Clear Skies Common Sense

Aging can be Enjoyable with More Rests, Great Partners, and Realistic Goals

james.s.russell@verizon.net (JSR) — Thu, 29 Jul 2010 09:15:00 GMT

For the nine years Karen and I have hiked the Cascades, people have said, “You’ve got to see the Enchantments.” They’re a chain of blue lakes at elevations ranging from 6,800 and 7,800 feet beneath peaks in the Alpine Lakes Wilderness. Mountain goats roam among them.

My 69^th birthday made me fear I’d never see them, because I struggle at elevations around 4,000 feet. Nevertheless, I got a three-day forest service permit. I wanted to casually say, “Oh yes, I’ve seen the Enchantments.”

It wasn’t a casual trip, but I like challenges. I enjoyed it because I rested frequently and had a great partner. But age means lowering my expectations.

Our daughter Pam joined me. She volunteers to help participants climb mountains for Reach the Summit, a fundraiser for the American Lung Association of Oregon. Most climb to honor a friend or relative with lung disease. Pam’s an asthmatic who’s summited Mt. Hood and helped me summit Mt Adams 14 years ago. She also carried the tent and poles.

My frequent rest stops under my 25-pound pack cut short plans to hike to Snow Lakes the first day. As I sucked in air, she snapped photographs of ridges, creeks and wildflowers such as lupine, bluebells, columbine and paintbrush. After six-and-a-half hours and 4,200 feet of elevation, we stopped at Nada Lake. We heard and saw fish jump to nab mosquitoes on that quiet green lake as the sun set on the peaks.

Our early stop meant we faced a 1700-foot elevation gain next day. The Enchantments were covered in mushy snow for which we had no equipment. A mostly melted Lake Viviane was all we’d see. I’d have to say, “Oh yes, I’ve seen an Enchantment.”

I never doubted I’d make it until the first 400 feet of elevation. Cold in camp, I’d put on too much clothing. I stripped down, but quickly put them back on after I fell into lower Snow Lake crossing a narrow dam. When the slopes increased to climbing with our hands, rests increased. I chanted, Head up. Breathe from your abdomen, diaphragm and chest. Your legs are strong.

Finally Pam said, “Can you see the waterfall? That’s it. Can you make that?”

No, but I didn’t tell her. We both knew it was getting too late to return safely. Finally, gasping, dizzy, stumbling, with a pulse rate at 120, I quit. “Pam, you go on.”

“Dad, when did you eat last?”

“At the lake.” Two hours earlier.

“What? You have to eat every 45 minutes. You’re strong. If you’re dizzy, you need food. Eat this.”

I squeezed the quick-energy gel down my throat and thought, I’m a klutz.

“And this fruit bar. It’ll kick in after 15-20 minutes. It’s cherry.”

I didn’t taste cherry. I tasted cardboard boot-box.

She scouted the route. “You can make it.”

“OK, I can do this until 2:00.” And enjoy it, I said as my head cleared.

At 1:39 I took a picture of her by the sign, Lake Enchantments.

I felt no elation. The trip was far harder than I expected. I felt more limited.

Icy blue Viviane Lake with bright snow on a shoreline under granite spires and two mountain goats restored me. It took several days to recover. Pam said it was the hardest hike she’d ever been on, but loved it.

I said, “I couldn’t have made it without you.”

She said, “I’d never have done it without you.”

Aging means picking great partners, setting realistic, but ever diminishing goals, and taking ever increasing rests to enjoy the journey.

Anti-Incumbent Voices Rising Up Despite Meager Amounts of Money

james.s.russell@verizon.net (JSR) — Thu, 22 Jul 2010 17:43:00 GMT

Amidst anti-incumbent moods, five challengers filed with the Secretary of State against Congressman Hastings. They face a serious obstacle: campaign funds. “My campaign manager estimated we needed $500,000,” said Richard Wright, Democratic challenger in 2006. Current Federal Election Commission (FEC) reports indicate anti-incumbents have under funded campaigns compared to Hastings who raised $633,569 from 351 individuals and 277 Political Action Committees.

Jay Clough, Kennewick, Democrat, has raised $25,999. Clough, which rhymes with tough, “Had enough? Vote for Clough,” is a 33-year-old Tri-Cities native. He’s a stocky, former Marine Corporal and CWU graduate. During 2008 and 2009 he blogged about how the federal government should work. “If you don’t like the way the government is running, you need to hold your representatives accountable. One way to do that is get out and run.”

Since June 2009 he’s run. He works 40 hours per week on the Hanford clean-up and campaigns nights and weekends in face-to-face meetings, as he did recently under these clear skies. He out-hustled Democratic candidates to earn virtually every Democratic district endorsement. “He was the overwhelming favorite,” said George Fearing, the 2008 challenger to Hastings and chair of the Democratic Committee for the Congressional 4^th District.

My search of FEC reports informed me the other challengers “had taken no action to become a candidate.” Not so.

Rex Brocki, Union Gap, Tea Party, emailed, “I am indeed a candidate, and the reason you don’t see me yet …is the FEC has endless technicalities, …which I’m exploiting … to legally keep [opponents] ignorant.” In his website “Rant and Raves” he said, “I don’t want this job, but we desperately [need] somebody besides Ron Paul in Congress to teach … those hooligans the meaning of ‘Congress shall make no law.’

Mary Ruth Edwards, Prosser, Constitution, detailed FEC technicalities. She filed with the FEC, “but until I reach the $5,000 threshold I will not be considered a candidate according to their definition.” She got them to admit, “I am eligible for election.”

She’s in her late 40s, a former Marine with degrees from CWU and Whitworth who teaches 4^th grade. Her political activism led her to the Constitution Party platform. She said, “Wow, these guys think exactly like I do.” She’s now Benton County’s party coordinator and speaks about the history and contents of the U.S. Construction around the Tri-Cities.

Leland Yialelis (pronounced Ya-lay-lease), East Wenatchee, Independent, said on the phone, “I’m campaigning in Othello as we speak.” He’ll soon hit the $5,000 minimum and file reports. He’s an equipment analyst with the State DOT. He’s been general manager of a $3.5 million business with 30 employees, state prison chaplain and clergyman. His website says there are no Republican and Democratic ideas: “There are only good and bad ideas.” His blog details differences with Hastings on a number of issues.

The fourth FEC ‘non-candidate,’ Shane Fast, Kennewick, Republican, did not have a campaign website I could find.

FEC also reports debts owed by the last two Democratic campaigns. Wright’s campaign owes him $120,500. “I don’t regret it. It’s important that all elections be contested and more important for people to stand up for what they believe.”

Fearing deflected questions about his campaign’s $8,500 debt, saying, “It’s been taken care of. “ Instead he supports Clough. “It’s very important Doc Hastings be defeated.”

Anti-Congressional-incumbent voices under these clear skies are muted by meager funds. They fight on with the spirit of citizenship flowing through our country. This is my small voice thanking them for their dedication to the election process at significant sacrifice to them and their families.

Readers Repond About The Tactics of Rupert Murdoch, News Corp and FOX

james.s.russell@verizon.net (JSR) — Thu, 08 Jul 2010 08:39:00 GMT

My column and blog portraying Rupert Murdoch as a bully for his tactics as Chairman and CEO of News Corporation and its FOX network energized readers. Some opposed my biases. Others cheered me on. Representative comments are listed below in the sequence they arrived. I edited for grammar and length. My conclusions follow reader comments.

“Unsubscribe. I disagree with you.”

“Elections this fall will tell the tale. [FOX] news is important media coverage and a balance to the lopsided overload of information expressed by most of the media.”

“This is a good column on a very important topic. The general citizenry seems to be looking the other way rather than facing Murdoch's threat. Thanks for giving people in NCW a reminder!!!”

“In the past I've appreciated your balance in assessing events and ideas, but your perspective of News Corp and its derivatives reeks of unbecoming liberal sour grapes and bias. Much of News Corp's ventures are a direct result of the liberal bias that existed long before FOX et al. were born. You conveniently ignore liberal outlets in the print media such as the NY Times, Washington Post, McClatchy, and LA Times; cable networks such as CNN, NBC, MSNBC, ABC and CBS; other vehicles such as MoveOn.org, ACLU, NAACP and Congressional Black Caucus; and big players such as George Soros, Jessie Jackson, Keith Olbermann, Dan Rather, Chris Mathews, Bill Moyers, on and on!

“Today, at least 75 percent of the media and news makers tend to present a liberal perspective of the news. News Corp has been successful because there is a large percentage of the American population that wants less of the liberal bias in their news.

“No Jim, you let me down with this one. You are bigger than this kind of biased blogging. Hope that, in the future, I will find your blogs to be better balanced.”

“This is an important subject that I hope you will continue to pursue. When news purveyors are cynical liars who claim to be "fair and balanced" but don't even try to be either, our country is very badly served. Free speech, when it is dominated by a bully like Murdoch is very expensive. FOX disseminates misinformation and promotes paranoia.

“News sources have never been perfect, but in prior decades, efforts were made to uphold professional standards. These standards seem to have been all but abandoned.”

“I think the New York Times has held inordinate power of opinion in NYC, and the challenge that the WSJ -NY Edition has produced is a welcome change to me. I have dropped the NYT weekly and only do Friday, Saturday, & Sunday, while getting the WSJ every day, including their new weekend edition.

“You may not like the FOX point of view, but it counters some of the weight of the media who absolutely fell for Obama and all his policies.”

“I wasn’t convinced that Murdoch is a threat. I guess I needed more.“

“Right on!!”

Several threads are important to me. First, readers abhor an unbalanced media perspective. Critics of FOX believe its bias is too unbalanced, while supporters believe FOX balances the liberal bias in the preponderance of the media.

Second, my original intent was to reveal how a concentration of power influences our communities. That point rarely came through.

Finally, I worry that combative media styles obscure too much truth unless people follow both sides. Instead people frequently shut off opposing opinions. I’m committed to politely poke balanced perspectives into people’s perceptions to unite us as we build better communities. I think this article fell short of that commitment.

A Bully Has Arrived in our Neighborhood

james.s.russell@verizon.net (JSR) — Thu, 01 Jul 2010 10:11:00 GMT

Bullying is a problem we oppose up here in these clear skies. Dan Olweus, who created a nationally respected bullying prevention program, says bullying has three components: an imbalance of power, aggressive behavior with unwanted negative actions and a pattern of behavior repeated over time.

A bully’s impact has arrived in this neighborhood and over ninety five percent of neighborhoods in the United States. He’s an Australian who became a US citizen in order to move the corporate headquarters of his Australian company to the United States in 2004. His name is Rupert Murdoch and he’s the founder, chairman and CEO of News Corporation, News Corp for short.

News Corp’s behavior is similar to a bully. Murdoch's aggressive business and political tactics have created a $30 billion media business second only to Walt Disney, a far less politically active company. Murdoch created its imbalance of power through aggressive political and business behavior with negative actions in a pattern of behavior repeated over time. Murdoch’s already profiting handsomely from the success of his apparent presidential candidate for the 2012 election.

News Corp used cash from its businesses to purchase a cable network from Metromedia and create the FOX cable network. It financed the startup of FOX news network with its negative, attacking news personalities such as Bill O’Reilly. FOX broadcasts inspired MSNBC to hire Keith Olbermann, and the sparring between the two networks has driven ratings for both networks higher than CNN's ratings.

News Corp is the world’s largest English language newspaper publisher. It owns the New York Post, the seventh largest newspaper in the US. It purchased Dow Jones and now owns the Wall Street Journal. The WSJ cut advertising rates in its New York metro section to cut income at the New York Times. NYT CEO Janet Robinson confirmed News Corp is “very, very, heavily” discounting rates. News Corp also owns book publishers HarperCollins and Zondervan, the Christian book company with retail stores.

Michael Wolfe, who wrote The Man Who Owns the News, describes Murdoch’s media tactics to strengthen his political and business power. In 1977, he and his New York Post staff chose Ed Koch, a liberal long shot among seven candidates in the primary race for New York mayor. Its early endorsement emphasized his campaign in photographs and headlines that buried critical articles and helped him win. His victory established the Post as a power in New York.

News Corp is underwriting Sarah Palin’s media moves. Her attorney Robert Barnett, said News Corp.’s HarperCollins was “first and fervent” in the bidding to sign Palin. HarperCollins CEO Brian Murray said, “Governor Palin is the most charismatic, inspiring and controversial figure to appear on the national political stage for years. She has a fascinating story to tell and we look forward to publishing what surely will be a captivating book.”

News Corp's various divisions are profiting by promoting Palin’s media campaign. Palin’s book signing for Going Rogue included co-publishing a different Christian version for Zondervan to publish and distribute through its stores. FOX news channel frequently quotes Palin’s support for candidate endorsements and covered her book signing tour. She is scheduled to host a FOX entertainment program. No other Republican potential presidential candidate has comparable media access.

Experts on bullying report that it often goes unnoticed in front of adults. The first step in prevention is to identify bullies and when, where, and how it happens.

Murdoch and News Corp have bullying power in our political process. Do we really want one person to have that much power over our electoral process?

Reminding Each Other that We Know How to Respond Well in Crises

james.s.russell@verizon.net (JSR) — Thu, 24 Jun 2010 09:10:00 GMT

We are all saddened by the plight of our southeastern citizens whose lives are splattered by the BP oil spill. What impresses clear skies folk are people working together to solve a problem and help victims who are being hurt. In short, people who do no harm, and do good. Our country has a lot of experience at responding well.

From this distant clear skies perspective, we’re not responding well. Too many misdirected responses are splattered throughout our media. What worries me is those responses are aimed to impress us.

Leaders do harm when they blame environmentalists or promising to “kick some ass.” Media does harm by demanding the BP COO state whether its most recent approach will cap the well -- BP won’t know until it tries.

The media focuses on whether the BP oil spill is Obama’s Hurricane Katrina. Obama has an advantage: he can call BP to the White House. Bush couldn’t call Katrina.

So Obama’s administration hammers out an agreement for BP to forego dividends and create a fund to compensate claims. The fund makes sense, but did White House officials stage it to impress us? The confrontation bothered me.

Senators held a hearing and asked CEO Tony Hayward if he expected to remain CEO. He’s head of a company whose spectacularly profitable stock is a mainstay in the investments and savings of thousands of shareholders, particularly our good neighbors in England. The stock at one point lost 85 percent of its value. BP has taken responsibility to clean up the spill and pay for damages. BP is trying.

Senators roasted him. Senators whose southern border has been leaking illegal entries for decades. Senators whose budget leaks so much red ink rating agencies are warning of debt downgrades. Senators, do you expect to remain senators?

These senators are responsible for the Minerals Management Service that granted the license to drill this well with inadequate oversight. Since our regulations are inadequate, our government suspended drilling permits, increasing unemployment. Then our government demands BP pay for the unemployment while we fix our inadequate regulation.

We’re not impressed senators. Friday night at a bluegrass festival a conservatively minded friend spontaneously interrupted the music to say he was disgusted with the way our senators behaved. We quickly agreed to stop commiserating and refresh ourselves with the harmony on stage.

Yet these Senators can take credit for the Center for Disease Control, which identified the SARS virus by linking with dozens of other labs and agencies around the world. It’s a fascinating story told in The Wisdom of Crowds by James Surowiecki. Not one agency was in charge. Everybody committed to the same goal. They shared information online daily and ruled out dozens of possible viruses until they identified the right one. Nobody claimed credit.

What is impressive are continued improvements firefighters make responding to wildfires. T volunteer fire-captain who arrives first remains in command until releasing authority to one of a host of arriving agencies. Everyone is committed to quench the fire, protect people and pay later. Afterwards agencies squabble about payments and how to respond, but they continuously refine the process.

We have lots of collaborative examples in air travel, electrical power, natural gas, transportation, church relief efforts and on and on.

In the meantime we can ask ourselves with every picture we see and every voice we hear, are we seeing something that will solve the spill and/or soothe the pain? If not, let them know we’re not impressed.

Enjoying and Tolerating Discussions About Disturbing Scientific Discoveries

james.s.russell@verizon.net (JSR) — Fri, 18 Jun 2010 15:46:00 GMT

The online Smithsonian article entitled The 10 Most Disturbing Scientific Discoveries covers scientific findings that have disturbed human beliefs in the past and present. Discoveries threaten confidence in our continued existence: microbes gaining on attempts to destroy them, cataclysms creating mass extinctions, ritual human sacrifices practiced in many cultures around the world and climate change. Other discoveries threatened faiths: earth is not the center of universe and evolution. Finally, current discoveries warn about our behavior: nuclear energy, faulty mental processes and substances that taste good but are not good for us.

Comments from diverse perspectives made the article more interesting, and more disturbing.

Comments corrected the article’s errors (the section on diets misinterpreted study results). Many comments replaced the inevitable ignorance because no one comprehends all 10 discoveries. One commentator said even though our sun is the center of our solar system, earth is the center of the universe because it extends infinitely in all directions. Still another said there is no center of the universe because all matter exists on the surface of a bubble where there is no center.

I don’t know what’s accurate. I just enjoyed sharing the mind-expanding mystery with fellow readers.

Discoveries that reflect poorly on humans were disturbing, such as ritual human sacrifice. And the part about faulty memories insisted, “Our cognitive failings are legion.” I admit to some cognitive failings, but legion?

Our behaviors, beliefs and emotions are manipulated intentionally and unintentionally. In a taste test we’ll prefer the first sample. We make incorrect generalizations from a few personal experiences. We misinterpret information to support what we already believe. We trust our indelible memories, such as 9/11, but they’re surprisingly inaccurate when compared with people’s journals at the time. But I can now claim our children are incorrectly recalling questionable behaviors by their parents.

Commentators didn’t challenge the discovery of cognitive failings, but promptly demonstrated them. People made generalizations from a few anecdotes. A woman said she believes in evolution because formerly blind fish in Mammoth Caves have evolved to fish that see because of lighted tours in the caves: “This was proof enough for me.” Another rejected global warming because average temperatures over the last ten years have not risen. A responder dismissed the last decade as an anomaly but used one to prove his argument by saying April 2010 was the hottest month on record.

Intolerant comments disturbed my enjoyment. People on both sides of evolution and global warming demonstrated our proclivity for sacrificing other people’s feelings with sarcasm. I cringed because I remember being a new faculty member in a group of teachers when a senior faculty member dismissed my comment to the effect that “We’ve already been over that idea and rejected it so we don’t need to get into again.”

I corked my humiliation as we went on to something else, but after twenty years I still wish we’d uncorked whatever my faulty memory thinks I said and pour it on the table to examine it.

People scarred by intolerance tend to avoid diverse dialogues and search for like-minded people whose opinions confirm their own. The result is people retreat into groups with isolated ignorance that threaten the delightful diversity shared by readers and commentators.

Even though people were warned that we need each other to buttress our faulty mental processes, intolerance worked to sacrifice those who disagreed with the majority perceptions. Maybe the eleventh disturbing discovery is that we can’t help ourselves. I am more optimistic than that.

Rediscovering Why I Married Wisely and Wonderfully

james.s.russell@verizon.net (JSR) — Thu, 10 Jun 2010 11:43:00 GMT

To prepare for Karen's and my four-day bike-tour in Europe this fall, I preferred to ride the 50-mile Entiat Loop in the 2010 Wenatchee Sunrise Rotary Century Bike Ride. I was definitely avoiding on the 100-mile ride, but 50 miles is respectable for a pair of 68-year-olds.

Friday afternoon before the race my wife decided our consensus decision was to ride the 11-mile Loop Trail option for families, except we'd ride around four times. I explained it broke the rules. No matter. Confused and disappointed, I concluded she was more of a mysterious wimp than I realized. By the time we finished, I learned once again why I instinctively married this wise planner who reigns in my enthusiasm.

I worked off my disappointment by riding to the bike store for new gloves while repeating my arguments to myself. We’d ridden the 25-mile loop along the eastern side of the Columbia River in Mike Utley’s Thumbs Up. Entiat would mean a mere 400-foot elevation uphill ride and a downhill return. We’d ride safely with fellow riders. We could park a car along the way to bail us out.

Secretly I looked forward to modestly talking about the ride with friends whom I knew would be impressed. But I couldn’t tell anybody now, not after the Wenatchee World had reprinted my article advocating for more street riders despite the dangers of street riding.

Muttering to myself displaced alert street riding on a Friday afternoon. Busloads and carloads of students swarmed the streets. The bike lane heading west on ninth street disappeared a block before the intersection at Valley Mall Parkway. I admitted the loop would be safer.

The loop is also pleasant. Our first circuit quickly reached shade trees. We dinged our bells as we passed strollers and skaters. Karen made it all the way from Walla Walla Park to the Orondo street boat ramp before our first bathroom stop, a rest stop.far more accessible than searching for one inside an open fruit warehouse on Highway 97.

After the first loop Karen was upbeat. She was beginning to understand the gears on her new bicycle. She explained that each handlebar has two buttons that go opposite directions for combinations of 21 gears. She’d bought the bike late last year and hadn’t ridden it much. Of course she'd fear fiddling with gear buttons on the highway.

Off we went on the second loop, stopping at checkpoints to get re-energized from energy bars, cookies and conversations with volunteers. We also got energized by biker Rod Daut of East Wenatchee. He loves the trail too, but described rides around East Wenatchee and Badger Mountain. Karen seemed interested. Unless I miss my guess I'll be riding up there in the future.
The more we rode the more I learned to minimize pain in my thighs by moderating pace and keep momentum going uphill by timing a downshift of two gears. On the third trip over the pipeline bridge I felt a thrill at rolling high above the rippling Columbia River and the distant roar of speedboats. I remember thinking we should design communities so we could ride like this all the way to Entiat and back without enduring carbon monoxide and roaring semi-trailers. I could bike forever like this.

A cramp gripped my thigh on our fourth trip over the pipeline bridge when I tried to keep up with Daut. I stretched my leg, pounded my muscles and called for my wise wife who was steadily out distancing me. Cramps started in the calf of my other leg and for the first time I doubted I’d make it. She gave me an energy bar she’d tucked away. I made it by pedaling smoothly to avoid the cramps lurking in my muscles.

The next morning Karen was euphoric, partly because by that time she could go the bathroom without pain.
“I know we can make Entiat next year, don’t you?”

“Of course.” Who am I to doubt her?

Dr. Riki Ott's Eye Witness Reports on the Human Tragedy of Oil Spill Clean-ups

james.s.russell@verizon.net (JSR) — Mon, 07 Jun 2010 15:08:00 GMT

Dr. Riki Ott, a marine biologist, toxicologist and commercial fisher from Prince William Sound warned families in gulf coast fishing villages about dangers they face. She documented the thousands of lives harmed by faulty clean-up operations after Exxon’s Valdez oil spill. In Leavenworth Washington recently Ott said, “I vowed to make a difference in the BP oil spill.”

    Unemployed shrimpers and coastal workers tell Ott BP is insisting they clean up without respirators. Her book Sound Truth and Corporate Myth revealed that Valdez clean-up conditions including dispersant Corexit escalated human suffering because 70 percent of workers didn’t wear respirators. Exxon and its clean-up firm VECO concealed 6,700 worker cases until courts forced them to release data. The companies recorded complaints as respiratory problems and sent workers home on medical leave. On the third day, they weren’t hired back. Using those two procedures, the companies were not obligated to report complaints as occupationally caused.
    Ott’s message, “When you work with oil, wear a respirator.”
    A worker’s wife told Ott about her husband’s “flu-like symptoms” similar to reports from 11 workers who were treated and released by West Jefferson Medical Center last week. Doctors said eleven workers in one week makes it “incredibly suspicious” that the cause is working on clean-up. The week before seven workers from boats south of New Orleans were hospitalized.
    Nevertheless, BP CEO Tony Hayward questioned whether the cause of hospitalized cases “was food poisoning or some other reason.” BP and Coast Guard officials said problems could be caused by “dehydration, heat, food poisoning and other related factors.”
    Photographs reveal workers who should be wearing respirators. Why not outfit a worker with a videocam to record working conditions as workers cough up toxicity from their lungs?
    Ott recognizes human tragedy. “This spill is a family wrecker.”

When You Gamble with Safety, You Gamble with Life

james.s.russell@verizon.net (JSR) — Thu, 03 Jun 2010 11:30:00 GMT

Andy Ervin, a passionate parent and employee at Together! For Drug Free Youth told me, “Adolescents who drink alcohol and use drugs put their developing brains at risk when they are most susceptible to permanent damage.”

She led me to counselors, materials and the second of two Town-Hall meetings organized by nine black-shirted youth. The information unnerved me. One-out-of-four eighth-graders in the 2008 Douglas County Healthy Youth Survey had a drink in the last 30 days. The average age of a youth’s first drink is 12.8 years

Whoops, my twin grandsons will be that age in two months. That bothered their motherr also. I wish we’d had more talks with them about drinking. Alcohol marketers are working far more effectively than we are, perhaps illegally as nearly as I can tell, so I’m rallying local volunteers to the cause.

Together! is a non-profit whose staff organizes parent and student groups in Chelan-Douglas Counties to provide youth with drug and alcohol free activities such as dances, after school programs and athletic facilities. Five years ago executive director Renée Hunter invested in certifying Steffanie Bonwell in programs that cut alcohol and drug abuse by youth. She spends three-and-a-half days per week on the front lines. That’s music to my ears like the bluegrass classic, “Stuff That Works.”

One program that works is Life Skills Training which a panel of experts gave its Top Tier rating because youth in the programs show sizable, sustained reductions in drug, tobacco and alcohol use based on randomized controlled trials. LST was taught in Eastmont School District, but dropped because of cutbacks and staff reassignments.

Eastmont youth are working in a program called Power of Youth, advised by counselor Armentia Tenner, and led by juniors Jose Gomez and Raquel Ramos. When I met them at East Wenatchee’s advisory committee meeting, Ramos wore their self-designed battle uniform: a black t-shirt with lime green letters promoting their motto, “When you gamble with safety, you gamble with life.”

Tenner has led Power of Youth teens for five years, and last year these youth created awareness about alcohol marketing programs that target pre-teens. Tenner co-wrote a grant with a committed grant writer, Eveline Roy of East Wenatchee. The grant raised $10,000 for an advertising program about teen drinking that was aired on radio, LINK buses and billboards. Youth displayed one billboard on the highest traffic corner in Douglas County at Grant and Sunset that says, “Think alcohol marketing doesn’t affect your kids? Think again.”

It’s right across the street from enemy advertising, which may be illegally displayed in windows and outside walls at the Union 76 gas station.

The station’s advertising may be illegal because state legislators thought again about alcohol advertising and passed legislation limiting ads that impact pre-adolescent youth. The Washington Liquor Control Board rules effective April 3, 2010 limit to four (4) the number of signs advertising alcohol brand names in windows or outside walls at businesses that sell alcohol. Volunteers talked to the manager at Discount Tobacco and Alcohol on Valley Mall Parkway and its advertising complies. Two drive-by views last week confirmed it.

But the Union 76 station appeared out of compliance on May 17 and May 31st. Posted in every front window at toddler eye-level were a race car driver, soccer player and Wenatchee Wild wolf in eight (8) beer ads. The only non-beer ad was a tobacco poster with a cute, smiling camel.

Parents and youth at the Town Hall meeting spoke about the pervasive pressures on youth to sample substance abuse. Support them. Warn our youth. If we’re silent, we’re gambling with safety, and gambling with life.

Witness Reports of Village Meetings to Gain Support for US Programs

james.s.russell@verizon.net (JSR) — Thu, 27 May 2010 08:51:00 GMT

Two Washington witnesses reported on meetings of foreign villagers hostile toward US programs to improve their communities. Both villages eventually supported the programs. One witness believes support will evaporate and the other believes support will continue. I think they’re both right.

One witness is Steve Tupper, a Viet Nam veteran and former Washington legislator. Until February, 2010 he worked for an NGO contracted to build strategic provincial roads in Afghanistan as the third tactic in NATO’s clear, hold and build strategy. He was chief of public relations charged with winning local support. Tupper describes a meeting where an Afghani provincial official encouraged villagers to support road building.

Villagers complained, “Those are your roads, not ours.” Since construction started 2 years ago, Taliban attacks have killed over 60 workers causing bulldozers to sit idle for several days while villagers mourn. The official convinced villagers that Americans were preferable foreigners compared to Iranians, Indians, and Russians. Tupper wrote,” I think most are merely sitting on the sidelines, accumulating as much money as possible while it flows, and then see who is still sticking around a decade from now.”

NATO can’t last a decade. Its Afghanistan enemy is funded by drug traffic, Al Queda fund raising and aid from nations like Iran. These sources appear sustainable and are strategically applied to maim military and community programs that are far more expensive. Financial and fiscal problems in NATO and the US will ultimately doom our current approach. Better methods are needed that block money flows, destroy Al Queda terrorist operations and punish nations that offer support.

Contrast the Afghani village meeting with one described by Sue Rose, retired banker and former Wenatchee Rotary president. In February 2010 she rode with other US citizens over dirt roads to deliver the first textbooks ever used in a mountaintop village in Guatemala. The textbooks are donated to schools in indigenous villages through the Guatemala Literacy Program after parents agree to pay into a fund for five years to replace the textbooks. Rose said the presentation was delayed an hour because opponents of the textbooks demanded a meeting to reconsider.

Opponents feared Spanish textbooks threatened their village dialect and way of life. Suspicion lingers from a civil war between indigenous insurgents assisted by communist nations such as Cuba on one side, and government forces assisted by US supplied weapons from the Iran-Contra scandal on the other. A UN investigation labeled the conflict genocide since 95 percent of 200,000 deaths were unarmed villagers attacked by government forces. Civilian elections ended the war in 1986 and all sides signed a UN peace agreement in 1996, but distrust and lawlessness still exist. Rose’s group was escorted by armed guards because bandits operate along remote roads.

GLP representatives won over villagers by explaining once again that the voluntary program includes teacher training and support for five years. After GLP’s effort over the last decade, 193 schools pay for textbooks and 43 schools operate self-funding computer centers. Rose said, “The whole village turned out as we delivered the textbooks. It was marvelous.”

When Karen and I accompanied a textbook delivery, the chief who received the textbooks told everyone he remembered when people gave them guns and said their safety was in the guns. “Today we are given books and told our future lies in these books. We believe in these books.”

The GLP approach to gaining village support is similar to one described in Three Cups of Tea, co-authored by Greg Mortenson. His Central Asian Institute’s program has built more than 50 schools at the invitation of local villages in Afghanistan and Pakistan. Ahmed Rashid, best selling author of Taliban: Militant Islam and Oil in Central Asia said, “The work Mortenson is doing, providing the poorest students with a balanced education, is making them much more difficult for the extremist madrassas to recruit.”

We Clear Skies villagers build communities with nonviolent methods that are sustainable, economical and spiritual. We need to support similar approaches for US programs in foreign villages.

Avoiding Deceptive Financial Grace Periods in Student Loans

james.s.russell@verizon.net (JSR) — Thu, 20 May 2010 11:17:00 GMT

A heartbreaking question prompted me to re-examine student loans, particularly since borrowing is on the minds of students, parents and grandparents. The question came from a borrower with Sallie Mae (SM), the bank that lends and processes transactions for $182 billion in student loans. She wrote, “Is it legal to apply all of our payments to interest and none to the principal? I've done their online calculator, and we have been paying more than the necessary amount every month [on their three loans], yet for a year they applied NOTHING to the principal.”

Under the new student loan law, Sallie Mae is restricted to selling private student loans with less onerous payment terms. Borrowers also avoid lending fees SM and other banks received as middlemen for federal loans. Students may borrow through the Direct Student Loan program administered by the Department of Education. The government should save $61 billion according to the Congressional Budget Office and is diverting those savings into more Pell Grant loans and simplifying repayment. Curious, I visited its website and found some misleading enticements.

The first visible page has a student loan headline that invites borrowers to apply for a loan. If you resist applying and scroll down, the next headline invites you to explore “Planning and Managing” tips such as getting all the free money and federal loans you can before applying for loans. Thus the page invites you to apply for SM loans while hiding from view tips for planning and managing.

Salllie Mae now offers the Smart Option Student Loan®. An orange link invites you to apply, and a smaller statement invites you to learn more. At the learn-more link I learned you get misled. The site claims, “You could [bold red] save more than 30% [end red] compared to a traditional private 15-year student loan payment deferred during school and grace periods.”

Language defends the statement. “By making required interest payments while in school and adhering to the shorter repayment period after school you could [bold] save as much as $8,000 or more. [end bold].”

A footnote elaborates on this deceptive claim even though SM’s trademark SOSL has a higher 9.75 percent APR rate compared to the traditional loan’s 9.11 percent APR. The SM APR is higher because the loan fee is added to the principal. Avoid adding fees to the principal. The verbose footnote tries to convince you that paying SM a higher interest rate saves you thousands. With SOSL you make fewer payments, make them sooner, and interest from deferrals. If you can find a lender of the traditional loan that allows the same payments, you’d save even more because the interest is lower.

The referenced loan is similar to what SM lent for years, deferring payments while in school and for six months after enrollment ends in what it lovingly calls the grace period. Grace implies forgiveness. Forbearance forgives debt. Deferral delays debt and increases interest.

The emailer’s problem arose because her husband’s two loans were in his name. Sallie Mae was notified when he returned for a required two-week-apprentice schooling, so it deferred payments for his loans and included only her loan on invoices. Her payments paid off her loan but interest accrued on his loans through the grace period. Afterward loan payments reduced accrued interest for a year before reducing principal.

She became a cosigner and converted to the SOSL loan. That experience leaves me concerned that millions of people with SM loans may have the traditional loan. Urge anyone to consider switching to the SOSL or similar payment plans. Otherwise returning to school could trigger deferments and add accrued interest to the balance.

Celebrating an Imperfect Mother's Day

james.s.russell@verizon.net (JSR) — Thu, 13 May 2010 10:35:00 GMT

My regrettable performance last Mother’s Day led me to confess to Karen and readers of my column that my children have the responsibility to honor their mother. She recalled hearing that sentiment years ago and it still hurt. I committed to honor her and fumbled into discovering that imperfections are one reason Mother’s Day is important.

Thursday I purchased a bouquet of flowers. Flowers from Thursday’s supplies are fresher than Saturday’s remnants.

I purchased a jacket sprinkled with spring flowers from the clothing store where past presents have brought her compliments. At Christmas I’d bought her a bracelet from a jeweler’s wife, so after asking her husband to check his records, I purchased matching earrings.

By Friday morning the jacket sat on the floor by the living room fireplace and the earrings and cards graced the mantle. She noticed. Before we left to meet our children Saturday night in Seattle, she sat in her lazy-boy with cards and presents in her lap. She smiled. “This feels different. Do you remember last year?”

That wounded me, but she enjoyed the difference. The flowers were the prettiest bouquet I’d ever bought. She loved the jacket. It was too small, but I exchanged it for the right size before we left town.

I fumbled the earrings gift. She reminded me that we returned the bracelet because it was similar to one I’d bought years before. She had exchanged it for a matching set of earrings she frequently wore, and almost identical to those now in her lap. I’m hoping she can exchange them for something. I’ve never bought her ankle bracelets.

In Seattle we celebrated Mother’s Day with our two daughters. Our oldest is a mother, the youngest not, perhaps partly because of uneasy Mother’s Days I’d created.

Our daughter-mother takes command of her Mother’s Days. Last year she announced her Mother’s Day wish was hiking with her three boys. They agreed it was a blast. This year she invited us to have brunch at her house.

We watched her open presents, including a gift from their now single father. One of the 12-year-olds reminded his brothers that Papa said it was from all of them. They clustered around her to see what it was. That evening she called from the lakeshore as she and her boys watched the setting sun. She had a good Mother’s Day.

Karen was upset that the card she’d mailed her early in the week never arrived. And the egg casserole she’d baked didn’t go over well because our daughter didn’t mention that the boys don’t eat eggs.

Both mothers had a good day despite the glitches. Glitches are a sensitive issue with mothers according to Stephanie Simon in the Wall Street Journal. She reviewed a number of mothers embarrassed by insights on imperfection from their children. Hallmark avoids the problem. Of the 1600 cards available this year, not one has a child poking fun at an imperfect mom.

Maybe imperfections linger unspoken as we honor mothers. What we say is I honor you for giving me your best. Unsaid is, ‘Sure you’re not perfect, which I deeply understand because you birthed me and I’m far from perfect. But it doesn’t matter. Know that I honor you in the best way I know how.’

If it’s real, she’ll feel good, regardless of the glitches. I have proof. Monday morning Karen said, “Oh yes, I had a very good day.“

Marching with Too Few Good People Who Want Immigration Reform Now

james.s.russell@verizon.net (JSR) — Thu, 06 May 2010 10:40:00 GMT

Just before Karen and I joined Wenatchee’s 2010 May Day marchers shouting slogans demanding that a bipartisan comprehensive immigration bill be introduced, she said, “If shooting starts, hit the ground.”

Her joke was rooted in public fear and hysteria, both of which may explain why many people who support reform stayed home from this year's march.

The unyielding positions in the controversy also explain why Congress has been unable to solve three major issues: a secure border, systems that provide adequate numbers of documented workers and a plan that offers undocumented workers in the U.S. and opportunity to earn citizenship based on work and community histories.

Frustrated Arizonians reacted with a law narrowly focused on documentation. They’ve experienced 800 Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents raiding four communities for human smuggling rings. Vigilantes patrol a porous border. The civil rights of innocent people have been violated.

Bloggers raised these issues on the Wenatchee World’s website following an article announcing the march. In an effort to reform the misinformed and unite everybody wanting reform, this report compares blogger comments with our experience.

I wonder how many of these marchers will be illegal aliens? Washington has no illegal aliens. Rob Scott, a Wenatchee attorney, pointed out that undocumented workers are not federal or Washington criminals. They can be deported, but they aren’t illegal aliens.

Why would the city allow criminals to march and to halt traffic for it? The city permitted organizers from reform groups to exercise their constitutional right to peacefully assemble. Police would have violated Karen’s and my rights if they demanded documentation before we marched.

[It’d be…] nice if ICE was there to monitor and take action if needed. City police and organizers escorted marchers. We immediately felt comfortable even though we saw only five whites among an estimated 700 people. Women pointed at Karen’s silver hair bobbing among the throng.

Most people were in families with children and youth. Adults pushed strollers loaded with babies, toddlers and diaper bags. Marchers laughed, chatted, shouted slogans and sang songs. Three pre-kindergarten girls held hands saying, “Si, se puede – Yes we can.” The one on the far left held her mother’s hand.

We passed three protestors. Two smiling men sat on the hood of a dated blue compact car talking to a young woman. The car had white paint with slogans such as “Go home.” One police officer with a bicycle silently shielded us from each other.

I would hope that this nation’s flag is not totally disrespected and dishonored. Dozens of people respectfully waved US flags on sticks, stakes and flagpoles. One man walked with a US flag draped around his shoulders. Next to him a woman had a Mexican flag draped around her shoulders.

I think INS should be at the end of the march so we can get rid of all the illegal people in Wenatchee. We didn’t see INS checking each adult’s and child’s documentation, but we did hear an organizer praise marchers for a peaceful demonstration. .

The march usually consists of dignitaries, citizens, and legal residents so ICE would be wasting their time. Unfortunately no dignitaries marched with us. Karen said, “I was disappointed there weren’t more whites represented.”

Imagine a crowd swollen with the employers who have worked to get bipartisan reform introduced, and friends who wished they’d joined us, and church members, social service workers, medical staff and teachers. And dignitaries like Rep Doc Hastings, who to his credit supported the most recent bill when employers convinced him it would build better communities.

Congress probably won’t pass immigration legislation this year. But maybe next year people could join the workers march to demonstrate massive support for immigration reform that unites our communities.

Awestruck by Traveling Through Hubble 3D Images’ of Space

james.s.russell@verizon.net (JSR) — Fri, 30 Apr 2010 03:27:00 GMT

Recently I joined a group of fifth graders to watch the Hubble 3D movie at the IMAX screen in Seattle’s Pacific Science Center. Hubble 3D creates the experience of riding through space based on 20 years of photographs recorded by the Hubble telescope from its orbit 350-400 miles above earth. The IMAX experience dwarfed my sense of wonder. I’m still overwhelmed, but one small conclusion is the budget we are spending is reasonable for its scientific value.

Our ride from earth traveled from our solar system spinning into our Milky Way galaxy. That surprised me because my most vivid view of the Milky Way was from the shoulder of Little Sister Mountain in Oregon. The pasty white endless stream of stars was way up in the sky. It’s not up there. We’re in it here. My home galaxy has more than 100 billion stars and a diameter of 100,000 light years.

One hundred billion felt large until I compared it to our nation’s debt of one trillion. Then we traveled through a tiny window in deep space where Hubble’s camera photographed 15,000 galaxies up to 10 billion light years away. That implies the whole universe has millions of galaxies. Wow. There are more stars in the universe than dollars in our federal debt.

Galaxies add stars from nebulae, which are dust storms of gases and particles the size of planets. One magnificent photograph had a pinhead-sized sun underneath a rectangular burgundy nebula that looked like a giant sweater box. Scientists think the dust cloud spawned that sun, like a cloud that gave birth to our sun.

The presentation displayed a magnificent, serene and orderly universe, until I realized the images were still-life photographs. Meteor fragments smashed into Jupiter leaving a hole far larger than earth. Stars explode and galaxies collide. One fifth-grader said her favorite picture was the beautiful floating butterfly sun. The butterfly’s body was an exploding sun and its wings were dust and gas speeding away at 600,000 miles per hour. We need to monitor this dangerous universe.

Hubble’s discoveries have forced once-in-a-millennium rethinking about astronomy according to one leading scientist. Astrophysicists knew gaps between stars and galaxies are expanding but thought the pace is slowing down. Instead, the expansion is speeding up. Scientists have hypothesized it’s because dark energy inside the universe is propelling it outward. They don’t know what dark energy is. It may come from dark matter but they can’t see or measure it either. Mysteries abound, such as what is going on in a black hole? Why did all the heated gas in the universe become extremely cold and then warm up a billion years later?

As most of my mind boggled at the science, part of my mind wondered about the cost. I was pleased to learn Hubble is a collaborative effort with the European Space Agency that provides 15 percent of the total funding. Hubble’s budget is included in NASA’s $1.1 billion astrophysics budget, a minor part of NASA’s Science Mission Directorate, which is in turn a minor part of NASA’s $18.5 billion budget.

The science emphasis is the most valuable public funding for NASA in my opinion and Hubble’s cost sounds reasonable for the scientific and inspirational value. Plans are on target to launch a new telescope located one million miles from earth by 2014 to take even more detailed pictures.

Let’s hope so. We need to keep an eye on what’s happening out there. Besides, being awestruck is an enlightening, freshening, humbling experience.

Checking in with Mom About How to Balance the State Budget

james.s.russell@verizon.net (JSR) — Thu, 22 Apr 2010 10:10:00 GMT

Mom briefly worked in my dad’s tire shop when she couldn’t balance our family’s modest budget. Dad did a great job of selling tires and expanding his, but our family was borrowing money. She told him to set priorities, cut costs, raise revenue, and reduce borrowing. He disagreed. She left for a job as research librarian and solved our budget crisis. Mom turned out to right about Dad’s business also.

Consequently I decided to use Mom’s principles to review the 2010 Washington legislature’s budget balancing. She’d praise, scold, and shake her head in disbelief.

Mom’s first praise would be for balancing the budget. Dad didn’t. Congress won’t. Democrats forced an extra session during which they raised politically insane taxes, but they balanced it. Give them credit.

Second, she’d praise prudent spending to relieve people’s recession pain. Overwhelmed agencies need funds to serve people’s needs. Government spending creates jobs. Capital expenditures are more economical when construction expenses are lower. The state funded a rainy day reserve for hard times, so use it.

Prudent spending would use the amount available from rainy day funds and federal stimulus funds. The state almost matched the $1.4 billon increased DSHS spending with stimulus money for enhanced federal Medicaid and a hospital assessment. It drained the meager rainy day fund. Mom liked compassionate policies, but would warn recipients they won’t be available next budget.

Legislators cut expenses by $3.6 billion such as postponing voter-approved initiatives to reduce class sizes and pay cost-of-living for K-12 staff. They promised to pay them in the future because we passed those requirements in statewide initiatives. Blame us for demanding those without considering the tradeoffs. However, Mom would have scolded them for avoiding budget reform, such as Rep Armstrong’s cost-cutting proposal to restructure DSHS.

Accepting permanent taxes to cut socials sins would have been acceptable to Mom. Cigarettes and candy endanger all of us. The special privilege of water bottles as non-recyclables is transparently ridiculous.

She’d have questioned the temporary BNO tax on services. Either it fills a gap in our tax code as a progressive tax that falls less on lower-income than on higher income residents or it’s unfair. If it closes a loophole make it permanent. Don’t be wimpy.

She’d have shook her head in disbelief at temporarily taxing beer and soda pop for $160 million in a $60 billion dollar budget in a recession. That debate for one-third of one percent for the whole budget could have been redirected to tax reform.

The cash legislators borrowed would have brought on a tongue-lashing. They borrowed money from this year’s state pension funds and capital expenditure funds. Bad ideas. Borrowing pension payments betrays an addiction to easy cash. Pension balances are too low now. And capital accounts should be spent in this economy.

But what would have disappointed her most would be new, lavish $2.0 billion promises for educational funding while avoiding budget reform. The legislature promised new redistribution formulas in K-12 and enhanced levy equalization even though it must fund smaller class sizes and increase cola coverage. A summary by Sen. Joe Zarrelli estimates the bow wave of budget decisions on those items is more than $4 billion by 2013-15. Mom would have said, “Those are worthy, but not now. Let’s see where we are next year.”

Mom had the compassion to put people first, the principles to avoid easy choices, and the courage to be honest about what we could and couldn’t do. The legislature got some of it right, but made it harder for itself and us. Let’s hope they face it next time.

Adding Training to Washington’s Requirements for a Concealed Pistol License

james.s.russell@verizon.net (JSR) — Thu, 15 Apr 2010 11:19:00 GMT

Steve McLaughlin trains citizens to be responsible weapons owners, particularly for Washington’s concealed pistol licenses (CPL). Naively I asked whether Washington required training before approving a license. He fired his answer with the controlled force of his military training. “No, and that’s the way it should be.”

For educators like me that’s backwards—people should get trained first, then get a permit.

Steve is a retired Navy commander who has worked in special forces combat in the Balkans, Africa and Iraq. “Lots of times I’ve fought where people may not carry guns. Without the second amendment, the first amendment, freedom of speech, would not exist.”

Last week I experienced why our nation’s founders chose the first two amendments. I visited Colonial Williamsburg, historically preserved to pre-revolutionary war years. Actors recreated the fury of townspeople after the royal governor ordered gunpowder removed from the community’s magazine in a middle-of-the-night maneuver.

Later a woman playing a townsperson identified the wood grained gold-trimmed flintlocks and pistols hung on a magazine wall. The weapons would have stablized my fears if my family lived during that passionate struggle of freedom versus protection. “Who owns these weapons,” I asked?

“The Crown,” she said.

Without gunpowder the security from those firearms vanished. I understood why the right to bear arms amendment included the words "shall not be infringed." While Steve supports citizens exercising their constitutional right to bear arms, he worries that they don’t understand their responsibility when carrying a weapon and using it under stressful situations. He said, “They are liable for their bullet's [damage] into and through anyone without [either] endangering themselves, those around them, and beyond.”

Applications for a CPL are at the Sheriff’s office. It’s comforting that Washington prohibits people from owning a license for a number of reasons. Rhonda Pickering, records supervisor said reasons include conviction or adjudication for any felony charges and crimes committed by one household member against another, such as assault in the fourth degree and stalking. Federal law prohibits possession of a firearm for anyone convicted of domestic violence, adjudicated as mentally defective and other factors.

Rhonda said information about training has not been shared with their office, but training is going on. She said, “We’ve had an influx in the last six-to-nine months from people getting fingerprints for a Utah license.”

What? Training is offered by two organizations recommended in the November/December 2009 newsletter of the NCW Gun Club. They are Firearms Academy of Wenatchee operated by Ron Skaggs and Jake Davis and Fortis NRA Training operated by Steve McLaughlin and Shawn Mahood. Mahood is authorized to provide Utah’s four-hour certified training as a prerequisite to getting a license. He advises students to get fingerprinted locally and apply for a Utah license that is valid in more states than Washington’s.

Training needs to stress differences in state laws. In Washington you cannot step up to a bar with your weapon. In Utah, you must inform an officer immediately that you are carrying a loaded, permitted weapon. Otherwise an officer who sees it may act on the assumption it is a personal threat.

I asked Rhonda if she thought people should get training. “Oh yeah, definitely. Sometimes it’s a little scary to see who’s getting a permit. If we had information from people who offered training, we’d hand it out.”

Washington should require a certified training course for people who want a concealed pistol license like Utah.
Even qualified trainers recommend the training, although they recoil at the idea of additional governmental restriction. My opinion is we’d be doing the owners and all of us a favor.

Thoughts about My Little Credit Card from a Big Bank

james.s.russell@verizon.net (JSR) — Thu, 08 Apr 2010 08:48:00 GMT

Experience with my new Bank of America affinity credit card has reinforced my opinion that we need stringent financial regulations. Proposed bills would add regulations and immediately assess giants like BOA to avoid putting taxpayers at risk if they fail. The financial behemoth brethren are pressuring congressional conservative policy makers to gut the regulations. They argue integrated firms offer more comprehensive financial services and shouldn’t be penalized for being big. Besides the financial crisis has already made them more responsive.

My trivial experience convinces me BOA has improved some financial transparency, but other practices demand consumer protection. Read about my experience and you judge.

My recent credit card statement identified the balance, minimum payment, and late payment penalty and warned that minimum payments would pay off the balance in 20 years. Paying triple the minimum would pay off in 3 years and reduce interest charges. Kudos to BOA for encouraging consumers to lower their interest charges.

Consumer credit card interest generates the largest percentage of BOA earnings. My account shows a minimum payment would cover the interest charge at 10.24 percent, but reduce the balance only $5.

But BOA offered me credit insurance directly contrary to its warnings. After I scheduled an online payment for my balance on the due date, an offer for Credit Protection Plus™ shined on my computer screen. A bright yellow sun and a college graduation cap were next to advertising enticements: “For whatever’s coming up in your life’s forecast. Get relief from your credit card payments during certain life events.”

Does that mean I’d have to forecast whatever’s coming up in my certain life events to qualify for protection?

If I qualified CPP would cancel my minimum payment. “Canceling--instead of just deferring—means we make your payments for you, to give you an important safety net.” Buying CPP protection would increase every monthly balance at a fee that I estimated would almost equal my minimum monthly payment.

In other words if I used CPP to pay my minimum, it would cover last month’s CPP fee and pay only $1.14 in interest. Unpaid interest would increase my balance.

Buying CPP would avoid $39 late payment fees. But the CPP fee is only 14 cents more than the late payment. Purchasing the voluntary protection would cost slightly less than voluntarily paying the late payment fee.

To be fair CPP offers Identify Theft Assistance and up to a $25,000 balance payment in the event of death.

This consumer safety net is offered to me by the largest consumer credit card company in the United States. The organization serves one of every two U.S. households. Last year BOA added Donald E. Powell, the former FDIC chairman, to its board at an annual compensation in excess of $200,000 per year. As chairman from 2001 to 2005 Powell demoralized regulatory staff by cutting employment despite warnings from the Office of Inspector General and the current FDIC chair that emerging risks in subprime lending and declining standards for commercial lending necessitated more trained regulatory personnel.

Powell’s BOA role is to improve regulatory relations. BOA’s Annual Report assured stockholders that its beefed up board would permit BOA “To take our seat at the table with policy-makers at every level and help create a financial system that supports economic growth and financial stability.” Oh joy--for the firm.

We consumers need to write our Congressional leaders to pass stiff regulations on these giant policy-influencing firms.

You Are My Hands

james.s.russell@verizon.net (JSR) — Mon, 05 Apr 2010 15:54:00 GMT

    This Easter season message of peace for all people is from a profoundly diverse common ground. The message is, “You are my hands.”
    My wife and I heard the message in Turkey with about 35 others on a pilgrimage in the footsteps of Paul. Our spiritual leader was the Very Reverend Canon Marianne Wells Borg from the Episcopal Diocese of Oregon and Director of the Center for Spiritual Development.
    She briefly diverted us from Paul’s footsteps to a shrine for Christians and Muslims called Mary’s House near Ephesus. Many people believe Mary, mother of Jesus, lived there in her last home, although others believe her final home was near Jerusalem.
    Mary’s House is a shrine for Christians because in 1896 Roman Catholic Pope Leo XIII made a pilgrimage to the site and Pope John XXIII subsequently elevated it to its current status as a Permanently Privileged Holy Place.
    Mary’s House is a shrine for Muslims because she is a symbol for piety and submission for Islamic women. Islam in Arabic means submission, derived from the word meaning peace, and refers to a life based on peace, mercy and forgiveness. Muslims Adnan and Cindy Abouammo from East Wenatchee told me that Mary is the only woman mentioned by name in the Qur’an, where an entire chapter is devoted to her. Adnan said our faiths have much more in common than most of us imagine.
    Turkey is a secular republic that guarantees freedom of religion even though approximately 98 percent of the people are Muslims. When Mary’s House became a permanent Holy Place, Turkey established the site as a national park.
    Surrounding Mary’s restored house and a Catholic Church is a sanctuary of gardens and shade trees. Statutes and icons of Mary are focal points of places for Muslims and visitors to reflect and pray. The Roman Catholic priest assigned by the church is also the curator for the national park.
    Rev. Borg hoped to provide communion for our group in the church. She had written the priest asking permission but he had not responded. He not only opened the chapel for our service, he placed his shawl around her neck.
    She administered bread and wine she had brought from Oregon to our diverse group of many faiths as well as agnostics and non-believers. From my view in the back row, all of us walked forward to share the Eucharist.
Afterward the priest greeted us and answered questions. Our inquisitive group asked if he believed it was Mary’s House. He said, “Mary has been here.”
    We discussed Muslim women praying in front of figurines when their faith forbids icons in their mosques. He said many Muslim women pray here. Someone asked whether Mary answers them. “Yes,” he said. “Mary tells them, ‘You are my hands.’”
    Consider the bureaucratic machinery that might have mangled that message. The message arose in an improbably peaceful Catholic Holy Place in a religiously tolerant nation that is 98 percent Muslim. Mary was worshipped and communion shared on common grounds because Popes, priests, politicians and pilgrims penetrated barriers that usually separate people of different ethnicities, faiths and genders. Muslim women passed the message to a Catholic priest who passed it to us.
    When conflicts push me toward despair, this story reminds me our hands create peace, mercy and forgiveness.

Escorting Grandsons Around a Once-Again-Functioning Washington DC

james.s.russell@verizon.net (JSR) — Thu, 25 Mar 2010 09:59:00 GMT

    My wife and I plan to take our twin 12-year-old grandsons to Washington DC and have scheduled visits to Capitol Hill and the White House.
    We want them to respect the balance of powers embedded in our constitution. Our first visit is to Capitol Hill, where Congressional performance is rated unfavorable by 64 percent of the people (Rasmussen Reports). But building grandson respect should be easier after Congress passed healthcare reform.
    Before passage, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi had the highest unfavorable rating at 64 percent. Yet as healthcare passage appeared hopeless in January she wrote Obama, “We’ll never have a better majority in your presidency in numbers than we’ve got right now. We can make this work.”
She publicly promised, “If the gate is closed, we will go over the fence. If the fence is too high, we will pole vault in. If that doesn’t work, we will parachute in. But we are going to get healthcare reform passed.”
    She secured 217 votes to pass it despite distrust between Democratic leaders in the Senate and the House, all of who were disappointed in Obama’s vague guidelines on healthcare. Senate Democrats’ special healthcare deals disgusted Americans. Pelosi pushed the Senate to vote on rescinding those deals this week.
    We’ll tell our grandsons that Congress should take primary responsibility for crafting the legislation. The president can be voted out of office every four years and must leave after eight, while Congressional majorities last for years and judges last for lifetimes, or infinity whichever comes first.
    We’ll visit the White House where Obama’s administration pledged to win passage. He won over skeptical progressives who insisted jobs and immigration reform were more important than healthcare. Obama said, “If we fail at this, it’s going to be harder for us to pull the line on this other stuff.”
    The judicial balance of power became involved the same day Obama signed the bill when attorney generals in about a dozen states including Washington and Virginia filed lawsuits challenging its constitutionality. Questioned on Fox news, Virginia's attorney general admitted victory for either side is uncertain.
    The bill’s opponents reacted with typical political pomposity. “The most radical social experiment...” “The will of the people has been spat upon.” Polls do show that a steady 54 percent of Americans don’t approve of the healthcare plan, leading to statements like, “Democrats have committed political suicide” for the November elections. Obama and Democrats believe healthcare will be supported when people understand what actually passed instead of the misinformation from opponents. We’ll tell our grandsons we should have election issues based on Congressional action rather than inaction.
    Or healthcare may not be the big issue. Polls show healthcare is fifth on people’s priority. The economy, political corruption, the war on terror and taxes all have higher priority. Wall Street yawned and bumped stocks less than half-of-one percent.
    On the Wenatchee World’s website only seven people commented on healthcare with comments that wandered away from substance to personal attacks. And on the New York Times most-read health list, the raging debate on fallout from the bill ranked seventh. It trailed articles on “baby fat” and “picking a nursing home,” and just ahead of a recipe for “roasted red pepper, tuna, steamed quinoa, white bean salad and pan fried squash.”
    We’ll be proud to tell our grandsons that our constitution’s balance of powers has framed significant social reform on issues from secession to slavery to social security for over 200 years, and has done it again. It deserves their highest respect.

You Can Save Taxpayer Money and Return Federal Dollars to our Clear Skies

james.s.russell@verizon.net (JSR) — Thu, 18 Mar 2010 09:45:00 GMT

    Despite looming cost increases to reform national healthcare and tax increases to balance our state budget, a man blasted the Census Bureau about a letter alerting us to complete the census form on April 1. The blaster blamed the government for wasting postage, trees, and labor to mail what could have been included with the survey. He laughed at himself for focusing on a trivial letter, but his emotion is understandable because he had to slash his organization’s budget and salvage what he could from Olympia’s proposed spending.
    Did he expose another example of bureaucratic waste? No, according to a federal spokesman from East Wenatchee. More importantly, he insists, the marketing is to motivate us to save taxpayer money and simultaneously bring in $1,400 per person to our communities.
    The missionary marketer is Steve Pasion. Steve worked as a public employee for the City of Spokane and the State of Washington. Luckily for us Steve moved here to be near his young daughters. He’s contracted to educate, market and speak for the Department of Commerce’s 2010 Census.
    Two days after blaster’s comments, Steve attended my service club’s luncheon. He decorated our tables with 2010 Census branding on bright blue beverage cups, red and white baggage tags, and a flyer with the theme: “It’s Easy. It’s safe. It’s important. It’s in your hands.” Skeptical tablemates poked at the materials and shook their heads amidst comments like, “Why are they wasting money on this?”
     Steve wasn’t allowed to present from the podium. Most of the materials were returned to him, presumably because few members wanted to be seen with 2010 Census branding.
Afterward one member questioned the need for an exhaustive census. Steve pointed out that Congress believes everyone counts and should be counted once every ten years. His answer sounded like a Marine on a rescue team: “We do get everybody.”
    If household members don’t fill out the survey, contracted census takers track them down at ten times the expense. He said, “The marketing spends dimes that save dollars,” calling it, “Priceless.”
He put savings on it. Census officials estimate that each one percent increase in the return rate saves $80 - $90 million. If we raise the survey return rate three points, we save taxpayers about a quarter-of-a-billion dollars. For the great majority of us, the most important way we can cut wasteful spending in the next two weeks is fill out the survey and return it immediately.
    Then he surprised us saying, “It’s worth about $1,400 per person.”
    The census determines the $430 billion federal annual allocation to our communities, which is approximately $1,400 per person. Steve told East Wenatchee’s City Council that its anticipated increase of one thousand citizens over the last decade would mean $14 million more dollars over the next decade to improve roads, sewers, school districts, and services to the aging. That’s important for a city struggling to raise $25 million to rebuild Grant Road from Sunset highway to Kentucky Avenue.
    Support Steve Pasion’s passionate plea. Display branding materials. Brag about our Census Bureau counting every person. Make every person count. Hold rallies. Host survey-signing parties. Ask not what you can do for your country, for now you know: fill out that census form!