A Hot Springs Death Reminds Park Visitors that they are in a Wilderness Area

I worked in Yellowstone National Park when I was a college student. That was a long time ago. The place is gorgeous. It’s the scenery and wildlife that cannot be found in many other places in the United States.

I remember the issues related to feeding the bears who stood in the middle of the roads begging for food. Traffic would be lined up for a mile of more as cars drove slowly past the bears. About every third or fourth car would stop and the passengers would lower their windows just an inch or two to give a begging bear some food. Employees at the park called these events “bear jams.” Every once in while a bear became angry and ripped open a window. There were lots of frightened tourists.

Abyss Pool, Yellowstone National Park, Water temperature 192 degrees

Taken with a Kodak Pony 35MM Camera.

The board walks in the geyser areas all had signs warning visitors not to leave the walks. You could see the water in those pools and geysers was boiling hot. Steam was emitting from them. Some pools had signs by them indicating the temperature of the water.

Mammoth Hot Springs. A dirty old slide taken with a Kodak Pony 35MM Camera.

Similarly there were signs warning visitors to stay away from close encounters with wild life. So when a Black Bear approached our patio dining area in Sequoia National Park we quickly went into the cabin. The bear broke open a can of tomato sauce and ate the contents as we watched through a window.

There have been deaths as a result of exiting trails and climbing on rocks in the Merced River near Yosemite Falls.

So when someone is killed as a result of not following the posted instructions who is to blame?

Twenty three year old Colin Nathaniel Scott thought he was wiser than park rangers.

Donald Trump is a Racist

June 10, 2016

Since posting The New York Times editorial numerous Republicans have spoken out against Donald Trump’s racist remarks. The best was said on June 7, 2016 by Paul Ryan. “I disavow these comments. I regret those comments that he made. Claiming a person can’t do their job because of their race is sort of like the textbook definition of a racist comment.”

The following New York Times editorial reflects my views in words that I cannot construct in a better way.

By THE EDITORIAL BOARD of The New York Times JUNE 6, 2016

Donald Trump’s Contempt for the Rule of Law

Federal judges have repeatedly and emphatically refused to recuse themselves from cases because of their race or ethnicity. These rulings were driven by two realizations: Ethnically based challenges would reduce every judge to a racial category, which would be racist in itself. And such challenges would make judges vulnerable to recusal motions — for reasons of race, ethnicity, gender or religion — in every case that came before them.

In other words, once these challenges were allowed, there would be no end to them.

The gravity of this matter has clearly eluded Donald Trump, who has cast aside the Constitution and decades of jurisprudence by suggesting both ethnic and religious litmus tests for federal judges. These pronouncements illustrate that Mr. Trump holds the rule of law in contempt.

Mr. Trump started down this road months ago, attacking a federal judge in California who is hearing a lawsuit against the now-defunct Trump University. Last week, he asserted that the judge, Gonzalo Curiel, had an “inherent conflict of interest” because he was “of Mexican heritage.” Mr. Trump implied that Judge Curiel — an American, born in Indiana — was biased against him because he intended to build a wall along the border to stop illegal immigration.

Republican leaders repudiated the remarks and hoped that the issue would disappear. But Mr. Trump went further on Sunday, when he said on the CBS News program “Face the Nation” that a Muslim judge might be similarly biased against him because he has proposed a ban on Muslim immigrants entering the United States.

When the interviewer, John Dickerson, reminded Mr. Trump that this country has a tradition of not judging people based on heritage, the presumptive Republican nominee responded, “I’m not talking about tradition, I’m talking about common sense.”

Republicans who say they disagree with Mr. Trump’s racialist statements have tried to assuage the public by arguing that he doesn’t really believe those views. But if that’s the case, it is pretty cold comfort. Cynically choosing to equate ethnicity with bias is hardly more appealing than simply being ignorant or bigoted.

Can a Racist be Elected President of the United States?

The answer to this question, sadly, is yes!

Who is that racist? Donald Trump.

Why would I believe that?

You can’t make this stuff up.

June 3, 2016 Redding, California (CNN) Donald Trump sought to tout his support among African-Americans on Friday by pointing out a black man in the crowd and calling him “my African-American.”

“Oh, look at my African-American over here. Look at him,” Trump said. “Are you the greatest?”

The remark didn’t generate a noticeable response from Trump’s audience.

June 3, 2016 Washington (CNN) Donald Trump on Friday vociferously defended his claims that a judge overseeing a lawsuit against Trump University is biased because of his Mexican heritage — pushing back against criticism that his objections are racist.

Speaking with CNN’s Jake Tapper on “The Lead,” Trump repeatedly referenced his plans to build a wall between the U.S. and Mexico and renegotiate trade agreements between the two countries.

Donald Trump, the presumptive Republican nominee for president, escalated his unprecedented verbal attacks on Federal District Judge Gonzalo Curiel on Thursday night. In an interview with the Wall Street Journal, Trump claimed the judge could not fairly preside over the Trump University cases because of Curiel’s “Mexican heritage.” (Curiel is from Indiana; his parents are Mexican immigrants.) “I’m building a wall, it’s an inherent conflict of interest,” he added.

From the American Heritage Dictionary

Racist

Believes that race accounts for differences in human character or ability and that a particular race is superior to others.
Discrimination or prejudice based on race.

According to Real Clear Politics the last poll was completed June 1 shows Clinton with a lead of 1.5. The previous poll completed May 30 shows Clinton with a lead of 1. In other words a win now is a 50/50 proposition. A bigot could be elected president.

Report predicts LA County will add 346,000 jobs by 2020

This is both good and bad news. Metropolitan Los Angeles is experiencing growth while many other large cities are shrinking. Chicago come to mind as a city that has lost 1/3 of its population. The key sentence in the following article is “Unfortunately, many of those jobs are low paying positions that would make it tough for someone to support a family.” The median price of a home in LA County is $526,000 according to Zillow. They have gone up 6.5% over the past year and Zillow predicts they will rise 1.6% within the next year. The solution for low paid workers is to commute to work. That could mean a one and half hour travel time. Many people are doing exactly that. Outbound freeways are jammed with cars every evening.

A new report from the Los Angeles County Economic Development Corp. reveals that L.A. County will add 346,00 jobs between 2015 and 2020, including 20,900 in the construction industry. Leo Jarzomb — Staff photographer

By Kevin Smith, San Gabriel Valley Tribune

Posted: 06/01/16, 12:41 AM PDT | Updated: 14 hrs ago

Los Angeles County is expected to add 346,000 jobs between 2015 and 2020 across a broad range of industries, according to a report released today.

The Los Angeles County Economic Development Corp.’s annual “People, Industries and Jobs” report shows that 123,000 of those jobs will be in the city of Los Angeles.

Construction, professional and business services, education and health services and leisure and hospitality will see the biggest growth rates in percentage terms. But the lion’s share of new jobs will come from administrative and support services (57,560), Food services and drinking places (39,510), social assistance (34,30) and professional and technical services (33,300).

Unfortunately, many of those jobs are low paying positions that would make it tough for someone to support a family.

On the plus side, construction is expected to add 20,900 jobs, which bodes well for both housing activity and commercial expansion.

Southern California’s construction industry took a heavy hit during and after the Great Recession, which began in late 2007 and ended in June 2009, as developers pulled back on building housing projects and commercial developments — sometimes curtailing activity altogether.

“We’ve been waiting for that industry to rebound,” said economist Christine Cooper, the LAEDC’s senior vice president and lead author of the report. “It has just been really hard.”

But the industry is rebounding and Southland developers have a variety of residential projects in the works.

KB Home, for example, has 10 housing developments underway in Los Angeles County in such communities as Santa Clarita, Van Nuys, Palmdale, Pomona, West Covina and Los Angeles.

An annual report on the company’s website shows that KB delivered 8,196 homes throughout its various U.S. markets last year compared with 7,215 the previous year and 7,145 in 2013. KB’s revenues have likewise risen, topping out at more than $3 billion last year compared with the $2.4 billion the company generated in 2014.

“As the housing market recovers, construction industries are expected to make a robust recovery,” the LAEDC report said. “Housing starts are showing signs of life after a dismal few years, and will be needed to meet pent-up demand.”

The report notes, however, that L.A. County’s economic recovery has been generally disappointing and that the region didn’t recover all of the jobs that were lost during the recession until last year. Moreover, the recovery that has taken place doesn’t take into account the job growth needed to accommodate the county’s ongoing population and labor force growth.

The report also shows a clear correlation between educational attainment and unemployment.

In 2014, the jobless rate for L.A. County residents with a high school education or the equivalent was 9.4 percent, nearly double the 5 percent rate for those with a bachelor’s degree or higher. That same kind of disparity played out in the city of L.A.

The median annual earnings for an L.A. County resident with a high school education or the equivalent was $26,049 in 2014. That figure is dismal when compared with the yearly median income of someone with a bachelor’s degree ($50,976) or someone with a graduate or professional degree ($71,596).

The largest share of working residents in the county (33.3 percent) earn $15,000 to $35,000, and nearly 8 percent earn just $15,000 or less. Still, Cooper said progress is being made on the education front.

“We’ve been doing these reports for a number of years and we’re seeing that more young people are gaining higher levels of educational attainment,” she said. “We see that as a really bright spot.”

That may be bright. But a not-so-bright portion of the study shows that nearly 323,300 of the 2.19 million families who were living in Los Angeles County in 2014 had their incomes fall below the poverty level in the previous 12 months. A large portion of that number included children and young working age adults.

Single mothers with children under 18 accounted for nearly 40 percent of those living below the poverty line.

“The good news is that our region is adding jobs across most industries, and is expected to continue its expansion,” Cooper said. “However, although we are seeing some job growth in high-paying industries, it is clear that not enough of our projected job gains are skilled, well-paying jobs that will support middle class incomes. We need to work together to change this trajectory, by fostering job creation in our leading export-oriented industries, which tend to pay higher wages and strengthen regional prosperity overall.”

Cooper said California’s new minimum wage requirements, which will boost the minimum wage to $15 an hour by 2022, will likely have some negative effects.

“Some businesses will choose to replace lower skilled workers will people who have higher skills,” she said. “And it will also lead to an increase in automation.”

If Donald Trump Becomes President of the United States

I saw the above presentation by Donald Trump on Fox News channel this morning. It is apparent that he has not backed down on any of his opinions. That is a troubling possibility for the U.S.A.

Just listen to his words!

Besides building a wall between the United States and Mexico he would impose a 35% tariff on goods manufactured in Mexico. The consequence of that would be 1) higher prices for all the consumer items bought in the United States from Mexico and 2) the United States has a positive trade balance with Mexico of $182 Billion and the million jobs created by that trade balance would be lost.

China holds $1.3 Trillion in U.S. treasury notes. A 45% tariff on those goods imported from China (his plan) would not only destroy their sales of consumer goods to America, it would create a trade war. China would most likely demand repayment of the notes. Donald Trump, who believes in bankruptcies when he doesn’t want to pay his debts, would do what? Refuse payment. That decision would cause worldwide economic panic and the destruction of the American economy.

Saudi Arabia would also demand payment on the notes it holds ($116.8 billion) and just might embargo the oil sold to American oil companies.

Japan holds $1.1 Trillion in American notes. You think they will simply pay 100% of the bill for our troops in their country?

Market Watch says on their web site that “45% of Americans pay no federal income tax” and that converts to “77.5 million households do not pay federal individual income tax.” So when Donald Trump on his web site says “If you are single and earn less than $25,000, or married and jointly earn less than $50,000, you will not owe any income tax. That removes nearly 75 million households – over 50% – from the income tax rolls”, what is he telling you?

When Donald Trump says we will have the most powerful military in the world, what is he telling you? Well actually nothing. You see America’s military is the most powerful in the world today.

There is no drought in California. The weatherman are all wrong. Donald Trump says so. So it must be true!

Think smoke and mirrors. Think of Alice in Wonderland. Think the powerful Oz. That would be someone behind a curtain who has no power at all.

You think we have problems now. Donald Trump will destroy in just a few years what has taken over 200 years to build. The United States is the greatest country in the world today!

President Obama’s nuclear non-apology, apology

The following column was printed in today’s Los Angeles Daily News. The author, Doug McIntyre, has written almost exactly what I was thinking. I was asking myself, Why did Barack Obama feel the need to go to Hiroshima, Japan? Those who have accused Obama of being the president who apologizes for America’s strength in the world have hit upon his weakness.

I emphasized one paragraph in bold that looks to the future.

—

Barack Obama never said the words “sorry” or “I apologize,” so technically it wasn’t an apology.

As the first sitting American president to ever visit Hiroshima, Japan, the world was focused on every syllable Obama would say.

“Seventy-one years ago” began the president, “on a bright, cloudless morning, death fell from the sky and the world was changed.”

Of course, 75 years ago, on a bright, cloudless morning in Hawaii, death also fell from the sky. But the president — a native son of Hawaii — had not traveled to Hiroshima to talk about World War II’s beginning, rather, its morally complex end.

The president’s critics (and more than a few friends) feared he might apologize for America’s use of atomic weapons to bring an end to the war in the Pacific; so concerned, the White House issued an unprecedented denial in advance, assuring the nation their president had no such intention.

Unfortunately, he did everything but.

In tone and demeanor, it was impossible to watch or read the text of President Obama’s Hiroshima address and not conclude the president regrets President Truman’s decision to drop the atomic bomb in August of 1945.

“The memory of the morning of August 6, 1945, must never fade,” Obama said.

Neither must the memory of Dec. 7, 1941.

Obama has a history of offering mea culpas for American foreign policy both past and present. He has not only apologized for the actions of his predecessors, he has frequently objected to his own foreign policy, bemoaning his inability to close the terrorist prison camp in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, while struggling to reconcile his use of drone strikes that also “rain death from cloudless skies” with his 2009 Nobel Peace Prize.

Barack Obama is hardly the first American president to have grave concerns about the horrific consequences of nuclear weapons. For this reason alone Donald Trump disqualifies himself to be commander-in-chief. The possibility of nuclear war has kept every president up at night. The possibility that Trump could be president should keep everyone up at night.

“With such weapons, war has become not just tragic, but preposterous,” the president said.

But the president who said this wasn’t Barack Obama. Rather, it was Dwight Eisenhower.

Eisenhower knew war. He understood its horrors. He understood the waste of it all.

“Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed,” said the former Supreme Allied Commander in March 1953.

Yet, while Eisenhower loathed industrialized murder — and that’s what warfare is — he was not a utopian. Ike’s feet were firmly planted on the ground. Americans trusted him. America’s enemies feared him. There was more to Eisenhower than pretty words.

While Obama seems conflicted about the use of American military power, the men responsible for ending the Second World War had clarity of purpose. With millions upon millions slaughtered, any president, maybe even Obama, would have used any tool at his disposal to bring that war to an end.

To harshly judge his predecessors from the safety of the post-Cold War world they gave us is to diminish what it took to get us here.

Doug McIntyre’s column appears Sundays. Hear him weekday mornings 5-10 on AM 790. He can be reached at: Doug@DougMcIntyre.com.

Trump’s Discrimination Against Muslims

A Pin Drop

This article is appropriate for Memorial Day.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Once upon a time when our politicians did not tend to apologize for our country’s prior actions, here’s a refresher on how some of our former patriots handled negative comments about our great country.

JFK’S Secretary of State, Dean Rusk, was in France in the early 60’s when DeGaulle decided to pull out of NATO.

DeGaulle said he wanted all US military out of France as soon as possible.

Rusk responded, “Does that include those who are buried here?”

DeGaulle did not respond. You could have heard a pin drop.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

When in England, at a fairly large conference, Colin Powell was asked by the Archbishop of Canterbury if our plans for Iraq were just an example of ’empire building’ by George Bush.

He answered by saying, “Over the years, the United States has sent many of its fine young men and women into great peril to fight for freedom beyond our borders. The only amount of land we have ever asked for in return is enough to bury those that did not return.”

You could have heard a pin drop.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

There was a conference in France where a number of international engineers were taking part, including French and American. During a break, one of the French engineers came back into the room saying, “Have you heard the latest dumb stunt Bush has done? He has sent an aircraft carrier to Indonesia to help the tsunami victims. What does he intend to do, bomb them?”

A Boeing engineer stood up and replied quietly: “Our carriers have three hospitals on board that can treat several hundred people; they are nuclear powered and can supply emergency electrical power to shore facilities; they have three cafeterias with the capacity to feed 3,000 people three meals a day, they can produce several thousand gallons of fresh water from sea water each day, and they carry half a dozen helicopters for use in transporting victims and injured to and from their flight deck. We have eleven such ships; how many does France have?”

You could have heard a pin drop.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

A U.S. Navy Admiral was attending a naval conference that included Admirals from the U.S., English, Canadian, Australian and French Navies. At a cocktail reception, he found himself standing with a large group of officers that included personnel from most of those countries. Everyone was chatting away in English as they sipped their drinks, but a French admiral suddenly complained that, whereas Europeans learn many languages, Americans learn only English. He then asked, “Why is it that we always have to speak English in these conferences rather than speaking French?”

Without hesitating, the American Admiral replied, “Maybe it’s because the Brit’s, Canadians, Aussie’s and Americans arranged it so you wouldn’t have to speak German.”

You could have heard a pin drop.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

AND THIS STORY FITS RIGHT IN WITH THE ABOVE…

Robert Whiting, an elderly gentleman of 83, arrived in Paris by plane. At French Customs, he took a few minutes to locate his passport in his carry on.

“You have been to France before, monsieur?” the customs officer asked sarcastically.

Mr. Whiting admitted that he had been to France previously.

“Then you should know enough to have your passport ready.”

The American said, “The last time I was here, I didn’t have to show it.”

“Impossible.. Americans always have to show their passports on arrival in France!”

The American senior gave the Frenchman a long hard look. Then, he quietly explained, ”Well, when I came ashore at Omaha Beach on D-Day in 1944 to help liberate this country, I couldn’t find a single Frenchman to show a passport to.”

You could have heard a pin drop.

$12 Billion Man Buys into Tribune Publishing

Tribune Publishing said this morning that Patrick Soon-Shiong, by some accounts the wealthiest man in Los Angeles, is buying 12.9 percent of the company’s stock and paying $15 a share, the elevated price that Gannett has offered in a bid to take over the company. Soon-Shiong will become the second-largest shareholder, get a seat on the board of Tribune Publishing and be vice-chairman. The Los Angeles Times says it will be a $70.5 million investment. The company is also entering into a licensing deal with Soon-Shiong’s NantWorks for use of what Forbes calls in its story “over 100 machine vision and artificial intelligence technology patents for news media applications.” Per Forbes, Tribune would earn the first $80 million in revenues from NantWorks’s AI patents and a 6% royalty after that. Tribune would issue 333,333 shares of stock to a NantWorks subsidiary, NantStudio.

Patrick Soon-Shiong is a South African-born American surgeon, medical researcher, businessman, philanthropist, and professor at University of California at Los Angeles.

Forbes magazine estimates Mr. Soon-Shiong’s wealth at $11.9 Billion as of today. He was born in South Africa and holds degrees from University of the Witwatersrand, University of California, Los Angeles, and University of British Columbia. He is 63 years old and married. He is currently chairman of the Chan Soon-Shiong Family Foundation and chairman and CEO of the Chan Soon-Shiong Institute for Advanced Health, National LambdaRail, the Healthcare Transformation Institute and NantWorks, LLC.^[5] In October 2010, he bought Earvin “Magic” Johnson’s minority ownership stake in the Los Angeles Lakers. He lives in the Brentwood neighborhood of Los Angeles.

This proves you don’t have to be a flamboyant loudmouth to be a billionaire.

Megyn Kelly, Donald Trump and The Media Circus

You may have thought that Megyn Kelly was a serious reporter when she challenged Donald Trump at the first GOP debate on August 6, 2015. That was where she challenged Mr. Trump on his treatment of women. You would be wrong. Her real intent, and the intent of Fox News, was to obtain attention grabbing headlines that would result in higher viewership of that cable station. The plan worked even better than they had anticipated.

How do I know this? Watch yesterday’s interview by Kelly of Trump. (the video appears to be blocked. It can be found on Youtube) Not one serous question was asked about the campaign for president. Not one serious question was asked about anything. It was all fluff. Why now? Fox wants to continue the appearance of Mr. Trump on their programs. So they made nice. In addition the ending of the program was an advertisement for a Megyn Kelly written book. The new book about her year covering — and feuding — with presumptive Republican nominee Donald Trump.

Fox News and Megyn Kelly are not alone in their pursuit of the money that the election generates. MSNBC and CNN have coverage every hour of the day and night on the election and of course their focus on Donald Trump. When it comes to in depth analysis DO NOT look for any of that, even on Sunday morning programs like Meet the Press and Face the Nation.

That leaves the citizenry of America to figure out who should receive their vote based upon the limited, media controlled information and the information posted on line by “independent” thinkers. Is anyone really non-partisan?