Saturday, April 6, 2013

What Fun! I spent a couple of days looking for Gold in Southern Oregon

I had a great time with my oldest son, Richard, the last couple of days. He’s been studying the area since he moved to Applegate a year ago, and had a list of sites for us to legally look for gold. We only had enough to to explore a couple of placer sites (that he’s thinking about claiming) and checked out a half dozen old lode mines and tunnels through mountains.

What a gold history Southern Oregon has! I never realized it. I got to learn about some history of the area (he had some good local stories about successful prospectors), along with geological information about where to look for gold.

Numerous books have been written by gold experts (where to look, etc), but there’s nothing like hands-on experience. You have to tromp around those mountains, ravines, gullies, and river beds with a sharp eye out to find the best place to set-up and take a shot at your fortunes.

If you’d like to know more about this subject (history & current gold info), here’s a couple of good links for you:

Gold History in Southern Oregon

Good Year in Mining – Updated Southern Oregon article 

It was a fun, but an exhausting time for my old bones! I don’t know how those old prospectors did it! I don’t think they lived for very long back then! Oh, did I mention the part about bears, cougars, and lots of snakes? thought I’d throw that it…

Wednesday, April 3, 2013

Here we go again – drug warriors want to impose an insane new law

      Good Day World!

 I’m going to step away from this blog for a couple of days and will see you again on Saturday April 6th. 

Meanwhile, please feel free to explore, and if your interested in reading a free novella by yours truly – Rafter’s Redemption – look for the link (with photo) on the right side of this page.

Todays topic: drug warriors looking to impose a new draconian law based upon no scientific evidence. The ignorance behind this proposal is exposed in the following article:

“In the face of growing public support for marijuana legalization, drug warriors are seeking to tighten the screws on consumers by imposing new and tougher drug testing rules that have nothing to do with safety or impairment.

In Sacramento Sen. Lou Correa is sponsoring a "zero tolerance" drug DUI bill (SB 289) that would outlaw driving by anyone with traces of marijuana or other drugs in their blood. Because marijuana's active component, THC, is typically detectable in the blood for hours or days after any impairment has faded, the bill would effectively criminalize thousands of non-impaired drivers as DUI. Tell Your California State Senator to Say No to SB289.

The scientific facts and fallacies about drug testing are explained in California NORML's newly published booklet, "California NORML Guide to Drug Testing," available through www.canorml.org. The guide covers the reliability and sensitivity of different kinds of tests, their relevance to impairment and performance, how to deal with abusive testing, and drug testing's capricious and discriminatory impact on consumers, medical and otherwise. Order the Drug Testing Guide(contact CalNORML for information on review or multiple copies.)

Unlike the alcohol breathalzyer, chemical tests for marijuana have no clear relation to impairment or safety. Blood tests for THC, unlike alcohol, do not measure the actual dosage consumed or active in the body. Instead, they reflect recency of use, spiking to high levels immediately after smoking regardless of actual dosage, then tailing off to low levels that can nonetheless be detectable for days after last use. "In effect, SB 289 is equivalent to calling drivers DUI if they've had had a glass of beer or wine in the past few hours, or left an empty bottle in their trash," says Cal NORML director Dale Gieringer.

Accident studies have found that drivers who test positive for marijuana often show no signs of impairment, and in some instances even may drive more safely. Regular users, such as most medical marijuana patients, often develop tolerance and may drive safely despite having high levels of marijuana in their system.

The U.S National Highway Traffic Safety Administration calls it "inadvisable to try and predict effects based on blood THC concentrations alone," noting that "concentrations of parent drug and metabolite are very dependent on pattern of use as well as dose." [NHTSA 2013].

Advocates of "zero tolerance" DUI laws have sought to stir up public fears of increased marijuana accidents on the road. Such fears are belied by accident statistics, which show that highway safety has improved steadily over the years even while access to marijuana has expanded. In California, highway fatality rates have posted record lows in recent years, and DUI arrests have likewise been on the decline. Studies have found no evidence that strict per se DUI drug testing limits have any impact on highway safety.

Neither is there any good evidence that drug testing is needed to protect workplace safety or productivity. Unlike other medical devices and drugs, which are required to be proven as "safe and effective" in extensive, rigorously controlled, double-blind studies, no such studies have ever been conducted in the case of drug testing. Ironically, while the federal government continues to ban Americans from using marijuana for medicine on the grounds it isn't FDA approved, it is forcing them to submit to drug tests that have never been FDA tested as safe or effective for improving safety or productivity.

NORML constantly hears from responsible consumers, including seriously ill medical marijuana patients, who have been unfairly barred from employment, housing assistance, child custody, and medical treatment because of abusive drug testing.

"Americans need to stand up for personal privacy and freedom from drug testing," says Gieringer. "In no other nation is drug testing so widely abused. Drug testing is a scientifically unproven technology that impinges on the privacy of millions of Americans. If Americans are seriously worried about drug impairment, they should consider performance tests that measure actual impairment."

California NORML www.canorml.org - 415-563-5858 / FAX 510-849-3974

Time for me to walk on down the road…

Tuesday, April 2, 2013

Laker’s Retire Shaq’s Number & Beat Mavs in Must Win Game

 What a great half-time ceremony honoring Shaquille O’Neil tonight. Putting his jersey number up there with the other Laker legends was a touching moment. The Hall of Fame isn’t far away.

It was cool seeing Phil Jackson there along with other Laker greats (Jamaal Wilkes, Kareem Abdul Jabbar, James Worthy, Jerry West & more) who showed up to honor him. Good speech by Shaq. Kobe had a classy tribute to his old team mate too.

In a tough year for the Laker organization – with the death of Jerry Buss and multiple star injuries – the Lakers are struggling to make the playoffs. They’ll be lucky to hold down the 8th seed - which means they’ll have to face the high power Spurs.

Tonight’s win – 101- 81 – means the Lakers will stay on pace for the last seed. Kobe was fantastic with a triple-double, and Earl Clark brought energy, points, and rebounds off of the bench.

Every game counts now, with only nine left in the regular season. There’s no telling when Steve Nash will be able to play again. Metta World Peace is weeks away from playing. So players like Clark, Jamison, Blake, and Meeks really need to step up if the Lakers hope to make the playoffs.

Go Lakers!

Rafter’s Redemption continues…

A novella by Dave Stancliff

   CHAPTER TWO

   In The Army  

 Basic training happened by the sea, at Ft. Ord, the U.S. Army’s Training Center for Infantry in California. It was named after Major General Edward Cresap Ord, who served with Fremont’s Army in the early days of California.

  Rafter and his fellow trainees in Company B, 1st Battalion, 1st Brigade, ran along the beach in the morning fog every day. They ran all over the base. Everywhere they went they ran. They sang as they ran. They moaned while running miles in full gear with their heavy M-14 rifles at port arms. They ran through obstacle courses. They ran carrying a buddy on their back. They ran in their dreams like dogs sometimes do.

  Every morning they woke to infuriated drill instructors telling them to get their maggoty asses off their racks. The tension got worse every step of the way. Every day. (GO HERE to continue story)

Monday, April 1, 2013

April Fools Day for Cybernet Citizens Can Be Any Day!

Could it be?  Will Bill Gates really give you $5,000 for sharing a link on Facebook?

Of course not. The email is bogus and so is the picture of Gates holding a sign that purportedly shows him making that promise.

This is just one of an ever-growing collection of email hoaxes that fill in-bins across the world. They’re not scams – no one is trying to steal your money or personal information – they’re just fiction. 

Why do so many people accept the bogus messages as fact and forward to others? (Read story here)

Today’s Topic: Autographed copy of Beatles' 'Sgt. Pepper's' album sells for a record $290,500

Photo: Heritage Auctions via AP   Good Day World!

Even Lucy and her diamonds can't compete with these riches. A rare, signed copy of The Beatles’ "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band" has brought $290,500 at auction, shattering the previous record for such an item. Boy does this album take me back!

A true classic by the Fab Four.

It was twenty years ago today,
Sgt. Pepper taught the band to play,
They've been going in and out of style
But they've guaranteed to raise a smile.
So may I introduce to you
The act you've known for all these years
Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band.
We're Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band
We hope you will enjoy the show,
We're Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band
Sit Back and let the evening go.
Sgt. Pepper's lonely, Sgt. Pepper'lonely,
Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band
It's wonderful to be here
It's certainly a thrill
You're such a lovely audience
We'd like to take you home with us
we'd like to take you home
I don't really like to stop the show
But I thought that you might like to know
That the singer's going to sing a song
And he wants you all to sing along
So let me introduce to you
The one and only Billy Shears
And Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band.

PHOTOS: The Beatles: Rare Photos Offer Inside Look at Fab Four

PHOTOS: John Lennon: Days in the Life

Time for me to walk on down the road…

Sunday, March 31, 2013

AS IT STANDS: Take your politically correct terms and shove them!

By Dave Stancliff/For The Times-Standard
  The term “politically correct,” is an oxymoron. When I first heard it used while working as an editor for a weekly newspaper called The Desert Trail in 29 Palms, California, I thought it was so stupid it would surely go the way of the fabled Dodo bird and the nickel candy bar.
   In a 1983 “As It Stands” column, I implored readers to reject the term because it was a political ploy to push certain agendas. I pointed out the new name for a manhole cover was a subterranean ingress and egress aperture cover. That got a lot of laughs.
   Somewhere along the line, the laughs slowed down and people started getting serious/stupid about the term. To my dismay, it didn’t go away. Instead it spread like poison oak in our language garden. It became so pervasive that the PC police think nothing of calling insane people selectively perceptive, or some other equally non-descriptive term.
   Call me an old fuddy duddy, but I saw no problem with saying someone without hair was bald. Now, no one is bald, they’re comb free. Remember when someone had BO (body odor)? That same person today is said to have
nondiscretionary fragrance. Please!
   You know something isn’t right when censorship is foisted off as selective speech and drunks are referred to as spacially perplexed. Politically correct terms came about in order to tell people how they should act. No, really.

  Political Correctness denotes language, ideas, policies, and behavior seeking to minimize social and institutional offense in occupational, gender, racial, sexual orientation, certain other religions, beliefs or ideologies, disability, and age-related contexts, and as purported by the term, doing so to an excessive extent, according to Wikipedia.
   In other words, political correctness is out of control! My clumsy (excuse me - uniquely coordinated) attempt to illustrate this contention comes with plenty of examples. We no longer just have earthquakes, we have geological corrections. Despite that, when the earth starts to shake like a giant baby’s rattle I will still scream “earthquake!”

   If we don’t already have a PC term for crime rate, I imagine civic leaders would be good with the term “street activity index.” I have to admit - with guilty pleasure - I kinda like the following PC terms for some jobs.
   Now, when you get a job in a restaurant you don’t have to tell your friends you’re just a dishwasher. No, your title will be “utensil sanitizer” and you’ll wear a snappy white apron.
   How about janitor? It’s kinda of a blah description, but when you change it to “sanitation engineer” you’re suddenly vaulted into white collar realms when describing your job. The same goes for the garbage man; who is now a sanitation engineer too.
   Conversation between a father and a lifeguard who just saved his daughter from being pulled out to sea:
  Father: “Thank you! Thank you for saving my drowning daughter!”
   Lifeguard: “No problem. I save aquatically challenged people all the time.”
   Takes the snap out of that conversation doesn’t it?

  I can see where calling someone “differently weighted” instead of fat would seem a kinder description, but as far as descriptions go it’s useless. What’s differently weighted supposed to mean? Too fat or too skinny? Perhaps being at a perfect weight? I think you can see my point here.
   I refuse to consider “motivationally dispossessed” as another term for lazy.
   Just for a laugh, if you want to take this whole PC discussion to the next level, let’s look at some political correct terms for females and males.
  For the Women:
* Her breasts will never sag, they will lose their vertical hold.
* She does not snore, she is nasally repetitive.
* She does not get drunk, she becomes verbally dyslexic.
* She is not a bad driver, she is automotively challenged.
   For the Men:
* He is not a sex machine. He is romantically automated.
* He is not a male chauvinist pig, he has swine empathy.
* He does not get lost all the time, he discovers alternate destinations.
* He does not fart and belch, he is gastronomically expressive.

As It Stands, you may think I’m ignorant (factually unencumbered), but you have to admit the PC police continue to clutter the language with terms best left under rocks!
                                                          

Saturday, March 30, 2013

And the Hate Goes on: KKK to Celebrate White Unity Today In Tennessee

         Good Day World!

Today’s topic is a reminder that racial hatred is alive and thriving in the south these days. The KKK are rallying today in Memphis, in what’s being termed a “White Unity Day.”

Organizers promise hundreds of Klansmen will descend on Memphis from North Carolina, Virginia, Indiana, Alabama, Georgia and Maryland today.
"There's so many coming, it's hard for me to keep track of 'em," said Imperial Wizard Chris Barker, who is the head of the Loyal White Knights, which has a presence in 15 states, mostly east of the Mississippi.

The Klan's agenda is pretty simple: Send the immigrants back where they came from, silence the homosexuals and the communists (known as liberals today), promote sobriety and abstinence, end abortion, and discourage the mingling of races in a way "God never intended."

Anyone that thinks racism isn’t a major problem in this country today has their head in the sand.

Related articles:

KKK plans rally in Memphis Saturday to celebrate white peoples' rights

KKK plans huge rally in Memphis, Tennessee

Time for me to walk on down the road…

Friday, March 29, 2013

AS IT STANDS offers a new feature for readers – A serialized novella

forest-sunlight-thumb

       Good Day World!

 I’m excited about sharing my new novella with you today – RAFTER’S REDEMPTION.

This blog is a multi-purpose platform for my work in print and digital media. I want to continue to add features that will bring you back. Any input on the following novella will be appreciated. Each installment will start here, but you’ll be directed by a link to continue reading at the RAFTER’S REDEMPTION home page. Thanks for stopping by!

us-history-vietnam-war

RAFTER’S REDEMPTION 

Chapter One

FREEDOM

   Rafter Rabago barely managed to get his diploma from Covina High School in 1968, surprising friends, family, and the school’s entire faculty. Some of his detractors said he shouldn’t have graduated, based on the time he missed. His commonly known distain for the whole process of education had pushed more than one teacher to the limit.
  He was never interested in organized school sports. His physical education coaches constantly tried to get him to play football, basketball, or to wrestle. The reason? He was probably the most gifted athlete in the school. Except he didn’t want to be an athlete. A jock. It drove his PE coaches crazy to watch him dribble the basketball around others and to slam dunk it with apparent ease during PE class.
  When it came to football he could pass, defend, and receive the ball effortlessly. He was faster and more agile than any student in the school. At six-feet, and 180 pounds by his senior year, he was a force few physically challenged. In his physical education tests he did more pushups, sit-ups, chin-ups, and pull-ups than anyone on the varsity football squad.
 He set school records in all of them. He was faster than anyone on the school’s track team, and tied the fastest 100 meters record in the school’s history as his PE coach clocked him in awe.
   With all his physical gifts, Rafter should have been groomed as a professional athlete. The coaches daydreamed about his potential. Friends didn’t ask why he didn’t participate in sports. They knew why. He didn’t like the discipline. Didn’t like the idea of being told what to do, when to do it, and how to do it.
   Rafter was not a good student either. That discipline thing was a problem in classrooms. He wasn’t stupid, but he sometimes did have trouble focusing on the lessons. The teacher’s words sometimes sounded like angry bees in his head and his attention wandered off to other subjects. As could be expected, this lack of attention hadn’t gone unnoticed by his teachers since the first day of his first grade class. His eyes gave him away, staring into space. Or, his other extreme; class clown. Getting laughs while earning Ds in Mathematics and English.
   Some of the contorted faces he made caused teachers to grin in spite of themselves. He was a natural clown. A rubber face. A teller of off-color jokes when adults weren’t nearby. Despite being a poor student and a non-jock with a perfect record of never having made the honor roll in 12 years of basic education, Rafter was popular. People liked being around him because he exuded a certain air of adventure. Of discovery. And his sense of humor was a hit, especially when it came to getting girl friends. (GO HERE to continue reading)
 

Thursday, March 28, 2013

Big Brother launches latest attack against your privacy and freedom

           Good Day World!

Today’s topic is Big Brother, aka our government. Who sends spies in the skies with drones over our amber waves of grain – leaving the battle fields across the planet and now poking their nose in every American’s business.

We all know the Patriot Act took away some of our liberties. They continue to be chipped away by whatever means the government can come up with. As if there isn’t enough real time surveillance in our society, the moles in Washington want to hack our Gmail, Google Voice, and Dropbox in real time.

Privacy is rapidly disappearing for everyone nowadays. You don’t have to be a celebrity or famous. Someone is tracking you as you read this. Somewhere, in the course of your day, strangers will be watching or listening to you. 

Here’s the latest attack on your privacy:

Despite the pervasiveness of law enforcement surveillance of digital communication, the FBI still has a difficult time monitoring Gmail, Google Voice, and Dropbox in real time. But that may change soon, because the bureau says it has made gaining more powers to wiretap all forms of Internet conversation and cloud storage a “top priority” this year.

Last week, during a talk for the American Bar Association in Washington, D.C., FBI general counsel Andrew Weissmann discussed some of the pressing surveillance and national security issues facing the bureau. He gave a few updates on the FBI’s efforts to address what it calls the “going dark” problem—how the rise in popularity of email and social networks has stifled its ability to monitor communications as they are being transmitted.

It’s no secret that under the Electronic Communications Privacy Act, the feds can easily obtain archive copies of emails. When it comes to spying on emails or Gchat in real time, however, it’s a different story.” (Read the rest of the story here)

Time for me to walk on down the road…

Wednesday, March 27, 2013

Free Novella for ‘As It Stands’ Readers: ‘Rafter’s Redemption’

I’ve decided to do something crazy. If it works out, I may continue to do it. My idea is to offer readers an original fiction novella by yours truly for free.

I enjoy sharing and who knows? Maybe the right person will read them and they’ll be interested in representing my writings in the future. If not…oh well. I hope you enjoy it. (photo via history.com)

Prologue: Rafter’s Redemption – an original novella by Dave Stancliff       Copywrite @2013

1976 Humboldt County, California
When he woke up his arms ached. He was lying on his stomach somewhere in a dark place. A basement? Minutes crawled by as his brain attempted to clear the fog clinging to it since he opened his eyes.

Dawning awareness. His fingers dug into dirt. Soft, wet, smelly. Odor of decay. Not buried in it. Lying on it. His body pressed up against it. His arm muscles were spastic snakes, stilling his movements. He waited for them to settle down.

Alive. In pain, but alive. What happened? He raised his head slightly and felt a gentle breeze. His eyes, growing accustomed to the darkness, revealed he was under a house. He had no idea whose house. He could just make out some porch steps. Irregular rows of lattice-work lined the house perimeter. There were several broken openings.

What was he doing here? The thought paralyzed him. No memory at all. There had to be a reason why he was under this house. Who was he hiding from? More important, who was he? He didn’t even know his name. Or, how long he’d been lying there.

More pain. Bright lights went off behind his eyes like slivers of lightning. His head sank back onto the cold earth. Throbbing. Suddenly a thunderous roar and muzzle flash, and his hip exploded in pain!
I’ve got you now you son of a bitch!” A voice roared. He rolled over, off the wounded hip, and wondered what terrible thing he must have done to deserve an ending like this?

The first chapter of “Rafter’s Redemption” will be posted Friday, March 29th. Hope to see you there.

 

Trump's Lowest Grift Ever Saved for Holy Week

This is a story about how the devil's puppet, aka Donald Trump, mocked Christianity by selling a book combining the Bible, the Constitu...