I was going to write this rant last night but I went out doing stuff and by the time I got home, I was too tired to do anything but go to bed. So, I’ll write it now. Enjoy.
This weekend, Jamestown College hosted the 2nd Annual North Dakota Intercollegiate Honor Band and I was selected as one of the representatives from the NDSU Gold Star Band. I was going to use this rant to complain about all of the little things that happened that detracted from the experience. Instead, I’ve decided to focus on the high points of the two day festival. First of all, I was, somehow, selected as principal tuba. Unfortunately, they didn’t inform me of that fact until the start of the second day. (Okay, so I complained slightly, but there are a lot of other little things I could complain about as well, but I won’t.) The guest conductor for the weekend was Bill Long, a fellow tuba player. I’ve never had a conductor with as much energy as Mr. Long. He was also one of the most passionate directors I’ve ever worked with. He loved everything about the music we were playing, and he reflected that in his directing. When we had breaks and meals, the ten of us from NDSU all got together and goofed around. I think there was a total of about four seconds in those two days when we were all together that we weren’t laughing. It was some of the most fun I ever had. Fortunately for me, I wasn’t drinking milk while we were together or I would have, well, you know. (Laughing + Milk = A Funny Scene for All) Sadly, that pretty much sums up all of the positives for the weekend for me. There were a lot of other things I took away from the weekend, but they weren’t all that positive, such as the importance of tuning and dynamics. (Alright, so I complained again. But I didn’t go in depth on what was wrong with the tuning or dynamics. If I did that, you’d be reading for a week and a half.) Well, I think I’d better end this rant now before I really do start to list all of the negative aspects of the weekend. But let me leave you musicians out there with this final thought, it's okay to play pianissimo.
Alien Technology, a high technology firm that produces various products including small, inexpensive computer chips for various uses, is looking at locating a production facility in Fargo near NDSU. Alien has been working with North Dakota State in the research field due to NDSU’s excellent engineering programs. Now they look to bring a plant to Fargo and with it, hundreds, possibly more than 1,000, new jobs. As a condition to coming to Fargo, Alien is requesting around $50 million in tax incentives. That may sound like a lot of money, but a press release by Sen. Byron Dorgan (D-ND) states that this plant could eventually employ over 1,000 people and have a payroll exceeding $50 million annually. To Governor John Hoven, Mayor Bruce Furness, and President Joseph Chapman of NDSU, I say this: Do whatever you have to do to get this firm in Fargo. A large firm with high paying jobs is exactly what this entire region needs. As I’ve said before, we need jobs in this region that require educated people. There are thousands of fresh college graduates leaving North Dakota because there are no jobs for them. Having a large engineering firm in Fargo could help to keep some of those people here.
Giving a few tax breaks to a firm with such potential in research and development to get them in Fargo is a small price to pay. This state will get repaid time and time again with a firm such as this in the state. And the trickle down effects will be amazing for this city. With more and more educated people coming to or staying in Fargo, the entertainment in this city must expand. Look to my rant from January 4th. I outlined numerous entertainment options this city must explore. And with more people with higher paying jobs in the city, the opportunities for leisure must swell to fulfill the desires of the people living here.
In general, I disagree with Senator Dorgan on most topics. But he is going to be pivotal in convincing Alien Technology to locate in Fargo. The key figures in this, Sen. Dorgan, Gov. Hoven, Mayor Furness, and President Chapman of NDSU, must work together and do whatever they must to get this firm in North Dakota. There is much talk in this state about keeping young people. If the state fails to attract Alien, this state fails in its attempt to keep young people in North Dakota.
I was going to write today on the briefing yesterday by Hans Blix and Mohamed ElBaradei to the UN Security Council and the reactions to that briefing by the member states. But I came to a realization that no amount of evidence presented on my website or by Colin Powell or George Bush is going to change the mind of anyone against this war. There are some people that do not want to know the truth. The French aren’t even capable of understanding UN Resolution 1441. They think it calls for inspections. It doesn’t, it clearly calls for disarmament as Colin Powell had to remind them. I recommend reading the resolution in full to better understand it. You can Click here to get a copy (PDF format). It’s a short resolution (8 pages) and very straightforward and easy to understand.
There are those that support possible war, and anything I write will just reinforce your ideals. There are those that are opposed to possible war, and I won’t be able to change anyone’s mind no matter how much evidence I supply. Most anti-war people have no clue or don’t want to have a clue as to what is going on in Iraq. They call those in support of war “butchers,” yet they don’t seem to care what Saddam is doing to the people of Iraq. Amnesty International has reported on the torture of the Iraqi people. Here is an excerpt from one of their reports:
“Torture victims in Iraq have been blindfolded, stripped of their clothes and suspended from their wrists for long hours. Electric shocks have been used on various parts of their bodies, including the genitals, ears, the tongue and fingers. Victims have described to Amnesty International how they have been beaten with canes, whips, hosepipe or metal rods and how they have been suspended for hours from either a rotating fan in the ceiling or from a horizontal pole often in contorted positions as electric shocks were applied repeatedly on their bodies. Some victims had been forced to watch others, including their own relatives or family members, being tortured in front of them.
“Other methods of physical torture described by former victims include the use of Falaqa (beating on the soles of the feet), extinguishing of cigarettes on various parts of the body, extraction of finger nails and toenails and piercing of the hands with an electric drill. Some have been sexually abused and others have had objects, including broken bottles, forced into their anus. In addition to physical torture, detainees have been threatened with rape and subjected to mock execution. They have been placed in cells where they could hear the screams of others being tortured and have been deprived of sleep. Some have stayed in solitary confinement for long periods of time. Detainees have also been threatened with bringing in a female relative, especially the wife or the mother, and raping her in front of the detainee. Some of these threats have been carried out.” (Source)
Is this not enough evidence to remove the Saddam Hussein regime from power in Iraq? Not according to Amnesty International. As expected, Amnesty opposes the possible war in Iraq. They fail to understand that this torture in Iraq will not end through diplomacy. It will only end when the current Iraqi regime is ended. To Amnesty and many groups like them, peace is the total absence of war and war must be avoided at all costs. I have the same basic philosophy as Ronald Regan and George W. Bush, in order to maintain peace, we must display our willingness to use force against our enemies, Peace through Strength. I feel a war today would act to save lives in the future by ending a threat before it becomes an even greater threat.
I wish it were possible to end the Iraqi threat without an all out war. People will die, some of them innocent bystanders to war. But if we allow Saddam Hussein and Iraq to go unchecked, many more innocents will die in an unprovoked attack by Saddam or by terrorists working with him. We cannot wait. We must end the threat today.
It’s been a while since I’ve last written. Sorry to all of you that come here daily looking for entertainment or for something to get mad over. I don’t have many excuses, just four tests and a nasty cold over the last week. But that should be no reason to go this long without an update, right?
Anyway, remember my rant on January 4th about how North Dakota is going down the crapper? Looks like I’m not the only one thinking this way. The Guardian, a British news outlet, published an article on North Dakota yesterday. It isn’t a flattering view of North Dakota either. But it is an accurate description of this state. What positives does the article list for North Dakota? The World’s Tallest Structure, the KVLY-TV tower; The world’s largest Buffalo in Jamestown, describing it as being “positioned in a way that suggests it is about to dump the World's Largest Buffalo Dropping in the direction of passing humanity”; the world’s largest Holstein Cow, near New Salem; and “a modestly sized city” of Fargo. Make sure you read the article when you get a chance.
You upset over the article? How can you be, it’s all the truth. And this is how everyone else in the entire world views us. They don’t see Fargo and all we have to offer. They see a desolate wasteland of cow pastures. At lest Nebraska gets flown over by people going between New York and Los Angeles. What do we get? Tourism commercials with John Hoven (who, by the way, is an idiot) touting our wonderful nothingness as though that’s what people want to see on vacation. When you go on vacation do you want to watch cows grazing and wheat growing? Maybe I’m the only one here, but I’d rather have some culture. I want to see a world famous art museum, watch a major league baseball game, go to an amusement park. You ever heard of a cow milking fantasy camp? Neither have I.
How do we change this image of North Dakota to the rest of the world? As I said before, quit concentrating exclusively on agriculture. Not everyone in North Dakota is an in-bread yokel. Many if not most are, but not all of the people here are rednecks. (I can think of at lest three or four people that aren’t.) The most important people in this state that need to realize how others view us are those in the capital. John Hoven is number one. I think I’m the only republican in this state that cannot stand our republican governor. In 2004, vote for me! Write-in Michael Paul Lehmann on your ballot, I’ll turn this state around. Until we are able to realize the true state of the state, only then can we begin to improve it.
For just the third time in the United States’ Space Program, a tragic accident has cost the lives of astronauts. Just days after the 17th anniversary of the Challenger disaster and 36th anniversary of the Apollo 1 fire, the Space Shuttle Columbia was lost as it broke up on reentry minutes before it was due to land. Six Americans: Col. Rick Husband, Cmdr. William McCool, Lt. Col. Michael Anderson, Dr. Kapana Chawla, Capt. David Brown, and Cmdr. Dr. Laurel Clark; and One Israeli: Col. Ilan Ramon; were lost today (Profiles of the seven crewmembers at FoxNews.com). The Nation and the World today share in grief over the loss of these seven brave astronauts.
I have a major concern over this event today. It is not a concern for the overall safety of the Space Shuttle Program. It is a concern that this may have been a terrorist act. In more than 100 Shuttle launches (I believe Columbia was on the 133rd mission overall) there was only one other disaster when the Space Shuttle Challenger exploded shortly after launch in January of 1986. I find it an incredible coincidence that the one mission with an Israeli on the crew has a deadly failure. And if I were trying to destroy a Space Shuttle, I would attempt to do it during reentry. Great heat is created on any object entering the earth’s atmosphere due to friction, and anything mankind sends into space that we want back must be shielded against this great heat. In addition to the shielding, the angle of attack on the atmosphere must be just right. Remember that scene in the movie Apollo 13? If the entry angle is too steep, the object (be it a meteor or a crew capsule) will burn up. Reentry on the Space Shuttle is controlled by computers. Should someone be able to hack in to the NASA system and find the software for the reentry program, they, in theory, could change just one number causing the Shuttle to enter the atmosphere too steeply. (”Italian astronaut: Re-entry angle incorrect?”) And what better target for an international terrorist than an American Space Shuttle with an Israeli on board?
Of course this is just one theory by someone that knows nothing about the computer system of NASA and how difficult it may be to break in to their systems. And there are multiple redundancies on the Shuttle systems, so more than one program would have to be changed in order to cause a failure such as this.
Let us not forget the seven that were lost today and the 10 that were lost in the Space Shuttle Challenger and Apollo 1 disasters. I thought President Bush summed it up best this morning in an address he made to the Nation when he said, “The crew of the shuttle Columbia did not return safely to Earth; yet we can pray that all are safely home.”
January 27, 1967 – Apollo 1
Lt. Col. Virgil “Gus” Ivan Grissom
Lt. Col. Edward Higgins White, II
Lt. Cmdr. Roger Bruce Chaffee
January 28, 1986 – Space Shuttle Challenger
Francis R. Scobee
Michael J. Smith
Judith A. Resnik
Ellison S. Onizuka
Ronald E. McNair
Gregory B. Jarvis
Sharon Christa McAuliffe
February 1, 2003 – Space Shuttle Columbia
Rick D. Husband
William C. McCool
Michael P. Anderson
Kalpana Chawla
David M. Brown
Laurel B. Clark
Ilan Ramon
Apollo 1
Space Shuttle Challenger
Space Shuttle Columbia
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