Why the surprise about the leaks from Wikileaks?

As has been reported today 91,000 pages of classified documents have been leaked about the Afghan war and  there is a frenzy as to what problems this will cause for the war effort.  I also read where a private first class maybe under suspicion for leaking this info, kind of like a whistleblower.  I for one would like to know how a “private” has access to all this info? Some of the info maybe day-to-day stuff that occurs in the Afghan war and was accumulated overtime and this private decided to spill the beans! But it is hard to believe one person was involved with the more probable scenario of many more players being part of this leak.

However, this is an interesting turn of events that I would like to point out. It was just in the last month that Afghan war commander General Mchrystal had to resign for things he probably should not have said about the President and his administration. I find it hard to believe that a person at this level would not understand the things he was saying would lead to his undoing?  I wonder if the General did this on purpose to bring attention to the failing effort in Afghanistan.  Now all of a sudden there is a leak of all these documents talking about how bad the situation is in Afghanistan?  I do not believe these two situations have occurred by accident and where intentional acts to try to make the following two possibilities occur:

1)Government officials in other dept’s such as state, defense and the military are trying to get the Presidents attention to a losing cause if the U.S. does not get serious about defeating the Taliban.

2)The President is allowing this info to be published in order to buy himself time at a later date and safe face by saying ” I did all I could with the surge but the U.S. has to get out and somehow this will let him save face because during the election he said Afghanistan was where the focus should be and not Iraq.  If the Presidents strategy fails in Afghanistan he will need to save face somehow and this may be his starting point for doing so.

Unless Afghanistan is pounded by the Air Force and constant ground attack they will not be defeated. These people have been fighting for hundreds of years because they like it and once America pulls out they will go back to fighting each other.  I say if the U.S. is not there to win then get out now!!  If the Taliban takeover and they start to let Al Qaeda build training camps then continue the air strikes with plane and drones. If needed launch cruise missiles and keep special forces on the ground.   But the way I see it the continued turmoil with these leaks and a General resigning tells me the something is up and that something is not very good.

Mel Gibson throws a fit for the world to hear!

As has been reported Mel Gibson has been recorded saying violent and hateful things to his girlfriend, mistress or whatever she is and as usual the media in this country are talking about it like it is some news worthy story that should be told.  In the last few weeks it has been Lindsay Lohan and her trial and how it has been for her and even her dad has gotten media attention.  I for one am asking the question, “Why do you care what these people are doing”?.   The media will say the reason they report on these “hollywood types” is because we want to hear about it and sad to say, but I believe this to be true and I list below a few reasons why some in this country care about these Hollywood people.

1)Bored with their own life some people want to live in someone else’s life.

2)Some people think these stars are bigger than life and are mesmerized by everything they do.

3)My life would be so much better if I had the life of a Hollywood star.

4)Their lives are so much more fascinating and fun than my life.

These are just a few and I could go on and on, but you get the point.  I like to watch movies, shows on TV and keep up with a few actors I enjoy and there is nothing wrong with this but I would like to point out that we all need a balance in life.  Anyone one thing we latch onto can keep us out of balance with other things in our life and fixation on Hollywood and what they are doing is one of them.

I was talking with my son and agree with what he said about how the media in this country keeps this whole society wrapped up in stuff like this while serious issues in this country are ignored like the economy, healthcare and the war in Afghanistan.  While we are asleep at the switch paying attention to trivial things like Mel Gibson throwing a fit, this government is out of control with what they are imposing on us in the way of taxes and telling us how we should live!

All of us should pay attention to what is going on around us and stop worrying about what People magazine, Entertainment tonight have to say and pay attention to what your government is doing and prepare yourself for the election this fall so you can make a difference and send a message to Washington that we are paying attention and will not be distracted by Mel Gibson or Lindsay Lohan and their personal problems.

People Observation #7: Being Self Centered always leads to conflict

I was out with our group of friends last night for dancing and there is one man who attends that lives in our area while his family lives 7 hours away.  He will dance with the different ladies at the club and a few in particular on a regular basis.  I talk with him and we are friends and says he works here in the medical field and says he can’t find a job in the city he is from which is much larger than ours.  This person attends this club 3-4 nights a week while his wife takes care of the kids back home.  This seems odd to me but I do not judge or condemn anyone as this is his business.  But the reason I bring it up is because there apparently has been a change in the last few weeks.

Several weeks ago he said his wife called stressed out about the kids and he was upset saying about this.  Last week he left early and the last night he was not even there and some said the wife has put and end to “honky tonkin”!!  I am not picking on this person but I post this to make point in relation to the title of my post. This person seemed to be interested in himself and claiming “I just want to have a good time”.  Maybe not even thinking about the toll these decision were having on his family.  Sometimes we all can get caught up in “ourselves” and not take the time to think about others especially in our family situations.  When we only think about ourselves this can lead to conflict and sometimes years of separation and disconnect from those around us.

To me this is a good lesson, when the “red alert” is going off about the way you are acting then stop and listen to the alert it could save you a lot of grieve and headache down the road!

Similarities between the U.S., Mexican border and Gaza

I have waited to post on this story to see how things are going to play out.  But what has been reported is that a U.S. Border patrol shot and killed a 15-year-old Mexican in the area between El Paso and Juarez.  Appears the agents were trying to stop the flow of illegal immigrants with the help of “coyotes” as they are called when the incident took place.  The Mexicans began to throw rocks at the U.S. Border patrol agents when the shooting occurred. None of us were there to know exactly what happened, but I believe the U.S. Border patrol was in a no win situation.

Why do I think this?  Since Arizona passed their immigration law Mexico has been upset and their President has visited the U.S. and spoke before Congress on how this treats Mexicans badly and he will not have this.  It is reported the Mexicans are upset and taking to the streets protest because they believe the law to be unfair.  Now you have Mexican youths throwing rocks at authorities to show their displeasure the same way the Palestinians used rocks in the intifada against Israel.  Look at the parallels; Mexico feels like this is an injustice, but they will not send their police force or army to the border as they know the U.S. would crush them as the superior power.  Mexican youths are involved so if one is killed by the U.S. authorities then Mexico can use the publicity to try to show the brutality and unfairness of the U.S.  I don’t believe all this is a coincidence since the Arizona immigration law was passed. Doesn’t this sound like what Israel experienced in Gaza?

I for one am tired of hearing that “The Mexican street” is upset or the “Arab street is upset”!!  Will you know, I am upset!!  I am tired of the fact that we worry about all these other people and are not taking care of our own!! Is is high time that we do and go ahead and build a fence to keep the illegal Mexicans just like Israel did to keep out the Palestinians.

Neubworthy notes on U.N. sanctions against Iran

The U.N. voted 12-2 for more sanctions against Iran because of its suspected nuclear program with Turkey and Brazil voting no and Lebanon abstaining.  Interesting that in this vote Russia and China went along with the western nations in approving the sanctions against Iran.  Obviously, these U.N. votes or resolutions to do have sway over any country in trying to get them to “behave”.  But, makes you wonder what made Russian and China go along this time when in the past they have been against anything the security council wanted to do in the case of Iran and its nuclear program.

To me this seems to be headed down the same track like Iraq; UN sanctions, resolutions, threats of more sanctions and finally some type of military response.  I have lived long enough now to have a view of history in relation to current events and you can see when a problem is not dealt with at the time, you only put off the inevitable of having to deal with it later such as Iran.  The Ayatollah Khomeini took over in 1979 which was allowed by President Carter and at that time Carter was probably thinking if we make nice with him all would be ok, well it wasn’t!! Iran has been at war with the U.S. for 30 years through its proxy’s and because we did not deal with them 30 years ago this is where we are today.

Just like I stated above and applies to all aspects of life you have to deal with the problem in the present because if you don’t, you will have to deal with it sometime in the future whether you like it or not.

Neubs family notes

I had left off on my last post about the relationship with my mamaw and laying the ground work on my current dilemma, but I still need to post about some additional background information.  As I stated before as long as mamaw was alive I did have a relationship with the cousins, aunts uncles etc….  What I have come to understand (or at least I think I do) is that my two aunts did not like my dad (their brother) and this apparently dated back to childhood and lasted into adulthood.   Who could blame them since he was an alcoholic and inflicted a lot of pain on his family and this does take a toll over time.  As I began to get married and have my own family I wanted to maintain contact with my extended family as this was important to me.

In the meantime I found out my Dad was driving from California back to our state which is about 1,500 miles.  He was going to stay at my half brothers house and wanted me to come by and see him.   It had been over 20 years since I had seen him and I was 4 years old when he left so I didn’t even know him other than a few telephone conversations during that time.  I had no problem going to see him, as a matter of fact I wanted to. This was my Dad I wanted to meet him even though he had left us he had not been part of my life for the last 20 years!!.   When I walked through the door of my half brothers house there he was sitting on the couch and I really did not know what he looked like now as I had only seen picture from when I was a little kid.   I really don’t remember what we said, I could just tell by the look on his face when he saw me that it was surprise and stunned!!  I mean think about how you would be if you had kids and the last time you saw them they were 4 years old and the next time they are 25 years old!!

I don’t remember how long he stayed with my half-brother but in my next “chapter” of this scenario I will share how my dad moved back in with my mom. At the time this occurred we lived in the same apartment complex. She lived upstairs and me and my wife and son lived downstairs so this made for an interesting situation!!

Additional Life Advice for Today

I wanted to add something about myself in relation to what I posted about yesterday.  Sometimes all of us get down in the dumps and tired of the same old routine day in and day out and think about getting out of the “rut” but just don’t seem to make it.  My wife and I have been trying to do different things over the last few years that we had never done before.  A little over a year ago we decided to take a cruise after putting it off because it was out of the norm for us and we decided that life is short so we are going to do it. I hate to fly but I got over it and we had a great time.  As I have mentioned before we started dance lessons as we had never done that and wanted to try something different and it has been fun.  In the near future we are flying to California as we have never been that far west so this is something new for us and to top it all off our 23-year-old son planned the trip and we are tagging along with him!! So talk about something different!!.

I am trying different things at work to try to shake things up with a certification in fire investigation.  I know there is not a photo of me on here but I have had the same hair style since I was 17 years old.  My hair is thick so I was able to brush it back and it would just stay in place. I was dropping my wife off at her salon and the lady that does her hair said she would like to cut mine.  I had always gone to a barber so this was really out of my realm in a place where they do salon stuff and color hair.  I let her cut my hair and she made the comment “lets update your hair style”!!.  Kind of caught me off guard but after she was done I kind of liked the way it looks so I have continued to wear my “new look”!!  I worked with a woman years ago that everyone talked about what she was doing and getting in her business and she use to say that “everyone was interested in her because they were bored with their life”.  I didn’t get what she meant at the time as I was in my 20’s.  But as I have gotten older I can now see what she meant.  We must constantly reinvent ourselves and do the best we can not to get in a rut. If we do we should try to dig ourselves out as soon as possible and that is what my wife and I have tried to do.  The first step is to be aware what is going on so you take action and it does not have to be a big thing and can be something as minor as changing your hair style!!