Well, here we are. Into 2020. And it is definitely a new year with all kinds of things going on around the world that are unnerving and definitely the stuff of “interesting things” found in that Chinese curse people quote from time to time. And I have a lot to write about today.
I can say that at least, right now, there are two things that are grabbing attention world-wide that may or may not – who knows – continue to grab attention in the immediate future. The first is the wildfires in Australia. If you look at a map of the Australian continent, it seems the whole country is on fire. I have a childhood friend who lives in New South Wales, and at the moment she is living away from her home due to the fires burning near where she lives. Plus, it looks like the fires just surround the periphery of the continent.
https://images.app.goo.gl/5BXrVUQMvc8m4J3L8
Above is a map of the Australian continent. If you look, you’ll see what I am referring to.
For anyone to dismiss global warming as a cause of fires, floods, or anything in between is simply mind-blowing. I have no doubt a number of people would be inclined to quote Scripture, especially the book of Revelation, as the cause of much of what is going on, but I don’t know if I can buy it. Sure, I could be wrong, but I also could be right. It could go either way. And I’m not a biblical scholar of any sort; my leanings go more towards hard science these days, and it is hard science that is behind the findings of global warming being behind much of what is happening world-wide.
It is terrible what is going on. There has been much loss of property, much loss of wildlife, and a lot of human suffering as a result.
The other happening that is making a lot of news and noise world-wide is the killing of General Qassem Soleimani, the Commander of Iran’s Qudz force. He was taken out with a missile from a U.S. drone. This happened on Friday, January 3rd.
Depending on whose views you subscribe to, either he should never have been killed because this will make things worse in the Middle East, or it was the right thing to do because he was responsible for the deaths of thousands of people in that part of the world, including over 600 American military personnel. If you follow social media, the posts being made by all sorts of people are at either extreme. And it is hard to watch.
My personal opinion on this is pretty straight forward, but I have to preface it with my views on Donald Trump and his Presidency. I will say that I am not a fan of his; I never have been. He is difficult person to observe because he is so unlike anyone else who has been President in my memory. I find him to be reprehensible as a human being; he is dishonest, for one thing, and he has no character to speak of. Additionally, while he may understand finance and business (but many people have said he is not qualified to run a lemonade stand), I have always maintained, from the day he was elected, that he is not qualified to be President of the United States. I still feel that way, for the most part. I did not vote for him (I didn’t vote for Hillary Clinton either, for that matter), and I will not vote for him in 2020 if he survives the impeachment trial. To be truthful, I have no idea where my vote will go, because I am not a fan of many of the Democrats running for their Party’s nomination. I truly don’t know what I will do, at least not now.
With all of that said, I believe he did the right thing by directing the strike. Sure, he could have done some things better. He could have consulted with Iraq. If he had, though, they could have said “no”, but even if they had I suspect it would have happened regardless. I’m concerned that if he had consulted with Democrats in Congress they would have potentially tipped Soleimani off. I only say this because there is historical precedent for it happening. Recent precedent, in fact, involving Trump talking to Vladimir Putin. We don’t know what was said when they met back in 2018 in a closed door meeting where they were the only people in the room, but the speculation of whether or not Trump gave away the store is rampant. And this could have gone either way; either he did or he didn’t. But, again, we will likely never know what was said between them that day.
Just the same, I am of the opinion (and it is my opinion and nobody else’s) that he did what was necessary to stop a person who was responsible for huge numbers of deaths. The only problem I forsee is that of retaliation from Iran. There has been talk of a substantial bounty on Trump’s head (I recently read $80M), but at the time I write and publish this post this has not been verified. However, it is possible. And it is possible that a number of senior American officials are potential targets for Iran. Who knows?
Will this ultimately start a direct war with Iran? I don’t know, but anything is possible.
In other things going on…. I’ve continued to follow a group of people who are strongly interested in a pair of murders that occurred 50 years ago: the murders of Sister Catherine Cesnik and of Joyce Malecki.
Sister Catherine was an English teacher at the former Archbishop Keough High School (Catholic, all female) in Baltimore, Maryland. Joyce Malecki was a young woman from the Lansdowne neighborhood of Baltimore. Both women disappeared within four days of each other in November 1969. Joyce’s body was found two days later in the Soldier Park training area of Fort Meade, MD. Sr. Catherine’s body was found on January 3, 1970, in a garbage dump approximately 5 miles from her home in Lansdowne.
Over approximately the past six months a lot of earth has been turned over by this group of people, led by two women who were students of Sr. Catherine’s when she taught at Keough in the late 1960’s and 1970’s. The women, Gemma Hoskins (a retired teacher) and Abbie Schaub (a retired Registered Nurse), have been working with an investigative reporter named Shane Waters to continue the work where the Netflix series “The Keepers” left off. As I understand it, Abbie has backed off to a degree but is still involved with lobbying legislative efforts in different places to lift statutes of limitations in cases of clergy sexual abuse. Gemma and Shane are still actively working to uncover more about the murders and hopefully get closer to solving these cases. Both of them are no longer listed as “cold”, and haven’t been for a while, thanks to their efforts. Much of what they have uncovered is available in a podcast they publish called “Out of the Shadows.” I’ve been listening to it for a bit over a year, and the work they’ve done is incredible. And I plan to follow them further. While I am not in a position where I can do anything to assist them (and I knew nothing about this until I first watched “The Keepers” in 2017) I can certainly support them from the distance between my perch in southern New Hampshire and Baltimore, Maryland.
Last thing: since I last wrote, my wife has had surgery on her neck. I discussed the procedure that was to be performed on her, which involved putting a framework around the cervical vertebrae affected when she fell. I can say here that the surgery appears to have been at least moderately successful. She has lost the proprioception problems she was having, plus she doesn’t get dizzy or nauseous when she looks right, left, or up. She is starting to regain sensation and movement in her hands; this is one of those things that may take months to a year to resolve. According to the surgeon who did the procedure, there is no way to predict how long this will take. But she is definitely better. Not one hundred percent, but certainly better than she was. I, on the other hand, had my right knee operated on two days ago. It is for the same issue I had with my left this past August where I had a torn meniscus. While I needed five weeks to recover from the left, I expect to need much less from the right. At least I hope this is the case. Today has been a bad day for pain; I was much better yesterday than today, but tomorrow I can remove the dressing and bandaging around the surgical site. Hopefully that will make my discomfort level decrease. The other thing that happened, and it surprised me, was that my serum blood glucose level took off after surgery. I suspect it was due to IV fluids; if I’m not mistaken the staff gave me either Lactated Ringers solution or five percent IV Dextrose in Normal Saline. But I don’t know for certain; all I can say is that my normal blood glucose levels are around 100mg/dL. Yesterday they peaked at nearly double that. For a diabetic, that isn’t necessarily a good thing, but when I checked this morning my level was much lower. It made me feel better when I saw that.
I close with the following: RIP Jack Sheldon (1931-2019). He passed away before the New Year. For anyone not familiar with him, he was an incredible talent. An actor, a comic, a singer, and an incredible trumpet player. One of the best jazz guys around. He was 88 years old.
Qui Interrogat 