Goodbye Rick. Hello Mit.

It appears Rick Perry has lost his Mojo. The blustering and buffoonish Texas governor has slipped off the nation’s Republican debating stage. According to Eyewitnesses that reported in these mornings USA Today, Perry is slipping far behind the front-runner Mit Romney. Even falling behind Godfather Pizza CEO, Herman Cain. So, what has happened to Gov Supercuts?

First of all whatever it was that brought Perry to the national stage obviously doesn’t play nationally as it does in Texas. A state where such juvenile clowning around is sometimes tolerated. But not on national TV and in the national news. Saying dopey and irresponsible things only will get you a mention on late night talk shows. Good entertainment. Bad politics. And tarnishes one own Mojo.

Secondly a politician shouldn’t speak into national microphones and poo poo Social Security and Medicare. A Mojo killer right there. Especially since millions are so dependent on these government programs. Once again a political loose cannon touching the third rail. Zaaaaap! Sudden toast.

Finally, Mr. Big mouth is quickly slipping in to the nation’s political amnesia. Republicans are not as Right Wingish as some political spinners believe. Never the less, another wacky candidate forgotten. Washed away into “who was that guy anyway?” Goodbye Ricky. Give our best to what’s his name, George W something or another down there in Texas territory. Go Horns.

By their fruits yee shall run from them

To watch and listen how Republican candidates have regarded and debated each other recently on TV is a classic example of “Man’s Inhumanity to Man.” Cruel reckless accusations loaded with cheap shots. Firing away indiscriminately at the closes political target trying their very best not to discharge a live load into one’s own foot.

Maybe I’m mistaken. Aren’t these gentlemen and Lady supposed to be moral Christian men and women? If you apply the “Fruit” test (by their fruits yee shall know them) that alone indicates they must be from some other lower moral order. What happened to the “Golden Rule?” What happened to “Love thy neighbor?” What happened to “Do unto others?” What happened to humility, charity, meekness, patience, forgiveness, and other virtues as Jesus once spoke of?

Judging by their fruits, I would hazard to guess these political combatants to be less than human. Possibly ape like and practicing Darwinism. The survival of the fittest. More like survival of the meanest and dirtiest fighters. Absolutely shooting from the hip at close range with falsehood and defamation.

Do we really want these kinds of amoral individuals as our country’s political leaders? God help us all if we do. God bless America anyway.

I like what you're doing but narrow your focus

I kind of see what the point is to the Occupy Wall Street movement is about. Although they need to narrow their focus and hammer on one or two things. It would give them a more defined and pointed attack.

However, I agree with the general movement. Too much concentration of money in so few hands. Hands that might be a bit corrupt and greedy. I don’t trust anybody who makes their own rules and just makes money from money and leaves little benefit to the general American population. Sort of like Wall Street “Payday” lenders. Creepy and nasty.

I would suggest the OWS movement to concentrate on getting congress to confirm the director to the Consumer Protection Agency. Lobby the House of Representatives to get that done. Consumers could surely use more protection from the maniacal banks and brokers. Either confirm a director or get rid of the local US Rep who keeps voting NO.

Next, press for taxing the rich and large corporations. Eliminating loopholes and corporate subsidies. Make them pay for their greed. However, I would change the tax laws for corporations and the extreme rich. Lowering the tax from 35 percent to 25 percent with no exceptions, deductions, tax credits, subsidies or any tax holidays. Just a flat rate. I would also tax capital gains by the same rate. This would make tax laws fairer for all.

Anyway, this is what I would concentrate on if I were part of the Occupy Wall Street movement. I wish you guys well. Good luck.

The post office could turn into a shopping mall.

Here is my simple fix for the United States Postal Service. It amounts to consolidating a couple of other federal run services. Plus one created by special congressional law. Two services which already exist as stand alone departments and one that may need to be created or borrowed from other government services.

First borrow from the general printing office a add on service of copying, printing, and computer generated graphics for mail marketing. Something that might resemble Kinko’s or a small mailing and printing business ran inside the PO.

Next consolidate either the Small business Administration or the federal housing Administration with a created national by law credit union. Handling banking, home loans and business loans. Again, all ran inside the Postal Service

So, you have a one-stop shop for mail, printing, banking, and home and business loans. All under one roof. What do you think? Cool huh?

Podcast 5:30 Steve Jobs and my Grandkids: Click on link below.

Dinner at home with personal devices on the table. Pass the catsup please.

Who are the job killers? Americans out of work. That's who.

When Republicans talk about killing jobs, they are speaking of jobs of little substance. Jobs that pay a marginal amount and short lived. Jobs without benefits. Many jobs that pay minimum wage and only attractive to undocumented workers. All in all jobs no trained or skilled worker would desire. And you can bet your life these jobs would not be alluring to the defenders of such jobs. No self-respecting congressman would ever think of taking such jobs. Oh? Why not?

Americans out of work are looking for steady career jobs. Jobs with health and retirement benefit. Jobs that would require training and skill. Jobs with longevity. Jobs that will carry them through to a reasonable retirement. Jobs that will build a strong middle class. However, those kind of jobs have been sent away. Far away to China, India, Mexico, and other so-called “Off-shore” places. And who sent them there? The same folks who are yammering about killing jobs. Our friendly Republican congressmen and women. Aided with the help of our friendly US Chamber of Commerce. Yes. Are you surprised?

So instead of long-term jobs with long-term benefits, our skilled and willing work force is served up with long-term unemployment. Nonetheless, this is the reward they receive. Pink slips. Termination due to jobs moved off shore. Go flip burgers. Good luck buddy. Have a nice day.

“Job Killer” is just an empty slogan just to distract all of us from the real point. Mostly regulation and rules. Regulations that protect Americans from unnecessary hazardous work. Regulations that protect the air we breathe and the water we drink. Regulations that protect us from bank and loan fraud. Job Killer is just a hollow GOP war cry in order to take back control of the Whitehouse and all of congress. In turn, American workers get meaningless low paying jobs. Mining coal. Building pipelines. Jobs on land and sea oil rigs. All short term contract work. Usually hard and dirty work and with no thanks. Just let go with no unemployment benefit at the end.

Americans didn’t struggle and finish colledg just to serve the interests of Big Oil and Coal owners and their shareholders. That would be the opposet of the American Dream. Quite the reverse for sure. Americans struggled and got training to build America up. Not let it down. American want long term well paying careers. Workers loyal to a company that is loyal to American workers. God bless American workers. God bless America.

Happy Columbus Day

Happy Columbus Day. Did Christopher Columbus ever come t the lower forty-eight states? You know, North America. Or, was it he only visited what was known as the West Indies around the Mid-Atlantic islands? Cuba, Puerto Rico, Bahamas, etc. Whether or not he came to what we know as America, I still have to put the trash on the street. Yes, trash will be picked up on Columbus Day. What a celebration huh?

Letter to our local newspaper

Letter to the Editor: More of the same. Larry Shepard, Broken Arrow. Recent ads on TV tell us oil for the tar sands of Canada is a safe and clean source of energy. Would you also believe that Jack the Ripper only tickled his victims? They are strip mining vast tracts of boreal forest and turning it into a lunar landscape dotted with pools of toxic and hazardous wastes. Take a look at National Geographic March 2009 issue. It is not pretty. The proposed route of the Keystone pipeline is being obtained by eminent domain, not by the purchase of the right of way. So they are taking the land they want, not paying the people who own the land. Our governor told us jobs would be created. She did not say they are only temporary, mostly diggers and welders who will be gone once the pipeline is finished. Nor did she say the product going through the pipeline needs high pressures to get it to flow, with good chances of blowouts and spills all along its track. The company owning the pipeline does not have a good clean-up record, but it may still need to hire someone to clean up its mess. None of this is leading us down the road to a sustainable energy future. It is only giving us more of the same with more problems and a higher environmental cost. Letters to the editor are encouraged. Send letters to letters@tulsaworld.com

Op-Ed from our local paper. This could happen anywhere

Oklahoma's phosphorus limit under attack. ED BROCKSMITH. Oklahoma agreed to review its numeric phosphorus limit for scenic rivers if northwest Arkansas reduced phosphorus in sewage and if Arkansas regulated poultry manure in the Illinois River watershed. Time will tell if that was a good bargain. Phosphorus is a nutrient that degrades water quality, as Tulsans well know. This summer's outbreak of potentially toxic blue green algae at several lakes was fed by nutrients including phosphorus. If the Oklahoma Water Resources Board (OWRB) bows to pressure from Arkansas and weakens the limit, it might be devastating to the Illinois River and Tenkiller Lake. The battle to protect the Illinois River goes back a long way and is still contentious. The United States Supreme Court, in a major Illinois River pollution lawsuit, ruled that upstream states must meet the water quality standards of downstream states. Oklahoma raised its water quality standards and began extensive water sampling for phosphorus. Oklahoma sued some of the nation's biggest poultry companies for polluting the watershed with manure. A federal judge in Tulsa has seemingly parked on the case and there is no resolution. The Northwest Arkansas Council and others are again lobbying Oklahoma, Congress, and the EPA against Oklahoma's nutrient limit. Their primary concern seems to be the cost of more advanced sewage treatment. The council is composed of corporations, chambers of commerce and developers. Walmart and Tyson Foods, two of America's biggest companies, push the council's pro-growth, regional agenda. Another player is the University of Arkansas. Both the Sam Walton College of Business and the Agriculture Department are heavily funded by the Walton Foundation and by Tyson. These forces are smart, have big purses and have a lot at stake if poultry companies have to clean up their mess and if sewage treatment plants are forced to remove even more phosphorus. Northwest Arkansas leaders want to show that the limit is impossible to achieve. They believe that the degradation of the Illinois River has progressed to the extent that saving the river is not economically feasible. Instead of putting pressure on the poultry industry, which is unregulated by the Clean Water Act, northwest Arkansas' leaders, including owners of regulated sewage plants, are telling us that it is impossible to save the Illinois River. At a recent OWRB hearing in Tahlequah, one after another Arkansas speaker railed against the limit. In the midst of their consternation and teeth-gnashing, one voice spoke for more river protection, reminding how much phosphorus crosses our border with Arkansas, and advising against any decision swayed by selfish critics who profess to be our good neighbors but who are more worried about their bottom lines. The speaker was Save the Illinois River (STIR) President Kurt Robinson of Muskogee. Robinson said that restoring the Illinois River and five other Oklahoma Scenic Rivers (all beginning in Arkansas) is not impossible. Robinson thanked the cities and the taxpayers in northwest Arkansas who have poured millions of dollars into sewage treatment plant improvements over the last decade. He gratefully acknowledged that some poultry manure finally is being removed from the watershed. Will Oklahoma's .037 phosphorus limit help restore the Illinois River and Tenkiller Lake? Should there be a moratorium on spreading poultry manure in the watershed and should cities pressure factory farms and Congress to clean up the poultry industry's mess? Will these things be costly? Is it worth it, and will future generations thank us? The answer to all these questions is a resounding yes. Is it too late to save the Illinois River, as our neighbors say? That answer is definitely no! Oklahoma has set its sights high for the Illinois River. Arkansas has very low expectations. It reminds me of something the late Oklahoma humorist James H. Boren said: "You can't soar with eagles if you roost with the chickens. Ed Brocksmith is a member of Save the Illinois River..

From my blog Okie Without Borders. Growing up Okie in L A.

Once you had passed over the very narrow Red River Bridge from North Texas, you will drive 20-miles north and a bit east. Arriving in the little Micropolitan village of Wilson, Oklahoma. One main street, one fire house, one post office, one Ford dealer, one drug store, one ice house, one movie theater, one set of railroad tracks, and a half dozen or so fundamentalist churches. Your typical southern Plaines Mayberryish former oil boomtown. Once the commercial hub for other smaller rural towns in the Wilson solar system. And, for the most part a slow and peaceful place to be.

As I had reported several times in the past, my parents and we siblings had traveled by car from Los Angeles to visit the red dirt homeland. Wilson, Oklahoma USA. My grandmother Ayers lived in Wilson on Sixth Street about a half mile south of Main. It’s a small rural farm and oil worker town consisting of about 1600 inhabitants and as mentioned just north of the Red River. Wilson is located just off old US 70 west of the larger Oklahoma town of Ardmore. At least in Wilson is where she had lives when I visited her in the late 1940s and up to the mid 1960s. But prior to those times she and her family lived on various tenant farms in southern rural red dirt Oklahoma.

Nonetheless, her home was a modest white wood frame house. Square, four rooms, and sizable front and back porches. The front Porch, which faced west, was big enough for cousins to sleep out on in a rollaway bed. Really the best place of the house to sleep in mid-summer. The back porch, which faced east to a broad sunrise, was more utilitarian. It had an old wringer washer, galvanized tub, and a garden hose. The hose was used to either fill the metal washtub or used to connect to the wringer washer. Plus the back porch was a great place to hand crank a bucket of ice cream. Or, just a sitting place for we grandkids to giggle and poke each other while eating watermelon.

Now if you were to draw a square on a sheet of paper and divide it into four equal quarters that would be the floor plan of my Gramma’s house as possibly drawn by an architect. Plane and simple. One living room to the south, two bedrooms to the north, and a kitchen in the back and squeezed in-between the two bedrooms was a very small bathroom. Small, compact, and very useable house by one grandmother. However, when kids and grandkids came to visit, a bit tight and compressed. But we loved it nonetheless. A modest carpet of grass and weeds surrounded her house. Certainly not to big or difficult for her to maintain. The grass was outlined by a white picket fence with front gate leading out to the sidewalk on Sixth Street.

Almost straight across the street from my grandmother’s but a bit south lived the Morgan’s. An old couple in their seventies or early eighties. Mrs. Morgan always had a smile on her bespectacled thin face and a quick tendency to talk. Mr. Morgan looked as if he was in constant pane with all facial features pointing down. Walked with a stiff leg, aided with a cane, and slanted forward. The Morgan’s would sit outside in the evenings on two old metal seat and back patio chairs while observing the activity on the street. She sat crossed legged. He sat slanted like a 2 by 4 sitting in a chair. Mr. Morgan sat that way because of a back injury and fused vertebras. Nonetheless, they were kind folk and always willing to talk.

On the same side of the street my grandma lived and south down at the corner lived banker Wilson. He own and ran the bank of Wilson on Main Street in town. He certainly lived in a larger house that faced the corner. His house was twice the size of my grams but modest. Maybe 1500-square feet or so. However, Banker Wilson was a thoughtful man sometimes even inviting we restless cousins down to his house for a snack or iced tea. He knew the benefit of establishing relationships and probably read Dale Carnegie.

Just to the north and on the same side of the street as my grandma’s lived the Peffer family. We grandkids would sometimes play with the Peffer kids. Mr. Peffer was the town’s pharmacist and was well regarded in the neighborhood. His drug store was on Main Street complete with soda fountain and shelves of paperback books. Once I had even bought the book Dr. Strangelove from their respected establishment. But, one summer years later in 1964 when I was visiting Wilson and headed back to college it was discovered Mr. Peffer lost his license to practice his trade. He lost his license because of not really having a college pharmacy degree. Disqualifying him to perform pharmacy work. However, his daughter had recently graduated from pharmacy school at Oklahoma University and took over the filling of prescriptions. So, it all worked out.

So, let us pause here. There is certainly more to this travelogue and next week we’ll pick up the travel adventure and take a walk downtown. Stay tuned. Chuck Ayers