Occupation of Independence

Uncompahgre Plateau, west of Montrose, CO. I am pleased to stumble upon my second "forest miracle" in one summer. Up here at 9000 feet the locals are busy as beavers harvesting firewood in various areas where it is allowed. It's nice to see them actually get some use out of their oversized, overpowered, and overpriced pickup trucks, the official car of Colorado. Maybe one of them will tell me how much a full load of firewood is worth, compared to buying heat from the power company. Of course, I just love seeing downed timber get cleared away. It makes the forest a lot more attractive and removes "ladder fuel" from a potential forest fire. And Coffee Girl can chase squirrels up tree with fewer speed bumps on the forest floor. (Then again, she has amazing buoyancy in bounding over logs.) Progress is being made in this forest, and I don't want to sound greedy, but do you think that commercial companies can get permits to cut firewood and then sell it

Is "obscene" too harsh of a word? It could be. For many years I called Christmas the most obscene national holiday. But that was a mistake. The commercialism (and endless, stupid music) of Christmas might be objectionable on the basis of taste, but it doesn't really offend important values held by serious and sincere people. After all, Christmas really isn't a Christian holiday; it never was. It's simply about fun. But the hypocrisies of the modern Fourth of July do offend the values that most Americans used to take seriously. What could be more disgusting than pretending to care about "freedom" one day a year when, in fact, freedom means little to the average Amerikan today. Too bad I haven't paid more attention to politicians' speeches; it would be great to have statistical proof of a mere suspicion of mine that Democratic politicians don't even bother bloviating about freedom -- nobody would believe them if they did. The whole no

Since being listed on hitchitch.com recently (due to no effort of mine) this blog has many new readers. I probably owe it to them to tell them about this blog so they don't waste their time. This is not one more RV blog that discusses where the blogger is today, whether he got the oil changed at Walmart, or whether RV toilet paper should be one ply or two. Nor am I interested in selling you solar panels, LED lights, etc. Presumably you don't need me to tell you that there is 'breathtakingly beautiful' scenery in XYZ national park. I don't want more readers -- I want better readers and commenters. So then, let's put our newbie readers through a sink-or-swim test by depriving them of the travel escapism and eye candy that they expect. _______________________________________ Anyone who reads a lot of editorials and opinion on the internet must feel frustrated much of the time. So it is a pleasure to announce a rare victory: an editorial that is worth rehash

It must be mere impressionism because it really doesn't make sense that a mountain biker would see more wildlife than a hiker, but such has been my experience. On today's ride I saw a bobcat stop in the middle of the forest road, a hundred yards ahead of Coffee Girl and me, and then do a double-take. Connected by a leash tied to my hip, we must have looked like a pretty strange animal to that bobcat. After a couple seconds it scampered off. There's no mistaking that short tail. Speaking of impressionism is it really true that the middle of a forest is as depopulated of wildlife as it seems, or do too-many-trees simply get in the way of seeing what animals are there? Wildlife biologists must know the answer to that. My version of common sense -- which could be mistaken -- is that there just isn't as much to eat in the middle of a pine tree monoculture as there is at the edge of a forest, or for that matter, in somebody's backyard on the edge of town. You'd t

At long last it is time for the Duel . In order to appreciate the drama of this you might consider watching the end of Barry Lyndon , where you will find more than courage and honour involved. You'll also see intricate rules and rituals being followed to the letter, whilst Schubert's excellent piano trio plays in the background. Young Lord Bullington, the step-son of Barry Lyndon, spoke to him: "Mr. Redmond Barry (aka Barry Lyndon): the last occasion on which we met you wantonly caused me injury and dishonour, in such a manner and to such an extent to which no gentleman can willingly suffer without demanding satisfaction , however much time intervenes. I have now come to claim that satisfaction."    I couldn't have said it better myself. In the original challenge I neglected to explain how the winner would be determined. Rest assured that it will be decided by a distinguished group of "seconds", as well as the head "factors" in charge

Are we supposed to be shocked or are we supposed to giggle about the "charges" that the Italian captain of the wrecked cruise ship was unmanly enough to get into a lifeboat with other passengers instead of going down with the ship? From one point of view this storyline is charming and nostalgic. It conjures up chivalrous images of an era long-gone, when a gentleman was expected to give up his life preserver and place on the lifeboat to a lady and her two small children. It's hard to believe that modern culture still believes in romantic atavisms like a captain being the last off his ship. Perhaps the Media is just desperate for a story: disasters have a way of becoming yesterday's news so quickly; but scandals and controversies can be milked for weeks or months. Imagine you were on that ship as it began listing. Shouldn't your behavior mirror the norms of society in general? For decades the Federal government has been running a Ponzi scheme regarding housing,

Several years ago I skimmed Hitchens's God is Not Great . Disappointment, rather than disagreement, was the book's main effect on me. It is sophomoric for a modern intellectual to pose as Voltaire or Thomas Paine and rail against traditional religions. Why don't they show some real guts by taking on the conventional belief systems of the intelligentsia itself? These are well known, but seldom acknowledged and never criticized, by conventional intellectuals who want to stay popular within their own coteries. (They have to make a living after all, so they don't want to be on the receiving end of the subtle blacklisting that a Marxist or Green apostate would receive from an editor in the publishing industry or a reviewer at the New York Times.)   None of the obituaries that I've read about Hitchens really inspires me to read any of his books. But the threshold is far lower for magazine-length articles. A fair number of them are free and accessible at Salon.com. Indee

No matter how much a person might like their mobile lifestyle, there must be times when it seems frivolous and vacuous: when it degenerates into "channel surfing with gasoline". In the back of his mind, the traveler might yearn for experiences more substantial and challenging than mere sightseeing. But it would still be nice if mobility enabled these deeper and richer experiences. For instance, during the Arab Spring, I was in the habit of reading bicycle touring blogs. Most of them were pretty boring: "...yesterday I was there, today I'm here. This morning I had instant oatmeal instead of corn flakes for breakfast." Then they photographed the oatmeal. In contrast, one of these cycle tourers was staying in a Bed and Breakfast in downtown Cairo, right next to Tahrir Square where all the demonstrations took place. What an experience he had! Driving to an "Occupy Wall Street" rally could be one of those experiences, and one that an RV is uniquely ad

Many full time RVers start off with a Livingston TX address since that's where the Escapees organization is. The first year I got a jury duty notice from Livingston when I was in Washington state in the summer. I called a clerk in Livingston, where a human being actually answered the phone. She understood the situation -- they have many RVers on the voting list there apparently -- and I was excused from jury duty.

Once again American taxpayers are getting a chance to see all the shiny toys and weapons that their billions have paid for, while generals give slide shows of how accurate they are. Such great television! Isn't war fun -- it's just like playing a video game. (Meanwhile, in the AfPak theater of operations, the highest-tech weapon of all, the drone, kills boys gathering firewood. But that's yesterday's news.) It is infuriating to watch all the air-time that BBC and CNN are giving the Gadhafy regime. Why do they even bother to listen to its lies? On a purely technical level you have to admire how well the Gadhafy regime has learned to convert the Media into a lapdog. Apparently they have been studying the American government during this era of 7 and 24 news, when a successful news biz or career depends on access to government officials everyday. They say that a culture is defined by the questions it never even thinks to ask. If so, how does that apply here? Obviously,

It wasn't so long ago that I mused in a speculative way on uprisings in the Middle East and North Africa. I didn't really think it was going to turn out to be so BIG! Tomorrow a protest is scheduled for the Big Enchilada, Saudi Arabia. Is this the End? Will lightning strike twice? My guess is that the Saudi protest will stay somewhat subdued. Isn't shooting protesters rather old-fashioned and unnecessary? It creates martyrs. The next day there is a public funeral, and the mob is itching for revenge. Maybe a reader knows how it works when they non-violently arrest a protester. Aren't you required to have your national identification card with you at all times in most countries? So they know who you are, and then enter that number into the computer. You are marked for life. Many of the protesters are young. Do they expect to ever get a government job someday? And that's the biggest part of the economy these days, directly or indirectly.  Even if the protesters

Political discussions are best when there is ambivalence in the situation, the writer, or the readers. There is an opportunity to discuss unions on that level, although so far, the discussion of the Wisconsin public unions has been bitterly partisan. You can be against overpaying public unions -- primarily in the form of pensions and benefits -- and still see a constructive purpose for unions in the private sector and in the right industries. The worst part of the discussion so far should offend everyone, regardless of how friendly they are to unions. Democrats are trying to compare public sector unions in Wisconsin to genuine freedom fighters in North Africa and the Middle East. Why? Just because they are having demonstrations? In the Middle East protesters are risking their lives. They are trying to overthrow an oppressive regime and build a new country. In contrast, the public sector unions in Wisconsin are trying to preserve the status quo , in which they are a privileged caste

My sporting advice to liberals is to keep blaming Palin for the Tucson shooting, despite its apparent failure as shown by recent polls. Oh dear, here comes a military metaphor: they can fail tactically while winning on a strategic level. Attacking Palin solidifies the notion that she is the front runner, the heir apparent. If Republicans fall for this and "rally 'round the Palin", the liberals will end up getting the last laugh, since she is a weak candidate.  Palin is unqualified, dumb, and unpresidential. Is it not obvious that Palin was chosen to fight the "tired old white guy" image that McCain had? (Think Bob Dole in 1996.) Also, the first (half) black candidate for president was generating a lot of excitement on the Democrat side, so the GOP didn't want to be completely left out of the affirmative action presidential sweepstakes. I think that trend has become passe. The example of Obama will bring Americans back to the sensible notion that a half

It is a common complaint, almost a cliche, that politics has become increasingly partisan and bitter over the last few years. Everybody bemoans this, but nobody does anything about it. The aftermath of the Tucson shooting -- more than the shooting itself -- seems to suggest a frightening political volcano lying dormant just below the surface. For a sense of perspective let's look at a quote from Boswell's Life of Johnson , circa 1770. Johnson says: I would not give half a guinea to live under one form of government rather than another. It is of no moment to the happiness of an individual. Sir, the danger of the abuse of power is nothing to a private man. What Frenchman is prevented from passing his life as he pleases? It was easy for Johnson to make that argument. No matter how tyrannical a government was in his day, it could have only the smallest impact on everyday life compared to what it can do today, whether it be tyrannical or benevolent. The machinery simply didn'

If, in the privacy of their own hearts, many Leftists jumped to conclusions or even felt a brief moment of dark glee upon hearing of the Tucson shooting, they shouldn't be blamed too much; after all, most restrained themselves while waiting for more evidence. The most notable exception to responsible behavior was Paul Krugman at the ever-shrinking New York Times. But that was expected. After all, the Democrats took quite a "shellacking" in the midterm election, causing it to be compared to 1994. Naturally a shocking act of violence instantly brings to mind the Oklahoma City bombing, which Clinton was able to use to his advantage in becoming the Comeback Kid. My advice to the Left is that they not be misled by seductive analogies. So far, Obama has shown none of the political acumen or good luck of Clinton. In the mid-90s, Talk Radio was the only crack in the Leftist hegemony over the Media. (Fox News didn't hit the big time until later in the 90s.) But today the int

There should be more pundits and "news" sources that take a time-agnostic point of view: "Oh so that's what happened today, is it? Well who the hell cares." But the Media focuses on the trivial and ephemeral. I'm afraid the internet is just making it worse, with its obsession with how things are "trending", and with who's hot and who's not. In the political news, the Media obsesses over tweaking this or that tax policy or government entitlement program to the Left or Right. When are we going to focus on something important for a change?! We live in a Democratic age, as opposed to the earlier era of an Aristocracy or Monarchy. We think that the very legitimacy of our political establishment is based on "the consent of the governed." And yet, we have created trillions of dollars of debt or unfunded entitlement programs that will have to be paid by people in the years of 2020-2050 A.D. Some of them aren't even old enough to vot

It's not so hard to write a travel blog, as I know from past experience (rv-boondocker-explorer). After all, there are millions of armchair travelers who are easy to please with the morning news -- their daily dose of (free) escapism -- about where you slept last night and what the pretty scenery looks like there. Then there's your trip to the local Pioneer Museum, which is proud to feature the world's third largest ponderosa pine cone, etc. The challenge picks up considerably as you move away from the travel genre. My half-seniorish brain is a giant compost heap, a mouldering pile of half-forgotten quotes from a lifetime of reading classic books. I can't quite remember a nice quote about needing to be almost formally and ritualistically polite in conversations if we are to have full-bodied discussions of any type. This is pertinent to a blogger who wants to crawl out of the trivia and small talk. For instance you can't discuss much without using labels, which r

The internet is abuzz with howls of protest about the TSA's new procedures for screening airline passengers. I wasn't too interested in this at first, probably because I haven't flown for years. But then I saw an angle that did interest me. When an issue fits neatly into the Left-versus-Right paradigm, it can be quite boring. All the shibboleths and slogans are so predictable. If you ask somebody for their opinion, it ends up being a mere recording. But it is much more interesting when an issue produces mixed feelings and cross-currents on both sides. Let's consider the poor Democrats first. A good liberal's instinctive reaction to some -- nay, to any -- new or expanded federal government program is that it must be a step towards Progress. At least its intentions must be good; what else matters? And yet, this is part of the War on Terror, which is Bush's War. And the airline unions hate the new procedures. Furthermore privacy issues are a not-insignificant pa

As national holidays go, Veterans' Day is a rare success. It stands for something serious instead of frivolous or merely traditional. Oh it's true that there are a few political cranks (like me) who get nervous about too much patriotic bluster on 11 November because they think it contains an implicit advertisement for the permanent Warfare state that America has become. But many people would admonish the cranks thusly: Why not put your stupid politics aside for one day of the year, and honor the individuals who suffered and sacrificed and were proud to do so? Very well then, let us put politics aside and admire individual soldiers for what they went through. But wasn't war itself once called 'the continuation of politics by different means?' If that is true, and if we are serious about ignoring politics, we should be just as happy to honor soldiers who fought on the "other side." Why focus exclusively on American troops? Surely most people have the great

If I were a Republican I'd be careful about post-election euphoria. None of the fundamental weaknesses of the GOP have been addressed. It is still seen on the coasts as the party of low IQ Bahbl-bangers in the hinterlands. When an independent voter thinks of the GOP, unpopular perma-wars in the Mideast are the first thoughts to come to mind. If the "God and Country" coalition that dominates the GOP had its way we would find new wars, starting with Iran. The coalition is made of Rapture Christians, neo-cons, and defense industries. The label, conservative, is still misapplied to the GOP. The party was taken over by neo-cons during the G.W. Bush's administration. Neo-cons pay some lip service to the idea of limited government, but their real loyalty is to post-WWII hegemony by the USA. When they talk of "patriotism," they really mean defending the American global empire, starting with Israel of course. Rapture Christians naturally feel the same way. It won&