The Life Slant - Page 13

Constitutional Confrontation – Kaepernick’s Protest

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Colin Kaepernick

*All men are created equal, and Congress shall make no law abridging the freedom of speech, or the right of the people to assemble peaceably, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.  These parts of the Constitution appears to trouble many Americans.

We respond to our emotions sometimes more quickly than others. It is hard to do the right thing when you we not know what the right thing is. We do not want to impose on others what we do not wish for ourselves as universal law of the Golden Rule.

We learn to stand for the National Anthem from custom, not law. The formal standard has been; stand, remove hats and place your right hand over your heart. As eyes or television cameras scroll the coinurts or stadiums, persons are talking, holding their drinks, and wearing hats. Such lack of attention causes heartburn to the point of almost saying, “Hey Butthole, respect the flag, respect the anthem, respect those that fought for America. Take off your hat; aren’t you American?

The question answers itself. The buttholes may be visitors, not American. Colin Kaepernick, a black football player, is now accused of being un-American. With little attention to our Constitution, what has taken issue is the interpretation of those that have fought for our flag and respect for our national anthem.

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Salish Sea Orcas SOS

Salish Sea Orcas

*Another dead wolf, J50, of the Salish Sea, the third one in 2018. The Pacific Northwest’s picturesque sea is being lambasted by a man-made accelerated climate crisis, hideous poisons and the man-driven Sixth Mass Extinction, which has shifted into overdrive.

Salish Sea Map
foo Photo credit: Crag Law Center

The Salish Sea is a global hotspot for acidification, a glaring symptom of burning more subsidized climate-destroying fossil fuels. As the sea absorbs more carbon dioxide from fossil fuels it’s rapidly deforming shellfish and coral reefs because acid melts calcium carbonate the backbone of both shells and reefs. The Salish Sea web of life is quickly unravelling.

At the top of the Salish Sea food chain, the critically endangered pods (J,K,L) of Southern Resident orcas are wasting away. The past 18 months have been horrendous.”

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9/11 ROSEMARY PLUS ONE

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September 11th

*The terrorist actions of 9/11/2001 are chronic and ever-present. We share a common duty to honor and remember those suffering through unimaginable death. Deeply distressing is that the hallowed annual readings throughout cities in America of victims have missing names and the count of souls has not come to an end.

This year’s Police Memorial Ceremony at the nation’s capital in May, chilled attendants from the announcement of the 2017 deceased local, state and federal officers fallen ill from toxic exposure at Ground Zero while saving lives, retrieving bodies, and securing evidence or vestiges; evidence our environment relates to our health.

Much like Hurricane Maria’s first reported 64 deaths in Puerto Rico to the number of 2,975, twenty-three New York City Police officers died at the World Trade Center on September 11, but in the last 17 years, 156 have perished from noxious illnesses. From the 343 firefighters that died on 9/11, there have been 182 more deaths reported. The FBI registers 15 additional FBI Agents that have died related to 9/11. The count at the Pentagon needs adjustment.

Pentagon September 11th memorial
Pentagon September 11th memorial

Rosa Maria (Rosemary) Chapa at age 64 had talked to her husband JJ about retirement yet like any other Tuesday, went to work at the Pentagon. Her office had recently moved to the renovated west side of the first floor, Office of the Comptroller for the Defense Intelligence Agency. Osama Bin Laden’s Al Qaeda took her highly spirited, giving and determined life with 183 other souls, 59 were aboard American Airlines flight 77.

She left behind her husband, five children and her dog Lucky.

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Great Barrier Reef Sharks SOS

*The Great Barrier Reef is not only the largest network of coral reefs on the globe, but also it’s a glorious cornucopia of biological diversity, or, life.

An exquisite loggerhead female returning to the sea after laying her eggs on a remote beach in Far North Queensland, Australia. Photo credit: AAP

The Reef is under siege. It’s coming undone at an unprecedented rate from accelerated man-made heatwaves, super coal tanker incessant noise, the Sixth Mass Extinction and a horrendous onslaught of man-made long-lasting toxic chemicals. Keep Reading

Fisheries Massacring Sea Turtles, Near-Term Extinction

*Sea turtles have swum the seas for a couple hundred million years. Today all seven species are in dire shape, especially in Mexico and Australia.

According to University of British Columbia’s renowned fisheries biologist, Professor Daniel Pauley, “between 10 and 100 trillion oceanic creatures a year are being destroyed by man.” Incomprehensible.

Shark caught in fishing net. [Extinction of Sea Turtles]
55 million sharks are indiscriminately caught by fisheries, another 45 million are poached — 100 million sharks are looted each year from our oceans. Photo credit: Smithsonian

Fisheries are annihilating everything in the seas. There are 13 million miles of longlines, or, enough line for 27 return trips to the moon, with almost 2 billion legal and illegal hooks. In 2000 alone, University of Duke scientists reported that longlines mutilated 200,000 loggerhead and 50,000 leatherback sea turtles. Horrendous.

It’s not just these deadly hooked lines that are the culprits. The conservation group World Animal Protection estimates that each year fisheries disdainfully discard and/or abandon 640,000 metric tons of nets, which become ghost nets. Not only do these ghastly entanglements suffocate 308,000 cetaceans (whales, dolphins, porpoises), but also many thousands of sea turtles.

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Fossil Fuel Pollution – Raging British Columbia Fires

Fossil Fuel Pollution - Raging British Columbia Fires

*3,000 intrepid firefighters are battling more than 500 apocalyptic firestorms spread across the massive forested Canadian province of British Columbia.

Thick smoke is blanketing millions of urban dwellers from Vancouver, British Columbia (BC), to Seattle, WA. That smoke has spread thousands of miles eastward across Canada and the U.S.

Thick forest fire smoke is choking the southwest of British Columbia and the northwest of Washington state. Photo credit: NASA

For the elderly, the children, the outdoor workers and anyone afflicted with respiratory, e.g. asthma, or heart ailments, it’s a crisis. They are advised to stay indoors and keep windows shut tight. It’s a nightmare for all the animals. While this year’s area of scorched forests (about a million acres) is far less than the record of last year (more than three million acres), BC is in a state of emergency. Keep Reading

Denmark’s Horrific Whale Bloodbath

*There is no justification for slowly and diabolically torturing the cetaceans (whales, dolphins porpoises) in the 21st century.

In the midst of an accelerating Sixth Mass Extinction, 400,000 cetaceans are senselessly destroyed each year.

Faroe Islands Whale Bloodbath
This gruesome lust by Faroese for cetacean blood is cruel and inhumane. Photo credit: Alistair Ward, Triangle News

The hideous images of the current Danish Faroe Islands whale bloodbath staining the North Atlantic Ocean are unacceptable. Keep Reading

Unprecedented Crime, Climate in Crisis

*A new book “Unprecedented Crime” by climate scientist Dr Peter Carter and researcher Elizabeth Woodworth is a vital addition to our understanding the climate in crisis.

This is a well researched and written account of the present fossil fuel-induced catastrophe befalling all life on Earth. It’s a story interwoven with reverence for our mother, Nature. With over 100 years of combined research experience, this book is rich.

The more subsidized climate-wrecking fossil fuels burned, the more extreme weather occurrences. From the horrendous hurricanes to the epic floods, heatwaves, droughts, firestorms and terrifying tornadoes, they all piled up in 2017.

Unprecedented explains these events and then easily connects the dots.

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Peace

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*Peace.  We don’t hear much about it these days.  It’s almost as if we talked and fussed and signed about it so much in the 60s & 70s, that it got tired – or we did.  By the 80s a person flashing a peace sign was seen as immature or perhaps desperately clinging to their youth.  Peace became passé.  Which explains 2018.

The thing about Peace is that it can mean so many things.

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Theoretical Education in a Practical World

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Library - Theoretical Education

*From the New York Times, May 26, 2018: “Last year the University of Wisconsin at Superior announced that it was suspending nine majors, including sociology and political science, and warned that there might be additional cuts. The University of Wisconsin at Stevens Point recently proposed dropping 13 majors, including philosophy and English, to make room for programs with “clear career pathways.”

It’s about time.

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Silent Screams – the Pressure of Masculinity

Masculinity

*It is not good for man to be alone…we don’t do alone well. A few days ago, I saw a Facebook message from a friend who had thought about taking his life. He woke up the next morning to learn that an acquaintance had committed suicide several days ago.

I don’t know the details, nor did I have any knowledge of what this man was battling. I only knew this man in passing, but our interactions we’re always polite and respectful. Whenever we stopped and chatted, the conversation consisted mainly of superficial things, but he still was genuine nonetheless.

My heart goes out to his family and all of those who hold him dear to their hearts. The challenges we face as men are very real, and they’re heavy. Keep Reading

400,000 Whales, Dolphins, Porpoises Destroyed Annually

*The fate of our brethren, the highly intelligent and sensitive cetaceans (whales, dolphins, porpoises), is very grim. The hideous man-made Sixth Mass Extinction is accelerating more than 1,000 times faster than the previous five others.

Legendary biologist and animal activist Farley Mowat meticulously documented the human destruction of cetaceans in Sea of Slaughter. He estimated that humans murdered in excess of five million whales in 18th, 19th and first half of the 20th centuries.

Whaling in the Faroe Islands - Denmark
Whaling in the Faroe Islands, Denmark. Photo credit: Wikimedia

A more recent account by National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) workers found that 2.9 million whales were slain between 1900-1999.

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Endless Hideous Heatwaves

*Unrelenting heatwaves and hellfires are raging around the globe. August has commenced where July’s fury ended, more furnace-like heat.

This weekend Spain and Portugal may set an all-time European heat record eclipsing Athens, Greece, at 118.4 Fahrenheit (F), recorded on July 10, 1977.

Heatwaves in Europe
A humongous deadly heatwave is blanketing southwestern Europe. Photo credit: Met Office

It’s not just that a North African high is pumping scalding bone-dry air and mega tons of dust over the Iberian Peninsula. It’s also that the fire risk is extreme. 20 percent of Portugal is tinderbox dry.  11,000 intrepid firefighters and 56 water-bombing aircrafts are on emergency standby to combat forest fires.

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Hell-Fire: New Not Normal Firestorms

*Help, the planet is on fire. From Siberia to the Congo Basin and the Arctic to Brazil and much in between, the onslaught of terrestrial and marine heatwaves is ubiquitous.

World Fire Map - Hell-fire

The oceans, which drive the climate, are supercharged with fossil fuel heat. 300 zettajoules of man-made heat have lambasted our planet. All life lives within a habitable range of temperatures. Once that range is exceeded, death occurs.

Instead of heeding thousands of scientific warnings urging all nations to reduce fossil fuel emissions, the opposite has occurred. Keep Reading

The Alcoholic Next Door

Alcoholism

*That glorious moment when you get to put your head down and shut your eyes and let it all go away for a few hours. The TV still emitting a faint glow, this side of the pillow still cool, lids barely touching and BANG BANG BANG BANG BANG BANG! Damn! 12:30 at night. This can’t be good.

One of my neighbors. A very nice young lady crying and babbling and reaching for a hug – needing to be not wrong for a moment. Details trickle out as they are withheld, revolving around a drunk husband, a dog beaten to death, a rope being held by its end. Sadly, it is just another story to add to my life’s collection; each heartbreaking, each unique yet identical to all the others.

Prohibition did not work. People like to drink. They have since the first accidentally-fermented grapes were bravely ingested. No matter how many marriages it wrecks, families it demolishes or lives it obliterates, alcohol is not going to go away. Keep Reading

Climate Crisis – Heatwaves, Firestorms, Failing Crops

Heatwave - Climate Change

*The planet is exhibiting telltale symptoms of our addiction to burning climate-wrecking fossil fuels: hellacious wildfires, unrelenting heat, sweltering Arctic temperatures and withering crops in northern Europe. We are in a climate crisis!

14 million people in the megalopolis of London braced themselves for record-breaking heat, dubbed “Furnace Friday.” Combustion-induced smog levels soared exacerbated by extreme heat. Intense demand for power had emergency services on red alert. Hospitals contended with many heatwave casualties. 90,000 lightning strikes, flash flooding and wildfires ravaged sun-baked Britain in an unforgettable week of Mother’s Nature’s unbridled overheated wrath.

Burnt Cars from Greece's July 2018 Firestorm - Climate Change
Apocalyptic fiery images of burnt cars from Greece’s firestorm of July 23, 2018. Photo credit: The Guardian

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A Father’s Journey – Part 5. Relax Daddy, Just Follow My Lead

Steven Pecevich (father) reading to baby Sydni

* Relax, Daddy. Just follow my lead. It’ll be okay. Let me show you the way.

*Stephen Pecevich, a single dad of three in the Boston area, had his life take a complete detour when his youngest child was diagnosed with cancer before she she was even 60 days old.  Follow the story of how this devoted father found faith and strength on what Stephen calls “a life detour”, as we publish regular excerpts from Stephen’s own memoir, which will be available in its entirety in the near future.

January 25th

Dear Sydni,

*The moment I arrived at the hospital this morning, without delay, I noticed a teardrop sliding down the contour of your rosy right cheek. Instinctively, I wiped the droplet from your face, brushed it against my lips followed by crossways over my heart.

Right then and there, I prayed to God that He allow me to absorb your struggle and pain. When I opened my eyes, to my immediate wonder, in the place of your anguish and grief, I instead was beholden to calmness and repose. I perceived pure beauty. It was as if you were saying:

“Relax, Daddy. Just follow my lead. It’ll be okay. Let me show you the way.”

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Iceland’s Repugnant Whaling Bloodbath

Blue Whale slaughtered - Iceland Whaling

*The direct action conservation movement Sea Shepherd revealed that on July 7, 2018, Iceland’s only fin whaling company, Hvalur hf, tortured and murdered an endangered blue whale.

For almost 50 years blues have been protected. During the 20th century, 360,000 of these glorious beauties were obliterated, including 29,000 in one year alone. Their populations have not rebounded.

Blue Whale - Iceland Whaling
At 100 feet long and 200 tons, blues are Nature’s priceless treasures.

Today, those that remain are filled with man-made poisons. The song of the largest animal to have ever lived on Earth is mostly drowned-out from humongous propellers of 100,000 ocean vessels daily, and incessant deafening air gun surveys for more climate-wrecking subsidized fossil fuels. A deaf whale is a dead whale. Keep Reading

Too Much Forged in Fire

You might be watching too much Forged in Fire if:

  • Your kids are making a fortune selling snow cones, as there is a constant supply of chopped ice.
  • You can’t watch TV because the satellite dish is in the back yard filled with coal.
  • You walk into the kitchen to see why Sunday dinner is late, to find a $35 roast beef hanging from the ceiling, your wife wielding a knife in each hand, watching a youtube clip of Doug Marcaida.
  • The beater car in your neighbor’s backyard seems to be walking away piece by piece – first the leaf springs, then the axle …

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Trees: Nature’s Masterpiece Burned For Heat

Burning Masterpieces for Heat - Trees

*Would you dispassionately stand by and watch if every priceless Renaissance work of art in Florence’s Uffizi Gallery, or Paris’s The Louvre, or 20th century masterpieces held in New York’s The Museum of Modern Art were burned for heat, one by one?

Ladies and gentlemen, our remaining ancient forests are indeed the equivalent to what the great master’s painted. They are Nature’s finest invaluable living, breathing masterpieces on our planet!

Trees - General Sherman Redwood
Each year, the largest tree on the globe, a sequoia named General Sherman, adds the comparable wood of one tree 1.5 feet (ft) wide by 65 ft high. Photo credit: Reese Halter

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