Day three at AADB

Well I can't believe day 3 is in the books already. I came back to the room
early as I was tired after not sleeping well for reasons I won't go into
here.

It was a jam-packed ay as I knew it would be though. Where do I start?

How about from the beginning. I got up and had breakfast , followed by my
first workshop on board roles and responsibilities. Some key points that
were stressed:
1. The importance of getting your paperwork done correctly and timely.
2. The fact that personnel information is confidential.
3. If board member has conflict on an issue, they cannot vote on it and
cannot participate in discussion.
4. Related to that is if session is closed on this issue, conflicted board
member needs to leave as he is considered member of the public in this
instance.
5. Fundraising is one of the functions of a nonprofit board.
6. ED handles day to day operations while board sets mission, budget and
other matters.
7. President is liaison between ED and Board.

Another important point that Howard Rosenblum mentioned was that the board
must follow the law in an ethical way.

After the two session on this subject, it was time for lunch and some work
at the AADB table taking sign-ups or pledges for the walk-a-thon to be held
on Thursday here in Ft. Mitchell. Please pray that the weather cooperates
for this event as it was stormy today and there is concern about the
weather for Thursday.

I managed to end up at the last hour of the business meeting where the board
and the ED were taking questions from the membership. Financial issues
topped the list of questions. S it's getting a little late here and I want
to get to bed, I won't go into great and glorious detail here.

This evening there was a Special Interest group for those who primarily
communicate using speech. It was interesting but turned into a political
discussion. I went upstairs after this to pick up a couple of small silent
auction items I had successfully bid on.

After that, I came to my room and went on-line. Now it will be time to go
to bed shortly. Let's hope we don't get any more rain here as we got some
noisy storms this morning.

Stay tuned for another jam-packed report tomorrow.

Day two at AADB

Well today was a much busier day here at AADB. There were things to do and
people to meet.

I helped out with the raffle whose drawing will be held tomorrow. I looked
at some silent auction items and put in some bids. I came back to the room
and rested for a while before the opening ceremony.

We had the opening ceremony tonight where several things happened. It
started with the singing of the National Anthem and "Oh Beautiful", both of
which were done very well. One of the teens from that program did the
signing for the National Anthem. That had to be a thrill for her.

We next had Lynn give some announcements about the symposium. The
communications coordinating team was introduced and all of the team leaders
were introduced. That goes up to letter P as they're doing it by letter
this year. The team leaders are the ones delegates go to if there are
problems with SSP matches and the like.

There was next a plaque given in memory of Tom Sprinkle, a former Board
member, who recently passed away. After this was completed, we had the
introduction of the board. After that was completed, there was the call of
the states and then questions from members. These questions ranged from
issues with the symposium to issues outside of it.

All in all it was a jam-packed day with more to come tomorrow.

One more thing about the restaurant. The food is good and there is plenty
of it. I had a chicken Cesar salad for lunch today. When it arrived, I
could not believe how big it was. It had to be one of the larger salads
I've seen. Last night I had a grilled cheese BLT. Before you think, yuck
or whatever, just know that I wasn't sure how I would like it either.
Actually it wasn't bad at all. It was certainly different.

Now off to catch some zzs as things start early tomorrow.

First night at AADB

This report won't be long as not much is happening and this netbook wil die
if I don't get off of it.

I had a safe trip down. As the title implies, there's not much going on
tonight. Have seen a few people I know and met some too.

Things really get started tomorrow.

Concealed carry: A Bad Idea

Just last Friday an 11-year-old girl in Cleveland was shot for getting too
close to a man's car while playing. More info at
www.crimecrawlers.com/?p-6338.

That is likely not the only situation to come to light either. What about
other populations, such as senior citezens and people with disabilities?
They would be vulnerable if there were concealed carry. Are there numbers
available for states that currently have concealed carry? If so, I've never
seen them and the vulnerability issue is something that is not talked about
by advocates for concealed carry either. Why is that? Might it be because
there are no reliable statistics to back up their view that it makes
everyone safer. Might it be because these statistics would punch a gaping
hole in their arguments? Whatever the anser is, it is never mentioned and
you'd better have good statistics if you're going to argue with some of
these people who want this so bad they wont' listen to the other side.

The other problem with concealed carry is that the arguements for it are
based on the second amendment to the U.S. Constitution. What the
proponents forget is that this amendment refers to a militia which means the
military or national guard. It does not mean civilians outside of law
enforcemetn or the military. When will these people understand that?

The guy who shot the 11-year-old was a vigilante, nothing more and nothing
less. Hopefully he will pay the price for it. How many more like that will
there be if there is concealed carry? Safety is at stake.

As the title of this blog states: Concealed Carry: A Bad Idea. Let's get rid
of it once and for all.

Congress the economy and related items

The title says it all. This one's about the economy, Congress and related
items. It's an outgrowth of a discussion on social media. The upshot is
that the person who started this one agrees with OBAMA AND THE DEMS ON
POLICY. As regular readers of this blog know, I don't.

Bush was brought up in this discussion and to some extent, that's fair game
as he did some things I don't agree with. Chief among these were TARP and
the auto industry, aka UAW, bailout.

Before you talk about the GOP remember that the Democrats in Congress never
bothered to pass a budget last year. How shameful is that? It's plenty
shameful as it shows that the Dems aren't doing their job as responsible
leadership demands that they pass a budget. The Dems also don't want to
enact any spending cuts. They just want to spend like drunken sailors ,
something that cannot be sustained. Obama wants to re-distribute wealth by
taking it from the rich and giving it to others. That's called socialism as
he wants everyone to be equal.

Don't even get me started when it comes to the unions. They couldn't even
get card check, aka forced membership, passed in a democratically-controlled
Congress. That tells me that this is real bad, stink out loud legislation.
Membership is down and unions are desperate. Thankfully Congress didn't
reward them on that one. People see unions as Irrelevant and only
protecting the leadership of the union, not the workers.

The UAW didn't want to change things and wanted to write all the rules when
it comes to the auto companies. The bailout kept their way of doing things
in place, something that is not good. It kept a bad business model in
place. The auto companies should have been forced to go through bankruptcy
which would have been a much more orderly process than the bailouts. Keep
in mind that this was the second bailout for Chrysler. What does that tell
you about the company? It tells me that the company isn't viable. Keep in
mind that Ford didn't take the bailout. Good for them.

Unions wonder why they're irrelevant. They're irrelevant because much of
what they were created to do has already been done. Things like the
40-hour week, minimum wage and worker safety to name a few. They demand
what could be characterized as extortion wages, lavish benefits and control
over the work rules, the latter of which should be the prevue of management.
The wages and benefits cause companies to take jobs where it's cheaper to do
business, even if that means sending those jobs overseas.

Regulations are another can of worms I won't go into right now. Suffice it
to say, there are a number of reasons the situation is not good right now.
Only time and the right leadership will bring about a change.

Thoughts on victory in war on terror

Sunday night May 1 turned out to be a great night for the U.s and the
families of about 3,000 people who were visciously murdered on 9-11. Why do
I say that? Because we finally caught and killed Osama Bin Laden.

I am proud of the SEALS who carried out this mission and thank them for what
they did. It was obvious we were never going to take the slime ball alive.

While President Obama takes the credit for this, he certainly can't take all
of the credit. I say this because president George W.Bush and his policies
laid the ground work for this wonderful victory. Some of that ground work
unfortunately is too inconvenient for President Obama and his liberal
buddies. This is particulary true of the enhanced interrogation methods
that were used on various detainees which yielded valuable information.
KSM was one who gave valuable information through use of enhanced
interrogation methods. If the slime ball were taken alive,there would be
the necessity to use some of these methods on him and this would be highly
inconvenient to president Obama and his liberal buddies.

Leave it to president Obama and others in the White House to screw up what
should be a proud moment in our history. They didn't plan for the aftermath
of the mission and thus don't have their story straight from what I have
heard in some places. There is also a raging dispute about release of the
pictures and president Obama has already answered that one by saying no to
release of any pictures. Failure to release them will only further fuel the
conspiracy theorists, something which is not a good idea. Yes, the hard
core ones in that crowd will never believe it even if the pictures were
released. However, these need to be released as we had to endure the
carnage of 9-11 and we should see justice done. The pictures would allow us
to see justice done and can be done without compromise of military
oeprations. That's why you do the release in consultation with military and
intelligence officials.

This was a great day in our history. Too bad president Obama had to screw
it up like he does almost everything he touches.

Why we don't need nuclear power

I can give 50 reasons and more why we don't need nuclear power, especially
given the looming crisis and catastrophe in Japan. We're now looking at a
likely meltdown and egregious problems with the spent fuel ponds. This is a
massively dangerous situation and will eclipse Chernobol as the worst
nuclear disaster rather soon. The Fukushima 50, as they are known, will
ultimately give their lives trying to bring this catastrophe under control.
It's not the way anyone should have to die.

There are those who say nuclear power is safe. I beg to differ with them.
When something goes wrong, it really goes terribly wrong. That's not a risk
we can tolerate nor is it an acceptable risk. Building these thigns at all
is an unacceptable risk and I don't care where they're located. The risk of
problems from either a natural or man-made disaster are too great and
Fukushima just makes that abundantly clear.

We don't need to take that risk. The U.S. is now evacuating U.S. nationals
from Japan. What does that tell you about the situation? It tells me that
the situation is deteriorating and rather fast too. We need to get control
of this and fast. It's a scary situation that doesn't need to be repeated
by building more of these things anywhere in the world.

I've heard recently on Fox News that China will likely build about 60 of
these things over the next decade. To that I say no way as their safety
record in other industries is not good and give me no confidence that they
can safely handle nuclear power. Besides, there are some active seismic
zones in that country and we don't need another Fukushima in China.

We've got two plants in active seismic zones here in the U.S. I hope there
are plans in place for evacuation in the event of a disaster. I wonder
about that though. Decommissioning those plants would probably be a real
good idea. That's an option that needs to be looked at.

Yes folks, this is one issue I don't agree with the republicans on. They
advocate for nuclear power and I don't want to see it. It's not necessary
and not economical, especially given the cost of natural gas right now.
Hopefully the economics will continue to work against the building of
nuclear power plants. That would be safer for everyone.

Remember that at least 50 people will likely die as a result of the
Fukushima crisis and catastrophe. Is that a sacrifice we want to make
again? I don't and hope no one else does either.