Challenger - 23 years later

At 8:39 PST on January 28, 1986 the Challenger Space Shuttle Exploded 73 seconds into its flight. Killing all seven astronauts.

I had been working as a young engineer here in Ridgecrest for only about 2 months when this happened. Several of us wanted to watch the launch, so we were gathered around a small TV in the projection room of one of the conference rooms in Mich Lab. The projection room was so small that we had to stand in the hallway and look in through the door in order for more than just 3 or 4 people to see what was going on. When the shuttle exploded we were stunned. Quickly the crowd around the TV grew so that most folks could no longer see the set, and they had a hard time hearing also because of all the sniffling and crying going on. The crowd quickly filled the hallway. We had been standing there for several minutes when suddenly an angry voice demanded "What the hell is going on here. You people need to get to work."

Simultaneously about half the crowd snapped back "Shut up!"

Fortunately one of the people in the back of the crowd quickly explained to our now very irate department head what had happened. So he didn't take being told to shut up by a cocky bunch of young engineers too personally.

Happy 4th of July

Happy Independence Day

Two hundred and thirty two years ago a bunch of rabble rousing malcontents got together and decided that they were fed up with being oppressed by their government. So they wrote down some complaints, signed the list and told their King to go jump in the lake.

Who would have thought that their little insurrection would grow into the nation we live in today.

In CONGRESS, July 4, 1776.
The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America,


When in the course of human Events, it becomes necessary for one People to dissolve the Political Bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the Powers of the Earth, the separate and equal Station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent Respect to the Opinions of Mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the Separation.

We hold these Truths to be self-evident, that all Men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness.

That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just Powers from the Consent of the Governed.

That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these Ends, it is in the Right of the People to alter or abolish it, and to institute a new Government, laying its Foundation on such Principles, and organizing its Powers in such Form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient Causes; and accordingly all Experience hath shewn, that Mankind are more disposed to suffer, while Evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the Forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long Train of Abuses and Usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object, evinces a Design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their Right, it is their Duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future Security.

Such has been the patient Sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the Necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The History of the Present King of Great-Britain is a History of repeated Injuries and Usurpations, all having in direct Object the Establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let the Facts be submitted to a candid World.

He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public Good.

He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing Importance, unless suspended in their Operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.

He has refused to pass other Laws for the Accommodation of large Districts of People; unless those People would relinquish the Right of Representation in the Legislature, a Right inestimable to them, and formidable to Tyrants only.

He has called together Legislative Bodies at Places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the Depository of their public Records, for the sole Purpose of fatiguing them into Compliance with his Measures.

He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly Firmness his Invasions on the Rights of the People.

He has refused for a long Time, after such Dissolutions, to cause others to be elected; whereby the Legislative Powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the Dangers of Invasion from without, and Convulsions within.

He has endeavoured to prevent the Population of these States; for that Purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their Migrations hither, and raising the Conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.

He has obstructed the Administration of Justice, by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary Powers.

He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone, for the Tenure of their Offices, and Amount and Payment of their Salaries.

He has erected a Multitude of new Offices, and sent hither Swarms of Officers to harass our People, and eat out their Substance.

He has kept among us, in Times of Peace, Standing Armies, without the consent of our Legislature.

He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil Power.

He has combined with others to subject us to a Jurisdiction foreign to our Constitution, and unacknowledged by our Laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:

For quartering large Bodies of Armed Troops among us:

For protecting them, by a mock Trial, from Punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:

For cutting off our Trade with all Parts of the World:

For imposing taxes on us without our Consent:

For depriving us, in many Cases, of the Benefits of Trial by Jury:

For transporting us beyond the Seas to be tried for pretended Offences:

For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an arbitrary Government, and enlarging its Boundaries, so as to render it at once an Example and fit Instrument for introducing the same absolute Rule in these Colonies:

For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws, and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:

For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with Powers to legislate for us in all Cases whatsoever.

He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us.

He has plundered our seas, ravaged our Coasts, burnt our Towns, and destroyed the Lives of our People.

He is, at this Time, transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to complete the Works of Death, Desolation, and Tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty and Perfidy, scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous Ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized Nation.

He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the Executioners of their Friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands.

He has excited domestic Insurrections among us, and has endeavoured to bring on the Inhabitants of our Frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages, whose known Rule of Warfare, is an undistinguished Destruction, of all Ages, Sexes and Conditions.

In every stage of these Oppressions we have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble Terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated Injury. A Prince, whose Character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the Ruler of a free People.

Nor have we been wanting in Attentions to our British Brethren. We have warned them from Time to Time of Attempts by their Legislature to extend an unwarrantable Jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the Circumstances of our Emigration and Settlement here. We have appealed to their native Justice and Magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the Ties of our common Kindred to disavow these Usurpations, which, would inevitably interrupt our Connections and Correspondence. They too have been deaf to the Voice of Justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the Necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of Mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace, Friends.

We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the World for the Rectitude of our Intentions, do, in the Name, and by the Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly Publish and Declare, That these United Colonies are, and of Right ought to be, Free and Independent States; that they are absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political Connection between them and the State of Great-Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do. And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm Reliance on the Protection of the divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes, and our sacred Honor.


Signed by ORDER and
in BEHALF OF THE CONGRESS
JOHN HANCOCK,
PRESIDENT.

A Day in Infamy

I have tried several times to write something about the 65th anniversary of the attack on Pearl Harbor.

There seem to be many correlations, connections or comparisons that I could make between Dec 7, 1941 and Sept 11, 2001. However the thoughts rumbling around in my head just don’t seem to make it onto the page.

I don’t personally remember Pearl Harbor or the subsequent world war. But I was raised by parents and grandparents who all lived through both. I digging through my grandparent’s stuff I have run across a plethora of WWII memorabilia - Gas rationing stamps, postcards reminding us to recycle rubber, aluminum, and steel, practically everything.

This got me to thinking about the differences in our generations. My grandparents’ generation was brutally attacked and they responded with a strong national identity and overall national sacrifice. It cost over 400,000 American lives but they went to war and defeated Germany, Japan and Italy.

My parents’ generation fought a much different world war - the cold (third?) world war. There were regional conflicts in Korea and Vietnam that we believed would have world wide impact if we did not fight. We lost over 100,000 American soldiers in those conflicts. While we got to see the downfall of the Soviet Union without an armed conflict, the wars we fought had much different results. World War II ended with costly but obvious victories for the Untied States and our allies. Korea ended with the nation split and the communist north 50 years later, testing nuclear bombs. Vietnam ended when congress denied funding for out troops, and we pulled out leaving our allies to die by the millions when the communist north over ran their country.

My generation has to fight the Global War on Terror. This was has been waged against us for over 25 years. It just took the Sept 11 attacks on New York, Washington and Pennsylvania to jar our complacent nation into action. Now, 65 years after Pearl Harbor and 5 years after 9-11 we are positioning ourselves to once again walk away from a war without defeating our enemy. The reasons for this are many. Some people still don’t believe that we are in a war. They think that this can be handled with diplomacy and police enforcement. Some people think that holding hands and singing KumbyYa will make the world a better place. Many of our politicians on both sides of the aisle are willing to sacrifice what is good for America in order to gain what is good for themselves. Far too many Americans don’t like where or how the war is being fought or they don’t understand who we are fighting. And that is the main difference in our generations.

In World War II the enemy was clear – Japan, Germany, Italy and anyone who supported them. In the cold war the enemy wasn’t quite so clear cut. The enemy was Communism which was represented by the Soviet Union and China. But in the Global War on Terror, who is our enemy. Muslims? Radical Muslims? Sure, most terror attacks against the United States were carried out by Muslims. Does that mean we declare war on all Muslims?

We went to war in Afghanistan. We overthrew the Taliban there who was supporting Al Qaeda and Osama Bin Laden. Then we went to war in Iraq and over threw a murderous dictator there that had been funding terrorists for years. Now we are dealing with a violent insurgency in Iraq that is being inflamed by Iran and Syria. So we go after Iran and Syria also. Or do we pull out and concentrate on capturing one man, Osama Bin Laden? Do we crush the insurgency in Iraq regardless of the loss of innocent civilians? How do we tell the innocent civilians from the insurgents? How much do we spend? How long do we fight? What is victory? Can we ever defeat an enemy that will never surrender? Are we fighting a nation, a religion, an ideology, a ghost?

In browsing the blogosphere last night and this morning I ran across several dedications and memorials about Pearl Harbor. But one of the best things I read was Our Pearl Harbor By Victor Davis Hanson. Mr. Hanson does a much better job contrasting our generation with the greatest generation than I ever could. Give it a read; it’s not very long and certainly worth a mouse click and three minutes of your life.

So far the United States has encouraged its citizens to shop rather than sacrifice. The subtext is that we can defeat the terrorists and their autocratic sponsors with just a fraction of our available manpower - ensuring no real disruption in our lifestyles. That certainly wasn't the case with the Depression-era generation who fought World War II.

And after Pearl Harbor, Americans believed they had no margin of error in an elemental war for survival. Today, we are apparently convinced that we can lose ground, whether in Afghanistan or Iraq, and still not lose either the war or our civilization.

Of course, by 1945, Americans no longer feared another Pearl Harbor. Yet, we, in a far stronger and larger United States, are still not sure we won't see another Sept. 11.

Remember Who Paid For Your Freedom

I stumbled across this picture on Michelle Malkin's blog. I liked the picture and that led me to follow some of the links she provided.



Worcester Wreath Company which was founded by Morrill Worcester seems to be one of those American corporations that still understands the price that was paid for the freedom we all enjoy. I like that they not only talk about honoring our veterans but that they do something about it. Even more important is that they not only honor them with wreaths on their graves at Christmas but that they are active in teaching the next generation about the cost of freedom. That is something I think that the last couple generations have really dropped the ball on.

I was lucky enough to spend a lot of time with my grandfather when I was younger. He made sure that I knew what it meant to be free, what that freedom cost, and who paid the price. Grandpa’s lessons in freedom were never in the form of lessons, lectures or speeches. He taught me to value our freedom by just being himself and showing me what was important to him.

My grandfather would drive from Rapid City to Sturgis SD every couple weeks to buy cheese. There was a place in Sturgis that made the best Colby longhorn cheese. The cheese was good enough that Grandpa was willing to drive 26 miles to get it. Between Sturgis and Rapid City is the Black Hills National Cemetery. We never drove past that cemetery without my grandfather making some positive comment about the character of the men buried there. He was never preachy, or overly patriotic. He would make just a plain common sense statement like "Field full of heroes coming up on our left."

Sometimes we would drive through the cemetery. We wouldn’t stop, he wouldn’t talk, we would just cruise nice and slow through the cemetery. On rare occasions Grandpa would stop the car, get out and wander around for a while. He would eventually stop at any one of several different headstones where he would pause briefly staring at the stone and then look at me and say something along the lines of “He was a good guy, one of the best, but he cheated at poker.” Then we would get in the car and head home.

Unfortunately I was too young to notice or care whose names were on the stones. I never looked or paid attention. But through the years I learned the lesson – these are the men who paid the price for our freedom.

My grandfather and my mother are now at rest in that field full of heroes.

So if you plan on buying live Christmas wreaths this year and you don’t have a local source for your wreaths, I would recommend the Worcester Wreath Company. You can purchase their products here.