US Navy To The Rescue

The USS Ronald Reagan, one of the US Navy's newest aircraft carriers was in the news the last couple of days for coming to the rescue of the cruise ship Carnival Splendor who it seems had an engine fire and became stranded off the coast of Mexico. All in a days work for the USS Ronald Regan's crew, a horror story for the passengers who paid big bucks to make what was suppose to be a pleasure cruise.

OK first let me say, most of you who may be reading my blog (if there is anyone) know from reading my profile that I spent 20 years in the navy, and no I've never had the honor of being on a naval vessel that came to the rescue of a cruise ship, although I have been on board for rescues of aircraft in the water and merchant ships but those could make for other interesting stories. What I want to assure everyone is the passengers where never in any danger, the only ones who may have been in danger where the first responders of the crew.

The media is making a big deal out of the fire and you hear passenger's like, Leticia Lewis who told CNN "I'm just thankful to be alive". CNN's not pointing out those people who said "oh I wasn't worried at all". First of all the technology used in all types of newer vessels can control and put out a fire in a ships engine room in a matter of seconds before it can get out of hand, most of that technology are inventions pioneered by the US Navy and other navy's of the world. A good example is a chemical agent called Bromochlorodifluoromethane or the trade name Halon 1211.

Back in the mid 80's about the time I was serving on the aircraft carrier USS Constellation, engine rooms and many other spaces on board US Navy ships began replacing the old CO2 fire extinguishing systems most of us may be familiar with with the new Halon 1211 systems, which while on board was put to the real test when we had a engine room fire on board, and worked pretty good considering it was a new system, the fire did end up burning 42 Spaces (rooms) on board, however that was about 25 years ago and the Halon systems of today are a million times more reliable.

Briefly to tell you how this works with out getting technical is when there is a fire, Halon 1211 is automatically actuated and it destroys all the oxygen in the room, and as we know it takes three things for a fire to start or continue burning, Fuel, Air and an Ignition source. So the way Halon works is by getting rid of the air. As a side note to that I remember a terrible tragedy back in the mid 80's when a marine stationed at Marine Corp Base Camp Pendelton, Ca was looking for a quick high and breathed in some Halon 1211, needless to say it sucked all the Oxygen out of his body and killed him instantly, I tell you this just to show you how effective it could be.

So despite all the media hype about the possible danger the passengers where in, it's just that hype, it was a small fire and was out almost instantly. Now the fact that they spent that much money to go on a seven day cruise and ended up floating helpless of the coast of Mexico is a tragedy. Someone who may not normally get sea sick can get violently ill when your ship has no power and floating around like a fishing bobber, you add the smell of rotting food and sewage it makes for a horrible four days.

Yet Carnival being in the business of taking people on cruises have stood up and said everyone is invited to come back for a free cruise on them, (of course they did, don't want to loose the business right?) so the passengers got an experience of a life time, something they can tell their grand children about, I mean how many people have actually gotten the chance to see an actual aircraft carrier in action and still get to go on a cruise when the are ready.

You hear allot lately with people wondering if cruises are safe, and they are very safe, probably one of the safest and different vacation you can take, unless their is a major explosion on board a ship which to is highly unlikely barring a terrorist attack. So sit back in your patio chair and enjoy the cruise.

One thing I do want to say is that Carnival owes the US Navy and Coast Guard a big thank you, not only did they come too their rescue, the defense department announced today that they will not send Carnival a bill for their services.

Picture Courtesy of USA Today

Amazon.Com what are you thinking?

I just wanted to say something about this, I'm not sure the whole story but what I do know about it is making me so sick at this moment. Just the title "The Pedophiles Guide to Love and Pleasure: A Child-Lovers Code of Conduct," makes me want to puke.

I am going to college right now at San Diego City College to get my degree in history, and if you are going to college or have in the past few years you know how expensive text books can be, so Amazon is often one of the book dealers I turn to when I need used text books, I like them. But now what are we to do, how can a reputable business with any type of ethics even consider carrying a book like this in their inventory?

Never have I thought that any business remotely main stream would carry a title like this. This is the type of book in my mind I could be sold in the dark reaches of the Internet, you know the same web pages that the FBI is searching for that sells child pornography, or some nasty motel room that has a sign in the front window reading "rooms for rent by the hour".

So now what should we do, should we start a group that goes through Amazon and other online books stores inventory to see what other kind of disgusting material is being sold? We could but it would take forever, the thing that needs to happen is these stores need to police themselves.

So do I think we should boycott Amazon, no I don't because I'm sure that Amazon has a system in place to ensure that objectionable material does not make on to the sales pages, and of course what is objectionable too you may not be to me. ( Although there is no doubt this is objectionable to 99.9% of Amazon shoppers) Amazon has guidelines and this case was probably just some human error, yes let them know how you feel but if you do boycott your going to hurt the hourly employee's not the CEO.

So Amazon just try a little harder, I never heard of something like this from you guys before so the likeliness of this happening again is probably pretty low, so clean up your mess, talk to your customers and let's get ready for the holidays.

Book pics courtesy of treehuggers.com

Another Bush For President??

Hello America, I have a serious question for you today. Is The United States ready for President Bush #3. I say why not? In my opinion the Bush clan so far has had a impressive run as being the President of this great nation. Even though Bush senior may have only been a one term President he accomplished many things, as far as I am concerned his only down fall, and the only reason he didn't win reelection was because he ended the Persian Gulf War to soon, actually his reelection bid looked like it would be successful until the end of the war.

Of course President Bush Jr. we all know his accomplishments although many people to this day like to drag his name through the mud, he will go down in history as one of the best and most honest presidents this country has ever had and most importantly him and his policies against terrorism is still what is protecting us this day.

So what about Mr. Jeb Bush, former Governor of Florida, what did he accomplish in that job that would make him qualified to be the next President of the United States of America. In Florida right now he is most remembered as the education governor, because he made education reform a high priority. He introduced the A+ plan to achieve consistent standardized testing across all schools.

Believing that Florida schools had failed the students rather than the students failing school he implemented a system funding public schools on a comparative grading system as well as championing school vouchers and charter schools.

Jeb Bush was also the first republican governors ever reelected to a second term despite being named the number one target of the DNC , this was based on the fact that we was very accessible to the public which made him very popular. In appointing members of his administration he had a very non discriminating attitude, by appointing more women, blacks, and other minorities to high government positions than any other Florida Governor in history.

In my oppion Jeb Bush would be an excellent choice for President of the United States, he is not the only person I am eyeballing for that position and I will keep you posted on those I believe would be qualified. Although I am Republican at heart my goal for the 2012 election is to get those candidates elected who would best govern this country with no regard to their party's, it is time for the citizens of this great country to take charge and stop voting right down the line just because of their party. Its not the people in charge who has gotten this country in trouble, it is us the people who elected them!!

Photo courtesy of the Orlando Sentinel

9/11 Where I Was

Ok this is a continuation from my last entry, I am truly very frustrated with the American people right now, like I commented on my last post I can understand some people don't agree with us being in Iraq, that's not me I think us going into Iraq was a case of sooner or later and if President Bush hadn't sent us in when he did, we would have ended up there eventually and the causality list would have been much larger than it is today.

Now Afghanistan, how can a true red blooded American not believe we should be there. The Taliban allowed Al Qadea to operate within the borders of Afghanistan with impunity before and after the terrorist attacks on American soil. One thing I do agree with is that President Bush should have put the majority of the emphasis on Afghanistan during this entire period. I do however believe the people in this country who insist that this is a war the United States wanted or started and that we need to pack up and leave no matter the consequences are anti-American and have no idea what the consequences would be.

I knew marines who have paid the ultimate consequences in Afghanistan, matter of fact I was on the ship that sent the first marines into Camp Rhino, I remember that day as clear as I remember my son being born. I was stationed on board the USS Dubuque, LPD-8 which is an amphibious assault ship. We were part of the amphibous battle groups centered around the USS Pellilu, USS Dubuque and USS Comstock. On Sept 12th, 2001 we were in Darwin, Australia on a port visit, now of course because Australia is clear on the other side of the world it was Sept 11, 2001 in the United States.

I was on board the ship in a duty status, while the other 75% of the crew where on liberty in the city when suddenly other people on duty aboard the ship that day started talking about a airplane hitting one of the buildings of the World Trade Center. I remember at the time everyone just assumed it was a small Cessna or similar personal use airplane.

Me and the other guys from our division moved into the office and began watching events unfold in New York, still thinking that it was a horrible accident, when suddenly on the television screen a huge jetliner appeared and almost immediately crashed into the second tower.

Then all hell broke loose.

to be continued. Picture courtesy of craft-addict.com

Some Information

Hello everyone, I hope this early morning finds you all doing well, I was thinking since I posted earlier today about terrorism, about how little many people may know about what we discussing, sure I know just about everyone knows something about terrorism, like who Al Qaeda is, and that there central base of command is in Afghanistan and Pakistan, yet I can't help but think that the American public as well as non US Citizens needs to know much more, than we already do.

Lately I have been getting upset because I have been hearing not only protesters from other countries saying that Afghanistan is the war that we (As Americans) wanted, but now I am actually hearing Americans and US residents saying the same thing. It is as if the attacks on Sept 11, 2001 never really happened, somewhere there is a belief going around that President Bush had been spoiling for a fight and out of the blue we invaded Afghanistan.

I understand that 9/11 was nine years ago, but are our memories really that short? I also understand that many of our soldiers who are now fighting in Afghanistan and other parts of the middle east were as young as nine years old when the planes hit the World Trade Center, Pentagon and nose dived into that field in Shanks ville, Pa. so for them the actual event may be just a fleeting memory in a blur of childhood memories. What really appalls me today is how it seems many people act like it never happened and the United States has reverted to it's past and I again seeking to re-enact the Manifest Destiny orginally used as an excuse in going to war with Mexico back in the 1840's.

Well for all you Manifest Destiny conspiracy theorist's believe me the United States has absolutely no desire to make Afghanistan and Iraq the 51st and 52nd states, and another thing is I really don't understand those Americans who act like we have no business being in Afghanistan, to you I say what the hell is wrong with you. Granted Iraq may be a differnt story when it come to debating if we should have invaded or not and their are alot of valid view points, although I personaly believe we did the right thing when it came to Iraq but that's a different blog entry.

So here is the point of this blog entry is to let my "loyal" readers know that I am going to start exploring different aspects of the terrorism story that may have been forgotten in the past 9 years, so stand by because my first entry will be covering where I was on 9/11 as I was still active duty on board the USS Dubuque, LPD-8 and saw some intresting things being on of the first military units on the scene. Well God Bless All of you and I will be looking forward to exloring terrorism with you.

Time for the United States to be on the lookout!!!

Hello my friends, I hope this day finds everyone doing good, I thought I would just take this time and bring out some of my thoughts on the latest terrorist activity going on throughout the world but especially the failed attempts against the United States. Right now you are hearing allot of discussion of whether they are dry test runs or not. Come on folks do we really think that matters? Of course it doesn't matter; what does matter it seems is that the amount and frequency of the attempts are increasing.

I'm sure just about everybody was either watching the news or heard allot later about the October 29 parcel bombs that where shipped from Yemen addressed to two Chicago, Illinois synagogues. One was found on board a UPS cargo flight and the other on board an American Federal Express flight, the flights where stopped and searched in Britain and United Arab Emirates after tips came into the US government from sources within the government of Saudi Arabia.

According to White House counter terrorism chief John Brennan the devices enclosed in the parcels were constructed of computer printer cartridges, circuit cards, wiring and a powerful explosive called PETN. As of today Yemen based Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula or AQAP accepted responsibilty for the devices found on October 29. Also Brennan said the US government is looking into AQAP's claim of responsibility for the crash of UPS flight 6 the resulted in the deaths of the two crew members.

As a side note if you remember 80 grams of PETN was also the explosive material inside the alleged underwear bombing by Umar Farouk AbdulMutallab on Christmas Day 2009, and now in the past week there have been reports of letter or parcel bombs being sent to European heads of state including the Chancellor of Germany and the Prime Minister of Italy, as well as mail bombs addressed to the European Union Law Enforcement Agency and the head of the European Court of Justice and other targets in Greece.

At this time law enforcement are not totally sure where the bombs came from, except they don't believe the bombs found in Greece where from Al Qaeda. No matter where they came from it has become quite obvious terrorists no matter who they are working from are becoming bolder, willing to take more risks to hit their intended targets.

Now to get to my point, many of you may know I retired from the US Navy on 31 Dec 2005 so I have been to many different country's and have seen how different threats play out, and now with Al Qaeda becoming bolder I can see the situation in the US becoming similar to that of Israel. In Israel terrorist attacks have been occurring on soft targets, rather than those targets which are heavily guarded. Examples would be light rail, buses, night clubs, grocery stores and other places where the general public become easy targets.

It's time us ordinary citizens to start taking these potential attacks seriously. In Israel to go shopping, or hang out with friends in a nigh clubs you have to pass through metal detectors and x-ray machines to help prevent these attacks, yet despite these actions people continue to die and I am afraid that is the next step Al Qaeda and other groups plan to take, I pray that I am wrong but I am afraid soon we will see bombings on the city buses, light rail, grocery stores and many public areas. In India it played out with gunmen taking over hotels and taking lives, recently their were alerts that the same type of attacks where being planned for Europe.

Here is my biggest fear, first of all I know there are sleeper terror cells throughout the country waiting for the word for something as simple as terrorists with guns walking down various cities at the same time and begin shooting, the thing is, it is going to happen! The main question is when. Our government is in denial and is not prepared so it is our responsibility to be on the lookout and have a plan for when it does happen.

Groups such as the ACLU complain anytime our government comes up with a plan to protect the American public and those plans are filed away, its time for people like the ACLU to get off their buns and start worrying about protecting us and themselves and stop taking the government to court anytime someone is inconvenienced when investigating possible terrorist plots, it's time for them to stop treating these cases as possible illegal immigration cases and begin eyeing them as potential life and death situations.

President Obama says democrats took a "shellacking' as I qoute from CNN

Well here we go, President Obama first thing this morning said he "takes all responsibility" for the failure of the democrats in the 2010 election, but as the afternoon came around the blame began to shift. First it was the fault of the economy and lack of jobs, a few hours later the fault was the Republicans who left "us"a this economy and the dwindling job market. So I have a question for you Mr. Obama how is that taking responsibility.

As I see it, (not that I wanted Democrats to stay in power anyways) the fault squarely on your shoulders Mr. President, I spent 20 years in The United States Navy and when something bad happens on board a ship the Commanding Officer always got the blame, and in the majority of cases they loose their job and are forced to retire from the naval Service. I don't want to mention the man's name but when I was on board the USS Constellation, CV-64 we had a major conflagration in the engine rooms and 46 adjacent spaces, luckily no one was killed, but with in 48 hours our beloved Commanding Officer stood before his crew on the flight deck and resigned his position as commanding officer and within a couple months was forced retirement.

President Obama, it is your fault that the democrats are in the situation they are in, you Mr. President jumped in with the initial goal of going down in history as the first to make a historical changes to American health care, when the majority of Americans wanted to see something done about unemployment and the economy. You sir and your lackeys are the ones responsible for the boat you and the other democrats are sinking in.

Hey President, you are also the Commander In Chief, maybe you should stand on deck in front of the American Citizens, take responsibility and retire.

Photo Courtousey Whitehouse.gov