will just not end. There is no easily apparent way that Clinton can win but Obama lacks the killer instinct to close the deal. So we are made to watch as Clinton shows what a poor loser she is and Obama flounders around showing that he really isn't the winner we thought he is. In the end Obama will win but he may be so damaged that McCain will win by default.
The vote in West Virginia shows that Obama is not universally liked within the party. It really does show that his appeal is within a segment of the electorate and that he lacks the broad appeal that it will take to win in the Fall. I believe that Clinton's appeal is that she is willing to talk about specific plans and policies and Obama is still talking about changing the nature of politics at the presidential level. The country right now is hurting on several levels due to the economy and we need to hear about plans that will help us now.
That is not to say that the nature of politics in Washington doesn't need to change. The Bush presidency has really polarized the national discussion on policies of the government. Bush has made policy by buzzword and fear. If we are to regain our standing in the World we need to have open discussions about what we are doing and why without demonizing those who speak out against the administration. That is what Obama wants to do and believe me it is needed and the sooner the better. But Obama needs to win first and do so in a way that shows he is a leader and that he really wants to be president. He needs to campaign and win in the remaining contests and win big. He needs to show us he is president and why Clinton would be not be the president that she tells she wants to be.

A Sad Anniversary

Today was the 5th Anniversary of the "Mission Accomplished" speech on the aircraft carrier deck. I know that we Americans like our wars to be short and decisive and so Bush's desire to declare the end is understandable but he should have checked to make sure that we had actually won. The number of service men and women who have giving their lives since this is a sad commentary on Bush's lack of understanding of just what he got us into. Since the whole war in Iraq was an overblown lie and intelligence work that was nothing more than a house of cards, it is easy to understand how Bush missed that we had not yet won anything.
The saddest part of the whole adventure in Iraq is that we had no apparent plan about what to do once we had beaten the Iraqi military and toppled the government. The fact that we just stood around and watched people wreck and loot the government buildings, hospitals, museums, shops and schools showed that we had both either not expected it to happen or had no plan if they did. The fact that there was no immediate work to fix the broken infra-structure shows just how flat footed we were. I know that usually that is not the job of the military but it is the job of our Defense Department and State Department.
The fact is the military are not the people who make war, it is the civilian government. The Congress, the President and all the people that make up the State Department, Defense Department, CIA and the rest of the intelligence gathers are the ones that plan and put our military in harms way. To a man these people have let down our military. Their lack of foresight, planning or even to check their facts is one of the most criminal acts of this whole sad debacle. So on this sad anniversary let the American People demand the truth and an accounting of what has happened. Then we need a real plan, not just stay the course, that gets our men and women out of there and doesn't destabilize the region more than we have already done.

I'm not the Only One

As my last day approaches I must admit that I'm becoming more impatient to just get it over with. I'm the last of 4 senior dispatchers to leave in the last 5 months. The 4 of us have about 100 years experience between us. My 24 1/2 years is only the 3rd most years. Last Sunday was the party for the latest person to go and we had a nice time. We had a potluck dinner and several people came into dispatch to say their goodbyes. One of the police sergeants who plays the bagpipes came in a played. The pipes always make me cry. He played several songs and ended with "The Campbell's are Coming". It was really nice but it still made me cry.
As people have been retiring I have started thinking about calls that I have taken over the years. The first neat call that I did was a childbirth shortly after I was on my own. I remember telling the father to assume the catchers position. He did just in time and caught the baby before she fell off the bed. He wanted to name her after me, luckily I was able to talk him out of that. Some of the dumbest calls were just after September 11th and the white powder/anthrax scare. Without a doubt the dumbest one was from one of the two hospitals in town. Caller was one of the nurses and she was concerned about white powder on the floor in the maternity ward locker room where they stored the diapers and baby powder. We sent the Hazmat Team and they swept the floor for them . We can laugh about it now but that was one long and frustrating day for dispatch and the Hazmat team.
I have done more code blue calls than I care to remember. So few of those are ever successful. SIDS deaths are the worst mainly because of all the emotions. Though I have to say that deaths involving old married couples are the saddest, at least for me anymore. It must be so hard to see the person you have lived with for the last 50+ years die.
Anyway I'm ready to go. 32 more days and I'm done with this phase of my working life.