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Saturday, October 07, 2006
Friday, October 06, 2006
Growing Up In Kent, Washington: Tarheels, Hayseeds, Hicks, Hillbillies, and Crackers
Growing up in Kent, Washington, most of our moms, and none of our dads, went to school after the 8th grade. They went to work on the farm, or in town, if they had lost the farm during The Depression. Most of them enlisted when they were old enough to lie their way into The Army.
The kids on the hill, including my future wife, had parents that went to college and made a little money. Down in the valley, the only thing we shared with the hill dwellers was the town itself, school, and the annual Cabbage Festival. In the valley, our cars and pickups were ten years old. The houses were a hodgepodge of rambling additions tacked onto tiny post-war structures. At least part of our food came from hunting, fishing, and foraging. We ate venison and steelhead at times. Our dads brewed their own beer and sometimes made wooden toys in a friend's shop. They also built home-made vacation trailers and rowboats.
Our fathers grew up in rural Washington, Oklahoma, Wyoming, The Dakotas and Carolinas, Kansas, Arkansas, and Idaho. We were descended (again, mostly on our fathers' sides) from tarheels, hillbillies, and crackers. Our mothers grew up in Western Washington, where our fathers ended up after the war. In 1945, they mustered out of the service in Bremerton or Fort Lewis, and liked the mild weather, the trees, and the fishing and hunting. Instead of going back to the farms on the prairies, they stayed.
We bought our clothes from J.C. Penney or the Sears & Roebuck catalog store. When (and if) we went on vacation, we camped. We went out for dinner once or twice a year, to Colonel Sanders or the A & W Root Beer Stand. I learned to swim in the Green River (the same river in which I was baptized) and got to swim in a pool once a year, with the Cub Scouts. The water was warm, and blue, and to this day, the smell of chlorine reminds me of wealth.
I didn't know anyone who had been divorced, except my dad's brothers, Uncle Romey and Uncle Gould. I never knew a mother who worked outside the home until I was eighteen. Every single kid's father had been in the army or navy, and in my case, both.
A few of the fathers were lucky, smart, or ambitious enough to get a business going, but mostly they worked in construction or Teamster jobs. There were no shopkeepers or clerks in this crowd. They were too physical for that. Those sorts of jobs would have seemed a little swish anyhow. Everyone's dad was periodically fired or laid off. None of my friends were destitute--our parents had enough money for clothes, food, and a trip to the movies or a comic book once in a while (thirty-five cents and twelve cents respectively), but at any given moment, every single one of us were exactly one paycheck from poverty.
When our dads were unemployed, we were eligible for government surplus food commodities. I remember going to a vast warehouse in Auburn to pick up cornmeal, margarine, canned "meat," nonfat dry milk, powdered eggs, canned peas and spinach, rolled oats, sugar, and peanut butter. My old man made Slugger's dogfood from some of the cornmeal and canned beef.
Growing up in Kent, Washington (pop. 3,200; now an incredible 85,000), the only place I ever ever heard words like "negro" or "black" were on T.V. The Japanese, Filipino, and Mexican families were mostly ignored. Had African-Americans had a larger presence, race would have been a far more important issue. The Japanese families that returned to Kent after the war, following their release from internment camps in Idaho, were mostly exempted, while the full brunt of racism was focused on the blacks. The words to describe our black brothers and sisters were coon, nigger, spook, spearchucker, darky, and jungle bunny. According to Dictionary.com, "The term nigger is now probably the most offensive word in English."
An early memory from childhood is of putting a nickel in my mouth, and hearing "Don't put that in your mouth! A nigger could have touched it."
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The kids on the hill, including my future wife, had parents that went to college and made a little money. Down in the valley, the only thing we shared with the hill dwellers was the town itself, school, and the annual Cabbage Festival. In the valley, our cars and pickups were ten years old. The houses were a hodgepodge of rambling additions tacked onto tiny post-war structures. At least part of our food came from hunting, fishing, and foraging. We ate venison and steelhead at times. Our dads brewed their own beer and sometimes made wooden toys in a friend's shop. They also built home-made vacation trailers and rowboats.
Our fathers grew up in rural Washington, Oklahoma, Wyoming, The Dakotas and Carolinas, Kansas, Arkansas, and Idaho. We were descended (again, mostly on our fathers' sides) from tarheels, hillbillies, and crackers. Our mothers grew up in Western Washington, where our fathers ended up after the war. In 1945, they mustered out of the service in Bremerton or Fort Lewis, and liked the mild weather, the trees, and the fishing and hunting. Instead of going back to the farms on the prairies, they stayed.
We bought our clothes from J.C. Penney or the Sears & Roebuck catalog store. When (and if) we went on vacation, we camped. We went out for dinner once or twice a year, to Colonel Sanders or the A & W Root Beer Stand. I learned to swim in the Green River (the same river in which I was baptized) and got to swim in a pool once a year, with the Cub Scouts. The water was warm, and blue, and to this day, the smell of chlorine reminds me of wealth.
I didn't know anyone who had been divorced, except my dad's brothers, Uncle Romey and Uncle Gould. I never knew a mother who worked outside the home until I was eighteen. Every single kid's father had been in the army or navy, and in my case, both.
A few of the fathers were lucky, smart, or ambitious enough to get a business going, but mostly they worked in construction or Teamster jobs. There were no shopkeepers or clerks in this crowd. They were too physical for that. Those sorts of jobs would have seemed a little swish anyhow. Everyone's dad was periodically fired or laid off. None of my friends were destitute--our parents had enough money for clothes, food, and a trip to the movies or a comic book once in a while (thirty-five cents and twelve cents respectively), but at any given moment, every single one of us were exactly one paycheck from poverty.
When our dads were unemployed, we were eligible for government surplus food commodities. I remember going to a vast warehouse in Auburn to pick up cornmeal, margarine, canned "meat," nonfat dry milk, powdered eggs, canned peas and spinach, rolled oats, sugar, and peanut butter. My old man made Slugger's dogfood from some of the cornmeal and canned beef.
Growing up in Kent, Washington (pop. 3,200; now an incredible 85,000), the only place I ever ever heard words like "negro" or "black" were on T.V. The Japanese, Filipino, and Mexican families were mostly ignored. Had African-Americans had a larger presence, race would have been a far more important issue. The Japanese families that returned to Kent after the war, following their release from internment camps in Idaho, were mostly exempted, while the full brunt of racism was focused on the blacks. The words to describe our black brothers and sisters were coon, nigger, spook, spearchucker, darky, and jungle bunny. According to Dictionary.com, "The term nigger is now probably the most offensive word in English."
An early memory from childhood is of putting a nickel in my mouth, and hearing "Don't put that in your mouth! A nigger could have touched it."
---o0o---
Thursday, October 05, 2006
An Air-conditioned anti-radiation suit used at the Hanford, Wash. Nuclear Site
This tearsheet [1] from Popular Science, shows a "girl" with a Geiger counter, in her air-conditioned suit about to do her job at Hanford. The Hanford Atomic Site occupies 586 square miles in Benton County, in central Washington. It was established in 1943 during World War II as the Hanford Engineer Works, part of the Manhattan Project, to provide the plutonium necessary for the development of nuclear weapons. Plutonium from Hanford was used to build the first nuclear bomb that was tested near Alamogordo, New Mexico, and used to build Fat Man, the bomb that was dropped on Nagasaki, Japan. Hanford is now a storage facility for nuclear waste. Hanford also contains the only operating nuclear plant in Washington state.
[1] a sheet or page cut from an actual printed magazine, journal, or newspaper, sent to the advertiser or contributor as proof of publication.
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Democrats closing in on a Congressional majority!
Reuters/Zogby polls released Wednesday seem to indicate that Democrats are closing in on the fifteen seats they need to retake the House of Representatives. Heh heh.
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Wednesday, October 04, 2006
Tuesday, October 03, 2006
Sabrina Demonstrates The World's Finest Projection Equipment (vintage ad)
click sabrina to enlarge
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Rudyard Kipling writes about gun control (circa 1911!)
The Gods of the Copybook Headings
AS I PASS through my incarnations in every age and race,
I make my proper prostrations to the Gods of the Market Place.
Peering through reverent fingers I watch them flourish and fall,
And the Gods of the Copybook Headings, I notice, outlast them all.
We were living in trees when they met us. They showed us each in turn
That Water would certainly wet us, as Fire would certainly burn:
But we found them lacking in Uplift, Vision and Breadth of Mind,
So we left them to teach the Gorillas while we followed the March of Mankind.
We moved as the Spirit listed. They never altered their pace,
Being neither cloud nor wind-borne like the Gods of the Market Place,
But they always caught up with our progress, and presently word would come
That a tribe had been wiped off its icefield, or the lights had gone out in Rome.
With the Hopes that our World is built on they were utterly out of touch,
They denied that the Moon was Stilton; they denied she was even Dutch;
They denied that Wishes were Horses; they denied that a Pig had Wings;
So we worshipped the Gods of the Market Who promised these beautiful things.
When the Cambrian measures were forming, They promised perpetual peace.
They swore, if we gave them our weapons, that the wars of the tribes would cease.
But when we disarmed They sold us and delivered us bound to our foe,
And the Gods of the Copybook Headings said: "Stick to the Devil you know."
On the first Feminian Sandstones we were promised the Fuller Life
(Which started by loving our neighbour and ended by loving his wife)
Till our women had no more children and the men lost reason and faith,
And the Gods of the Copybook Headings said: "The Wages of Sin is Death."
In the Carboniferous Epoch we were promised abundance for all,
By robbing selected Peter to pay for collective Paul;
But, though we had plenty of money, there was nothing our money could buy,
And the Gods of the Copybook Headings said: "If you don't work you die."
Then the Gods of the Market tumbled, and their smooth-tongued wizards withdrew
And the hearts of the meanest were humbled and began to believe it was true
That All is not Gold that Glitters, and Two and Two make Four
And the Gods of the Copybook Headings limped up to explain it once more.
As it will be in the future, it was at the birth of Man
There are only four things certain since Social Progress began.
That the Dog returns to his Vomit and the Sow returns to her Mire,
And the burnt Fool's bandaged finger goes wabbling back to the Fire;
And that after this is accomplished, and the brave new world begins
When all men are paid for existing and no man must pay for his sins,
As surely as Water will wet us, as surely as Fire will bum,
The Gods of the Copybook Headings with terror and slaughter return.
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More depressing ruminations on gun control and murder in America/Repeal The Second Amendment
click image to enlarge
How many more times will we have to witness these terrorists from within? These "random" killings seem to happen more and more often. This week alone, there have been three high profile shootings, with at least six people dead. The death toll in the Lancaster County, PA "Amish" killings may go up to seven.
click to enlarge
The FBI's Crime in the United States Report estimated that 67% of the 16,503 murders in 2003 were committed with firearms, or, over 10,000 murders.
Two months ago, two friends of our family were killed when hiking, shot by an unknown murderer. I wrote about the second amendment again, which elicited these comments:
Law abiding citizens giving up the right to own guns will not magically rid the world of criminals or guns. Keeping the right and (more importantly) exercising it, will, however, give innocent people the ability to defend themselves.
By Anonymous, at 7/28/2006 11:15 AM
The number of innocent people defending themselves is miniscule compared to the number of innocent people being murdered. The innocents all currently have the right to pack heat.The deterrent effect is complete and utter horseshit.I'm not really talking about giving up rights; I'm talking about extending our rights--by locking up every gun nut who refuses to surrender his weaponry.
By Jack Brummet, at 7/28/2006 12:37 PM
Your facts are not correct. Studies show there are about 2.5 million defensive gun uses per year in the united states ... people defending themselves from those who would do them harm.
By Anonymous, at 7/28/2006 1:59 PM
Yeah, that's the cops. I'll still let them keep their guns. . .until there is no longer any need!This argument--that if everyone was packing heat we'd all live in blissful harmony is not only disingenuous, but flat out crazy talk.
By Jack Brummet, at 7/28/2006 10:41 PM
Wrong again. That is ordinary citizens defending themselves. Everyone is entitled to an opinion, but to have any worth, an opinion should be an informed opinion based on the facts.You clearly do not have a handle on the facts or really understand the issue. As a result, your opinion is just random babble.No rational person believes that crime or violence can be eliminated with any “silver bullet”, but, just because you would like to give up your right to defend yourself, does not mean that everyone should. I will be able to defend myself and my family if the need should ever arise, whether in a parking lot or hiking, whether against a person or a wild animal. I doubt you will be.If your friend was prepared to defend herself, say may well be alive today. It obviously would not be a guarantee, but at least she would have had a chance to protect herself and her daughter. It is a tragedy that she was not prepared.
By Anonymous, at 7/29/2006 1:41 PM
Disregarding your insults, we can pass half-baked theories back and forth all we want. For every argument that you gun guys come up with about how more guns=less crime (and you come up with plenty), there’s a more valid argument that they don’t. It’s time to make a reasonable conclusion about whether guns are safe or not. And the most reasonable conclusion is that, well, things designed to kill people are just not inherently safe. With no guns around, we just might find out that we just don't need them anymore.
By Jack Brummet, at 7/30/2006 12:31 AM
In December, 20004, I wrote about the tragic killing of "Dimebag" Darrell Abbott of the band Damageplan in a nightclub in Columbus. Many of the comments (see below) on this article focused on how more guns would make us safer:
Ralph said...
Both sick biscuits were sick on hearing the trash these people produce. Both got close enough to have killed the person with a knife or baseball bat...The gun is irrelevant.Ralph (not a memeber of the NRA) - but one who fears liberals more than guns.
4:49 PM, December 09, 2004
click sign to enlarge
Jack Brummet said...
I'm pretty sure you have never listened to Damageplan, and, OK, I'll respect your right to think the Beatles produced trash. Yeah, you're not in the NRA. You're saying that these guys could have done the same damage with a knife or baseball bat? Possibly. I'm not sure the guy could have killed five people with a knife. Isn't that being a little disingenuous? At least Abbott would have possibly had a fighting chance. He might have run. Or ducked. "The gun is irrelevant." For a guy who has called me "stupid" elsewhere, you don't seem all that swift yourself. But you write OK for a mouth-breather. 6:26 PM, December 09, 2004
Monkey said...
I was very saddened by this news - having been a fan of Dime - but I tell ya - it never crossed my mind or a SECOND that guns were to be blamed - I'm not in the NRA but can see where if more people packed guns this kind of thing would be a lot less likely to happen. - An armed society is a polite society.I'm sure you don't see it that way - it's interesting to read an opposing view though - you write well. Have a great weekend.
9:54 PM, December 09, 2004
Michael Morrison said...
There are people who claim the "music" (sorry, but I find most of the current noise not really music, but I also recognize that is an opinion, not one I would force on others) played by today's bands causes violence. Should, therefore, that so-called "music" be banned? There are smarter people who say "guns cause crime just as flies cause garbage." In truth, owning a gun is the same human right as owning, say, a DVD. A free human being has the right to OWN anything he has honestly acquired, whether it's a gun or a recording (even one most of us find distasteful) or a Bible or a plant. If one insists on laws controlling behavior, then the only rational and moral law is one against acts that initiate force or fraud; that is, one can properly advocate laws against killing or stealing or driving under the influence ... but NOT against ownership of ANYthing honestly acquired.
10:15 PM, December 09, 2004
Jack Brummet said...
Hi Monkey - The previous commentator pointed out a baseball bat could have done as much damage. But to kill four people would have required much more energy, and time, than standing and pulling the trigger. So, in a way, I agree with you AND the NRA..."guns don't kill, people kill." But people kill with guns. Israel has a handgun murder rate one sixth of ours, even though they are heavily armed. Switzerland, where virtually everyone owns a gun has about one third the murders we do. Most murders are crimes of passion, and the people who carry them out are not deterred by the consequences (like the killer last night, or a terrorist in Israel). I'd just like to hamstring them a little. /jack
10:21 PM, December 09, 2004
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Monkey said...
Jack:True, true - it'd be some work to kill 4 people with a bat - but it could be done.Interesting facts you point out about Israel & Switzerland - it's amazing how a country can be so well behaved with so many guns - I have no answer to that - it's a mystery I guess. I guess we Americans are just a little more crazy or something - but I'd not have it any other way - crazy or not, I love our country even if we waste each other ever now and again.But I still feel SAFER knowing that so many of my fellow Americans are packing - because I still feel there's more GOOD people in the world than bad - and I want good people to have and carry guns freely - if nothing else so they can waste away idiots like the guy last night, or the clown that comes into McDonald's blowing away innocent people. I will always feel safer with guns all around me - even though that sounds warped probably to you and others I feel they're a GOOD tool in the right hands. (Like in the hands of the cop at that concert who probably saved a lot of lives) Off to beddy-by-land. Good night.
10:50 PM, December 09, 2004
Jack Brummet said...
Well, I guess we agree to disagree. For me it is about proportion. . .People with bats or knives don't do a lot of collateral damage. Someone with a semi-automatic weapon and a pocketful of clips could kill dozens of people. Tjis guy killed at least four before he even reloaded. I didn't look it up, but I know there are statistics about how many crimes are actually thwarted by people carrying guns. The last I heard, I believe was that far far more people are killed than saved by guns.
10:01 AM, December 10, 2004
Anonymous said...
Guns make us safer Jack, the same way having nuclear missiles kept the Russians away and you'll probably never believe that. You talked about the low rates of killings in Switzerland and Israel, and you were right.
1:42 PM, December 10, 2004
Stephen Clarke-Willson said...
BTW, the article was this: http://www.hillsdale.edu/newimprimis/2004/september/default.htm
4:45 PM, December 13, 2004
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Monday, October 02, 2006
Sunday, October 01, 2006
We are in a cocoon, enveloped by President Bush's benevolence. . .and catapult
click the poster to enlarge
Wrapping up another week and heading rapidly into the mid-term elections, President Bush continues his "Johnny One Note" act, spending most of his time speechifying and defending his decisions to invade Iraq, isolate and torture prisoners, setting the stage for an Iran invasion, and continuing to paint the Democrats as the party of appeasement and the party of ostriches.
While The President continued his relentless P.R. campaign (a/k/a "catapulting The Propaganda"), the White House was buffeted by random ill winds this week:
The resignation of Congressman Mark Foley
President Bill Clinton's charges of administration with inaction on counter-terrorism in the months leading up to the 9/11 attacks
Bob Woodward's new book, "State of Denial," depicting a White House in utter chaos following its disastrous Iraq invasion
And that was just the knuckehead stuff! What's next? When will the other shoe drop? Is there a smoking gun somewhere?
The White House is now engaged in a life or death struggle. Losing both legislative houses, will effectively neuter The President. For good. He will have two long years (preferably two long and excruciating years) to plan his Presidential Library.
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White House Goes Ape Over Bob Woodward's New Book, State of Denial
Click on The President making a speech to enlarge
Bob Woodward’s new book, "State of Denial," draws a disturbing picture of White House in utter chaos, attempting to right itself in the aftermath of its disastrous Iraq invasion.
The New York Times printed excerpts of the book on Friday, and the Administration immediately went into full damage-control mode, as top aides tried to figure out how to spin this one. . .which is really not unlike trying to make a rendering plant smell like lavender.
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